In our childhoods we either get all the social and emotional and ethical skills we need to be well adjusted adults, or we don't. Some of us don't know how to tell someone we like them. A lot of us get depressed and get wasted. Why don't we do something that makes us feel better? Because we don't know any other way. When I didn't have enough skills I compensated with drugs and alcohol. It's like there was a hole in the wall and I put a poster over it.

I think a lot of us who had these oddly shaped childhoods, in some ways we're hyper-capable. We're able to take care of ourselves in a lot of ways but it's like we're missing a piece. When everyone went to school to learn how to be a regular person we were sick that day. We compensate other ways. Alcohol and drugs is one of those ways. Instead of learning how to cope with our problems and deal with hardship and deal with anger, we just decide to get drunk and not care.

Being able to play tragedy for humor rather than pity is a new trick I've learned. For a long time that's what I did with my poetry, ask people to feel sorry for me. I got sober and I realized I have to get out of the pity thing; it's not going anywhere for me. I don't want to have any self-pity.

There was my other big misconception. That if I got sober and went to a meeting they'd make me believe in God. Not true. They ask you to believe in a higher power. You need a higher power, but it doesn't have to be a super-natural entity. You have all this power inside you.

What can I do to become more like my Ideal Image?

I used to think, "I can't go to these meetings because they'll make me believe in God. Make me go to church." I knew it wasn't right for me before I ever tried it. I was suspicious of anything outside my realm of experience. That same kind of attitude carries over into 12-step programs, because they are programs. There's this feeling that you don't need this bullshit, you can quit on your own. People that don't know anything about it seem to have a better idea. They haven't even been.

We've been there and come back. When you fall in the pit, people are supposed to help you up. But you have to get up on your own. We'll take your arms, but you have to get your legs underneath you and stand.