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The Living Amends letter is not an item that can be checked off of a list like “one and done”. Instead, I am talking about a Living Amends letter, which means the person shares what actions they plan to do to repair the relationship each day moving forward. (If everything isn’t in the light, it’s not time to offer or receive a Living Amends letter).
- Some people are just naturally more prone to rumination, which can make it easier to dwell on negative feelings.
- Working Step 9 is challenging and you’ll likely need support and assistance as you work through it.
- In his book he shares the situation of a woman who has a fight with her brother.
- If they didn’t pay attention, I do my best to let them suffer the consequence.
It has been good for me to re-read the Living Amends letter and assess where we are a year later, whether or not my husband is doing what he said, and whether I feel safe in the marriage. Today, we are still on the right path with room for improvement. Both of us are accountable for the Amends letters we wrote to each other, and we try to live each day as Living amends to each other, the marriage, and ourselves. My husband wrote the Living Amends letter with humility, owning his actions and the damage they caused me without using rationalization or justification. My husband also acknowledged the difficulty in trying to put himself in my shoes. He admitted he hadn’t experienced anything close to what he had put me through.
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Making amends does not necessarily depend on your ability to connect with a person or how they respond to you. One of the 12 Steps is making amends, and that action is intended to heal both parties involved. Nelson Mandela understood that truth and reconciliation was the only true https://ecosoberhouse.com/ path forward for a nation that had experienced so much trauma. He’s a teenager, so I try to let him function at that age level. When he runs out of clean clothes, I don’t lecture or offer solutions. I let him decide if he wants to do laundry at midnight or wear dirty clothes.
Avoid the temptation to shirk responsibility by casting blame or justifying your actions. I didn’t request any of these actions; my husband initiated them. This includes both forgiving others as well as yourself. While self-forgiveness is a powerful living amends practice, it’s important to recognize that this model is not intended for people who unfairly blame themselves for something they aren’t responsible for. Everyone makes mistakes and has things for which they feel sorry or regretful.
amends
For example, we might intend to go to a friend’s birthday party, but in actuality, we fail to show up for the event. While we might apologize later for missing the party, our apology consists of words rather than actions or changed behavior. And those words ring hollow when we repeatedly break our promises. So, to truly make amends, we have to offer more than words. When you make a real effort to change your past behaviors, you need to make the initial move in repairing broken relationships. These steps mean taking ownership of the past, apologizing for wherever you made mistakes and moving forward from those missteps.
Once you enter into sobriety, there isn’t a set timeline for working Steps 8 and 9, so you might want to ask your sponsor and recovery support network for their insights about whether you’re ready. In Twelve Step recovery, your pace is your own to determine. No doubt you will experience challenges and setbacks along the way. But by prioritizing your recovery on a daily basis and doing whatever that next right thing might be for you, you will keep moving forward in living a life of good purpose. It’s important to note that making amends is for the person we hurt. Yes, we partake in the process to “clean up our side of the street,” but we do not make amends to clear our conscience or undo our feelings of guilt.
Relationships
Living amends require a voluntary fundamental redirection. We are not tied to the old behaviors of our disease, or to our character defects. Although it sounds lofty, there are realistic, achievable ways to implement examples of making amends. It’s much easier to just apologize and move on, but committing to living your life differently looks different. Making these types of life improvements typically requires that you work with a counselor or therapist who can provide an outsider’s perspective and objective view of your life.
It would take years to fully heal from years of betrayal, regardless of how quickly he wanted to move on. I still experience triggers from time to time, and I know many women who are years ahead of me on their healing journey who say the same thing. However, the healing process is ongoing, so the Amends from the addict should be ongoing or “living” too.