I am a science-fiction fan because sci-fi allows us to ask what WE would be like in different circumstances. It helps us ask questions. If your work commute took you two years instead of twenty minutes, how would you spend your time differently? When the consequences of your choices amp up, would you remain yourself? What does being “me” actually mean in a totally different environment?
Babylon 5 is a TV sci-fi series that ran from 1993 to 1998 about a space station that acted as a sort of diplomatic outpost, resulting in a number of interactions — and conflicts — with others. In the series, the leader of that station, Captain John Sheridan is asked eight powerful questions:
- Who are you?
- What do you want?
- Why are you here?
- Where are you going?
- Do you have anything worth living for?
- Whom do you serve and whom do you trust?
- Do you have anything worth dying for?
Sci-fi aside, these are great questions for those of us living on planet Earth. They ask about the beliefs and ideas at our core. Is my favorite NFL team the only thing that gets me excited, or does a conversation over the dinner table with family? When I’m thinking about driving over to the bar, what is the final destination of that trip? Is that really someplace I want to go? Am I using my addiction — alcohol, drugs, work, TV, procrastination, gambling, controlling others — to avoid having to answer the question “Who am I?”
Questions like these can be an important part of living out Step 4 by looking inside ourselves to see what matters, what drives us, what makes me “me.” Knowing this makes it easier to draw the line between need and want, between the things we do and who we want God to make us. This searching is what makes Step 5 and Step 6 possible. We will struggle to ask God to remove those defects unless we can gain a vision of the sane and happy “me without addiction” that will be the eternal outcome.
This is just one fictional list of questions, and you may have better questions to ask, that have helped you dig deep. If you have good questions you’d like to share with others, post a comment below and we’ll anonymously add them to this page.
It may not take you 2 years to travel to work via space ship, but consider investing in your own future by taking a couple minutes of commute time to think through these questions. Allow God to lovingly show you the real you that He sees, to light your way through recovery. And, at the next Celebrate Recovery® Open Share, consider sharing what you’ve learned. Your CR brothers and sisters are here to celebrate you along the way!