Recovery Month – Day 25 – Setbacks

Setbacks are all a part of life. You are the only person who can determine whether you handle them, or they handle you.

— JJMeyer —

September is National Recovery Month.

The focus of my blogs throughout the month of September will be on addiction and its life destroying tendencies. The writings derive from my own personal experiences of battling addiction and living a life of recovery.

These specific writings are focused on the ACT acronym.

ACT leads to sobriety…

A – Acknowledge you have a problem and you are powerless over it and you need help.

– Connect with a power greater than you and people who have solutions that will help you conquer your problem.

T – Take positive, recovery-oriented action every day.

We spent the first 17 days looking at the Acknowledge and Connect stages of ACT. We are closing out  Recovery Month by looking at the most important stage and that is–Take positive, recovery-oriented action every day.


Today’s post is a continuation from yesterday (September 25).


I’ve always enjoyed playing sports. Competing in sports served as my most important teacher in how to handle life. One of the greatest lessons sports taught me is there will ALWAYS be setbacks and how you handle them makes all the difference in the world.

I’ll never forget climbing on a plane out in San Francisco just before Christmas in 1981. My college basketball team was heading back to Ohio after upsetting two pretty good Division I teams to win the University of Pacific’s holiday tournament. We were a small Division III school who was invited to the tournament for the bigger Division I teams to beat on.

Prior to climbing on the plane, we found we had just topped the national polls for the first time. We were ranked the number one Division III team in the nation. Our school had never been ranked number one before.

We all felt pretty good about ourselves.

Then a few days later we got upset by Capital University, another Division III team from Ohio.

What a humbling loss that was. Our number one ranking lasted exactly one week.


That’s how life is, one minute things are rolling along quite nicely and the next minute a curveball is thrown at you.

How we handle life’s curve balls makes all the difference.


If you go back to yesterday’s story, you may have noticed I was gaining a little bit of confidence when it came to staying sober for the rest of my life.

I was certain God had staged my first Lead meeting specifically for me. Hearing an opiate addict nurse share her experience, strength and hope…gave me a LOT of hope. I remember thinking, “If she can whip opiates, I can too.”

It was also at this point where my counselor took me through the entire first step (see my September 3rd and 4th posts).

I was finally seeing a light at the end of the tunnel and it no longer was a freight train.

Then my first major sober-setback came along.

More to follow tomorrow.


2 Corinthians 4:8-9, “We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed.”

P.E.A.C.E.

Jay@EagleLaunch.com

2 comments on “Recovery Month – Day 25 – Setbacks

  1. Julie on

    These blogs this month have touched me deeply. I find that I’m bracing myself before I read each one. My son has an addiction problem with opiates and has been on the recovery road for awhile. His story sounds so much like the blogs you post. I lift him up to the Lord every morning, knowing that only God has the power to change him. God has showered his grace on him. I’m a little worried about him. Would appreciate all prayers.

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