Getting High on Recovery

What songs have inspired you in your recovery?

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So what describes one person’s experience of addiction? It’s personal. I am a fan of U2. Like me, you may appreciate their body of work, or you may not. But I invite you to consider what their lyrics have to say about the fall into addiction. Along with the hope of recovery.

• • •

I disappeared in you
You disappeared from me
I gave you everything you ever wanted
It wasn’t what you wanted
The men who love you, you hate the most
They pass right through you like a ghost
They look for you, but your spirit is in the air
Baby, you’re nowhere

Desperation is a tender trap
It gets you every time

Ah, you don’t know if it’s fear or desire
Danger the drug that takes you higher?

Oh, love, you say in love there are no rules
Oh, love, sweet-heart, you’re so cruel

• • •

Six o’clock in the morning, you’re the last to hear the warning
You been tryin’ to throw your arms around the world
You been falling off the sidewalk, your lips move but you can’t talk
Tryin’ to throw your arms around the world

Gonna run to you, run to you, run to you; be still
Gonna run to you, run to you, woman, I will

Addiction is so cruel and recovery is no fool?

I will let the songs speak for themselves. What the lyrics say to you may be different than what they say to me. In a few words, to me the lyrics convey disappearing into our addiction, giving more and more and more of yourself and yet losing more. And more. And more. Desperation. Fear. Desire for a drug that takes you higher. Yet there is a gift in your desire – you long for something real. For love.

For many, recovery begins badly. Stumbling around with nowhere to go when everyone else seems to be getting up to go to work. Yet, here you are, trying to become. Falling again. Getting up again. And walking. Again. Learning to throw your arms around the world that you have, embracing what is in your heart. Even though you are afraid sometimes. Learning to find stillness. And embracing the love that is in the people you care about and the love that you have for yourself.

What songs have inspired you in your recovery?

Keep it Real

Lyrics: U2 “So Cruel” and “Tryin’ To Throw Your Arms Around the World”

Photos by Matt Keortge and Jannine L’Amour