With inventories and amends, we are unwinding our personal histories.
—Heard at a recent meeting
I see in my mind’s eye a powerful metaphor in the word ‘unwinding.’
I see myself with a ball of string, my life in my hands, unwinding it. It is my life, and the string is the thread and narrative of my story.
Metaphors are useful because they reflect similarities to the analog, but they are out of the usual context and can be considered apart from the original. Here are some of the similarities that occur to me.
My problems and defects loomed large when I started to consider my life and defects of character. It was like I was holding a giant ball of string, too large to handle. It is massive when I start, but grows progressively smaller as I unwind the string. Like my experience with defects of character and problems from my past. These defects seemed very large but grew smaller as I unravelled them.
The string is like my story and life narrative. I pull on it, and a bit more comes out. With successive inventories and reviews I have seen more and more of my story come clear and apparent as I remove layers of deception and denial. And when I unwind one layer, another comes into view. And the string on the top layer can be different colour and material from the layers under it. There are various lessons to learn, defects to remove; just as there are different colours to unwind.
The string, as I unwind the ball of twine, does not go away. It lies at my feet. I don’t forget and ignore it, but it no longer represents a problem. It has become untangled and lay as a heap on the floor.
I then have to decide what I am going to do with the string that I have unwound. Do I throw it away? I don’t think so. I think of my mother working on her sewing machine. She had a spool of thread that she used to stitch mend and sew. She had two spool types that she used. Sometimes she used a wooden spool that she purchased with the thread wrapped around it already. She also used a small silver spool around which she had wrapped thread to use. I think of the unwound ball of string and think of threads that look useful. Hand wrapped around a small silver spool that can be used in a sewing machine. The 12-step program is the sewing machine. God helps me chose and wrap the good thread. And the hand wound spool is used to stitch a new garment, useful and practical in life.
So, I am unwinding my life and my stories. Like a ball of twine. Then rewinding them in a more useful manner.
As I say, not a bad metaphor.
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Hi Andy,
I really like your webpage content. Interested in receiving your blogs and newsletter, will be making a plan and start on the worksheets. Will leave it to God to put me in touch with the person to work on the inventories with. Look forward to our next conversation.
Kindest Regards,
Kim