This Week’s Recovery Application Challenge
Ambivalence: Resistant to Repentant
The following questions make the most sense if you have committed to the readings and thoughtfully (and prayerfully) answered the the TWIRL questions. If you have not completed the TWIRL exercise, we recommend that you do so by clicking on the blue TWIRL link before tackling the application questions listed here.
Please take a moment to pray before thoughtfully engaging in this exercise…
What the Apostle Paul struggled with is something we refer to as ambivalence. Ambivalence is the reality of wanting two or more things with equal intensity that are in direct opposition to one another. The net result is a resistance to one thing or the other when one is pulled in the opposite direction by the other. Perhaps you have heard the expression, “Torn between two lovers…”, which is what Paul is talking about when dealing with the power at war with his mind. He wants to do in recovery that which is good, healthy, and right—not because he has to but because he wants to for his own benefit. Yet he is being pulled by a force with equal or greater intensity by that which is self-centered and in opposition to the will of God.
- How is this true in your life?
- What do you hope to accomplish in recovery? What does your life look like should you accomplish your goal?
- What would you admit that you are selfish about that, when you are honest and not lying to yourself (denial), tends to get in the way of your recovery God’s way? Include activities, thoughts, feelings (i.e.: ambition, greed, pride, resentment, jealousy, anger, disappointment, frustration, shame, etc.), and fantasies (i.e.: lust, daydreaming, rehearsing worst-case scenarios, grandiosity, etc.)
- What do you have to gain or have gained pursuing selfishness? List them all and be specific.
- What do you have to lose or have lost pursuing selfishness? List them all and be specific. Identify individual relationships affected by name. In other words, don’t generalize by indicating “my family” or “my children”.
- What do you have to gain or have gained in recovery God’s way (ABC Recovery Steps, 12 steps)? List them all and be specific. Again, identify each individual relationship by name.
- What do you have to lose or have lost in recovery God’s way? List them all and be specific.
- Next, Score each item on each of your four lists between 1 and 100. You’re scoring them, not ranking them. So, several on the list can receive a score of 100 or 50. Then, add up your scores in each category. Combine the scores for questions 4 and 7. Then combine the scores for 5 and 6. By doing this you can measure your degree of ambivalence and discover how much or little you may be resistant in your recovery.
- Assuming the likelihood that your score for 5 and 6 is substantially higher than your score for 4 and 7, why do you still pursue selfishness to achieve satisfaction or to minimize dissatisfaction? Could it be that you are addicted to you?
- Take time to meditate on this and pray that God will be powerful in your life and that His influence will be powerful in your mind to how you think and behave.
It is God working in you to will and to act according to His purpose. Philippians 2:13
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