Frogs

I’ve chosen the frog as an image for this month’s blog mostly because I love the

three acronyms attached to the word frog:

FEAR RESTRICTS OUR GROWTH

FORGIVENESS RECOGNIZES OUR GREATNESS

FULLY RELY ON GOD

This is the first spring in my new house and I am amazed each day as new leaves

and blossoms break through the hard soil of winter. In Jersey, I had done the

planting so I knew what was going to come up. Here, I have no preconceived

ideas about what will grow or when it will grow. It’s all an adventure in surprise.

And surprise is not one of my favorite things.

I‘ve always liked the predictable because I thought it was safe and I knew how to

maneuver through it. Now some predictable things are good and having some

order in life is helpful. The problem with predictability for me was the fear of not

having it and using the past to predict the future.

FEAR RESTRICTS OUR GROWTH

We all have a past. We can’t change that fact, but we can change the amount of

time and attention we give to the past, our past and the past of others.

Some of us live in the shadow of our past mistakes, failures, addictions, and lost

opportunities because we are afraid we can’t change.

Some of us use the past of others to control them or excuse ourselves.

Regardless of who is bringing up the past or why someone is bringing up the past,

The past brought me to today, it is simply a teacher and it’s purpose is to teach

me how to live free and healthy now, in the present.

Fearing the past, in myself or others, restricts my growth.

Forgiving the past allows the beauty of new growth to break through.

FORGIVENESS RECOGNIZES OUR GREATNESS

In the garden, each daffodil, hyacinth and tulip, pushing its’ way through the hard

soil, is a miracle. Each of us today, having survived the pain of our past, is a

miracle. Yesterday, in the middle of some prickly bushes, I found a pink hyacinth

struggling to get through. It wasn’t as perfect and pretty as the hyacinths growing

the garden area. Its growth had been stunted and its petals had been scratched

and torn. But those things made its presence even more beautiful and

meaningful. The little hyacinth hadn’t given up, hadn’t blamed the prickly bush

and hadn’t compared itself to the grander hyacinths in the flower beds. It

accepted the situation it was growing in, and refusing to be angry gave its all.

Many things in our lives have interfered with the way we might have wanted to

be. Can we forgive them and be the miracle of grace we find in ourselves today?

To do this we need to remember the third frog acronym:

FULLY RELY ON GOD

Early in recovery, steps 1,2 and 3 gave us a foundation for relying on God. Then

our slogans, meetings and spiritual practices supported our connection to our

Higher Power. But fully relying on God requires something else, it requires letting

go of the negativity, competition, anger, self absorption, denial and victim

thinking that is so rampant in our world.

Remember the story of the two frogs?

“a group of frogs were travelling through the woods by the river, when two of

them slipped and fell into a deep pit. The two frogs, realizing their plight, started

croaking loudly and jumping with all their might as high as they could. When the

other frogs heard the two in the pit and saw how deep the hole was, they didn’t

even consider helping and told the two frogs to just give up, they were as good as

dead. One of the frogs hearing them and starting to believe it was hopeless,

stopped jumping and gave up. The other frog kept on jumping. Once again the

frogs on safe ground kept yelling at him to stop the pain and just die. But he kept

jumping even harder, and against all odds he finally made it out. When the other

frogs noticed he had jumped out, one of them questioned him and said didn’t you

hear us, why did you keep jumping? The exhausted frog, hopping closer to the

speaking frog, said I’m partially deaf and couldn’t hear you well, I thought you

were encouraging me to not give up.

There will always be voices in our own heads and given to us by others, that

discourage us and feed our fears.

But there will also always be the voice of our Higher Power, loving us

unconditionally, that will inspire and empower us.

Which voice do you listen to?

Will you be the FROG who fully relies on God?

As the month of April shows us the promise of new growth, may we draw on the

courage promised to us in the 12 steps and refuse to allow fear to restrict our

growth. May we remember how our Higher Power has forgiven us and rise in the

greatness of Gods grace. And may we fully rely on God when the voices of fear

threaten to stop us.