I’m Just Glad You’re Here

“Sorry I’m late.” We've all heard it a thousand times when someone starts to share. At the beginning of my recovery, it really pissed me off to see people not taking their recovery more seriously. I viewed it as lack of planning and just straight up disrespect. How could they not get their act together? How could they be late all of the time?

I personally couldn’t stand it. It really bothered me, until one day. That day, a fellow in the program showed up with less than 5 minutes left in the meeting. My mind started going through all of the reasons why a person could or would be late. Fifty-five minutes had elapsed, the meeting was winding down, and the closing remarks were being read. Then it hit me: they could have been acting out. They could have been anywhere else other than a meeting. I realized at that moment they needed a meeting.

They needed to be in the presence of a meeting, to be in a place where they weren’t at risk. A lot of assumptions were going through my head. And, that moment shifted my paradigm and changed my thought process permanently on the topic. Now, I just get bothered by the fact that people bring it up that they were late and I respond in my head, “I’m just glad you’re here today. Keep coming back.”

Keep coming back!