From smoking marijuana to breathing life
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From smoking marijuana to breathing life
I was introduced to marijuana when I was 17 years old; it was 1973 and I was away for the weekend at the Gold Coast.
There were six of us sitting around at my friend’s boyfriend’s home and he came out and said: “Does anyone want to try marijuana?” We all looked at each other and as no one was game to say no, that’s where it all began. It was a fun-filled afternoon full of laughter and I thought it was great . . . it seemed so long since I had laughed like that.
There was no drug use in the circles I mixed with at home, but every weekend when I went away it became a regular practice. I moved to the Gold Coast when I was 21 years old where I went from an occasional weekend smoker to smoking at least five nights a week.
I was the life of the party, funny and outgoing when I was stoned and it was how I was identified. It also gave me the confidence I seemed to be lacking. I had always justified the fact that it was ok to smoke marijuana because it was natural and because it grew out of the ground.
Eventually I started smoking every night and all day on the weekends, pulling a bong the minute I walked in the door from work. My body never got a chance to know how it felt because every day it was completely numbed. During this time I considered myself to be a responsible human being because I ate healthily and held down a responsible job; meanwhile I was partying five nights a week, getting drunk and stoned.
I shared accommodation with many people over the next 29 years and part of the housekeeping money went into the pool to buy drugs, just so we never ran out. It was always a ritual after dinner to see who could roll the biggest joint and I remember getting lessons on how to roll the best joint: it was a bit of a competition to get recognised for rolling the biggest and the best and there was always a bowl of marijuana mix ready to go on the table.
The 1970’s was the era of sex, drugs and rock ’n’ roll, and there was plenty of it to go around. Getting stoned, going dancing and having sex with a stranger became the norm. All the girls including myself made it a bit of a game to see if we could get sex for the night.
Ten years on I cut back a little on the party scene but continued to have my bongs or joints. I started growing my own in the back yard as the price of dope went through the roof. I started selling foils of dope to keep my habit going but I was always in fear of getting caught. During this time I had become anxious and highly stressed and was always short of money, even though I had always worked. There was always a drama in my life and ‘unexpected’ expenses always kept popping up to keep me broke.
I was married in 1994 and my life settled from the party life when we moved to live on some land where I could grow my dope more freely. I still smoked a joint every night as it had become the way I dealt with issues – being numbed and checked out – and it was starting to knock me out and put me to sleep. There was no more laughter.
My marriage lasted seven years and I then threw myself into my career. I had cut back a little on the marijuana through the week but made up for it on the weekends: it was one of these weekends in 2008 that I met who I thought was my perfect partner. He smoked marijuana and drank alcohol every night and I was soon back to being checked out and back in a destructive cycle.
One morning after a particularly big night I woke up and thought to myself – what am I doing to my body?
I was in an unloving relationship with no true communication and I was wiping myself out every night. I discussed how I was feeling with a close friend and she was feeling the same way and knew of someone who had turned her life around with Universal Medicine.
In 2010 we both attended a healing course at Universal Medicine presented by Serge Benhayon. He spoke about how drug use – and anything that alters who we are – replaces the emptiness we feel inside from not being connected to who we truly are. I had always felt there was something missing in my life but to discover it was me blew me away. There was something that resonated so deeply within me that day and it set me on a journey to discover who I was.
When I made the choice to stop smoking marijuana and cigarettes and drinking alcohol over an eight month period, it seemed that I was faced with a complete stranger: I had to reconnect with this woman that I had diminished and buried with the substance abuse. It was a journey of rediscovering myself and acknowledging that I was a different woman to the one I had been portraying to the world.
I realised smoking marijuana had stopped me from:
- facing my childhood hurts
- the feeling of being alone
- feeling my lack of self-worth
- connecting to the beautiful, amazing being that I was
I started to be more self-loving by making choices like eating very healthily, going to bed earlier, exercising daily and allowing my feelings to surface. With the support of Universal Medicine Esoteric Practitioners I was able to deal with my past issues, and with those changes it was a natural progression to dispense with drugs and alcohol . . . and it was dead easy to do. I also learnt the Gentle Breath Meditation®, which supported me to deeply connect to myself through my own breath – the breath of life. I was breathing me for the first time in many years.
Today, in 2017, I have never been more vital and more connected to who I am. I rarely have stress or dramas in my life and sometimes look back over my life and wonder who was that girl that dampened her light, her self-worth and her ability to connect to the true being within – her innate essence.
Today I appreciate my body, the steadiness I hold and the love I have for who I am, warts and all. I no longer need marijuana and in fact I know there is no way I could smoke dope, take drugs . . . or drink alcohol.
Ever again.
Filed under
Addiction, Alcohol, Anxiety, Breath, Drugs
