The song "I Tried" by Bone Thugs-N-Harmony is deep and hella sweet.  I have listened to it twenty times on the radio and have downloaded it as well.

I wrote myself a note to write in my personal diary today but I have refused the order.  Sometimes it feels pointless when I am the only one reading.  Sometimes I dislike writing because of the unusual way I hold my pencil, which I have difficulty ammending.  Recently I have started a new life in the town where I grew up.  I moved from the city to the suburbs, and I am recieving free housing and board, which is nice.

I have had two anxiety attacks since my arrival April 30th.  That is two anxiety attacks in about twenty days.  If I keep this pace up for twelve months,  I will have 36.5 anxiety attacks in a one year period.

The first days back I felt very depressed and ashamed and that old failure feeling set in deep.  Why do I think I have to be perfect?  Visions of my old house and roommates, old situations I was in haunted me.  I think I looked very angry to my family.  My mood eventually stabilized.

At some point I decided asking for help was a useful skill to learn.  When I can't get something done my mind tends to devour itself or give up completely.  This does not seem sustainable.  When I got here I made it a point to get out there and allow myself to be vulnerable.

I started going to AA meetings and found out that the AA in Cincinnati has three self-funded meeting facilities in the area.  Aside from the basic focus of AA, I wanted to learn more about community organizations and about how they work on the inside.  AA has no official hierarchy.  The only authority is that of experience and the authority of the sponsors.  From my observation authoritarianism exists in the language and the twelve-step program of the group.  Sponsorees are urged to stay sober "or they are going to die."  Most of the dialouge in the meeting is centered around adherence to the twelve-step program.

I like to see things from many angles.  I enjoy the meetings.  They keep me coming back.  Any free public meeting where people confront the obsessive nature of their emotional problems is positive.  I have made myself say something at every meeting I have attended.  Perhaps the severity is necessary.  In the process of going to meetings I have felt the revelation that my own drinking has been self-destrutive, not only self-destrutive but that my own attitudes and thoughts and behavior have been set on reinforcing something that is not good for me.  The whole time I was drinking I was convinced that it was healthy for me to relieve myself in this form, not knowing the consequences of relying on a corporate-manufactured drug for my own personal relieft and fulfillment.  Where I am right now I think alcohol hid the fact that I was lonley and socially awkward.  It always was difficult for me to talk to others.  My entire life my inner-most thoughts have been shut out by society and by family and at some point I began to shut them out myself, downsized.  They were never gone though, just hidden. 

Where was I, ah yes, AA.  I want to apply what I am learning in AA and set up community mental health organizations, or perhaps simply community health organizations.  Because of the specialization and high cost, and exclusive nature of the medical community, knowledge about our own bodies has been robbed from the people!  Mental health issues are rarely isolated to the mind and typically manifest in the form of chronic ailments and sleep deprivation.  If people could develop counter-institutions to the medical establishment, a revolution against capitalism would be much more feasible.  More on this as more arrives...

good night