10.4.2015 UNITE To Face Addiction

Some of you know I was in DC 10.4.2015 for the Unite to Face Addiction Rally and Advocacy days. It was amazing to see 15K people standing up to smash the stigma about this disease. It was uplifting to congregate with nearly 700 advocates who were preparing to meet with their legislators to ask for co-sponsorship of important bills (CARA and REDEEM.) It was powerful to realize I had a voice; a voice for myself and for the voiceless. I was proud to be there.

This is what I want to share about the experience.

I believe in recovery. I believe in a life after the wreckage. I believe in the struggle. I believe in healing. I believe in our internal and eternal goodness. 

I believe there are those who still suffer who need help. But believing is not enough. 

Our society, the organizations that are there ostensibly to assist those of us who need help most, are not equitable in their assistance, are not well funded in their programs, are not accessible to all.

Part of the reason for that is that is our legislators don't know who we are. We have been silent until now. WE ARE IN RECOVERY AND WE VOTE! I am ready to come out of the shadows and stand up for my healthy life. I am walking away from the stigma of shame. I am living a life of "conscientious compassion" in thought, word and deed. 

If you want to know how to join, and it is not too late to stand up and be heard, let me know. There are simple things you can do from your desk, computer and phone, that will help us all.

We can practice activism from the heart.

p.s. CA Representative Zoe Lofgren signed on as co-sponsor of CARA a few short days after we met with her in person. You can make a change. Stand up and be heard.

When compassion and justice are unified, we arrive at what I call conscientious compassion. This is compassion, not merely as a beautiful inward feeling of empathy with those suffering, but a compassion that gives birth to a fierce determination to uplift others, to tackle the causes of their suffering, and to establish the social, economic, and political conditions that will enable everyone to flourish and live in harmony.

- Ven. Bhikkhu Bodhi, "Conscientious Compassion"

Kyczy Hawk RYT E-500Author “Yoga and the Twelve Step Path” and “Life in Bite-Sized Morsels” and “From Burnout to Balance” among others. She is the founder of S.O.A.R.(™) Success Over Addiction and Relapse. Kyczy has been teaching recovery focused yoga classes since 2008.  Taking the foundation of a traditional yoga training she received from the Lotus Yoga Teacher Association (of the Himalayan Yoga Institute), she has combined the wisdom and inspiration from other teachers along the way.  Publishing “Yoga and the Twelve Step Path” was the happy conclusion to years of study and research into the inter-relationship between the philosophy of yoga and the principles of 12 Step recovery.  A leader of Y12SR (Yoga of 12 Step Recovery) classes for nearly five years and a devoted teacher to people in treatment centers and in jail- Kyczy created a teacher training program for others who wish to work in this field. Trauma sensitivity and the somatics of moving home into your body are some of the basics taught in S.O.A.R.(™) Success Over Addiction and RelapseWith deep bows she thanks her teachers; Sarla Walters, Durga Leela, Annalisa Cunningham and Nikki Myers.More about her work can be found at www.yogarecovery.com.