Pain and Negativity CAN Convert Into Happiness!

To some people, the idea of self-help or self improvement is not very REAL. Somehow they just never think in those terms. They never thought that they could DO something to
change their lives to the better.

This is a selection from a much longer post in the Community section. As is fairly obvious, it's a long-winded ad for some kind of quasi-spiritual support group. Aside from wondering how exactly group therapy counts as self-help, this post got me curious about the Recover page on the craigslist forums. If it isn't abundantly clear by now (or if you're just new to this column), I didn't have high hopes for the List's ability to actually help people with real problems. Going to craigslist to make your life happier and more normal is like to trying to get your rocks off to the Cathy comic strip. You can certainly try but you'll probably be worse off for either outcome.

hey friends. I've been playing  < Joey_B >

music instead of you know what.
www.myspace.com/therealamateurpornography
just remember, after you accept the fact that you are the only one responsible for you and climb out of the endless sea of self pity you can look forward to days and nights and weeks and months and years of joy, happiness and contention.

Yes, it wouldn't be craigslist without spam. Joey_B is trafficking in multiple levels of disappointment here. See, the Recover forum is a page for struggling addicts in search of that essential community component in their process of getting and staying clean. As with most things on craigslist this sounds really positive and if it were executed properly (re: policed enough to keep the scammers and riff-raff out) it would live up to that potential. Instead, Recover is really just a mess of mostly unrelated garbage and empty platitudes like the above semi-spam. Joey_B offers some vague and ultimately useless advice as well as a Myspace link that promises generic porn but instead offers up crappy punk music. Also, the word should be "contentment" but considering how confounding this post is, maybe Joey had it right the first time.

Get over yourself bitch!  < Odells >

Dont f*** with me punk - i will and can tear you a new asshole stupid f***!

As you can see, not all contributors to the Recover forum even pretend to be helpful. What was really confusing about this post is that it came from a thread that didn't really look like a flame war. I'm not sure where Odells got fuel for this assault. All that's certain is that no Internet forum is truly safe from this, as Katie Couric put it, pure poppycock.

Todays Gift  < luvbeingsober >

Getting outside of ourselves, moving beyond our own egos, opens the door to real communication with the people we'll meet today. We have to learn to look with loving appreciation into the soul of that person or child who stands before us. We have to practice being concerned with their needs before our own, and in time our concern will be genuine. The separation between us will exist no more.

I believe in justice. It's not because I think there's some cosmic force that judges all our actions, no matter how little. It's not because I think people are generally good and willing to pursue the truth. It's because actions have logical consequences. For example, when you do violence to other people, they're more likely to respond to you with violence, so whatever damage gets done to your person when you're violent is probably your own damn fault. By the same token, I believe the most fitting punishment for people who abuse vices and live to regret it is to be condemned to a lifetime of lameness. There may be some truth to AA-tastic statements like luvbeingsober's but that doesn't change the fact that it's debilitating in its lame, lame lameness. The lesson? If you party too hard you'll either end up dead or forced to listen to corny bits of philosophy in boring rooms for the rest of your life.