The Practice of Imperfection:

Finding and Keeping Serenity

You didn't cause it. You can't control it. You can't cure it.

You've probably heard that. What's harder to hear — and harder to believe — is the rest: you can still find peace, even if they don't.The Practice of Imperfection is a recovery guide for family members of people with addiction, written by someone who has stood where you're standing — and also where they're standing. Dave H. brings long experience in both AA and Al-Anon, and the hard-won perspective of a man who has been the addict, the family member, the sponsor, the parent, and the spouse in recovery all at once. 

This isn't theory. It's what actually works.

The path this book maps isn't about getting them better. It's about getting your serenity back — and learning how to keep it even on the days when everything around you is still broken. Through a simple framework of Awareness, Acceptance, and Action, each chapter returns to the same honest promise: serenity exists. You can find it. You'll lose it. And you can find it again.

That's not failure. That's the practice.

About the Author

Dave H. has been in every seat at this table. He grew up in a home shaped by addiction, abuse, and secrets. He became an addict himself. He got sober, and has spent the years since not only staying sober but learning — slowly, imperfectly — how to live. He found Al-Anon when he realized that sobriety alone wasn't enough to bring him peace, and that the people he loved most were teaching him something AA couldn't: that serenity isn't the same as survival.

He sponsors people in both programs. He knows what it's like to work the steps for your own life, and he knows what it's like to work them while watching someone you love refuse to. He married another person in recovery, blended families, and became the parent of children who developed the same disease he'd overcome. Every chapter of this book is written from inside one of those experiences, not above it.

Dave lives in recovery, in relationship, and in the ongoing practice of finding serenity — losing it, and finding it again.