AA Thoughts For Today - January

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AA Thought for the Day

January 5

To Run the Show

Most people try to live by self-propulsion. Each person is like
an actor who wants to run the whole show; is forever trying to
arrange the lights, the ballet, the scenery and the rest of the
players in his own way. If his arrangements would only stay
put, if only people would do as he wished, the show would
be great. Everybody, including himself, would be pleased.
Life would be wonderful.
- Alcoholics Anonymous, (How It Works) pp. 60 - 61

Thought to Ponder
First of all, we had to quit playing God. It didn’t work.

AA-related 'Alconym'
L E T G O = Leave Everything To God, Okay?

~*~A.A. Thoughts For The Day~*~

Resentments
Few people have been more victimized by resentments
than have we alcoholics.
It mattered little whether our resentments
were justified or not.
A burst of temper could spoil a day,
and a well-nursed grudge could make us
miserably ineffective.
Nor were we ever skillful in separating
justified from unjustified anger.
As we saw it, our wrath was always justified.
Anger, that occasional luxury of more balanced people,
could keep us on an emotional jag indefinitely.
These emotional "dry benders" often led
straight to the bottle.
Other kinds of disturbance -- jealousy, envy,
sef-pity, or hurt pride -- did the same thing.
c. 1952AAWS, Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions, p. 90

Thought to Consider . . .
Anger is the hot wind that extinguishes the light of reason.

*~*~*AACRONYMS*~*~*
C A L M = Can Anger Leave Me.

*~*~*~*~*^Just For Today!^*~*~*~*~*

Essentials
From "'Let's Keep It Simple'":
"After years of sobriety I occasionally ask myself: 'Can it be this simple?' Then, at meetings, I see former cynics and skeptics who have walked the A.A. path out of hell by packaging their lives, without alcohol, into twenty-four hour segments, during which they practice a few principles to the best of their individual abilities. And then I know again that, while it isn't always easy, if I keep it simple, it works."
1990 AAWS, Inc.; Daily Reflections, pg. 30

*~*~*~*~*^ Grapevine Quote ^*~*~*~*~*

"My desire to drink became a desire not to."
Nipawin, Saskatchewan, November 2003
"Nobody's Fault But Mine,"
Happy, Joyous & Free

~*~*~*~*^ Big Book & Twelve N' Twelve Quotes of the Day ^*~*~*~*~*

"Next, we decided that hereafter in this drama of life, God was going
to be our Director. He is the Principal; we are His agents. He is
the Father, and we are His children. Most good ideas are simple, and
this concept was the keystone of the new and triumphant arch through
which we passed to freedom."
~Alcoholics Anonymous, 4th Edition, How It Works, pg. 62~

"To be doomed to an alcoholic death or to live on a spiritual basis
are not always easy alternatives to face."
~Alcoholics Anonymous, 4th Edition, We Agnostics, Page 44~

Next came the expression of an aspiration and a hope for himself.
-Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions p.101

Misc. AA Literature - Quote

It is plain that a life which includes deep resentment leads only to futility and unhappiness. To the precise extent that we permit these, do we squander the hours that might have been worthwhile. But with the alcoholic, whose hope is the maintenance and growth of a spiritual experience, this business of harboring resentment is infinitely grave. For then we shut ourselves off from the sunlight of the spirit. The insanity of alcohol returns and we drink again. And with us, to drink is to die.
If we were to live, we had to be free of anger. The grouch and the sudden rage were not for us. Anger is the dubious luxury of normal men, but for us alcoholics it is poison.

Prayer for the Day: My Design - God, my purpose is to help others. Give me this work, till my life shall end and life till my work is done.