Daily Recovery Readings - August 9

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God grant me the Serenity to accept the things I cannot change;
Courage to change the things I can;
and Wisdom to know the difference.
Thy will, not mine, be done.

August 9

Daily Reflections

". . .OF ALL PERSONS WE HAD HARMED"

"...and became willing to make amends to them all."
TWELVE STEPS AND TWELVE TRADITIONS, p. 77

One of the key words in the Eighth Step is the word all. I am not free
to select a few names for the list and to disregard others. It is a list of
all persons I have harmed. I can see immediately that this Step entails
forgiveness because if I'm not willing to forgive someone, there is little
chance I will place his name on the list. Before I placed the first name
on my list, I said a little prayer: "I forgive anyone and everyone who
has ever harmed me at any time and under any circumstances."
It is well for me to contemplate a small, but very significant, two-letter
word every time the Lord's Prayer is said. The word is as. I ask,
"Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against
us." In this case, as means, "in the same manner." I am asking to be
forgiven in the same manner that I forgive others. As I say this portion
of the prayer, if I am harboring hatred or resentment, I am inviting
more resentment, when I should be calling on the spirit of forgiveness.

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Twenty-Four Hours A Day

A.A. Thought For The Day

"We have an allergy to alcohol. The action of alcohol on chronic
alcoholics is a manifestation of an allergy. We allergic types can never
safely use alcohol in any form at all. We cannot be reconciled to a life
without alcohol, unless we can experience an entire psychic change.
Once this psychic change has occurred, we who seemed doomed, we
who had so many problems that we despaired of ever solving them,
find ourselves able to control our desire for alcohol." Have I had a
psychic change?

Meditation For The Day

Ask God in daily prayer to give you the strength to change. When you
ask God to change you, you must at the same time fully trust Him. If
you do not fully trust Him, God may answer your prayer as a
rescuer does that of a drowning person who is putting up too much
of a struggle. The rescuer must first render the person still more
helpless, until he or she is wholly at the rescuer's mercy. just so must
we be wholly at God's mercy before we can be rescued.

Prayer For The Day

I pray that I may be daily willing to be changed. I pray that I may put
myself wholly at the mercy of God.

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As Bill Sees It

God Will Not Desert Us, p. 221

"Word comes to me that you are making a magnificent stand in
adversity--this adversity being the state of your health. It gives me
a chance to express my gratitude for your recovery in A.A. and
especially for the demonstration of its principles you are now so
inspiringly giving to us all.

"You will be glad to know that A.A.'s have an almost unfailing
record in this respect. This, I think, is because we are so aware that
God will not desert us when the chips are down; indeed, He did not
when we were drinking. And so it should be with the remainder of
life.

"Certainly, He does not plan to save us from all troubles and
adversity. Nor, in the end, does He save us from so-called
death--since this is but an opening of a door into a new life, where
we shall dwell among His many mansions. Touching these things I
know you have a most confident faith."

Letter, 1966

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Walk In Dry Places

Confidence In the next phase.
Assurance
"God has carried me this far. I will not be let down now." These are brave words of recovering people who find themselves facing new doubts and fears.
There's nothing unrealistic about this attitude. Those of us in 12 Step programs and beneficiaries of a miraculous chain of events that brought our movement into being. Our responsibility is to continue carrying the message by proving how the program works.
It's our success in dealing with life's problems that eventually attracts others to our fellow ship. The best proof of how our spiritual program works is showing how our Higher Power continues to solve problems in our lives.
We don't always know what the next phase in our lies will bring. We can only know that with God, all sorts of wonderful things continue to be possible.
Though I can't see around the corner, I'll know today that my Higher Power will guide me smoothly and safely through the next phase.

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Keep It Simple

If there is no wind, row.---Latin proverb
At times, staying sober will be easy; at other times, it will be hard. But we must do what is needed to stay sober. Having a hard week? Go to extra meetings. Feeling alone? Call a friend and ask if you can get together. Feel like drinking? Go to a safe place until the urge passes.
We have no choice. We must row when there's no wind. If not, we'll fall back into our addiction.
If we work hard, we'll stay sober. Plus we'll grow as spiritual people. Hard times test us and make better people. But this will only happen if we keep our Higher Power and our program close to our heart.
Prayer for the Day: Higher Power, help me remember that I grow during hard times. I pray that I'll accept and use what You've given me each day.
Action for the Day: Today, I'll list five things I learned from my program in hard times.

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Each Day a New Beginning

For me, stopping smoking wasn't a matter of will power, but being will-less. --Joan Gilbertson
Most of us have struggled, willfully, with untold numbers of addictions; liquor, uppers, downers, sugar, chocolate, cigarettes, men. The more we became determined to control our use or to abstain, the greater the compulsion felt for one drink, one bite, one puff. Giving in completely was the turning point.
This recovery program helps each of us find relief from our primary addiction once we humble ourselves, accept our powerlessness, and ask for help. It can help us equally effectively, every day, with any problem we are willfully trying to control. Is a family member causing us grief? Is a co-worker creating anxiety? Has a close friend pulled away? We expend so much energy trying to manage outcomes! In most cases, our attempt to control will invite even more resistance.
The program offers the way out of any frustrating situation. We can be mindful of our powerlessness and cherish the opportunities offered by our higher power. We can turn over whatever our problem to God and quietly, trustingly, anticipate the resolution. It's guaranteed.
How much easier I will find life's experiences if I will let go of my willful ways. The right outcome in all cases will more quickly surface.

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Alcoholics Anonymous - Fourth Edition

BILL'S STORY

In 1929 I contracted golf fever. We went at once to the country, my wife to applaud while I started out to overtake Walter Hagen. Liquor caught up with me much faster than I came up behind Walter. I began to be jittery in the morning. Golf permitted drinking every day and every night. It was fun to carom around the exclusive course which had inspired such awe in me as a lad. I acquired the impeccable coat of tan one sees upon the well-to-do. The local banker watched me whirl fat checks in and out of his till with amused skepticism.

pp. 3-4

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Alcoholics Anonymous - Fourth Edition Stories

1 - THE A.A. TRADITION

The Twelve Traditions
(The Long Form)

3.) Our membership ought to include all who suffer from alcoholism. Hence we may refuse none who wish to recover. Nor ought A.A. membership ever depend upon money or conformity. Any two or three alcoholics gathered together for sobriety may call themselves an A.A. Group, provided that, as a group, they have no other affiliation.

4.) With respect to its own affairs, each A.A. group should be responsible to no other authority than its own conscience. But when its plans concern the welfare of neighboring groups also, those groups ought to be consulted. And no group, regional committee, or individual should ever take any action that might greatly affect A.A. as a whole without conferring with the Trustees of the General Service Board. On such issues our common welfare is paramount.

p. 563

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Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions

Step One - "We admitted we were powerless over alcohol--that our lives had become unmanageable."

It was obviously necessary to raise the bottom the rest of us had hit to the point where it would hit them. By going back in our own drinking histories, we could show that years before we realized it we were out of control, that our drinking even then was no mere habit, that it was indeed the beginning of a fatal progression. To the doubters we could say, "Perhaps you're not an alcoholic after all. Why don't you try some more controlled drinking, bearing in mind meanwhile what we have told you about alcoholism?" This attitude brought immediate and practical results. It was then discovered that when one alcoholic had planted in the mind of another the true nature of his malady, that person could never be the same again. Following every spree, he would say to himself, "Maybe those A.A.'s were right..." After a few such experiences, often years before the onset of extreme difficulties, he would return to us convinced. He had hit bottom as truly as any of us. John Barleycorn himself had become our best advocate.

pp. 23-24

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You can't fly a kite unless you go against the wind and have a weight
to keep it from turning somersaults. The same with man. No man
will succeed unless he is ready to face and overcome difficulties and
is prepared to assume responsibilities.
--William J. H. Boetcker

Any fool can criticize, condemn and complain - and most fools do.
But it takes character and self-control to be understanding and
forgiving.
--Dale Carnegie

Never assume you know who I am or what I'm doing, ask me a
question instead.
--Carol Neilson

Everything has its wonders, even darkness and silence, and I learn,
whatever state I may be in, therein to be content.
--Helen Keller

"I have held many things in my hands, and I have lost them all;
but whatever I have placed in God's hands, that I still possess."
--unknown

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Father Leo's Daily Meditation

ACCEPTANCE

"The man who has become a
thinking being feels a
compulsion to give to every
creature the same reverence for
life that he gives to his own."
-- Albert Schweitzer

Today I accept people. Even the people with who I do not agree, I
accept. My freedom is dependent upon my attitude towards others.
My respect is rooted in the respect I give to others. God is to be found
in my neighbor!

Nowhere is this more true for me as a religious person than in my
attitude to people of other creeds --- and those who have none! The
spiritual life that unites me to God and the world requires not only
acceptance of "difference" but my personal need for it.

But more than this; even those who hurt, abuse and destroy need to be
accepted from within my spiritual self --- because something of their
life exists in mine. In this accepting love is the daily healing of my
disease.

May my acceptance of the tyrant lead to the forgiveness of the self.

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Whatever you do or say; let it be as a representative of the Lord Jesus.
Colossians 3:17

"Trust in the LORD with all your heart and lean not on your own
understanding; in all your ways acknowledge him, and he will
make your paths straight."
Proverbs 3:5-6

"The LORD will guide you always; he will satisfy your needs in a
sun-scorched land and will strengthen your frame. You will be like
a well-watered garden, like a spring whose waters never fail."
Isaiah 58:11

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Daily Inspiration

A thoughtful gesture can accomplish so much and can even be the beginning of a miracle. Lord, help me to warm the heart of just one person today.

Keep your feet firmly planted in your faith and your eyes raised to the heavens. Lord, You are my strength, my encouragement and my source of all that is good.

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NA Just For Today

The Power Of Love

"We begin to see that God's love has been present all the time, just waiting for us to accept it."
Basic Text, p.46

God's love is the transforming power that drives our recovery. With that love, we find freedom from the hopeless, desperate cycle of using, self-hatred, and more using. With that love, we gain a sense of reason and purpose in our once purposeless lives. With that love, we are given the inner direction and strength we need to begin a new way of life: the NA way. With that love, we begin to see things differently, as if with new eyes.

As we examine our lives through the eyes of love, we make what may be a startling discovery: The loving God we've so recently come to understand has always been with us and has always loved us. We recall the times when we asked for the aid of a Higher Power and were given it. We even recall times when we didn't ask for such help, yet were given it anyway. We realize that a loving Higher Power has cared for us all along, preserving our lives till the day when we could accept that love for ourselves.

The Power of love has been with us all along. Today, we are grateful to have survived long enough to become consciously aware of that love's presence in our world and our lives. Its vitality floods our very being, guiding our recovery and showing us how to live.

Just for today: I accept the love of a Higher Power in my life. I am conscious of that Power's guidance and strength within me. Today, I claim it for my own.
pg. 231

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You are reading from the book Today's Gift.
What is without periods of rest will not endure. --Ovid
When we are tired, we need to stop and give ourselves time to rest. Sometimes we think we can't spare the time. But without rest, all our activity soon becomes a burden and there is no joy in it. Animals know it is necessary to take time to rest. This is part of the rhythm of life: activity and rest, effort and relaxation.
Our bad moods are often our body's way of telling us we need rest. When we were little, we needed naps. Somehow, we forget to allow ourselves this right when we are older. We are wise to remember we never outgrow this need for rest to make the day go better.
When we return to our day refreshed, we have given ourselves and all those around us the gift of ourselves at our best.
What can I do better when I am rested?


You are reading from the book Touchstones.
We must embrace the absurd and go beyond everything we have ever known. --Janie Gustafson
We have stepped beyond the limits of our former life and accepted the possibility of the unknown. Many of us have always tried to be rational, to trust only what we could understand or reason through. That attempt served the part of us that lusted for control and power, but it kept us from unknown possibilities and dreams.
When we decide to be less controlling, we begin to believe in possibilities we didn't allow before. That is how we let God influence our lives. Perhaps we don't see a reasonable way to a more satisfying job, but we can be open to surprising possibilities. We may see nothing we can do to overcome our compulsions, but we pray for God to remove our shortcomings in God's way, and already we have a new attitude.
God, give me the courage to step into the unknown, the absurd, and experience the awakening of my spirit.


You are reading from the book Each Day a New Beginning.
For me, stopping smoking wasn't a matter of will power, but being will-less. --Joan Gilbertson
Most of us have struggled, willfully, with untold numbers of addictions; liquor, uppers, downers, sugar, chocolate, cigarettes, men. The more we became determined to control our use or to abstain, the greater the compulsion felt for one drink, one bite, one puff. Giving in completely was the turning point.
This recovery program helps each of us find relief from our primary addiction once we humble ourselves, accept our powerlessness, and ask for help. It can help us equally effectively, every day, with any problem we are willfully trying to control. Is a family member causing us grief? Is a co-worker creating anxiety? Has a close friend pulled away? We expend so much energy trying to manage outcomes! In most cases, our attempt to control will invite even more resistance.
The program offers the way out of any frustrating situation. We can be mindful of our powerlessness and cherish the opportunities offered by our higher power. We can turn over whatever our problem to God and quietly, trustingly, anticipate the resolution. It's guaranteed.
How much easier I will find life's experiences if I will let go of my willful ways. The right outcome in all cases will more quickly surface.


You are reading from the book The Language of Letting Go.
Asking for What We Need
Decide what it is you want and need, then go to the person you need it from and ask for it.
Sometimes, it takes hard work and much energy to get what we want and need. We have to go through the pains of identifying what we want, then struggle to believe that we deserve it. Then, we may have to experience the disappointment of asking someone, having the person refuse us, and figuring out what to do next.
Sometimes in life, getting what we want and need is not so difficult. Sometimes, all we need to do is ask.
We can go to another person, or our Higher Power, and ask for what we need.
But because of how difficult it can be, at times, to get what we want and need, we may get trapped in the mind set of believing it will always be that difficult. Sometimes, not wanting to go through the hassle, dreading the struggle, or out of fear, we may make getting what we want and need much more difficult than it needs to be.
We may get angry before we ask, deciding that we'll never get what we want, or anticipating the "fight" we'll have to endure. By the time we talk to someone about what we want, we may be so angry that we're demanding, not asking; thus our anger triggers a power play that didn't exist except in our mind.
Or we may get so worked up that we don't ask--or we waste far more energy than necessary fighting with ourselves, only to find out that the other person, or our Higher Power, is happy to give us what we want.
Sometimes, we have to fight and work and wait for what we want and need. Sometimes, we can get it just by asking or stating that this is what we want. Ask. If the answer is no, or not what we want, then we can decide what to do next.
Today, I will not set up a difficult situation that doesn't exist with other people, or my Higher Power, about getting what I want and need. If there is something I need from someone, I will ask first, before I struggle.


Today I will take the time and quiet I need to find that place of peace and happiness within me. Whatever happens outside of me will never replace that which I can find within me wherever I am. --Ruth Fishel

*****

Journey to the Heart
Grow in Your Sensitivity to Toxicity

Just as we are becoming more careful about our earth and the toxins we put into the ground and air, so will we grow in our sensitivity to events, people, places, and substances that are toxic to us.

Our bodies will speak to us, tell us what they don't want, what they can't handle anymore. Our bodies will tell us what hurts, what we're allergic to, what we wish to move away from. Often, underneath the toxins are old, embedded emotions. Release the emotions and you release the toxins. Our bodies will gasp for clarity, purity, cleansing, and detoxification.

What is toxic to one person may not be toxic to the next. What my body wants and needs today may be different from what yours wants and needs today. The answer is in listening-- listening to our bodies, listening to what they're saying, how they're reacting to the people, the substances, the world around us. Listen. What is your body telling you?

Grow in your sensitivity to toxicity. Trust the messages from your body. Let yourself heal.

*****

more language of letting go
Be thankful when you get something else

Dear God,
Thank for for the baby brother, but what I prayed for was a puppy.
--Children's Letters to God

Sometimes we look around, assess the situation, and decide what we think we need. So we go to God and begin praying.

Out of the blue, our prayers get answered. But the answer isn't what we requested. We were so specific, we think. Now, this-- this thing-- has come along. We didn't get what we asked for. Our prayers were answered, but we got something else.

Don't get bitter or so involved with feeling blue about not getting what you requested that you miss out on what you did receive. Wants and needs are closely connected. And all our needs, even the ones we're not completely aware of yet, will be met. Be grateful that God knows more about what we need than we do.

Sometimes when we pray, we get what we want. Sometimes we get what we need. Accept both answers-- the yes's and the something else's-- with heartfelt gratitude. Then look around and see what your lesson and gift is.

God, help me remember to be thankful even when the gift is not quite what I expected.

*****

Extra Weight
Choosing Loving Care by Madisyn Taylor

Our bodies are not our enemies, treat it with the care and support your mind, body and spirit deserve.

Our bodies are like living temples, and deserve all the love and care we can give them. Amazingly flexible and strong, they allow us to experience the world. If we notice that we’re not feeling our best, that we’ve put on extra weight, or that our favorite clothes don’t fit, we can make the choice to be good to ourselves in a new way today.

There are times we become conscious of a deeper hunger that will not be satisfied physically. We can make a new, healthier choice for ourselves in any moment, regardless of the hour, day, week or month. And when we make the choice lovingly, we work from a creative place of improving our lives and nurturing the best within us, so there is no need to punish ourselves. From this place, we can be gently honest with ourselves about the reasons we want to eat certain foods. We can reach out to doctors to help us determine if our bodies are out of balance at a level that requires something other than basic nutrients. We can also reach out to our friends for support and to share the journey of health, which is just another part of our adventure on the physical plane.

When we treat ourselves and our bodies as we would a trusted and loyal companion, we keep our energy free from negative thoughts that would complicate our journey. Our bodies are not our enemies, and we are not fighting a battle. Instead, we are investing our love and attention into the care and support of a beautiful creation—our selves. Published with permission from Daily OM

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A Day At A Time

Reflection For The Day

On numerous occasions, I’ve found that there’s a strong connection between my fears and my resentments. If I secretly fear that I’m inadequate, for example, I’ll tend to resent deeply anybody whose actions or words expose my imagined inadequacy. But it’s usually too painful to admit that my own fears and doubts about myself are the cause of my resentments. It’s a lot easier to pin the blame on someone Else’s “bad behavior” or “selfish motives” – and use that as the justification for my resentment. Do I realize that by resenting someone, I all that person to live rent-free in my head?

Today I Pray

May God help me overcome my feelings of inadequacy. May I know that when I consistently regard myself as a notch or two lower than the next person, I am not giving due credit to my Creator, who has given each of us a special and worthwhile blend of talents. I am, in fact, grumbling about God’s Divine Plan. May I look behind my trash-pile of resentments for my own self-doubt.

Today I Will Remember

As I build myself up, I tear down my resentments.

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One More Day

Usually when people are sad, they don’t do anything. They just cry over their condition. But when they get angry, they bring about a change.
– Malcolm X

Those of us who have a chronic illness often feel a lot of anger, but we can choose how to deal with the anger. If we insist on denying it, we may isolate ourselves and be numbed by an unbearable sadness. Or we might lash out at the people we love.

A sounder choice for us is to acknowledge our anger — and our right to be angry. We don’t deserve illness. Or pain. When we allow ourselves these honest reactions, we are freer to move toward acceptance — and action. When we accept our limitations — no matter how unfair they are — we then can decide where and how and when we will make needed changes in our lives.

My anger can lead me toward growth if I use it in the right ways.

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In God’s Care

We cannot always oblige, but we can always speak obligingly.
~~Voltaire

Sometimes we forget that we’re all special people who are in each others’ lives for a purpose. Our Higher Power has guaranteed each of us love, growth, and support. In return, we’re expected to treat our fellow travelers respectfully and courteously. Abrupt or harsh comments put people on the defensive and strain communication. Then none of us feels the support and love we need from one another.

We can ease a friend or co-worker’s troubles today by quietly, calmly relying on our Higher Power to help us in our conversations. And when we are troubled, we don’t need to project our tenseness or anxiety to everyone around us. We will gain esteem for ourselves and show love to the other person if we share our words in a loving tone. It’s relly so easy to decide to honor one another in this way. In the process, we are honoring God too.

I will speak kindly and lovingly to others today.

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Day By Day

Admitting unmanageability

“What do you mean, ‘unmangeable’?” we ask when we first come into the program. (And we are surprised at the smiling faces and suppressed chuckles.) We have been living with our delusions for so long that we really believe everything is okay – or will be okay next week. We simply can’t see how out of control our lives truly are: angry creditors, unemployment, separation or divorce, health problems.

Some of these situations were ridiculous, others tragic – and still we fantasized that we were in control. After a period of time in the program, however, living with them seems hard to imagine. But if we still think we have control, we need to ask for help in facing our delusions and our tomorrow-will-be-better syndrome.

Have I turned the management of my life over to God?

Higher Power, help me to truly accept Step One.

I will look at what is unmanageable in my life today by…

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Food For Thought

Daily Inventory

When we are not functioning up to par, we need to find out where the problem is. If the day begins to fall apart and we feel overwhelmed and unable to cope, it may be a good idea to stop and take inventory.

Examining the quality of our abstinence is a good place to begin. Have we permitted thoughts of making a small exception here and there? Are we dwelling too much on what we will have for the next meal? Did we make a substitution, which gave us more carbohydrates than we could handle?

If the problem is not with abstinence, then it must be in our emotional or spiritual life. Are we harboring resentments, which are poisoning our outlook? Have we made a mistake, which we are unwilling to admit? Is there something we need to do for a family member that we are procrastinating about doing? Are we denying a legitimate need of our own?

Grant me the honesty to confront my weaknesses.

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One Day At A Time

~ ANSWERS ~
There is no need to run outside
For better seeing,
Nor to peer from a window.
Rather abide at the center of your being.
Lao Tzu

I always looked for answers outside of myself. I did not put the trust in my self and thought someone, anyone, always knew better than me. I believed the advertisements and compared myself to polished pictures of beautiful thin women.

As I recover from compulsive overeating, I am learning that all of the answers are inside of me. I need only to get quiet and listen to that still small voice. I pray that my Higher Power will give me the willingness to go inside where my truths lie.

One Day at a Time . . .
I look within and wait patiently ...
knowing the answers, however big or small,
are all within.
~ Melissa S. ~

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AA 'Big Book' - Quote

As we discovered the principles by which the individual alcoholic could live, so we had to evolve principles by which A.A. groups and A.A. as a whole could survive and function effectively. It was thought that no alcoholic man or woman could be excluded from our Society; that our leaders might serve but never govern; that each group was to be autonomous and there was to be no professional class of therapy. - Pg. xix - 4th Edition - Forward To The Second Edition

Hour To Hour - Book - Quote

When our minds clear (as the drugs of alcohol, cocaine, pot, crystal, and heroin work out of our system), our betrayals become clear. It is painful knowing we betrayed the trust of our parents, our lovers, our children, our employers and our friends. Most of all we betrayed ourselves. Our steps are the steps out of the betrayal.

Higher Power, as I understand You, help me face my betrayals with courage, knowing that each step will contribute to healing the betrayals.

Appreciating What I Have

Today I won't let my desire for more, blind me to what's already here. My life is full of blessings that I look right past when all I see is what's missing rather than what is there. Desire is natural and good, I need to feel it to grow and reach beyond myself. But today, I will appreciate what I already have before I ask for more. Appreciation is like water on a plant, it causes good to grow in my life. What I appreciate expands. It grows before my eyes, it deepens and widens. The mere act of appreciation somehow creates more of what I am already giving thanks for. It opens doors to the coffers of this generous world and invites the its bounty to come in. Appreciation lets the creative universe know that I am grateful for what is being so freely given to me.

Today I will appreciate what I have knowing that it opens a doorway to increase

- Tian Dayton PhD

Pocket Sponsor - Book - Quote

'Forgiveness is not an occasional act; it is a permanent attitude.' ~Martin Luther King. Undoubtedly, there are many on your list to forgive. There is only one whom you must forgive 'that is yourself.'

Because my Higher Power forgives me, I forgive myself.

"Walk Softly and Carry a Big Book" - Book

It's the twelve steps, not the twelve standstills.

Time for Joy - Book - Quote

Today I will take the time and quiet I need to find that place of peace and happiness within me. Whatever happens outside of me will never replace that which I can find within me wherever I am.

Alkiespeak - Book - Quote

Divine aid was AA's greatest asset. - Bill W.

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AA Thought for the Day

August 9

Sunlight
He said, "Why don't you choose your own conception of God?" That statement hit me hard.
It melted the icy intellectual mountain in whose shadow I had lived and shivered many years.
I stood in the sunlight at last.
It was only a matter of being willing to believe in a Power greater than myself.
Nothing more was required of me to make my beginning.
- Alcoholics Anonymous, p. 12

Thought to Ponder . . .
I saw, I felt, I believed.

AA-related 'Alconym' . . .
A B C = Acceptance, Belief, Change.

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

Service
"Service gladly rendered,
obligations squarely met,
troubles well accepted or solved with God's help,
the knowledge that at home or in the world outside
we are partners in a common effort,
the well-understood fact that in God's sight
all human beings are important,
the proof that love freely given surely brings a full return,
the certainty that we are no longer isolated
and alone in self-constructed prisons,
the surety that we need no longer be square pegs
in round holes
but can fit and belong in God's scheme of things -
these are the permanent and legitimate satisfactions
of right living
for which no amount of pomp and circumstance,
no heap of material possessions,
could possibly be substitutes.
True ambition is not what we thought it was."
1952AAWS, Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions, p. 124

Thought to Consider . . .
Service is love in work clothes.

*~*~*AACRONYMS*~*~*
G O D = Group Of Drunks

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

Ego
From "The Three Legacies of Alcoholics Anonymous":
"At the beginning I had liked this title very much. But as the book-naming discussion went on, I began to have certain doubts and temptations. From the start the title 'The Way Out' was popular. If we gave the book this name, then I could add my signature, 'By Bill W.'! After all why shouldn't an author sign his book? I began to forget that this was everybody's book and that I had been mostly the umpire of the discussions that had created it. In one dark moment I even considered calling the book 'The B.W. Movement.' I whispered these ideas to a few friends and promptly got slapped down. Then I saw the temptation for what it was, a shameless piece of egotism. So once more I began to vote for the title 'Alcoholics Anonymous.'"
2001 AAWS, Inc.; Alcoholics Anonymous Comes of Age, pgs. 165-66

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

"Every August, one of the founding members of my group (a real character, who is jokingly said to be our spiritual leader -- or is it spherical leader?) says that in honor of the eighth month and Tradition Eight, he is offering a special discount on sponsorship for anyone who needs it.
"Sometimes people take him up on the offer, but a good proportion of them cancel during the introductory trial period. Of course, this is all said in jest at our meetings, and we get a good laugh out of it."
Lynwood, Washington, August 2004
"Professionalism and AA,"
AA Grapevine

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

"When we became alcoholics, crushed by a self-imposed crisis we could
not postpone or evade, we had to fearlessly face the proposition that
either God is everything or else He is nothing. God either is or He isn't."
~Alcoholics Anonymous, 4th Edition, We Agnostics, pg. 53~

"We usually conclude the period of meditation with a prayer that we
be shown all through the day what our next step is to be, that we be
given whatever we need to take care of such problems. We ask
especially for freedom from self-will, and are careful to make no
request for ourselves only. We may ask for ourselves, however, if
others will be helped. We are careful never to pray for our own
selfish ends. Many of us have wasted a lot of time doing that and it
doesn't work."
~Alcoholics Anonymous, 4th Edition, Into Action, pg. 87~

“We trust infinite God rather than our finite selves.”
-Alcoholics Anonymous p. 68

“There is a direct linkage among self-examination, meditation, and prayer. Taken separately, these practices can bring much relief and benefit. But when they are logically related and interwove, the result is an unshakable foundation for life.”
-Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions p. 98

Misc. AA Literature - Quote

Word comes to me that you are making a magnificent stand in adversity - this adversity being the state of your health. It gives me a chance to express my gratitude for your recovery in A.A. and especially for the demonstration of its principles you are now so inspiringly giving to us all.
You will be glad to know that A.A.'s have an almost unfailing record in this respect. This, I think, is because we are so aware that God will not desert us when the chips are down; indeed, He did not when we were drinking. And so it should be with the remainder of life.
Certainly, He does not plan to save us from all troubles and adversity. Nor, in the end, does He save us from so-called death - since this is but an opening of a door into a new life, where we shall dwell among His many mansions. Touching these things I know you have a most confident faith.

Prayer for the Day: Lord, show me the way and I will follow.