More Recovery Readings - February

[bluidkiti]

February 1

You are reading from the book Today's Gift.
It's not enough to talk to plants, you also have to listen. --David Bergman
Plants grow best when we pay attention to them. That means watering, touching them, putting them in places where they will receive good light. They need people around them to notice if they are drooping at the edges or looking particularly happy in the sunlight. The more attention a plant receives, the better it will grow.
We need to be noticed in the same way. If we notice a family member or friend is drooping, perhaps we can pay some special attention to him or her. All of us need someone to care about how we are and to truly listen to us. We can share and double someone's happiness by noticing and talking about it also. We help the people around us to grow by listening to their droopy edges as well as their bright days. People need this as much as plants need light and water.
How can I help someone grow today?


You are reading from the book Touchstones.
Who of us is mature enough for offspring before the offspring themselves arrive? The value of marriage is not that adults produce children but that children produce adults. --Peter De Vries
Many of us, in entering recovery, are confronted with guilt about our roles as fathers. We can see so clearly with hindsight that we could have been better parents. Others of us recall the unfairness of our own parents and find it hard to forgive them.
This mixture of guilt and resentment is part of the package of recovery. If we remained the same and never learned anything new, we wouldn't have to feel guilty about the past or face our need to let go of resentments. Our spiritual renewal requires that we forgive ourselves and accept the forgiveness of those around us. Even today our children are not helped by our guilt, but they will be helped - at any age - by our amended lives. And all generations are enriched when we are able to repair broken connections with our parents.
I can accept the increased consciousness that recovery brings without punishing myself for what I didn't know.


You are reading from the book The Language Of Letting Go.
Step Two
Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity. --Step Two of Al-Anon
We come to believe in a better life through the powerful gift of other people - hearing them, seeing them, and watching the gift of recovery at work in their lives.
There is a Power greater than us. There is real hope now that things can and will be different and better for our life and us.
We are not in a "do it ourselves" program. We do not have to exert willpower to change. We do not have to force our recovery to happen. We do not have to pull ourselves up by our bootstraps just so we believe that there is a Power greater than ourselves - one who will get the job done in our life. This Power will do for us what your greatest and most diligent efforts could not accomplish.
Our Higher Power will restore us to a sane and beneficial life. All we do is believe.
Look. Watch. See the people around you. See the healing they have found. Then discover your own faith, your own belief, your own healing.
Today, regardless of my circumstances, I will believe to the best of my ability that a Power greater than myself can and will restore me to a peaceful, sane way of living. Then I will relax and let Him do that.


I know that one step at a time I am making progress today. I am grateful for all my growth, even though it is not always very obvious. --Ruth Fishel

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Journey To The Heart

Transcend Your Limitations

You’re free now, free to take the journey of a lifetime. Free to experience life, in its newness, its freshness, its magic– in a way you never have before.

The only limitations on you are the ones you’ve placed on yourself. Your prison has been of your own making. Don’t blame or chastise yourself. Life has created certain challenges for you. The purpose has been to set you free, to provide you with lessons, experiences, circumstances that would trigger growth and healing. Life has been provoking, promoting, urging you to grow, stretch, learn, heal. Life has been trying to break you out of your prison.

Set yourself free. Let yourself go on a journey of love. Take notes. Be present. Experience. Learn. Love and laugh, and cry when you need to. Rest when you’re tired. Take a flashlight to help you see in the dark. But most of all, take yourself and go.

Go on your journey of joy.

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More Language Of Letting Go

Say woohoo

I put on my skydiving gear and headed for the airplane. Here I was again, ready to go. My hands were already sweating; I could feel the quiver in my lip. Why did I keep doing this to myself?

Once I boarded the airplane, I started what had become a routine for me. I don’t have to do this, I told myself.I’m volunteering to skydive. It’s not mandatory. Not wanting to overly embarrass myself in front of the other, more experienced sky divers, I coped with my anxiety by fidgeting. I fidgeted with the altimeter on my hand. I fidgeted with the strap on my helmet.

I wanted to tell my jump master I couldn’t jump because I was having a heart attack, but I knew he wouldn’t believe me. It was just anxiety, fear building up to an unmanageable, uncontrollable level.

A friend was sitting across from me, watching. “How are you doing Mel?” he asked.

“Scared,” I said.

“Do you say woohoo?” he asked.

“What do you mean?” I said.

“When you get to the door and jump, say woohoo,” he said. “You can’t have a bad time if you do.”

I walked to the door of the plane, hoisted myself out, and waited for the nod from my jump master, signaling that he was ready for the count.

“Ready,” I said. “Set.” Then with all my might I yelled, “WOOHOO,” so loud the sky divers in the back of the plane heard me.

My jump master followed me out of the plane and then positioned himself in front of me. I looked at him and grinned. Then I grinned some more. So this is why I’m doing this, I thought. Because it’s so much fun.

It was the best jump I’d had yet.

We’re jumping into the unknown, when we have a baby or a new job.

Sometimes, however, we don’t choose our experience. I can recall sitting on the edge of the bed in the hospital room after Shane’s death, knowing that the journey I was about to embark upon would not be an exhilarating one. God, I don’t want to go through this, I thought. It’s not going to be over in three months or a year. This one I’ll live with the rest of my life. I can remember standing in the parking lot outside the courthouse after my divorce from the children’s father. I took one deep breath, feeling exhilarated and free. The next one was filled with terror and dread. My God, I was now a dirt-poor single parent with two children to raise.

Sometimes we jump out that door voluntarily. Sometimes we’re pushed.

Feel your fear, then let it go. Dread is just a prejudice against the future. After having examined all the probabilaties and possibilities, we decide ahead of time that we’re going to have the worse experience possible. So let go of dread,too.

Fidget if you must. Ask yourself what you’re doing here. Then walk to the door and give the count. See how much fun it can be when you jump into the unknown and feel the rush of being fully alive.

God, help me take a deep breath and holler woohoo.

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Accepting Compliments
Receiving a Gift with Grace

by Madisyn Taylor

When we willingly accept compliments, we are reminded that others see us through different eyes.


Many of us find it difficult to accept compliments but easy to believe the slightest criticism. Today, right now, let’s make a choice to fully accept compliments as we would a gift. Sincere compliments are gifts of praise. They are kudos given for wise choices or accomplishments or perhaps for just letting your light shine. There is no reason not to accept the gift of a kind word, but some of us argue against them, even giving reasons why they aren’t true.

If we visualize the energy of a compliment, we would see beautiful, shining, positive energy being sent from the giver. That energy, if accepted graciously, would brighten our personal energy field. Our gratitude then returns to the giver as warm, fuzzy, glowing energy, completing an even circuit of good feelings. But if we reject a compliment, what could have been a beautiful exchange becomes awkward and uncomfortable, making it a negative experience instead. Misplaced modesty can ruin the joy of sharing this connection with another person. But we can accept a compliment and still be modest by simply saying “thank you.” However, if compliments are rejected due to a lack of self-esteem, then the first step would be to start believing good things about yourself. Try giving yourself compliments in the mirror. Beyond the initial feelings of silliness, you will notice how good it feels and can watch the smile it puts on your face. The next step would be to see how it feels to gi! ve compliments to others. Notice how great you feel when you’ve made another person’s face brighten and how differently you feel when the gift you’ve offered is rejected. Having experienced all sides, you will be ready to play along fully and willingly.

We are our harshest critics. When we accept compliments, we are reminded that others see us through different eyes. All living beings crave positive attention, and we all deserve to have positive energy shared with us. Perhaps if we happily and gratefully accept compliments, we will give others permission to do so as well. Published with permission from Daily OM

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A Day At A Time

Reflection For The Day

The longer I’m in The Program, the more clearly I see why it’s important for me to understand why I do what I do, and say what I say. In the process, I’m coming to realize what kind of person I really am. I see now, for example, that it’s far easier to be honest with other people that with myself. I’m learning, also, that we’re all hampered by our need to justify our actions and words. Have I taken an inventory of myself as suggested in the Twelve Steps? Have I admitted my faults to myself, to god, and to another human being?

Today I Pray

May I not be stalled in my recovery process by the enormity of The Program’s fourth Step, taking a moral inventory of myself, or by admitting these shortcomings to myself, to God and to another human being. May I know that honesty to myself about myself is all-important.

Today I Will Remember

I cannot mend if I bend the truth.

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One More Day

Snow endures but for a season, and joy comes with the morning.
– Marcus Aurelius

We are a nation which sometimes sells out for short-term goals and short-term gratification. We may overuse credit cards. At times we live on impulse and buy on impulse. Gone is the long-term planning our parents tired to teach us as children. Gone is learning to wait.

Now we have no choice. Life’s circumstances, especially illness, force us to wait whether or not we want to. True, we live with pain and annoyance, but once again, quite accidentally, we begin to know the joy that comes from the waiting and from savoring any small victory.

Patience is a virtue I am once again cultivating. Life’s circumstances have taught me the importance of finding the joy in each day.

This books author is Sefra Kobrin Pitzele