Chapter Five: How It Works
Life the gift of recovery!
Thread Starter
Join Date: Aug 2007
Location: Home is where the heart is
Posts: 7,061
70:3-11, 12-22
3-11 If we remain the same selfish, self-centered people we are now, we are certain to drink again. It is only by the total refocusing of our motives in life, as a result of our spiritual awakeing, that we are delivered from the gates of death. Indifference to the welfare of others is evidence that we are basing our decisions on selfishness. Our sobriety and our very lives depend upon our consciously seeking to act in the best interest of others (20:1)
To begin this new way of life, we ask God daily to direct our thinking and eliminate self-seeking motives (86:16)
When we forgive someone we give of ourselves prior to receiving anythign from the other person. We may have mistakenly believed we would have to be a "good" person before we could receive help from God. God gives us the power we need to live up to our ideals as soon as we are humble enough to ask.
12-22 The solution to our problems lies in our being willing to seek God's help. The fourth step helps us to identify exactly what the problem is. Without this self-examination we may be confused as to what is the real problem. We have defects in our characters, mistaken ideas, and attitudes about the source of happiness and satisfaction. By seeing the un-successful and even harmful results of our acting on our old beliefs, we become willing to continue to learn the new way of life suggested in this book.
Source:
The Annotated AA Handbook
Frank D.
Suppose we fall short of the chosen ideal and stumble? Does this mean we are going to get drunk? Some people tell us so. But this is only a half-truth. It depends on us and our motives. If we are sorry for what we have done, and have the honest desire to let God take us to better things, we believe we will be forgiven and will have learned our lesson. If we are not sorry, and our conduct continues to harm others, we are quite sure to drink. We are not theorizing. These are facts out of our experience.
To begin this new way of life, we ask God daily to direct our thinking and eliminate self-seeking motives (86:16)
When we forgive someone we give of ourselves prior to receiving anythign from the other person. We may have mistakenly believed we would have to be a "good" person before we could receive help from God. God gives us the power we need to live up to our ideals as soon as we are humble enough to ask.
12-22
To sum up about sex: we earnestly pray for the right ideal, for guidance in each questionable situation, for sanity, and for the strength to do the right thing. If sex is very troublesome, we throw ourselves the harder into helping others. We think of their needs and work for them. This takes us out of ourselves. It quites the imperious urge, when to yield would mean heartache. If we have been thorough about our personal inventory, we have written down a lot. We have listed and analyzed our resentments. We have begun to comprehend their futility and their fatality. We have commenced to see their terrible destructiveness. We have begun to learn tolerance, patience, and good will toward all men, even our enemies, for we look on them as sick people. We have listed the people we hurt by our conduct, and were willing to straighten out the past if we could.
Source:
The Annotated AA Handbook
Frank D.
Life the gift of recovery!
Thread Starter
Join Date: Aug 2007
Location: Home is where the heart is
Posts: 7,061
71:1-3,
1-3 The way that we become convinced of the ability of God to change our lives is by doing the things suggested in this program. When we experience for ourselves that this works to solve our problems, we acquire faith --- a reliance upon the power of God. It is our old ideas and attitudes about life, the symptoms of which are our defects of character, that stand in the way of our access to God. By swallowing and digesting big chunks of truth about ourselves, we are nourished and can grow.
We do not do our fourth step merely to gain self-knowledge. Self-knowledge will not solve our alcoholic problem (39:3). Our writting helps to clear away self-justification which allows us to honestly appraise our character. When combined with attempts to establish a relationship with God, it produces spiritual experience, experiences of God working in our lives. We may build upon this as we continue in this new way of life. Our purpse is to discover the obstacles in ourselves so that the grace of God can enter us and expel the obsession that compels us to drink.
Source:
The Annotated AA Handbook
Frank D.
We hope you are convinced now that God can remove whatever self-will has blocked you off from Him. If you have already made a decision, and an inventory of your grosser handicaps, you have made a good beginning. That being so you have swallowed and digested some big chunks of truth about yourself.
We do not do our fourth step merely to gain self-knowledge. Self-knowledge will not solve our alcoholic problem (39:3). Our writting helps to clear away self-justification which allows us to honestly appraise our character. When combined with attempts to establish a relationship with God, it produces spiritual experience, experiences of God working in our lives. We may build upon this as we continue in this new way of life. Our purpse is to discover the obstacles in ourselves so that the grace of God can enter us and expel the obsession that compels us to drink.
Source:
The Annotated AA Handbook
Frank D.
12-Step Recovered Alkie
Join Date: May 2010
Location: West Bloomfield, MI
Posts: 5,797
Yanno....... I've only JUST TODAY noticed this section of the board.
What a great post to stumble upon!!!
I've only read parts of it but I look forward to sending ppl here to read through this when the 4th step comes up.
What a great post to stumble upon!!!
I've only read parts of it but I look forward to sending ppl here to read through this when the 4th step comes up.
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