Daily Readings 01-16-2023 Daily Reflections HITTING BOTTOM Why all this insistence that every A.A. must hit bottom first? The answer is that few people will sincerely try to practice the A.A. program unless they have hit bottom. For practicing A.A.'s remaining eleven Steps means the adoption of attitudes and actions that almost no alcoholic who is still drinking can dream of taking. TWELVE STEPS AND TWELVE TRADITIONS, p. 24 Hitting bottom opened my mind and I became willing to try something different. What I tried was A.A. My new life in the Fellowship was a little like learning how to ride a bike for the first time: A.A. became my training wheels and my supporting hand. It's not that I wanted the help so much at the time; I simply did not want to hurt like that again. My desire to avoid hitting bottom again was more powerful than my desire to drink. In the beginning that was what kept me sober. But after a while I found myself working the Steps to the best of my ability. I soon realized that my attitudes and actions were changing - if ever so slightly. One Day at a Time, I became comfortable with myself, and others, and my hurting started to heal. Thank God for the training wheels and supporting hand that I choose to call Alcoholics Anonymous. ************************************************** ******** Twenty-Four Hours A Day A.A. Thought For The Day The A.A. program is more a way of building a new life than just a way of getting over drinking, because in A.A. we don't just stop drinking. We did that plenty of times in the old days when we went "on the wagon." And, of course, we always started to drink again, because we were only waiting for the time when we could fall off. Once we've gotten sober through the A.A. program, we start going uphill. In our drinking days, we were going downhill, getting worse and worse. We either go down or up. Am I going uphill, getting better and better? Meditation For The Day I will try to obey God's will day in and day out, in the wilderness plains as well as on the mountaintops of experience. It is in the daily strivings that perseverance counts. I believe that God is Lord of little things, the Divine Controller of little happenings. I will persevere in this new way of life. I know that nothing in the day is too small to be a part of God's scheme. Prayer For The Day I pray that the little stones which I put into the mosaic of my life may make a worthwhile pattern. I pray that I may persevere and so find harmony and beauty. ************************************************** ********* As Bill Sees It Never Again!, p. 16 "Most people feel more secure on the twenty-four-hour basis than they do in the resolution that they will never drink again. Most of them have broken too many resolutions. It's really a matter of personal choice; every A.A. has the privilege of interpreting the program as he likes. "Personally, I take the attitude that I intend never to drink again. This is somewhat different from saying, 'I will never drink again.' The latter attitude sometimes gets people in trouble because it is undertaking on a personal basis to do what we alcoholics never could do. It is too much an act of will and leaves too little room for the idea that God will release us from the drink obsession provided we follow the A.A. program." Letter, 1949 ************************************************** ******** Walk In Dry Places Material things matter The Money Problem Now and then we have heated discussions about the role of material things in sobriety. Someone is bound to say that money can't buy happiness and that the spiritual has to come first. But material things do matter in our lives, and we share with others the same desire to get ahead in life. We usually like good clothes, new cars, and steady pay checks. It is somewhat hypocritical to say that money and material things don't matter when we obviously need money and would like to have more of it. Our problem with money and material things occurred when we made a god of them, when we saw worldly success as the end-all and be-all of life. The proper function of money is to provide for smooth exchange of the goods and services we must use in order to live. Far from denouncing spiritual gifts that should be used properly, but not worshipped. More than likely, we can appreciate material things far more than we did while drinking, despite the exaggerated love we had then for worldly things. I will neither despise material things nor make a god of them today. I will view them as part of God's plan, as things to use. ************************************************** ********* Keep It Simple Fair play is primarily not blaming others for anything that is wrong with us.---Eric Hoffer It's tempting to blame others for our problems. Recovery asks us to answer for our actions. Admitting we are powerless over our actions. Admitting we are powerless over our alcohol and other drugs is a start. Each of the Twelve Steps asks us to answer for our actions in some way. And the program shows us how to do this. Over time, we see that being responsible for our actions is the best way to live. Our self-confidence grows as we become more responsible. We start to see just how much we can do. We have gone from being drunks to being responsible people. If we can do this, then we can do anything! Prayer for the Day: I pray to remember that I'm responsible for my actions. Blaming puts distance between me and other people. Higher Power, help me to play fair. Action for the Day: Today, I'll list four times I've blamed someone else for a problem that was really my problem. ************************************************** ********* Each Day a New Beginning I feel we have picked each other from the crowd as fellow-travelers, for neither of us is to the other's personality the end-all and the be-all. --Joanna Field We must look around at the people in our lives today, and know that we have something special to offer each of them, and they to us. We do travel separate paths together. We may need to learn tolerance; perhaps a friend's behavior pushes us to be more tolerant. Impatience may be our nemesis, and everywhere we turn are lines, slow cash registers, traffic jams. Our experiences with others aren't chance. Fellow travelers are carefully selected by the inner self, the spiritual guide who understands our needs in this life. We are both the teachers and the pupils. We need both our friends and those we may label our enemies for what they can help us learn. I will carefully look about me today with gladness at the travelers I've selected to learn from. ************************************************** ********* Alcoholics Anonymous - Fourth Edition Chapter 9 - The Family Afterward A word about sex relations. Alcohol is so sexually stimulating to some men that they have over-indulged. Couples are occasionally dismayed to find that when drinking is stopped the man tends to be impotent. Unless the reason is understood, there may be an emotional upset. Some of us had this experience, only to enjoy, in a few months, a finer intimacy than ever. There should be no hesitancy in consulting a doctor or psychologist if the condition persists. We do not know of many cases where this difficulty lasted long. p. 134 ************************************************** ********* Alcoholics Anonymous - Fourth Edition Stories BUILDING A NEW LIFE - Hallucinating and restrained by sheriff's deputies and hospital staff, this once-happy family man received an unexpected gift from God--a firm foundation in sobriety that would hold up through good times and bad. Once I was sober, my wife took me back. I felt that I had to go back to take care of the kids I had once left on welfare. My third son is our A.A. baby. I also got to see all our boys play sports. There were other A.A.'s with kids on the teams, and we would hang around together at the games. I really enjoyed myself. My sobriety baby is now in college. I have beautiful relationships with all my kids. pp. 484-485 ************************************************** ******** Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions Step Seven - "Humbly asked Him to remove our shortcomings. " For us, the process of gaining a new perspective was unbelievably painful. It was only by repeated humiliations that we were forced to learn something about humility. It was only at the end of a long road, marked by successive defeats and humiliations, and the final crushing of our self sufficiency, that we began to feel humility as something more than a condition of groveling despair. Every newcomer in Alcoholics Anonymous is told, and soon realizes for himself, that his humble admission of powerlessness over alcohol is his first step toward liberation from its paralyzing grip. pp. 72-73 ************************************************** ********* Warriors Anonymous Practice of the Day- BB pg 86- Ch 6- Into Action: (Referencing the directions for the 11th Step) On awakening let us think about the twenty-four hours ahead. We consider our plans for the day. Before we begin, we ask God to direct our thinking, especially asking that it be divorced from self-pity, dishonest or self-seeking motives. Under these conditions we can employ our mental faculties with assurance, for after all God gave us brains to use. Our thought-life will be placed on a much higher plane when our thinking is cleared of wrong motives. -Tom- My sponsor took a lot of time making sure I understood these particular instructions for the morning portion of the 11th step. -first lesson was when I should do the 11th step- “upon awakening” meaning first thing of every morning. Personally I need a cup of coffee in me before my brain wakes up, then I get after it. -second lesson- go directly to my God and ask Him to divorce (which means dis-union) my mind from self-pity, dishonesty and self-seeking motives. The most important thing is that I am asking Him to do that for me, I cannot do it myself. Remember at the beginning we established “the main problem of the alcoholic/addict centers in his mind rather than in his body”. I can’t change me, I don’t have the Power, but my Higher Power does. This is not a “self-help” program, it is a “Higher Power reliance” program. -third lesson- it is not until the 11th step that AA says “now you can use your brain and start thinking, and this is how we go about thinking” I would not be able to think clearly and confidently unless I had completed the 10 previous Steps. I pray that today I put all my efforts in the Solution and pay no attention to the problem. |
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