DAILY PONDERABLES
Together WE Trudge The Road OF Happy Destiny
Daily Reflections
AN INDIVIDUAL ADVENTURE
Meditation is something which can always be further developed. It has no boundaries, either of width or height. Aided by such instruction and example as we can find, it is essentially an individual adventure, something which each one of us works out in his own way.
TWELVE STEPS AND TWELVE TRADITIONS, p. 101
My spiritual growth is with God as I understand Him. With Him I find my true inner self. Daily meditation and prayer strengthen and renew my source of well-being. I receive openness to accept all that He has to offer. With God I have the reassurance that my journey will be as He wants for me, and for that I am grateful to have God in my life.
From the book Daily Reflections
© Copyright 1990 by Alcoholics Anonymous World Services, Inc.
Twenty-Four Hours A Day
A.A. Thought for the Day
I have lost much of my inferiority complex. I was always trying to escape from life. I did not want to face reality. I was full of self-pity. I was constantly sorry for myself. I tried to avoid all responsibilities. I did not feel that I would handle the responsibilities of my family or my work. Owing to my inferiority complex, I was eager to be free of all responsibilities. I wanted to drift; I wanted to be "on the beach." A.A. showed me how to get over my feeling of inferiority. It made me want to accept responsibility again. Have I lost my inferiority complex?
Meditation for the Day
"One thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things that are before, I press onward toward the goal." We should forget those things which are behind us and press onward toward something better. We can believe that God has forgiven us for all our past sins, provided we are honestly trying to live today the way we believe He wants us to live. We can wipe clean the slate of the past. We can start today with a clean slate and go forward with confidence toward the goal that has been set before us.
Prayer for the Day
I pray that I may drop off the load of the past. I pray that I may start today with a light heart and a new confidence.
From the book Twenty-Four Hours a Day
© Copyright 1975 by Hazelden Foundation
NA - Just for Today
Freed From Insanity
Do I believe it would be insane to walk up to someone and say, "May I please have a heart attack or a fatal accident."
Basic Text p.23
We've heard it said that unless we're in love, we can't remember what love feels like. The same could be said of insanity: Once we're freed of it, we may forget how truly bizarre our insane thinking can be. But to be grateful for the degree of sanity to which we've been restored in Narcotics Anonymous, we need to remember just how truly insane we've been.
Today, it may be bard to imagine saying something as ridiculous as, "May I please have a heart attack or a fatal accident?" No one in their right mind is going to ask for such things. And that's the point. In our active addiction, we were not in our right mind. Each day we practiced our addiction, we courted fatal disease, degradation, exploitation, impoverishment, imprisonment, death by violence, even death by sheer stupidity. In that context, the idea of asking for a heart attack or a fatal accident doesn't sound all that far out. That's how insane we've been.
The program, the fellowship, and our Higher power-together, they've worked a miracle. The Second Step is not a vain hope - it is reality. Knowing the degree of the insanity we've experienced, we can appreciate all the more the miraculous Power that has restored us thus far to sanity. For that, we are truly grateful.
Just for today: I will take some time to recall how insane I've been while practicing my addiction. Then, I will thank my Higher Power for the sanity that's been restored to my life.
pg. 326
From the book Just for Today
© Copyright 1991-2013 by Narcotics Anonymous World Services, Inc.
Thought for Today
Pride makes us artificial and humility makes us real.
~Thomas Merton
St. Theresa's Prayer:
May today there be peace within.
May you trust your highest power that you are exactly where you are meant to be.
May you not forget the infinite possibilities that are born of faith. May you use those gifts that you have received, and pass on the love that has been given to you.
May you be content knowing you are a child of God. Let his presence settle into your bones, and allow your soul the freedom to sing, dance, praise and love.
It is there for each and everyone of you.
Buddha/Zen Thoughts
Once an old woman came to Buddha and asked him how to meditate. He told her to remain aware of every movement of her hands as she drew water from the well, knowing that if she did, she would soon find herself in that state of alert and spacious calm that is meditation.
Native American
"See how the boy is with his sister and the other ones of his home lodge and you can know how the man will be with your daughter."
--LAKOTA Proverb
Very early in our lives we form beliefs, attitudes, expectations and habits. We will live by these habits when we are older. The Elders say to watch the boy with his sister. If he is respectful and treats her good, then odds are that;s the way he will treat all women when he is older. Also, watch the young girl and how she treats her brother, for that will indicate what kind of woman she will be to her man. We need to teach our children to respect one another while they are young. The best way to teach them is to show respect ourselves.
Great Spirit, let me be a role model for the children.
Keep It Simple
Any man may make a mistake; none but a fool will persist in it. --- Cicero.
The way we face life's challenges is what gives meaning to our lives. If we run from our mistakes, they follow us. If we stand up and work with them, we learn. Facing our mistakes teaches us wisdom and courage. Our self-respect grows. Spiritual growth means asking, “How would my Higher Power want me to deal with this mistake?” Then we listen for the answer and do what is needed. The better we get at facing our mistakes, the better we become at learning from them. Native American culture teaches us that all mistakes in life are gifts. The gift is that we are given a chance to learn.
Prayer for the Day: Higher Power, help me face the mistakes of life and find the lessons that lie within them.
Action for the Day: When I make a mistake, I'll stop and ask, "What does my Higher Power want me to learn from this?”
TWELVESTEPS
and
TWELVE TRADITIONS
Tradition Seven (pgs 163-164)
“The meeting that night was at New York’s old 24th Street Clubhouse. During the intermission, the treasurer gave a timid talk on how broke the club was. (That was in the period when you couldn’t mix money and A.A.) But finally he said it—the landlord would put us out if we didn’t pay up. He concluded his remarks by saying, ‘Now boys, please go heavier on the hat tonight, will you?
“I heard all this quite plainly, as I was piously trying to convert a newcomer who sat next to me. The hat came in my direction, and I reached into my pocket. Still working on my prospect, I fumbled and came up with a fifty-cent piece. Somehow it looked like a very big coin. Hastily, I dropped it back and fished out a dime, which clinked thinly as I dropped it in the hat. Hats never got folding money in those days.
“Then I woke up. I who had boasted my generosity that morning was treating my own club worse than the distant alcoholics who had forgotten to send the Foundation their dollars. I realized that my five-dollar gift to the slippee was an ego-feeding proposition, bad for him and bad for me. There was a place in A.A. where spirituality and money would mix, and that was in the hat!”
There is another story about money. One night in 1948, the trustees of the Foundation were having their quarterly meeting. The agenda discussion included a very important question. A certain lady had died. When her will was read, it was discovered she had left Alcoholics Anonymous in trust with the Alcoholic Foundation a sum of ten thousand dollars. The question was: Should A.A. take the gift?
What a debate we had on that one! The Foundation was really hard up just then; the groups weren’t sending in enough for the support of the office; we had been tossing in all the book income and even that hadn’t been enough. The reserve was melting like snow in springtime. We needed that ten thousand dollars. “Maybe,” some said, “the groups will never fully support the office. We can’t let it shut down; it’s far too vital. Yes, let’s take the money. Let’s take all such donations in the future. We’re going to need them.”
Big Book
"Some people cannot be seen--we send them an honest letter. And there
may be a valid reason for postponement in some cases. But we don't
delay if it can be avoided. We should be sensible, tactful, considerate
and humble without being servile or scraping. As God's people we stand
on our feet; we don't crawl before anyone."
~Alcoholics Anonymous, 4th Edition, Into Action, Page 83~
The Fundamentals--In Retrospect - AA Grapevine - September 1948
Dr. Bob
THE feeling that one belongs to and has a definite personal part in the work of a growing and spiritually prospering organization for the release of the alcoholics of mankind from a deadly enslavement is always gratifying. For me, there is double gratification in the realization that more than 13 years ago, an All-wise Providence, whose ways must always be mysterious to our limited understandings, brought me to "see my duty clear" and to contribute in a decent humility, as have so many others, my part in guiding the first trembling steps of the then infant organization, Alcoholics Anonymous.
It is fitting at this time to indulge in some retrospect regarding certain fundamentals. Much has been written, much has been said about the 12 Steps of A.A. These tenets of our faith and practice were not worked out overnight and then presented to our members as an opportunist creed. Born of our early trials and many tribulations, they were and are the result of humble and sincere desire, sought in personal prayer for Divine guidance.
As finally expressed and offered, they are simple in language, plain in meaning. They are also workable by any person having a sincere desire to obtain and keep sobriety. The results are the proof. Their simplicity and workability are such that no special interpretations, and certainly no reservations, have ever been necessary. And it has become increasingly clear that the degree of harmonious living which we achieve is in direct ratio to our earnest attempt to follow them literally under Divine guidance to the best of our ability.
YET, withal, there are no "shibboleths" in A.A. We are not bound by the thongs of theological doctrine. None of us may be excommunicated and cast into outer darkness. For we are many minds in our organization and an A.A. Decalogue in the language of "Thou shalt not" would gall us indeed.
Look at our 12 Points of A.A. Tradition. No random expressions these, based on just casual observation. On the contrary, they represent the sum of our experience as individuals, as groups within A.A. and similarly with our fellows and other organizations in the great fellowship of humanity under God throughout the world. They are entirely suggestive, yet the spirit in which they have been conceived merits their serious, prayerful consideration as the guidepost of A.A. policy for the individual, the group and our various committees, local and national.
We have found it wise policy, too, to hold to no glorification of the individual. Obviously, that is sound. Most of us will concede that when it came to the personal showdown of admitting our failures and deciding to surrender our will and our lives to Almighty God, as we understood Him, we still had some sneaking ideas of personal justification and excuse. We had to discard them but the ego of the alcoholic dies a hard death. Many of us because of activity have received praise not only from our fellow A.A.s but from the world at large. We would be ungrateful indeed to be boorish when that happens yet it is so easy for us to become, privately perhaps, just a little vain about it all. Yet, fitting and wearing halos is not for us.
WE'VE all seen the new member who stays sober for a time, largely through sponsor-worship. Then maybe the sponsor gets drunk and you know what usually happens. Left without a human prop, the new member gets drunk too. He has been glorifying an individual instead of following the Program.
Certainly we need leaders but we must regard them as the human agents of the Higher Power and not with undue adulation as individuals. The 4th and 10th Steps can not be too strongly emphasized here--"Make a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves . . . continue to make personal inventory . . . promptly admit it when we are wrong." There is your perfect antidote for halo-poisoning.
So with the question of Anonymity. If we have a banner, that word, speaking of the surrender of the individual--the ego--is emblazoned on it. Let us dwell thoughtfully on its full meaning and learn thereby to remain humble, modest, ever-conscious that we are eternally under Divine direction.
ALCOHOLICS ANONYMOUS was nurtured in its early days around a kitchen table. Many of our pioneer groups, some of our most result-full meetings and best programs have had their origin around that modest piece of furniture with the coffee pot handy on the stove.
True, we have progressed materially to better furniture and more comfortable surroundings, yet the kitchen table must ever be appropriate for us. It is the perfect symbol of simplicity. In A.A. we have no V.I.P.'s nor have we need of any. Our organization needs no title-holders nor grandiose buildings. That is by design. Experience has taught us that simplicity is basic in preservation of our personal sobriety and helping those in need.
Far better it is for us to fully understand the meaning and practice of "Thou good and faithful servant" than to listen to "With 60,000 members you should have a 60 stories high administration headquarters in New York with an assortment of trained 'ists' to direct your affairs." We need nothing of the sort. God grant that A.A. may ever stay simple.
Over the years we have tested and developed suitable techniques for our purpose. They are entirely flexible. We have all known and seen miracles--the healing of broken individuals, the rebuilding of broken homes. And always, it has been the constructive personal 12th Step work based on an ever upward-looking faith which has done the job.
IN as large an organization as ours, we naturally have had our share of those who fail to measure up to certain obvious standards of conduct. They have included schemers for personal gain, petty swindlers and confidence men, crooks of various kinds and other human fallibles. Relatively their number has been small, much smaller than in many religious and social uplift organizations. Yet they have been a problem and not an easy one. They have caused many an A.A. to stop thinking and working constructively for a time.
We cannot condone their actions, yet we must concede that when we have used normal caution and precaution in dealing with such cases, we may safely leave them to that Higher Power. Let me reiterate that we A.A.'s are many men and women, that we are of many minds. It will be well for us to concentrate on the goal of personal sobriety and active work. We humans and alcoholics on strict moral stock-taking must confess to at least a slight degree of larcenous instinct. We can hardly arrogate the roles of judges and executioners.
Thirteen grand years! To have been a part of it all from the beginning has been reward indeed.
Dr. Bob
AA Co-Founder, Dr. Bob, September 1948
The Best of the Grapevine, Volume 2
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