DAILY PONDERABLES
Together WE Trudge The Road OF Happy Destiny
Daily Reflections
LOOKING OUTWARD
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.
ALCOHOLICS ANONYMOUS p. 87
As an active alcoholic, I allowed selfishness to run rampant in my life. I was so attached to my drinking and other selfish habits that people and moral principles came second. Now, when I pray for the good of others rather than my "own selfish ends," I practice a discipline in letting go of selfish attachments, caring for my fellows and preparing for the day when I will be required to let go of all earthly attachments.
From the book Daily Reflections
© Copyright 1990 by Alcoholics Anonymous World Services, Inc.
Twenty-Four Hours A Day
A.A. Thought for the Day
Who am I to judge other people? Have I proved by my great success in life that I know all the answers? Exactly the opposite. Until I came into A.A., my life could be called a failure. I made all the mistakes one could make. I took all the wrong roads there were to take. On the basis of my record, am I a fit person to be a judge of other people? Hardly. In A.A. I have learned not to judge people. I am so often wrong. Let the results of what they do judge them. It's not up to me. Am I less harsh in my judgment of people?
Meditation of the Day
In our time of meditation, we again seem to hear: "Come unto me, all ye that are weary and heavy laden, and I will give you rest." Again and again we seem to hear God saying this to us "Come unto me" for the solution of every problem, for the overcoming of every temptation, for the calming of every fear, for all our need, physical, mental, or spiritual, but mostly "come unto me" for the strength we need to live with peace of mind and the power to be useful and effective.
Prayer for the Day
I pray that I may go to God today for those things, which I need to help me live. I pray that I may find real peace of mind.
From the book Twenty-Four Hours a Day
© Copyright 1975 by Hazelden Foundation
NA - Just for Today
Not Perfect
"We are not going to be perfect. If we were perfect, we would not be human."
Basic Text p. 30
All of us had expectations about life in recovery. Some of us thought recovery would suddenly make us employable or able to do anything in the world we wanted to do. Or maybe we imagined perfect ease in our interactions with others. When we stop and think, we realize that we expected recovery would make us perfect. We didn't expect to continue making many mistakes. But we do. That's not the addict side of us showing through; that's being human.
In Narcotics Anonymous we strive for recovery, not perfection. The only promise we are given is freedom from active addiction. Perfection is not an attainable state for human beings; it's not a realistic goal. What we often seek in perfection is freedom from the discomfort of making mistakes. In return for that freedom from discomfort, we trade our curiosity, our flexibility, and the room to grow.
We can consider the trade: Do we want to live the rest of our lives in our well-defined little world, safe but perhaps stifled? Or do we wish to venture out into the unknown, take a risk, and reach for everything life has to offer?
Just for today: I want all that life has to offer me and all that recovery can provide. Today, I will take a risk, try something new, and grow.
pg. 331
From the book Just for Today
© Copyright 1991-2013 by Narcotics Anonymous World Services, Inc.
Thought for Today
"I have learned silence from the talkative;
tolerance from the intolerant and kindness
from the unkind. I should not be ungrateful
to those teachers."
--Kahlil Gibran
--------------------------------
"I think that there is a very close connection between humility and patience. Humility involves having the capacity to take a more confrontational stance, having the capacity to retaliate if you wish, yet deliberately deciding not to do so. That is what I would call genuine humility. I think that true tolerance or patience has a component or element of self-discipline and restraint - the realization that you could have acted otherwise, you could have adopted a more aggressive approach, but decided not to do so."
The 14th Dalai Lama (thanks to Shannon H.)
Sobriety adds years to your life and life to your years
Buddha/Zen Thoughts
To study the buddha way is to study the self. To study the self is to forget the self. To forget the self is to be actualized by myriad things. When actualized by myriad things, your body and mind as well as the bodies and minds of others drop away. No trace of realization remains, and this no-trace continues endlessly.
-Dogen, "Actualizing the Fundamental Point"
“To be wronged is nothing, unless you continue to remember it.” ― ~Confucius (thanks Rabbi Jenny)
Native American
"My Grandfather survived on this earth without using anything that did not go back into the earth. The whole world could learn from that."
--Floyd Westerman, SIOUX
Our grandfathers knew how to live in harmony. They did not create poisons or technologies that destroyed things. They did not make their decisions based on greed or for selfish reasons. They did not take more then they used. Their thoughts and actions were about respect. The Elders conducted themselves in a respectful way. We need to consider our actions around respect for Mother Earth.
My Creator, have the grandfathers teach us today about the old ways.
Keep It Simple
Write down the advice of him who loves you, though you like it not at present. --- Anonymous
We addicts often learn things the hard way. In the past, we found it very hard to take advice from anyone. It’s still hard to take advice, but it’s getting easier every day. We know now that we can’t handle everything in life by ourselves. We’ve come to believe there is help for us. And we’re learning to ask for help and advice.
Sometimes we don’t like the advice we get. We don’t have to use it. But if it comes from people who love and understand us, we can try to listen. Write it down. Think about it. It may make sense another day.
Prayer for the Day: Higher Power, please work through people who love me. I need your advice. Help me listen to it.
Action for the Day: I will make notes to myself, writing down things that seem important. I will read them once in a while.
TWELVESTEPS
and
TWELVE TRADITIONS
Tradition Nine (pgs 172-173)
“A.A., as such, ought never be organized; but we may create service boards or committees directly responsible to those they serve.”
WHEN Tradition Nine was first written, it said that “Alcoholics Anonymous needs the least possible organization.” In years since then, we have changed our minds about that. Today, we are able to say with assurance that Alcoholics Anonymous—A.A. as a whole—should never be organized at all. Then, in seeming contradiction, we proceed to create special service boards and committees which in themselves are organized. How, then, can we have an unorganized movement which can and does create a service organization for itself? Scanning this puzzler, people say, “What do they mean, no organization?
Well, let’s see. Did anyone ever hear of a nation, a church, a political party, even a benevolent association that had no membership rules? Did anyone ever hear of a society which couldn’t somehow discipline its members and enforce obedience to necessary rules and regulations? Doesn’t nearly every society on earth give authority to some of its members to impose obedience upon the rest and to punish or expel offenders? Therefore, every nation, in fact every form of society, has to be a government administered by human beings. Power to direct or govern is the essence of organization everywhere.
Yet Alcoholics Anonymous is an exception. It does not conform to this pattern. Neither its General Service Conference, its Foundation Board*, nor the humblest group committee can issue a single directive to an A.A. member and make it stick, let alone mete out any punishment. We’ve tried it lots of times, but utter failure is always the result. Groups have tried to expel members, but the banished have come back to sit in the meeting place, saying, “This is life for us; you can’t keep us out.” Committees have instructed many an A.A. to stop working on a chronic backslider, only to be told: “How I do my Twelfth Step work is my business. Who are you to judge?” This doesn’t mean an A.A. won’t take advice or suggestions from more experienced members, but he surely won’t take orders. Who is more unpopular than the oldtime A.A., full of wisdom, who moves to another area and tries to tell the group there how to run its business? He and all like him who “view with alarm for the good of A.A.” meet the most stubborn resistance or, worse still, laughter.
____________
* In 1954, the name of the Alcoholic Foundation, Inc., was changed to the General Service Board of Alcoholics Anonymous, Inc., and the Foundation office is now the General Service Office.
Big Book
"We do not like to pronounce any individual as alcoholic, but you can
quickly diagnose yourself, Step over to the nearest barroom and try
some controlled drinking. Try to drink and stop abruptly. Try it
more than once. It will not take long for you to decide, if you are
honest with yourself about it. It may be worth a bad case of jitters
if you get a full knowledge of your condition."
~Alcoholics Anonymous, 4th Edition, More About Alcoholism, pg. 31~
**************************************************************************
Every AA Ought to Know
From: "The Three Legacies of Alcoholics Anonymous"
Dr. Bob was essentially a far more humble person than I.
In some ways he was a sort of spiritual natural, and this anonymity business came rather easily to him.
He could not understand why some people should want so much publicity.
In the years before he died, his personal example respecting anonymity did much to help me keep my own lid on.
I think of one affecting instance in particular, one that every AA ought to know.
When it was sure that Dr. Bob was mortally afflicted, some of his friends suggested that there should be a suitable monument or mausoleum erected in honor of him and his wife Anne - something befitting a founder and his lady.
Of course this was a very natural and moving tribute. The committee went so far as to show him a sketch of the proposed edifice.
Telling me about this, Dr. Bob grinned broadly and said, God bless them.
They mean well.
But for heaven's sake, Bill, let's you and I get buried just like other folks.
A year after his passing, I visited the Akron cemetery where Dr. Bob and Anne lie.
The simple stone says not a word about Alcoholics Anonymous.
Some people may think that this wonderful couple carried personal anonymity too far when they so firmly refused to use the words "Alcoholics Anonymous" even on their own burial stone.
For one, I do not think so.
I think that this moving and final example of self-effacement will prove of more permanent worth to AA than any amount of public attention or any great monument.
Alcoholics Anonymous Comes of Age, pages 136-137
(Thanks Ronny H.)
To subscribe click the link below:
https://app.getresponse.com/site/dailyponderables/webform.html?wid=108246