11/17

DAILY PONDERABLES

Together WE Trudge The Road OF Happy Destiny

Daily Reflections

OVERCOMING LONELINESS

Almost without exception, alcoholics are tortured by loneliness. Even before our drinking got bad and people began to cut us off, nearly all of us suffered the feeling that we didn't quite belong.

AS BILL SEES IT, p. 90

The agonies and the void that I often felt inside occur less and less frequently in my life today. I have learned to cope with solitude. It is only when I am alone and calm that I am able to communicate with God, for He cannot reach me when I am in turmoil. It is good to maintain contact with God at all times, but it is absolutely essential that, when everything seems to go wrong, I maintain that contact through prayer and meditation.

From the book Daily Reflections

Twenty-Four Hours A Day

A.A. Thought for the Day

Everyone has two personalities, a good and a bad. We are all dual personalities to some extent. When we were drinking, the bad personality was in control. We did things when we were drunk that we would never do when we were sober. When we sober up, we are different people. Then we wonder how we could have done the things we did. But we drink again, and again our bad side comes out. So we are back and forth, always in conflict with our other selves, always in a stew. This division of our selves is not good; we must somehow become unified. We do this by giving ourselves wholeheartedly to A.A. and to sobriety. Have I become unified?

Meditation for the Day

"Well done, thou good and faithful servant. Enter into the joy of Thy Lord." These words are for many ordinary people whom the world may pass by, unrecognizing. Not to the world-famed, the proud, the wealthy, are these words spoken, but to the quiet followers who serve God unobtrusively yet faithfully, who bear their crosses bravely and put a smiling face to the world. "Enter into the joy of Thy Lord." Pass into that fuller spiritual life, which is a life of joy and peace.

Prayer for the Day

I pray that I may not desire the world's applause. I pray that I may not seek rewards for doing what I believe is right.

From the book Twenty-Four Hours a Day

NA - Just for Today

Walking Through The Pain

"We never have to use again, no matter how we feel. All feelings will eventually pass."

Basic Text p. 79

It hurts like never before. You get out of bed after a sleepless night, talk to God, and still don't feel any better. "It will pass;" a little voice tells you. "When?" you wonder, as you pace and mutter and get on with your day.

You sob in your car and turn the radio all the way up so you can't hear your own thoughts. But you go straight to work, and don't even think about using drugs.

Your insides feel as though they've been torched. Just when the pain becomes unbearable, you go numb and silent. You go to a meeting and wish you were as happy as other members seem to be. But you don't relapse.

You cry some more and call your sponsor. You drive to a friend's house and don't even notice the beautiful scenery because your inner landscape is so bleak. You may not feel any better after visiting your friend-but at least you didn't visit the connection instead.

You listen to a Fifth Step. You share at a meeting. You look at the calendar and realize you've gotten through another day clean.

Then one day you wake up, look outside, and realize it's a beautiful day. The sun is shining. The sky is blue. You take a deep breath, smile again, and know that it really does pass.

Just for today: No matter how I feel today, I'll go on with my recovery.

pg. 335

From the book Just for Today

Thought for Today

"Hope begins in the dark, the stubborn hope that if you just show up

and try to do the right thing, the dawn will come. You wait and watch and work: You don't give up." --Anne Lamott

Who has a harder fight than he who is striving to overcome himself.

~Thomas a Kempis

Humility, that low, sweet root, from which all heavenly virtues shoot.

~Thomas Moore

Yesterday ended last night. Today is a brand new day.

~Zig Ziglar

Buddha/Zen Thoughts

The very purpose of our life is happiness, the very motion of our lives is toward happiness. -His Holiness the Dalai Lama

"We absolutely insist on enjoying life" Big Book, p. 132.

Native American

Humbleness means peace and honesty -- both mean Hopi. True, honest, perfect words -- that's what we call Hopi words. In all languages, not just in Hopi. We strive to be Hopi. We call ourselves Hopi because maybe one or two of us will become Hopi. Each person must look into their heart and make changes so that you may become Hopi when you reach your destination."

-- Percy Lomaquahu, HOPI

The Creator has made available to us all the laws, principles and values which we need to know to live in harmony. The Creator also designed each human being to learn and grow by trial and error. We have tools to help us live the right way. We have prayers, visions, nature, teachers, Elders, and we have the Great Spirit to talk to and ask for help when we have problems. We also have choice. To walk the Red Road takes courage and a lot of prayer.

Creator, give me courage to walk the Red Road.

Keep It Simple

Mishaps are like knives that either serve us or cut us, as we grasp them by the blade or the handle. ---Herman Melville

We have hung on in hard times. We made it through our addiction. Some of us have lived through abuse. We've felt like our hearts were broken. But we’ve proven we are survivors. Now we’re learning that we can heal.

Being recovery doesn't mean things will be easy. But we have a Higher Power to help us. We have friends who listen to us, care for us, and help us through the pain. Because of our recovery program, we’re able to keep hope and love in our lives --- One Day at a Time.

Prayer for the Day: Higher Power, help me through the hard times. Help me trust in Your love and care.

Action for the Day: Today, I’'ll plan ahead with my sponsor. What will I do now so that I'’ll have strong support when hard times come?

TWELVESTEPS

and

TWELVE TRADITIONS

Tradition Ten (pgs 177-179)

Maybe this sounds as though the alcoholics in A.A. had suddenly gone peaceable, and become one great big happy family. Of course, this isn’t so at all. Human beings that we are, we squabble. Before we leveled off a bit, A.A. looked more like one prodigious squabble than anything else, at least on the surface. A corporation director who had just voted a company expenditure of a hundred thousand dollars would appear at an A.A. business meeting and blow his top over an outlay of twenty-five dollars’ worth of needed postage stamps. Disliking the attempt of some to manage a group, half its membership might angrily rush off to form another group more to their liking. Elders, temporarily turned Pharisee, have sulked. Bitter attacks have been directed against people suspected of mixed motives. Despite their din, our puny rows never did A.A. a particle of harm. They were just part and parcel of learning to work and live together. Let it be noted, too, that they were almost always concerned with ways to make A.A. more effective, how to do the most good for the most alcoholics.

The Washingtonian Society, a movement among alcoholics which started in Baltimore a century ago, almost discovered the answer to alcoholism. At first, the society was composed entirely of alcoholics trying to help one another. The early members foresaw that they should dedicate themselves to this sole aim. In many respects, the Washingtonians were akin to A.A. of today. Their membership passed the hundred thousand mark. Had they been left to themselves, and had they stuck to their one goal, they might have found the rest of the answer. But this didn’t happen. Instead, the Washingtonians permitted politicians and reformers, both alcoholic and nonalcoholic, to use the society for their own purposes. Abolition of slavery, for example, was a stormy political issue then. Soon, Washingtonian speakers violently and publicly took sides on this question. Maybe the society could have survived the abolition controversy, but it didn’t have a chance from the moment it determined to reform America’s drinking habits. When the Washingtonians became temperance crusaders, within a very few years they had completely lost their effectiveness in helping alcoholics.

The lesson to be learned from the Washingtonians was not overlooked by Alcoholics Anonymous. As we surveyed the wreck of that movement, early A.A. members resolved to keep our Society out of public controversy. Thus was laid the cornerstone for Tradition Ten: “Alcoholics Anonymous has no opinion on outside issues; hence the A.A. name ought never be drawn into public controversy.”

Big Book

"Above everything, we alcoholics must be rid of this selfishness. We

must, or it kill us! God makes that possible. And there often seems

no way of entirely getting rid of self without His aid. Many of us

had moral and philosophical convictions galore, but we could not live

up to them even though we would have liked to."

~Alcoholics Anonymous, 4th Edition, How It Works, pg. 62

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The principles of the 12 steps can be very difficult

or very simple to understand.

This is an effort to simplify the meaning of the principles of the 12 steps for those who may be having difficulty. These are the principles that are incorporated into our daily lives as ‘we walk the walk’. Employing each of these behaviors will help to rebuild a life of increased self esteem and self confidence. So, in my never ending quest to keep it simple, here are the action principles behind the twelve steps:

1. Honesty - The operative principle behind step 1 is honesty. If you cannot get honest about the scope of your problem, and honest about a sincere effort to resolve it you will not succeed. How about a definition of honesty as the absence of the intention to deceive? Who do we try to fool? Ourselves

2. Hope – In order to engage in a course of addiction recovery, we must have hope of success. If there is no hope, why try? Perhaps we have failed on our own, how about enlisting some help? A way to instill hope is to realize recovery is not a question of ability; after all there are millions in recovery, but rather persistence and application.

3. Faith – This stage of action is to begin to employ the recovery skills being learned. You can seek out help, but it is also necessary to utilize it. Our job is to become willing to do the right thing. A simple way to view the ‘next right thing’ is don’t engage in your behavior. Have faith it will work.

4. Courage - This step is really about courage to honestly (see step 1) look at ourselves. Take a look at how our behavior has become warped to justify our continued behavior. We are here to take an honest assessment of ourselves.

5. Integrity - If we have truly done a thorough job of introspection and evaluation of our assets and shortcomings do we have the integrity to own up to it? It can be very difficult to be open and honest about our past behaviors. We accept the need for a dose of humility.

6. Willingness – Now that we have accomplished an inventory of the good and no so good aspects of our character and behavior, are we willing to change them? All of them? The important part in this 12 step principle is the willingness to let go of old behaviors.

7. Humility – Here we move further into action, in step 6 we became willing to as let go of our old behaviors, now we ask for help in actually letting go. Can we learn to forgive ourselves?

8. Discipline and Action – We are continuing to remove the barriers that can block forward sober growth. We are getting ready to sweep our side of the street clean. Make a list of all those people we have harmed both through actions and not being present to live up to obligations.

9. Forgiveness – Asking for the forgiveness of those we have intentionally or unintentionally injured is the order of the day. A key point here is to try to correct those injuries through action, not just words. It is highly recommended that guidance and help is utilized here. Asking forgiveness is not a gift to the other person, but rather an act of kindness to you.

10. Acceptance - To be human is to make mistakes. Hopefully our journey has led us to the point where we can readily admit mistakes and accept ourselves for being imperfect. We must also learn not to judge others but accept them for who they are, not our vision of who they should be.

11. Knowledge and Awareness – Here we search and become aware of following our path being aware of our purpose in life and actively pursuing it. I view this principle as just being aware, not being got up in the rush of life, making conscious effort to do the right thing and to be at peace.

12. Service and Gratitude - Having brought about a personality change sufficient to remain in recovery; we are empowered to demonstrate the new principles by which we live, in our daily life through example. We seek out and are available to help others in need.

There you have it. Simple actions you can practice each and every day to improve the quality of your life in addiction recovery and those people you come in contact with. These are the simple one word action principles of the 12 steps.