DAILY PONDERABLES
Together WE Trudge The Road OF Happy Destiny
Daily Reflections
LIVE AND LET LIVE
Never since it began has Alcoholics Anonymous been divided by a major controversial issue. Nor has our Fellowship ever publicly taken sides on any question in an embattled world. This, however, has been no earned virtue. It could almost be said that we were born with it. . . . "So long as we don't argue these matters privately, it's a cinch we never shall publicly."
TWELVE STEPS AND TWELVE TRADITIONS, p. 176
Do I remember that I have a right to my opinion but others don't have to share it? That's the spirit of "Live and Let Live." The Serenity Prayer reminds me, with God's help, to "Accept the things I cannot change." Am I still trying to change others? When it comes to "Courage to change the things I can," do I remember that my opinions are mine, and yours are yours? Am I still afraid to be me? When it comes to "Wisdom to know the difference," do I remember that my opinions come from my experience? If I have a know-it-all attitude, aren't I being deliberately controversial?
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 real friends where I had none before. My drinking companions could hardly be called my real friends, though when drunk we seemed to have the closest kind of friendship. My idea of friendship has changed. Friends are no longer people whom I can use for my own pleasure or profit. Friends are now people who understand me and I them, whom I can help and who can help me to live a better life. I have learned not to hold back and wait for friends to come to me, but to go halfway and to be met halfway, openly and freely. Does friendship have a new meaning for me?
Meditation for the Day
There is a time for everything. We should learn to wait patiently until the right time comes. Easy does it. We waste our energies in trying to get things before we are ready to have them, before we have earned the right to receive them. A great lesson we have to learn is how to wait with patience. We can believe that all our life is a preparation for something better to come when we have earned the right to it. We can believe that God has a plan for our lives and that this plan will work out in the fullness of time.
Prayer for the Day
I pray that I may learn the lesson of waiting patiently. I pray that I may not expect things until I have earned the right to have them.
From the book Twenty-Four Hours a Day
© Copyright 1975 by Hazelden Foundation
NA - Just for Today
Courage
"Our newly found faith serves as a firm foundation for courage in the future."
Basic Text, p.93
Narcotics Anonymous is no place for the faint of heart! Facing life on life's terms without the use of drugs isn't always easy. Recovery requires more than hard work; it requires a liberal dose of courage.
What is courage, anyway? A quick look at a dictionary will tell us. We have courage when we face and deal with anything that we think of as difficult, dangerous, or painful, rather than withdrawing from it. Courage means being brave; having a purpose; having spirit. So what is courage, really? Courage is an attitude, one of perseverance.
That's what an addict in recovery really needs - perseverance. We make that commitment to stick with our program, to avoid using, no matter what happens. A courageous addict is one who doesn't use, one day at a time, no matter what. And what gives us courage? A relationship with a Higher Power gives us the strength and the courage to stay clean. We know that, so long as we are in our God's care, we will have the power we need to face life on its own terms.
Just for today: I have a Higher Power who cares for me, no matter what. Knowing that, I will strive to have an attitude of courage today.
pg. 316
From the book Just for Today
© Copyright 1991-2013 by Narcotics Anonymous World Services, Inc.
Thought for Today
"If you are pained by external things, it is not they that disturb you,
but your own judgment of them. And it is in your power to wipe out that judgment now."
--Marcus Aurelius Antoninus
How can you have a relationship with a God that you cannot see if you can’t have relationships with people that you can see?
Buddha/Zen Thoughts
Even if you seek tranquility, delight in goodness, and search for the source, if you don't meet someone with genuine true knowledge and understanding, it will turn instead into major error. The fault lies in false teachers.
-P'u-an
Native American
My children, you have forgotten the customs and traditions of your forefathers. ...You have bought guns, knives, kettles, and blankets from the white man until you can no longer do without them; and what is worse you have drunk the poison firewater, which turns you into fools. Fling all these things away; live as your forefathers did before you."
-- Pontiac, ODOWA
We need to think as our forefathers did. They knew the culture and the customs. The culture taught them how to live in harmony with each other. We need to think like this again. We must be God-reliant. We don't need the firewater. This liquid is very destructive to our native people. It kills our spirit. Our Indian people are happiest when we are spiritual. When we depend on anyone or anything else, we get off track. We need to talk to the Elders and find out what the old ways were. We need to ask them to teach us the culture, the tradition, and the customs. This will help us become whole again.
My Maker, guide my path as you did my ancestors
Keep It Simple
The universe is full of magical things waiting for our wits to grow sharper. --- Eden Phillpots
How nice to have the fog lifted! Sobriety lets our wits grow sharper. We can go after our dreams and ideas. We can listen to music and sing. We are part of the magic of the universe. At times we may not feel very magical, but we are. Our spirits hold much magic. Sobriety is magic. We work at making the world a better place. In doing so, we get magical powers. Power that heals and comfort others. Power that heals and comforts others. Powers to understand things that before we could not. Powers that let us see the world as we’ve
never seen it. Enjoy the magic and use your powers wisely!
Prayer for the Day: Higher Power, let Your magic enter and fill my heart.
Action for the Day: I’ll list four magical powers I have from being sober.
TWELVESTEPS
and
TWELVE TRADITIONS
Tradition Four (pgs 148-149)
But alas, this bright scene was not long in darkening. Confusion replaced serenity. It was found that some drunks yearned for education, but doubted if they were alcoholics. The personality defects of others could be cured maybe with a loan. Some were club-minded, but it was just a question of taking care of the lonely heart. Sometimes the swarming applicants would go for all three floors. Some would start at the top and come through to the bottom, becoming club members; others started in the club, pitched a binge, were hospitalized, then graduated to education on the third floor. It was a beehive of activity, all right, but
unlike a beehive, it was confusion compounded. An A.A. group, as such, simply couldn’t handle this sort of project. All too late that was discovered. Then came the inevitable explosion—something like that day the boiler burst in Wombley’s Clapboard Factory. A chill chokedamp of fear and frustration fell over the group.
When that lifted, a wonderful thing had happened. The head promoter wrote the Foundation office. He said he wished he’d paid some attention to A.A. experience. Then he did something else that was to become an A.A. classic. It all went on a little card about golf-score size. The cover read: “Middleton Group #1, Rule #62.” Once the card was unfolded, a single pungent sentence leaped to the eye: “Don’t take yourself too damn seriously.”
Thus it was that under Tradition Four an A.A. group had exercised its right to be wrong. Moreover, it had performed a great service for Alcoholics Anonymous, because it had been humbly willing to apply the lessons it learned. It had picked itself up with a laugh and gone on to better things. Even the chief architect, standing in the ruins of his dream, could laugh at himself—and that is the very acme of humility.
____________
* 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
"There is action and more action. 'Faith without works is dead.'"
~Alcoholics Anonymous, 4th Edition, Into Action, pg. 88~
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Friends I Haven’t Met
Who knew that when I joined AA, we’d make so many friends?
It’s not the reason why I came, I needed just to mend
Been beaten down, was so alone and in an awful state
Old friends that used to come around began to deviate
Some had tried to offer help, but I turned them away
The problem is with you, not me, they’d often hear me say
So, one by one, they gave it up, I seemed a hopeless case
It saddened them that they could not my misery displace
When thoughts arose to end it all, I knew that we had to act
Go through with it or ask for help, but who could I contact
I’d heard about AA but never thought it was for me
It’s filled with tramps and low life bums and rooms filled with debris
But since I had no where to turn, I slipped into meeting
So, I sat down, way in the back, not looking for a greeting
I was surprised at what I saw, the room was fully packed
I kept my eyes turned to the floor, afraid to make contact
Then an old lady sat by me, and asked me if I’m new
I’m only here to help a friend to find what he could do
She said that was a noble act, but it was plain to see
That friend that was in need of help was really only me
At meetings end she cornered me and would not let me leave
She told me of what she’d been through and I could not conceive
The words she said referred to her, this dame was upper crust
She came from high society and ended in disgust
We were the most unlikely pair, we came from different classes
She from a life of luxury and me the huddled masses
But I could seem a common thread, we both had lived with shame
And shared an illness of the mind, we really were the same
A light went right after that, I knew she hoped it would
That there were other people here that really understood
And they did not past judgement, but instead chose to assist
In giving one more desperate soul a chance to re-exist
Although I still had many doubts that this could work for me
I kept on coming back again, an AA wannabee
I listened to what people shared and wanted what they had
A life not ruled by alcohol, at peace and truly glad
A member saw that I was new and told me of a bunch
Of men who gathered once a week, together to have lunch
He asked me if I’d like to join this Thursday afternoon
It’s best to get there early, the tables fill up soon
As look back, that was the day my life began to change
I’d never been a joiner, the idea of it was strange
These men knew nothing of me, yet they made me feel at home
To share with them in fellowship, a kind I’d never known
One of them was a doctor, another one a priest
They came from every walk of life, a felon just released
Each man gave me his number and invited me to call
Whenever I’d just want to talk for no reason at all
Since then I’ve made so many friends, all members of AA
We hardly ever talk of things that made us go astray
Our conversations focus on the lives we live today
And how, due to this fellowship, we found a better way
When new folks come into the rooms, it’s my turn them to greet
The same way that old lady did when I took my first seat
It is not easy those first days, I try not to forget
The sad sack sitting all alone is a Friend I Haven’t Met
Larry R.
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