DAILY PONDERABLES
Together WE Trudge The Road OF Happy Destiny
Daily Reflections
WITHOUT RESERVATION
When brimming with gratitude, one's heartbeat must surely result in outgoing love, . . .
AS BILL SEES IT, p. 37
While practicing service to others, if my successes give rise to grandiosity, I must reflect on what brought me to this point. What has been given joyfully, with love, must be passed on without reservation and without expectation. For as I grow, I find that no matter how much I give with love, I receive much more in spirit.
From the book Daily Reflections
© Copyright 1990 by Alcoholics Anonymous World Services, Inc.
Twenty-Four Hours A Day
A.A. Thought for the Day
Continuing the consideration of the term "spiritual experience": "What often takes place in a few months could seldom have been accomplished by years of self-discipline. With few exceptions, our members find that they have tapped an unsuspected inner resource which they presently identify with their own conception of a Power greater than themselves. Most of us think this awareness of a Power greater than ourselves the essence of spiritual experience. Some of us call it God-consciousness. In any case, willingness, honesty, and open-mindedness are the essentials of recovery," Have I tapped that inner resource that can change my life?
Meditation for the Day
God's power in your life increases as your ability to understand His grace increases. The power of God's grace is only limited by the understanding and will of each individual. God's miracle-working power is only limited in each individual soul by the lack of spiritual vision of that soul. God respects freewill, the right of each person to accept or reject His miracle-working power. Only the sincere desire of the soul gives Him the opportunity to bestow it.
Prayer for the Day
I pray that I may not limit God's power by my lack of vision. I pray that I may keep my mind open today to His influence.
From the book Twenty-Four Hours a Day
© Copyright 1975 by Hazelden Foundation
NA - Just for Today
Right Back Up
"There is something in our self-destructive personalities that cries for failure."
Basic Text, p.77
"Poor me; woe is me; look at me, my life is such a mess! I've fallen, and no matter how hard I try, I continue to fail!" Many of us came to NA singing this sad refrain.
Life isn't like that anymore. True, sometimes we still stumble; at times we even fall. Sometimes we feel like we can't move forward in our lives, no matter how hard we try. But the truth of the matter is that, with the help of other recovering addicts in NA, we find a hand to pull us up, dust us off, and help us start all over again. That's the new refrain in our lives today. No longer do we say, "I'm a failure and I'm going nowhere!" Usually, it's more like, "Rats! I hit that same bump in the road of life again. Pretty soon I'll learn to slow down or avoid it entirely!" Until then, we may continue to fall down occasionally, but we've learned that there's always a helping hand to set us on our feet again.
Just for today: If I begin to cry failure, I'll remember there is a way to move forward. I will accept the encouragement and support of NA.
From the book Just for Today
© Copyright 1991-2013 by Narcotics Anonymous World Services, Inc.
Thought for Today
"If you can find a path with no obstacles, it probably doesn't lead anywhere."
The true measure of a man is how he treats someone who can do him absolutely no good. ~ Samuel Johnson
"Share your weaknesses. Share your hard moments. Share your real side. It’ll either scare away every fake person in your life or it will inspire them to finally let go of that mirage called “perfection,” which will open the doors to the most important relationships you’ll ever be a part of.”
– Dan Pear (thanks Stan F.)
Practicing What We Preach
A thought we hear repeated at our meetings every day
To keep this gift, SOBEREITY, we have to give away
Extend the hand of fellowship to all that are in need
And do it as its own reward, removed from pride and greed
A member shared a story of a most recent event
Occurring where he went, the AA message to present
It was a form of lock up, most were there against their will
He made this journey every week to tend to those still ill
Some of the folks were there because they’d mentioned suicide
Others from an overdose where they had almost died
Depression, drugs and alcohol became a common theme
Hope was what he went to share, a chance to be redeemed
The format of the meeting was to hear a speaker share
What it was like, what happened and the way they were repaired
The patients then were asked to share the thing had brought them there
And asked them if their stories could relate, but not compare
A fellow spoke right up, said he had given up on life
His liver was completely shot, he’d lost his home, his wife
He’d said he’d tried the AA thing for almost 20 years
It does not work, at least for him, he felt the end was near
When asked if he had worked the Steps, he shook his head and said
Those people do not like me, they won’t care when I am dead
He said no one had offered to help him do Four and Five
You’re just a bunch of hypocrites, I’m fed up with your jive
That statement had a strange effect, a feeling filled the room
Was almost like a challenge, took a moment to resume
And then our member told him he would help him do the deal
Work with him on Four and Five, a chance to let him heal
Our member was not anxious to fulfill what he just said
The man was not his own sponsee, let someone else instead
But that would only prove his point, and he was there to teach
That he had to ignore himself and practice what he preached
He gave the man his number and invited him to call
As soon as he had been released and not to drop the ball
And that call never came, yet he felt glad he made that talk
It showed the other patients AA meant to walk the walk
Give it away, this gift of ours, it’s more than just a saying
We may not always see the hoped result we’ve been conveying
The person that has lost all hope and seemed so out of reach
May yet be saved when they observe we practice what we preach.
Larry R.
Buddha/Zen Thoughts
Greater in battle than the man who would conquer
a thousand-thousand men, is he who would conquer
just one -- himself.
-Dhammapada, 8, translated by Thanissaro Bhikkhu.
Native American
"I got my education from my culture. My teachers were my grandmothers, and I am really thankful for that."
--Mary One Spot, SARCEE
Our often unrecognized, but most powerful teachers are our women. In order for men to learn a balanced way, we need to learn from our men Elders and our women Elders. Learning from the women Elders will teach us a whole different set of values and insights to life. When we have life problems, we need to go to the grandmothers to get their advice.
Grandmothers, teach me the values of the Great Mystery.
Keep It Simple
Honesty is the backbone of our recovery program.
Honesty opens us up. It breaks down the walls we had built around our secret world. Those walls made a prison for us. But all of that is now changed. We are free.
Honesty has made us wise. We aren’t sneaking drinks anymore. We don’t have a stash to protect.
People who didn’t trust us now depend on our honesty. People who worked hard to avoid us, now seek us out. Self-honesty is the greatest gift we can give ourselves.
Prayer for the Day: Higher Power, You are truth. I pray that I may not turn away from truth. I will not lie. My life depends on honesty.
Action For the Day: For twenty or thirty minutes, I will think about how learning to be honest has changed my life.
TWELVESTEPS
and
TWELVE TRADITIONS
Step Ten (pgs 91-93)
Disagreeable or unexpected problems are not the only ones that call for self-control. We must be quite as careful when we begin to achieve some measure of importance and material success. For no people have ever loved personal triumphs more than we have loved them; we drank of success as of a wine which could never fail to make us feel elated. When temporary good fortune came our way, we indulged ourselves in fantasies of still greater victories over people and circumstances. Thus blinded by prideful self-confidence, we were apt to play the big shot. Of course, people turned away from us, bored or hurt.
Now that we’re in A.A. and sober, and winning back the esteem of our friends and business associates, we find that we still need to exercise special vigilance. As an insurance against “big-shot-ism” we can often check ourselves by remembering that we are today sober only by the grace of God and that any success we may be having is far more His success than ours.
Finally, we begin to see that all people, including ourselves, are to some extent emotionally ill as well as frequently wrong, and then we approach true tolerance and see what real love for our fellows actually means. It will become more and more evident as we go forward that it is pointless to become angry, or to get hurt by people who, like us, are suffering from the pains of growing up.
Such a radical change in our outlook will take time, maybe a lot of time. Not many people can truthfully assert that they love everybody. Most of us must admit that we have loved but a few; that we have been quite indifferent to the many so long as none of them gave us trouble; and as for the remainder—well, we have really disliked or hated them. Although these attitudes are common enough, we A.A.’s find we need something much better in order to keep our balance. We can’t stand it if we hate deeply. The idea that we can be possessively loving of a few, can ignore the many, and can continue to fear or hate anybody, has to be abandoned, if only a little at a time.
We can try to stop making unreasonable demands upon those we love. We can show kindness where we had shown none. With those we dislike we can begin to practice justice and courtesy, perhaps going out of our way to understand and help them.
Whenever we fail any of these people, we can promptly admit it—to ourselves always, and to them also, when the admission would be helpful. Courtesy, kindness, justice, and love are the keynotes by which we may come into harmony with practically anybody. When in doubt we can always pause, saying, “Not my will, but Thine, be done.” And we can often ask ourselves, “Am I doing to others as I would have them do to me—today?”
Big Book
"When ready, we say something like this: 'My Creator, I am now
willing that you should have all of me, good and bad. I pray that you
now remove from me every single defect of character which stands in
the way of my usefulness to you and my fellows. Grant me strength, as
I go out from here, to do your bidding. Amen.' We have then
completed Step Seven."
~Alcoholics Anonymous, 4th Edition, Into Action, pg. 76~
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