Essentials Of Recovery : August 2023

Created to carry the message of recovery to all addicts. Whether the addiction is alcohol, drugs, food or any other addiction the program of recovery is the same. I am a recovering alcoholic of over twenty-seven years, a day at a time of course and I believe my primary purpose is to stay sober and help other alcoholics achieve recovery. Remember seven days without a meeting makes one weak. Sign up to get emails.This Blog is NOT IN ANY WAY affiliated to either A.A. or N.A. Help to stop drinking.

Thursday, 31 August 2023

Daily Dose Of Emmet Fox #essentialsofrecovery

YOUR OWN PLACE

If you say that you are unhappy, dissatisfied, perhaps ill or impoverished, a failure, this is simply another way of putting the fact that you are not allowing the will of God to have free play in your life— you are not doing the thing that He meant you to do.

Discontent is not necessarily a bad thing. It is your duty to be discontented with anything less than complete harmony and happiness. A wholesome discontent with dullness, failure, and frustration is your incentive for overcoming such things. Whoever you are, your true place is calling, and, because you really are a spark of the Divine, you will never be content until you answer.

Remember that this call is the call of God, and when God calls you to His Service, He pays all the expenses. Whatever you may require to answer that call—all will He furnish, if you be about His business and not your own.

“Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you, and ordained you, that ye should go and bring forth fruit, and that your fruit should remain” John 15:16

Daily Reflections #essentialsofrecovery

A UNIQUE PROGRAM

Alcoholics Anonymous will never have a professional class. We have gained some understanding of the ancient words “Freely ye have received, freely give.” We have discovered that at the point of professionalism, money and spirituality do not mix.

TWELVE STEPS AND TWELVE TRADITIONS, p. 166

I believe that Alcoholics Anonymous stands alone in the treatment of alcoholism because it is based solely on the principle of one alcoholic sharing with another alcoholic. This is what makes the program unique. When I decided that I wanted to stay sober, I called a woman who I knew was a sober member of A.A., and she carried the message of Alcoholics Anonymous to me. She received no monetary compensation, but rather was paid by staying sober another day herself. Today I could ask for no payment other than another day free from alcohol, so in that respect, I am generously paid for my labor.

Just For Today #essentialsofrecovery

Gratitude

“Hopeless living problems have become joyously changed. Our disease has been arrested, and now anything is possible.” Basic Text p.102

The NA program has given us more freedom than we ever dreamed possible. Sometimes, though, in the daily routine, we lose track of how much we’ve been given. How, exactly, have our lives changed in Narcotics Anonymous?

The bottom line of recovery, of course, is freedom from the compulsion to use. No longer must we devote all our resources to feeding our addiction. No longer must we endanger, humiliate, or abuse ourselves or others just to get the next “fix”. Abstinence itself has brought great freedom to our lives.

Narcotics Anonymous has given us much more than simple abstinence-we’ve been given a whole new life. We’ve taken our inventory and have identified the defects of character that bound us for so long, keeping us from living and enjoying life. We’ve surrendered those shortcomings, taken responsibility for them, and sought the direction and power we need to live differently. Our home group has given us the personal warmth and support that helps us continue living in recovery. And topping all this off, we have the love, care, and guidance of the God we’ve come to understand in NA.

In the course of day-to-day recovery, we sometimes forget how much our lives have changed in Narcotics Anonymous. Do we fully appreciate what our program has given us?

Just for today: Recovery has given me freedom. I will greet the day with hope, grateful that anything is possible today.

Twenty-Four Hours A Day #essentialsofrecovery

A.A. Thought For The Day

“Call on new prospects while they are still jittery. They may be more receptive when depressed. See them alone if possible. Tell them enough about your drinking habits and experiences to encourage them to speak of themselves. If they wish to talk, let them do so. If they are not communicative, talk about the troubles liquor has caused you, being careful not to moralize or lecture. When they see you know all about the drinking game, commence to describe yourself as an alcoholic and tell them how you learned you were sick.” Am I ready to talk about myself to new prospects?

Meditation For The Day

Try not to give way to criticism, blame, scorn, or judgment of others, when you are trying to help them. Effectiveness in helping others depends on controlling yourself. You may be swept away by a temporary natural urge to criticize or blame, unless you keep a tight rein on your emotions. You should have a firm foundation of spiritual living which makes you truly humble, if you are going to really help other people. Go easy on them and be hard on yourself. That is the way you can be used most to uplift a despairing spirit. And seek no personal recognition for what you are used by God to accomplish.

Prayer For The Day

I pray that I may try to avoid judgment and criticism. I pray that I may always try to build up others instead of tearing them down.

As Bill Sees It #essentialsofrecovery

Let Go Absolutely, p.242

After failure on my part to dry up any drunks, Dr. Silkworth reminded me of Professor William James’s observation that truly transforming spiritual experiences are nearly always founded on calamity and collapse. “Stop preaching at them,” Dr. Silkworth said, “and give them the hard medical facts first. This may soften them up at depth so that they will be willing to do anything to get well. Then they may accept those spiritual ideas of yours, and even a Higher Power.”

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

We beg of you to be fearless and thorough from the very start. Some of us have tried to hold on to our old ideas, and the result was nil–until we let go absolutely.

1. A.A. Comes Of Age, p.13
2. Alcoholics Anonymous, p.58

Walk In Dry Places #essentialsofrecovery

HONESTY IS NOT ENOUGH

Action AA tells us that we must be honest about our problems if we hope to overcome them.

Some people seem quite w11ling to do this. But an honest admission alone does not solve our problems. We have to go beyond honesty by taking needed action to correct what’s wrong in our lives.

For example, we would not believe that any- thing had been corrected simply because a doctor diagnosed a physical problem. We know that such diagnosis is only a preliminary step that must lead to treatment to be effective. In the same way, an honest admission of our alcoholism does not lead to sobriety unless we take further action to ad- dress the problem.

We should also be careful about becoming prideful in announcing our shortcomings. If we are recovering from alcoholism but excuse a bad temper as one of our “alcoholic defects,” are we attempting to correct our behavior? The more prideful we are about any fault, the more difficult it will be to change it.
Having become honest about my shortcomings, I’ll look for opportunities today to make needed corrections in my behavior. If I find myself using my “alcoholic nature” as an excuse for unacceptable behavior, I’ll take action to do something about it.

Father Leo’s Daily Meditation #essentialsofrecovery

STYLE

“Style is the man himself.”

– Georges Louis Leclerc de Buffon

Style is involved in Spirituality — especially when it concerns the recovering addict. Sobriety and serenity are not just seen in what we say or do or in our ability to keep away from the first drink or pill — they are seen in our creative styles. How we feel about ourselves should be seen in the confidence of our gait and the concern for personal appearance. Personal hygiene is important because it reflects a love of self. Physical health and exercise reveal a desire and interest in life, fitness and energy.

Style may not make the man but it certainly reveals the man!

May I seek to reveal the beauty You gave me with my appearance and style.

A Day At A Time #essentialsofrecovery

Reflection For The Day

From time to time, I begin to think I know what God’s will is for other people, I say to myself, “This person ought to be cured of his terminal illness,” or “That one ought to be freed from the torment she’s going through,” and I begin to pray for those specific things. My heart is in the right place when I pray in such fashion, but those prayers are based on the supposition that I know God’s will for the person for whom I pray, I out to pray that God’s will — whatever it is — be done for others as well as for myself. Will I remember that God is ready to befriend me, but only to the degree that I trust him?

Today I Pray

I praise God for the chance to help others. I thank God also for making me want to help others, for taking me out of my tower of self so that I can meet and share with and care about people. “Teach me to pray that “Thy Will be done” in the spirit of love, which God inspires in me.

Today I Pray

I will put my trust in the will of God.

Elder’s Meditation of the Day #essentialsofrecovery

“Our Creator makes available to us all that we need.
It is an honor to go out and gather it.
We must remember to say ‘Thank You.’
It is honorable to give away, to show our gratitude… and to let the children see this.”

–Barney Bush, SHAWNEE

So many times we forget to say “thank You” to the Creator. He made for us an abundant universe. He built the Mother Earth to reproduce plenty of everything. It is an honor to be a part of the Great Spirit’s world. The Creator always gives us what we need. When we are given things, we should be willing to share it with others. Whenever we give to others, this makes us feel good inside. The more we give, the better we feel. The better we feel, the more we want to give. We need to teach this to our children. The children learn by our behavior.

My Creator, thank you for today. Thank you for the sun. Thank you for the earth. Thank you for my life. Thank you for……

Today’s Gift #essentialsofrecovery

Differences

. . . with no hidden cutting edge.

The respect and dignity a couple shows each other set the table from which they are nourished for all other activities in their lives. Any feeling can be expressed in respectful or disrespectful ways. Anger is one of the most difficult to express respectfully. Everyone feels frustrated and angry at times. The crucial thing to learn is how to be angry and still be respectful – how to deal with our impatience without blame or put-downs. Many of us have to learn how to love without being possessive, how to be playful in a lighthearted way with no hidden cutting edge. When we treat our partner with disrespect, we pour poison into our own well. It may feel satisfying at first, but the long-term consequences are not good to live with.

When we are committed to respect in our relationship, we continue to learn at even deeper levels what respect truly means. We find that simply listening to each other – and letting in our differences – is a form of respect that nourishes us.

Name a difference between you and your mate that you respect.

From the book:

The More We Find In Each Other by Merle Fossum and Mavis Fossum

The Eye Opener #essentialsofrecovery

It is a constant source of amazement to some of the Old-Timers to answer a call for help from some alcoholic and to find that the person in trouble is a neighbor, relative, friend or fellow employee or a member of AA.

It sometimes happens that the new man preferred it that way as he would rather discuss the matter with a stranger than someone near him.

It is also true that some of us are not quick to grasp the opportunities to pass the Message along. If you see a man is beyond his depth and can’t swim, why should you wait for him to yell for help? He might be deaf and dumb.

Copyright Hazelden Foundation

Daily Tao / 243 – Dialogue #essentialsofrecovery

I still talk in my sleep.
I still dream.
How can there be perfect stillness
When my brain’s so noisy?

We carry on a constant dialogue within ourselves. This is the origin of our problems.

The very word ‘dialogue’ means talking between two sides. We could not have an inner dialogue unless there was a split in our minds. We all have two sides; as long as they are not united, we cannot attain the wholeness that spirituality requires.

Even with years of self-cultivation, it is not easy to tame the wild mind. One might appear to have attained perfect control in all waking situations, only to find endless turbulence during meditation and sleep. This is a sign of incomplete attainment. Perfection must be total.

The process of perfection is long and must be methodical. Although our efforts must be to the utmost, we must never risk repressing ourselves. Indeed, rather than shutting away the unpleasant or unruly aspects of ourselves, we must take them all out and examine them. Daily introspection brings harmony to all our facets. Those aspects that are bad can be dissolved. Those that are of advantage can be cultivated. This effort will take many years, but in this gradual way, we resolve ourselves with our subconscious mind and free ourselves from the struggle and conflict.

Daily Zen #essentialsofrecovery

"Selflessness is not a return to the feelings of infancy, an experience of undifferentiated bliss, or a merger with the Mother -- even though many people may seek such an experience when they begin to meditate, and even though some may actually find a version of it. Selflessness does not require people to annihilate their emotions, only to learn to experience them in a new way."

"Selflessness," Mark Epstein and H.H. The Dalai Lama in Thoughts Without a Thinker (pg. 96)

Wednesday, 30 August 2023

Daily Dose Of Emmet Fox #essentialsofrecovery

CHILDREN OF THE MOST HIGH

Read Matthew 7:7-11

This is the wonderful passage in which Jesus enunciates the primary truth of the Fatherhood of God. He says here, definitely and clearly, that the real relationship of God and man is that of parent and child. It is extremely difficult to realize the far-reaching importance that this declaration holds for the life of the soul.

It is axiomatic of course, that the offspring must be of the same nature and species as the parent; and so if God and man are indeed Father and child, man must be essentially divine too, and susceptible of infinite development up the rising pathway of divinity. That is to say, as man's true nature unfolds, he will expand in spiritual consciousness until he has transcended all bounds of human imagination. It is in reference to our glorious destiny, that Jesus himself says elsewhere, quoting the older scriptures:

Jesus answered them, "Is it not written in your law, I said, Ye are gods? If he called them gods, unto whom the word of God came, and the scripture cannot be broken . . ". (John 10:34-35)

Daily Reflections

THE ONLY REQUIREMENT. . .

“At one time. . .every A.A. group had many membership rules. Everybody was scared witless that something or somebody would capsize the boat. . .The total list was a mile long. If all those rules had been in effect everywhere, nobody could have possibly joined A.A. at all. . .

” TWELVE STEPS AND TWELVE TRADITIONS, p. 139-40

I’m grateful that the Third Tradition only requires of me a desire to stop drinking. I had been breaking promises for years. In the Fellowship I didn’t have to make promises, I didn’t have to concentrate. It only required my attending one meeting, in a foggy condition, to know I was home. I didn’t have to pledge undying love. Here, strangers hugged me. “It gets better,” they said, and “One day at a time, you can do it.” They were no longer strangers, but caring friends. I ask God to help me to reach out to people desiring sobriety, and to, please, keep me grateful!

Just For Today #essentialsofrecovery

Doing Good, Feeling Good

“We examine our actions, reactions, and motives. We often find that we’ve been doing better than we've been feeling.”

Basic Text p.42

The way we treat others often reveals our own state of being. When we are at peace, we’re most likely to treat others with respect and compassion. However, when we’re feeling off center; we’re likely to respond to others with intolerance and impatience. When we take regular inventory, we’ll probably notice a pattern: We treat others badly when we feel bad about ourselves.

What might not be revealed in an inventory, however, is the other side of the coin. When we treat others well, we feel good about ourselves. When we add this positive truth to the negative facts we find about ourselves in our inventory, we begin to behave differently.

When we feel badly, we can pause to pray for guidance and strength. Then, we make a decision to treat those around us with kindness, gentleness, and the same concern we’d like to be shown. A decision to be kind may nurture and sustain the happiness and peace of mind we all wish for. And the joy we inspire may lift the spirits of those around us, in turn fostering our own spiritual well-being.

Just for today: I will remember that if I change my actions, my thoughts will follow.

Twenty-Four Hours A Day

A.A. Thought For The Day

“Practical experience shows that nothing will so much insure immunity from drinking as extensive work with other alcoholics. Carry the message to other alcoholics. You can help when no one else can. You can secure their confidence when others fail. Life will take on new meaning for you. To watch people recover, to see them help others in turn, to watch loneliness vanish, to see a fellowship grow about you, to have a host of friends, this is an experience you must not miss.” Am I always ready and willing to help other alcoholics?

Meditation For The Day

One secret of abundant living is the art of giving. The paradox of life is that the more you give, the more you have. If you loose your life in the service of others, you will save it. You can give abundantly and still live abundantly. You are rich in one respect – you have a spirit that is inexhaustible. Let no mean or selfish thought keep you from sharing this spirit. Of love, of help, of understanding, and of sympathy, give and keep giving. Give your personal ease and comfort, your time, your money, and most of all, yourself. And you will be living abundantly.

Prayer For The Day

I pray that I may live to give. I pray that I may learn this secret of abundant living.

As Bill Sees It #essentialsofrecovery

Middle of the Road, p.241

“In some sections of A.A., anonymity is carried to the point of real absurdity. Members are on such a poor basis of communication that they don’t even know each other’s last names or where each lives. It’s like the cell of an underground.

“In other sections, we see exactly the reverse. It is difficult to restrain A.A.’s from shouting too much before the whole public, by going on spectacular ‘lecture tours’ to play the big shot.

“However, I know that from these extremes we slowly pull ourselves onto a middle ground. Most lecture-giving members do not last too long, and the superanonymous people are apt to come out of hiding respecting their A.A. friends, business associates, and the like. I think the long-time trend is toward the middle of the road–which is probably where we should be.”

Letter, 1959

Walk In Dry Places

Can We Fix Other People’s Problems?
Problem Solving

In Twelve Step work, we never run out of people who face serious problems. We’re often tempted to use our own expertise and resources to fix these problems for others.

This can be a mistake. It is always risky to undertake such assignments without a great deal of thought and understanding. Such attempts to fix others usually deal only with symptoms rather than causes.

Unless another person is totally helpless, the best course is to share experiences and knowledge with others, but to leave the problem solving to them. We should not encourage anyone to become dependent on us, nor should we set ourselves up as godlike individuals who have all the answers. We actually may be showing off instead of helping, and we may also be robbing others of the self-confidence and growth that come from fixing their own problems.

I’ll share my experiences and hope today, while refraining from trying to fix people. I don’t have answers for everybody, and it’s wrong to believe I do.

Keep It Simple #essentialsofrecovery

Love is something if you give away, you end up having more.

— Malvina Reynolds

Service is how we give love away. It’s the “self” of self-help. Service is not a duty; a gift that’s been given to us. We help ourselves by helping others. It’s how we make sure the program will be here tomorrow. We “carry the message.” It’s just one way we see how important we are to others. The world needs us. The world needs our love.

Prayer for the Day: I pray for help in making service a big part of my program. Higher Power, help me to “carry the message.”

Action for the Day: Which people could use a kind word and a little love? I will go visit them or give them a call.

Father Leo’s Daily Meditation #essentialsofrecovery

LISTENING

“If other people are going to talk, conversation becomes impossible.”

— James McNeill Whistler

Part of my addiction was never listening to what people were saying. This was part arrogance, part denial, part fear, part control, part ego — the bottom line was that I did not listen. I was bored and unhappy with my life because I was a prisoner of my own thoughts.

My spiritual awakening — which I consider a process rather than an event, a process that is still going on in my life on a daily basis — was in allowing some new information into my life that led to admittance and acceptance. The day that I was able to admit that I was an alcoholic was the day I took a step towards acceptance.
Today I receive immense help and comfort from other people, especially recovering alcoholics. Two people experiencing an honest conversation are part of God’s promised love for His world.

A Day At A Time #essentialsofrecovery

Reflection For The Day

I’ll begin today with prayer — prayer in my heart, prayer in my mind, and words of prayer on my lips. Through prayer, I’ll stay tuned to God today, reaching forward to become that to which I aspire. Prayer will redirect my mind, helping me rise in consciousness to the point where I realize that there’s no separation between God and me. As I let the power of God flow through me, all limitations will fall away. Do I know that nothing can overcome the power of God?

Today I Pray

Today may I offer to my Higher Power a constant prayer, not just a “once-in-the-morning-does-it” kind. May I think of my Higher Power at coffee breaks, lunch, tea time, during a quiet evening — and at all times in between. May my consciousness expand and erase the lines of separation, so that the Power is a part of me and I am a part of the Power.

Today I Will Remember

To live an all-day Prayer.

One Day At A Time #essentialsofrecovery

STAYING PRESENT

“First you need only look.”

Anne Hillman

My disease of compulsive overeating is fueled by my regrets of the past and my fears of the future. The more I try to rewrite the past, (which of course I cannot do); the more I try to devise a future plan, (which usually does not come to pass), the less I am present for my life.

I learn much from my three-year-old son. Sometimes when running to get a ball, he suddenly stops to look at an unusual insect he sees on the ground. His life flows and he abides by this pattern. He follows his heart and is “there” for life.

When I consciously stay present for life — when I savor each moment and stay with my feelings — I am alive and living. In the present there is no worry, no fear, no regrets.

One Day at a Time . . .
I ask my Higher Power to help me to stay present for my life, to stay with whatever is happening at any given moment. I feel feelings. I am spontaneous and life is exciting and inspired.

~ Melissa S. ~

Elder’s Meditation of the Day #essentialsofrecovery

“I started drinking more seriously, seeking refuge, seeking death actually, from a world that was feeling more and more unnatural to me. Following a painful accident related to drinking, I finally realized that I must decide whether I want to follow my grandparents or truly take up this life. Circumstances that followed led me to choose life.”

–Barney Bush, SHAWNEE

My life is run by choices and decisions. Every choice I make today will carry with it the consequences of that choice. Every decision I make today will carry with it the consequences of that decision. The question I will ask myself today is, “Do I want to be happy or do I want to be right?” Which ever one I choose will have a lot to do with the consequences I will experience today. If today was the last day of my life, what choices and what decisions would I make?

Oh Great Spirit, guide my path today and help me see the value of choosing the Red

Elder’s Meditation of the Day #essentialsofrecovery

–Barney Bush, SHAWNEE

My life is run by choices and decisions. Every choice I make today will carry with it the consequences of that choice. Every decision I make today will carry with it the consequences of that decision. The question I will ask myself today is, “Do I want to be happy or do I want to be right?” Which ever one I choose will have a lot to do with the consequences I will experience today. If today was the last day of my life, what choices and what decisions would I make?

Oh Great Spirit, guide my path today and help me see the value of choosing the Red

Today’s Gift #essentialsofrecovery

Defeat may serve as well as victory
To shake the soul and let the glory out.

— Edwin Markham

So life has given us some dents. So what? Dents are necessary, besides being unavoidable and painful. Each dent is a part of the process that enables us to embrace life as a creative experience and to see the world in a new way, a way of compassion and understanding. Recovery is not a matter of escaping further blows or of disguising the dents we already have. It’s a matter of understanding what the dents mean and how we can work with them.

Dents are neither soft spots in our characters that should make us ashamed nor saber scars that should make us proud. They are simply evidence that we have been alive for a while. Recovery offers us the chance to learn from our dents, to accept them as new spaces for growth. When we decide to see our dents as opportunities gained rather than opportunities lost, we stand much taller in our own eyes and in the eyes of others.

Today, I will look on my difficult life experiences in a new light. Today, I will plant some seeds.

From the book:

Days of Healing, Days of Joy by Earnie Larsen and Carol Larsen Hegarty

The Eye Opener #essentialsofrecovery

You can’t swim like a fish, run like a deer, fight like a tiger or fly like a bird. Every one of your five senses is excelled by some member of the animal kingdom. Man, physically, has many superiors and would long since have been extinct but for the fact that he alone possess reasoning power.

With this advantage he can build ships to outswim the fish, motor cars to outrun the deer, perfect weapons to outfight the tiger and airplanes to outstrip the fastest of birds. With this reason he can visualize the reason behind all Nature and thus avail himself of a Power greater than himself and all the forces with which he has to contend.

Copyright Hazelden Foundation

Daily Tao / 242 – Heart #essentialsofrecovery

Imagine your heart as an opening lotus.
From its center comes a crimson child,
Pure, virginal, and innocent.

One meditation gives this instruction :

Imagine your heart opening into a red lotus.

From its center comes a crimson child.

Bring this child out of your body and imagine him or her floating above your head. You, as a child, are holding a sun in each hand while each foot stands on a moon.

Hold this image as long as you can.

It is hard to bring out this child. When you try, you realize how many defenses you have built around yourself. You also realize how the experiences of adolescence and adulthood have stained you. Sometimes, you may even doubt that you have a pure and innocent self to bring out anymore. But each of us does. Each of us must find that crimson child within us and bring him or her out. For this child represents the time when our energies were whole and our hearts were untroubled by the duplicity of the world and ourselves.

Daily Zen

The fact is that the fundamental nature
Of each and every person
Contains a great spiritual awareness.
It is fundamentally without birth and death.
It extends through ancient and modern,
Spiritually alive and illuminating,
Undefiled, wondrous, sovereign,
In peace and bliss.
Is this not the Buddha of Infinite Light?

- T’aego (1301-1382)

Tuesday, 29 August 2023

GREAT POSSESSIONS

GREAT POSSESSIONS

One of the saddest passages in all literature is the story of the Rich Young Man who missed one of the great opportunities of history, “. . .and went away sorrowful: for he had great possessions”. Matthew 19:22
This is really the story of mankind in general. We reject the salvation that Jesus offers us—our chance of finding God—because we "have great possessions"; not so much that we are very rich in terms of money, for indeed most people are not, but because we have great possessions in the way of preconceived ideas—confidence in our own judgment, and in the ideas with which we happen to be familiar. We have pride, born of academic distinction, sentimental or material attachment to institutions and organizations; habits of life that we have no desire to renounce, concern for human respect, or perhaps fear of public ridicule And these possessions keep us chained to the rock of suffering that is our exile from God.

The poor in spirit suffer from none of these embarrassments, either because they never had them, or because they have risen above them on the tide of spiritual understanding.

Monday, 21 August 2023

Big Book - Experience 1

Daily Reflections

WE JUST TRY, p.242

My stability came out of trying to give, not out of demanding that I receive.

-The Best Of Bill, pp. 46-47

As long as I try, with all my heart and soul, to pass along to others what has been passed along to me, and do not demand anything in return, life is good to me. Before entering this program of Alcoholics Anonymous I was never able to give without demanding something in return. Little did I know that, once I began to give freely of myself, I would begin to receive, without ever expecting or demanding anything at all. What I receive today is the gift of “stability,” as Bill did: stability in my A.A. program; within myself; but most of all, in my relationship with my Higher Power, whom I choose to call God.

Just For Today

Friendships

“Our friendships become deep, and we experience the warmth and caring which results from addicts sharing recovery and a new life.”

IP No. 19, Self-Acceptance

––––=––––

Most of us come to Narcotics Anonymous with few genuine friends. And most of us arrive without the slightest understanding of what it takes to build lasting friendships. Over time, though, we learn that friendships require work. At one time or another, all friendships are challenging. Like any relationship, friendship is a learning process.

Our friends love us enough to tell us the truth about ourselves. The old saying, “The truth will set you free, but first it will make you furious,” seems especially true in friendship. This can make friendships awkward. We may find ourselves avoiding certain meetings rather than facing our friends. We have found, though, that friends speak out of concern for us. They want the best for us. Our friends accept us despite our shortcomings. They understand that we are still a work in progress.

Friends are there for us when we’re not there for ourselves. Friends help us gain valuable perspective on the events in our lives and our recovery. It is important that we actively cultivate friendships, for we have learned that we cannot recover alone.

––––=––––

Just for today: I will be grateful for the friends I have. I will take an active part in my friendships.

Twenty-Four Hours A Day

A.A. Thought For The Day

“Who are you to say there is no God? This challenge comes to all of us. Are we capable of denying that there is a design and purpose in all of life as we know it? Or are we willing to admit that faith in some kind of Divine Principle is a part of our makeup, just as much as the feeling we have for a friend? We find a great Reality deep down within us, if we face ourselves as we really are. In the last analysis, it is only there that God may be found. When we find this Reality within us, we are restored to our right minds.” Have I found the great reality?

Meditation For The Day
“Behold, I make all things new.” When you change to a new way of life, you leave many things behind you. It is only the earth-bound spirit that cannot soar. Loosen somewhat the strands that tie you to the earth. It is only the earthly desires that bind you. Your new freedom will depend on your ability to rise above earthly things. Clipped wings can grow again. Broken wings can regain a strength and beauty unknown before. If you will, you can be released and free.

Prayer For The Day
I pray that I may be freed from things that hold me down. I pray that my spirit may soar in freedom.

As Bill Sees It

The Value of Human Will, p. 232

Many newcomers, having experienced little but constant deflation, feel a growing conviction that human will is of no value whatever. They have become persuaded, sometimes rightly so, that many problems besides alcohol will not yield to a headlong assault powered only by the individual’s will.

However, there are certain things which the individual alone can do. All by himself, and in the light of his own circumstances, he needs to develop the quality of willingness. When he acquires willingness, he is the only one who can then make the decision to exert himself along spiritual lines. Trying to do this is actually an act of his own will. It is the right use of this faculty.

Indeed, all of A.A.’s Twelve Steps require our sustained and personal exertion to conform to their principles and so, we trust, to God’s will.

12 &12, p. 40

Walk In Dry Places

Meeting needs in the Right Way.
Self-Understanding.

Bizarre as it is, the bad behavior of drunkenness has an underlying logic when it’s really understood.

Why, for example, would people squander money buying drinks for total strangers when their families are going without?

This is an insane way of meeting needs for intimacy and approval. It’s true that these needs will never be met in this fashion, but try telling that to a person who is still drinking!

In recovery, we can more easily forgive ourselves for past actions when we realize they came out of a misguided attempt to meet basic needs. A starving person will seek out garbage. Starved as we were for necessities of life, we sought a form of garbage. The good news in AA recovery is that sobriety will help us meet basic needs in the right way.

I’ll keep in mind today that as a human being I have certain needs that should be met in proper ways.

Keep It Simple

Beauty is not caused. It is.

— Emily Dickinson

Probably, there have been many times when we thought we weren’t beautiful. We thought we were ugly. We thought we were bad people. This is a natural part of addiction. Our program tells us we’re good, we’re beautiful. Do we believe this? Do we accept this part of the program?

Beauty is an attitude, just as self-hate is an attitude. We need to keep the attitude that we’re beautiful. We owe it to ourselves and to those around us. And, yes, it’s true that you must love yourself before you can love others. Remember, ours is a selfish program. We have to love and see ourselves as beautiful, before we can give it to others.

Prayer for the Day: Higher Power, help me claim my beauty. Help me to see that, sometimes, I have to be selfish to grow.

Action for the Day: Today, I’ll work at falling in love with myself.

Father Leo’s Daily Meditation

HAPPINESS

“We are looking in the wrong places for happiness.”

– Robert J. McCracken
I sought happiness in the bottle. Others looked for “good feelings” in drugs, food or other people. Today I know that nothing that is outside of me can make me acceptable — acceptance must come from within.

I need to discover that spiritual place where I can be acceptable to me. Self-esteem is an essential part of my recovery and that can only be realized by making the spiritual journey within.

Today I seek to discover me. I want to know me — because You created me.

A Day at a Time

Reflection for the Day

After we take an inventory, determining and admitting the exact nature of our wrongs, we become “entirely ready,” as the Sixth Step suggests, “to have God remove all these defects of character.” Sure, it’s easy to feel like that and be “entirely ready” on a morning-after, but we know in such desperate moments that our motive may be remorse rather than repentance, induced more by a throbbing head than a contrite heart. The further we get away from the last addictive binge, the better the wrong-doing looks – more innocent, possibly even more attractive.

Am I ready THEN to “have God remove all these defects of character …?”

Today I Pray

May I be “entirely ready” for God to remove my defects of character. May those words “entirely ready” re-summon my determination in case it should fade with time and sobriety. May God be my strength, since I alone cannot erase my faults.

Today I Will Remember

I am “entirely ready.”

Hazelden Foundation

Elder’s Meditation of the Day

“The greater the faith, the greater the result.”

–Fools Crow, LAKOTA

The Creator designed us to act on faith. We are able to do this by holding firm to our beliefs. If we believe something and if we don’t want the belief to change, we need to add the power of the Great Spirit to this belief. We must always have the spiritual added to our beliefs. If we don’t add the Spirit, then we may very well change our minds the first time we are tested. Each time we are tested and we don’t change our minds, we get stronger. The wind may blow on the red willow trees bending them and causing the roots to grow deeper. The more the wind bends the tree, the bigger, stronger, and deeper the roots grow. We should be happy that we are tested. It’s the Creator’s way of making us have greater faith for greater results.

Great Mystery, Grandfather, I know if I am tested today that I can count on You to give me the courage to get to the other side. On the other side of every test is the reward of strength. Make me strong.

Today’s Gift

I thank God for my handicaps for, through them, I have found myself, my work, and my God.

— Helen Keller

All of us have unique talents and gifts. No obstacle, be it physical, mental, or emotional, has the power to destroy our innate creative energies.

In order to tap our inner resources, we must first be willing to explore our interests and abilities. Then we need to make persistent efforts to acquire the necessary skills and knowledge which will help us achieve our highest potentials.

Helen Keller’s life story is an excellent example of this kind of courage and persistence. With the help of her teacher, Anne Sullivan, Helen learned to speak and read. Because Helen did not allow her blindness and deafness to destroy her innate gifts, she inspired millions to challenge their own physical, mental, and emotional handicaps and limitations.

Today I will not allow my limitations to overwhelm me. I will see them as challenges that I and others can benefit from. I will acquire any new skills or information I need to make my limitations work for me, not against me.

From the book:

The Reflecting Pond by Liane Cordes

The Eye Opener

There is no man alive who is a bigger fool than he who knows everything – even God can’t teach such a one. This characteristic is common among alcoholics, and constitutes one of the greatest barriers to recovery. Our Program is best received by the humble heart and the attentive ear.

We must do a lot of “un-learning” before we are ready to start learning this new way of living.

Hazelden Foundation

Daily Tao / 233 - PROPHET

The prophets have their secrets
And their certain magic.
I am not a prophet.
I know only the ordinary.
That is my Tao.

Prophets of Tao are a special category. These men and women are acknowledged experts in meditation, philosophy, medicine, geomancy, sorcery, martial arts, science, mathematics, literature, painting, poetry, scripture, history, music, and liturgy. They can do extraordinary things; they can answer any question. The vast number of secrets each of them embodies is staggering. The degree of extraordinary skill they command is formidable.

They are great, but that is all.

Those who follow Tao strive for perfection, but they are wary about being called prophets. That is a limited role. Being a prophet represents a great trap baited with the temptation of self-importance. The ultimate aim of following Tao is to transcend identity. Those who call themselves prophets or even masters maximize their identities.

It is far better not to be a prophet, and to eschew the responsibilities, limitations, and temptations. It is far better to be obscure and to be thought stupid. Having someone call you by a title is an interference that you don't need. When you are seeing the greatest wonder of your life, the last thing you want is to have someone blocking the light.

Daily Zen

The heart is like a garden. It can grow compassion or fear,resentment or love. What seeds will you plant there?

Sunday, 20 August 2023

One Day At A Time

AMENDS

“If you have behaved badly, repent; make what amends you can and address yourself to the task of behaving better next time. On no account brood over your wrongdoing. Rolling in the muck is not the best way of getting clean.”

–Aldous Huxley

I grew up with high expectations of perfection and a constant feeling of failure. I seldom recognized truly bad behavior in myself, but instead I apologized for the things I had taken on as my responsibility that were not under my control. I apologized when the weather spoiled plans. I apologized for an adult family member’s poor behavior. I felt intense shame when I accidentally slipped and fell, sure that I’d embarrassed the people with me. Yet I was oblivious to how I snapped at people simply because I was in a HALTS (Hungry, Angry, Lonely, Tired, Sick) place. My temper was quick to rise and explode, but I always told myself I had a “good” excuse or cause.

On the other hand, I could feel so mortified over my behavior that it haunted me night and day for weeks, and even months, after the incident; long after any witness could recall it. Years later a phrase would bring the memory back to the forefront and shame me all over again as though it had happened mere minutes before.

I couldn’t seem to find a truthful middle ground until I began working the Twelve Steps. In studying the Steps I learned how to uncover and acknowledge the wrongs for which I am sincerely responsible, how to make proper amends, and how to let go and move on.

One Day at a Time …

I will remember that I am responsible only for my own behavior and actions. With the help of my Higher Power, I will acknowledge my wrongdoings quickly and make loving amends.

~ Rhonda H.

Daily Dose Of Emmet Fox

CHILDREN OF THE MOST HIGH

Read Matthew 7:7-11

This is the wonderful passage in which Jesus enunciates the primary truth of the Fatherhood of God. He says here, definitely and clearly, that the real relationship of God and man is that of parent and child. It is extremely difficult to realize the far-reaching importance that this declaration holds for the life of the soul.

It is axiomatic of course, that the offspring must be of the same nature and species as the parent; and so if God and man are indeed Father and child, man must be essentially divine too, and susceptible of infinite development up the rising pathway of divinity. That is to say, as man's true nature unfolds, he will expand in spiritual consciousness until he has transcended all bounds of human imagination. It is in reference to our glorious destiny, that Jesus himself says elsewhere, quoting the older scriptures:

Jesus answered them, "Is it not written in your law, I said, Ye are gods? If he called them gods, unto whom the word of God came, and the scripture cannot be broken . . ". (John 10:34-35)

Daily Reflections

TOWARD EMOTIONAL FREEDOM

Since defective relations with other human beings have nearly always been the immediate cause of our woes, including our alcoholism, no field of investigation could yield more satisfying and valuable rewards than this one.

-TWELVE STEPS AND TWELVE TRADITIONS , p. 80

Willingness is a peculiar thing for me in that, over a period of time, it seems to come, first with awareness, but then with a feeling of discomfort, making me want to take some action. As I reflected on taking the Eighth Step, my willingness to make amends to others came as a desire for forgiveness, of others and myself.

I felt forgiveness toward others after I became aware of my part in the difficulties of relationships. I wanted to feel the peace and serenity described in the Promises. From working the first seven Steps, I became aware of whom I had harmed and that I had been my own worst enemy. In order to restore my relationships with my fellow human beings, I knew I would have to change. I wanted to learn to live in harmony with myself and others so that I could also live in emotional freedom. The beginning of the end to my isolation – from my fellows and from God – came when I wrote my Eighth Step list.

Just for today

Facing death

“Often we have to face some type of crisis during our recovery, such as the death of a loved one...”

Basic Text, p. 102

––––=––––

Every life has a beginning and an end. However, when someone we love a great deal reaches the end of their life, we may have a very hard time accepting their sudden, final absence. Our grief may be so powerful that we fear it will completely overwhelm us—but it will not. Our sorrow may hurt more than anything we can remember, but it will pass.

We need not run from the emotions that may arise from the death of a loved one. Death and grieving are parts of the fullness of living “life on life’s terms.” By allowing ourselves the freedom to experience these feelings, we partake more deeply of both our recovery and our human nature.

Sometimes the reality of another’s death makes our own mortality that much more pronounced. We reevaluate our priorities, appreciating the loved ones still with us all the more. Our life, and our life with them, will not go on forever. We want to make the most of what’s most important while it lasts.

We might find that the death of someone we love helps strengthen our conscious contact with our Higher Power. If we remember that we can always turn to that source of strength when we are troubled, we will be able to stay focused on it no matter what may be going on around us.

––––=––––

Just for today: I will accept the loss of one I love and turn to my Higher Power for the strength to accept my feelings. I will make the most of my love for those in my life today.

Twenty-Four Hours A Day

A.A. Thought For The Day

“When many hundreds of people are able to say that the consciousness of the presence of God is today the most important fact of their lives, they present a powerful reason why one should have faith. When we see others solve their problems by simple reliance upon some Spirit of the universe, we have to stop doubting the power of God. Our ideas did not work, but the God-idea does. Deep down in every man, woman, and child is the fundamental idea of God. Faith in a Power greater than ourselves and miraculous demonstrations of that power in our lives are facts as old as the human race.” Am I willing to rely on the Spirit of the universe?

Meditation For The Day

You should not dwell too much on the mistakes, faults, and failures of the past. Be done with shame and remorse and contempt for yourself. With God’s help, develop a new self-respect. Unless you respect yourself, others will not respect you. You ran a race, you stumbled and fell, you have risen again, and now you press on toward the goal of a better life. Do not stay to examine the spot where you fell, only feel sorry for the delay, the shortsightedness that prevented you from seeing the real goal sooner.

Prayer For The Day

I pray that I may not look back. I pray that I may keep picking myself up and making a fresh start each day.

Walk In Dry Places

All that Glitters
Tempting Moments

Though real sobriety means all lose of desire to drink, it’s not uncommon to have moments when the old life takes on a sudden appeal. This appeal is never based on a realistic look at things as they were. It is more a rush of feeling connected with some alluring aspect of the drinking life.

Such a false feeling will always pass if we let ourselves remember what happened to us and why we needed to seek recovery. We cannot have this rush of feeling when we remember the misery, despair, and other pain from that part of our lives.

All that glitters is not gold, goes an old saying. All the glittering scenes connected with drinking are not really golden moments, either. They are, for us, always preludes to disaster.

I’ll remember today to let realistic thinking rule my life even if there are moments when my feelings run temporarily awry.

Keep It Simple

Heaven and hell is right now. You make it heaven or you make it hell by your actions.

—-George Harrison

We used chemicals to feel better, but we started feeling worse. We were out of control. Life seemed like hell.

Now we have a program that tells us how to make life better. Some days, it even feels like heaven! But we have to work our program to make our own heaven.

Working the program isn’t too hard. And it makes us feel so good. So, why don’t we do it all the time? Maybe we’re a little afraid of heaven. It’s time to learn to love having a better life!

Prayer for the Day: Higher Power, help me work my program each day, so each day has a little bit of heaven in it. Help me get used to having a better life.

Action for the Day: Tonight, I’ll think about the moments of kindness, joy, hope and faith that put a little bit of heaven into my life today.

Father Leo’s Daily Meditation

TOGETHERNESS

“A man who thinks of himself as belonging to a particular national group in Americas has not yet become an American.”

– Woodrow Wilson

Today I know that I belong. I am not alone. I do not exist outside of the human race. I am an important part of this world.

Addiction makes us feel different, separated and isolated. It keeps us divided within ourselves, our family and relationships. So long as it can do this, it wins.

Now I know that I belong. I make up a part of the whole. Something of this universe is mine.

I am not an island unto myself. I am an essential part of the human race. I am at home in my world.

A Day At A Time

Reflection For The Day

All of The Program’s Twelve Steps ask us to go contrary to our natural inclinations and desires: they puncture, squeeze, and finally deflate our egos. When it comes to ego deflation, few Steps are harder to take then the Fifth, which suggest that we “admit to God, To Ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.” Few steps are harder to take, yes, but scarcely any Step is more necessary to long-term freedom from addiction and peace of mind. Have I quit living by myself with the tormenting ghost of yesterday?

Today I Pray

May God give me strength to face that great ego-pincher — Step Five. May I not hesitate to call a trusted hearer of Fifth Steps, set up a meeting and share it. By accepting responsibility for my behavior, God and one other. I am actually unburdening myself.

Today I Will Remember

My Fifth Step pain is also my liberation.

Elder’s Meditation of the Day

“ … remember and think about the closeness of Wanka-Tanka. If they live in this wisdom, it will give them endless strength and hope.”

–Fools Crow, LAKOTA

The value of staying close to the Creator is the immediate help we have available to us whenever we need it.II can listen to the whisper of my heart for this is the place He communicates with me.

Staying close helps me remember that we are here to serve Him and to help other people.

The Grandfathers are my direct access to wisdom.

He who has wisdom has everything.

If we have wisdom, then we will see our lives become more effective in the areas of jobs, relationships, family, friends, and finances.

My Creator, today grant me the wisdom to seek Your wisdom. Help me to Walk of the Red Road.

Today’s Gift

Life can only be understood backwards, but it must be lived forward.

—Soren Kierkegaard

Once, in a small village, there was a huge fire. The blaze spread and several homes and businesses were burned to the ground. After a long while, the fire was brought under control and put out. Villagers banded together to rebuild their town, but one quite persistent young man insisted on searching the rubble for the cause of the fire. Impatient townspeople scolded him, saying, “Why waste time searching for causes? Knowing them won’t put out the blaze or repair the damage.” “I know,” replied the young man, “but knowing why might prevent other fires.”

Sometimes we have to look at painful past experiences in order to prevent their recurrence. When we understand ourselves better, we can move beyond the past and walk toward the future with surer, safer steps.

How well can I use my past today?

Daily Tao / 232 - LABELS

Don't call me a follower of Tao.
Following Tao is an intensely personal endeavor in which you spend each minute of your life with the universal pulse. You follow the fluid and infinitely shifting Tao and experience its myriad wonders. You will want nothing more than to be empty before it -- a perfect mirror, open to every nuance.

If you put labels on who you are, there is separation from Tao. As soon as you accept the designations of race, gender, name, or fellowship, you define yourself in contrast to Tao.

That is why those who follow Tao never identify themselves with the name Tao. They do not care for labels, for status, or for rank. We all have an equal chance to be with Tao.

Reject labels.
Reject identities.
Reject conformity.
Reject convention.
Reject definitions.Reject names.

Daily Zen

"One of the most compelling things about the Buddhist view of suffering is the notion, inherent in the Wheel of Life Image, that the causes of suffering are also the means of release; that is, the sufferer's perspective determines whether a given realm is a vehicle for awakening or for bondage. Conditioned by the forces of attachment, aversion, and delusion, our faulty perceptions of the realms -- not the realms themselves--cause suffering."

"Selflessness," Mark Epstein and HH Dalai Lama in Thoughts Without a Thinker (pg. 16)

Saturday, 19 August 2023

How to Live on 24 Hours a Day, by Arnold Bennett

Daily Dose Of Emmet Fox - Sermon On The Mount PT1

Daily Reflections

A FRAME OF REFERENCE

Referring to our list [inventory] again. Putting out of our minds the wrongs others had done, we resolutely looked for our own mistakes. Where had we been selfish, dishonest, self-seeking and frightened?

-ALCOHOLICS ANONYMOUS, p. 67

There is a wonderful freedom in not needing constant approval from colleagues at work or from the people I love. I wish I had known about this Step before, because once I developed a frame of reference, I felt able to do the next right thing, knowing that the action fit the situation and that it was the correct thing to do.

Just for today

First things first

“We apply effort to our most obvious problems and let go of the rest. We do the job at hand and, as we progress, new opportunities for improvement present themselves.”

Basic Text, p. 56

––––=––––

It’s been said that recovery is simple—all we’ve got to change is everything! That can seem a pretty tall order, especially when we first arrive in Narcotics Anonymous. After all, not many of us showed up at our first meeting because our lives were in great shape. On the contrary, a great many of us came to NA in the midst of the worst crises of our lives. We needed recovery, and quick!

The enormity of the change required in our lives can be paralyzing. We know we can’t take care of all that needs to be done, not all at once. How do we start? Chances are, we’ve already started. We’ve done the first, most obvious things that needed to be done: We’ve stopped using drugs, and we’ve started going to meetings.

What do we do next? Pretty much the same thing, just more of it: From where we are, we do what we can. We walk the path of recovery by picking up our feet and taking the step that’s right in front of us. Only when that’s been accomplished must we concern ourselves with what comes next. Slowly but surely, we’ll find ourselves making progress down the path, visibly drawing closer each day to becoming the kind of person we’d like to be.

––––=––––

Just for today: I will walk the path of my recovery by taking the step right in front of me.

Twenty-Four Hours A Day

A.A. Thought For The Day
“People of faith have a logical idea of what life is all about. There is a wide variation in the way each one of us approaches and conceives of the Power greater than ourselves. Whether we agree with a particular approach or conception seems to make little difference. There are questions for each of us to settle for ourselves. But in each case the belief in a Higher Power has accomplished the miraculous, the humanly impossible. There has come a revolutionary change in their way of living and thinking.” Has there been a revolutionary change in me?

Meditation For The Day
Worship is consciousness of God’s divine majesty. As you pause to worship, God will help you raise your humanity to His divinity. The earth is a material temple to enclose God’s divinity. God brings to those who worship Him a divine power, a divine love, and a divine healing. You only have to open your mind to Him and try to absorb some of His divine spirit. Pausing quietly in the spirit of worship, turn your inward thoughts upward and realize that His divine power may be yours, that you can experience His love and healing.

Prayer For The Day
I pray that I may worship God by sensing the eternal Spirit. I pray that I may experience a new power in my life.

As Bill Sees It

Privileged to Communicate, p. 231
Everyone must agree that we A.A.’s are unbelievably fortunate people; fortunate that we have suffered so much; fortunate that we can know, understand, and love each other so supremely well.

These attributes and virtues are scarcely of the earned variety. Indeed, most of us are well aware that these are rare gifts which have their true origin in our kinship born of a common suffering and a common deliverance by the grace of God.

Thereby we are privileged to communicate with each other to a degree and in a manner not very often surpassed among our nonalcoholic friends in the world around us.

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

“I used to be ashamed of my condition and so didn’t talk about it. But nowadays I freely confess I am a depressive, and this has attracted other depressives to me. Working with them has helped a great deal.”*

1. Grapevine, October 1959
2. Letter, 1954

*Bill added that he had no depression after 1955.

Walk In Dry Places

Inventory is now
Personal Inventory.

In the early days of AA, the dramatic accounts of drinking escapades seemed to show honesty. Taking personal inventory often included telling others about bizarre behavior connected with drinking.

We know today that inventory ought to continue on a daily basis, even though years have passed since our last drink. We’ve learned through painful experiences that in sobriety we can still display many of the shortcomings that plagued us as practicing alcoholics.

It can also be a trap to focus on our past wrongs rather than today’s faults. We may be using this focus on the past to avoid being honest about where we stand today. Let’s remember that inventory is always now. Taking inventory of the past won’t help us with today’s shortcomings.

I won’t use a discussion of my past wrongs as a subterfuge to keep from being honest about today’s wrongs. I’ll continue to take personal inventory and admit wrongs as they come up.

Keep It Simple

The future is made of the same stuff as the present.

— Simone Weil

We found we didn’t need magic to recover—we needed a miracle! Now we are walking miracles.

Part of our miracle is that we see how important today is. We can’t change our future unless we change today. So we live One Day at a Time. By living today well, we make our future better. There is comfort in knowing that the program will be there. Hope we’ll be there.

Old-timers say sobriety is easy if we go by one simple rule: don’t drink and go to meeting.

Life can get simpler; they don’t change much. Staying sober will be easier for us over time.

Prayer for the Day: Higher Power, help me keep my sobriety simple. Help me accept the rules of life.

Action for the Day: I will list three things that will be there for me tomorrow and the next day, because I’m working on them today.

Father Leo’s Daily Meditation

DECISION

“When you see a snake, never mind where he came from.”

– W. G. Benham

So many alcoholics have died looking for “the problem” that made them drink. The wife, family, neighborhood or unemployment was why they thought they got drunk. They died seeking a reason. Alcoholics Anonymous clearly states that alcohol is the problem for alcoholics.

Alcohol is the problem! A statement that is so simple yet so profound in its healing. Today thousands upon thousands are choosing not to die by not taking the first drink. To see the problem clearly and honestly is the beginning of wisdom. O.A., ACoA, N.A., G.A., Al-Anon and others have used these simple principles with profound results. Do I see the snake?

Teach me to avoid those things that cause me pain and destruction.