The boozer in us is still there, but put to sleep by AA. This member woke up his Mr. Hyde with a single beer.
WE ALCOHOLICS are, I think, double-personality people--one person sober and an entirely different one loaded. This thought is very much on my mind because I resurrected this second personality in myself when I recently strayed off the AA reservation.
This time, for perhaps the first time, I could separate the two personalities. In pre-AA days the two were so frequently blended and intermingled that I accepted both as making up the person, the whole me. As a consequence I despised myself, though I did realize vaguely that the things I hated most came out only while I was drinking. Now I know better.
The alcoholic personality, this Mr. Hyde to my Dr. Jekyll, is not me at all. It is a diseased product of a temporarily deranged ego and embodies all the unattractive thoughts, ideas, and character defects I have at the bottom of my mind. It is a ludicrous animal that crawls up out of the slime and, at least for a time, becomes AL W. We are all mixtures of good and evil, but this second personality of mine is more evil than good when in full alcoholic bloom. From the thoughts that went through my head recently (that I can remember) and from the actions which other people kindly filled in for me later, I realize that this "thing" was actually capable of almost anything.
The contention that one doesn't do anything while intoxicated or hypnotized that is against one's sober or conscious moral standards was proved wrong in my case--it was blown out of the water. I proved that I did do things I would never do sober. I never drive by a prison or a jail without experiencing a wave of gratitude that I'm not incarcerated in it. For among the criminals in any prison are a number of alcoholics (like you and me) whose Mr. Hyde personality trapped them. Mr. Hyde always leaves the tab for the real me to pick up, and the size of the bill progresses with the progression of this disease.
In my early days of overindulgence, alcohol merely changed some aspects of the sober me, aspects I wanted changed. But at one point, and I remember it well, I went completely over the line into acute alcoholism. And this second self, my Mr. Hyde, became an entity unto itself, with practically no resemblance whatever to the real person. It was dependent on me in only one area, in that I had to drink to bring it to life and into expression. No problem. I was addicted to alcohol. I lived for it. For the whole first part of my life I honestly felt that I couldn't live without it. So my Mr. Hyde had a very active life of his own, and with every breath he took, my self-respect as Dr. Jekyll went down another notch. The insane part of it was that I knew what was happening all the time. The more I hated Mr. Hyde for what he represented and what he did to me, the more often I brought him to life. I'm no scientist and I'm not trying to be scientific about all this. It's just that, with a little insight dropped in my lap the hard way, I can (at least to my satisfaction) piece together the repeated falls and final resurrection of an Alcoholic Named AL.
In the first three months of my exposure to this program, I buried this entirely phony second self. It sickened from malnutrition and died--I thought. A long time later, I found Mark Twain was right: The report of its death was greatly exaggerated. With one drink of beer, I literally reached down into the bottom of my mind, where all the garbage is, and stirred to life this decaying corpse. This is one of the reasons why there is no cure for this disease we share: The "drinker" never dies until we do. I guarantee, however, that AA will put it to sleep, and that is all we should ask. It's all I wanted to know once, and I believe--more than ever now--it's all I need to know from here on out.
My recent relapse, I understand now, was a direct result of questioning and wishfully disagreeing with part of a program my better self knew was created by alcoholics with divine guidance. They devised AA and offered help to fellow alcoholics who were sick of the complete dependence that is addiction--sick of unbelievable physical and mental pain, sick of causing pain to others, sick of being so much less than they really are. The real difference between a drunk and an alcoholic is not, as the comedians like to quip, that the latter has to go to all those damn meetings. It is hope and the inward knowing that our Mr. Hydes are not the people we were meant to be.
If there is any one motive common to all humanity, it is the search for happiness. It is this state of being that we all hoped to find at the bottom of the glass. Not finding it (except occasionally when the disease was young), we keep going from glass to glass until we are finally two people.
I was permitted a second look at my alcoholic personality. I saw it reflected in bar mirrors and it looked fine--old Al, swinging again at last! It was only the next day that I saw it in perspective, at least up to the point where memory blessedly stopped.
I was given a second look at what the disease had wrought. That look destroyed for all time the reservation I guess I had retained all along: that sometime, under controlled conditions, alcohol plus me could equal fun once more. The realization that rocks me even now is the literally God-forsaken chance I took on dying before my time, for that second look!
There was only one place I wanted to go as I waited in a jail cell for the court to convene. I wanted to go where the real action was--action on a very different plane, action not only seen but experienced, the human being in gentle and positive communion with the absolute Power. I wanted to go where I had first found God and at the same time found myself. Like a small child who has stumbled over his own stupidity and hurt himself very badly, I wanted to go to the only place I knew where even this lapse would be understood. Not excused, but understood.
I wanted to go back to AA. And I did!
A. J. W.
Blue Springs, Missouri
Grapevine April 1968
Why not sign up to get emails with all daily posts included?
Or Follow Us On Twitter #essentialsofrecovery
Why not sign up to get emails with all daily posts included?
Or Follow Us On Twitter #essentialsofrecovery
Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.This is a tough step and takes courage to do. It is, however, a step that can be done if you make sufficient effort.It is not new. The Catholic Church uses it in their confessional and the Psychiatrist uses it.Drinking is caused by inner conflicts and the only way to get rid of these conflicts is to bring them out in the open and destroy them. Wrongs cause conflicts, hence the necessity of this step.Take the first phrase, "Admitted to God." How do you do this? First learn humility so that you can ask help in a humble manner. If you have difficulty in admitting the actuality of a supreme power, work on the premise that there might be one. Once you get your mind in tune with the infinite it is not difficult to realize that you have no secrets from God."Admitted to ourselves:" This can only be done when we are honest with ourselves. In this program it is folly to try to kid yourself. Be ruthless in your soul searching and come clean.Great care should be taken in choosing "another human being." It must be someone you can trust. Your lawyer, your doctor, your priest or minister, another A.A., or a friend; someone who will act as a sounding board and keep your confidence.Once you take this step you will be astounded at the relief you feel. The burden of despair will be lifted from your back and you will be free.It is essential for every A.A. to realize the importance of taking this 5th step. By so doing, all enmities, resentments and wrong thinking may be cast out and we can continue to the next step with a clear conscience.It is advisable to repeat this step from time to time because it is human to err and even A.A.s are human.
Bert T.
AA Grapevine - March 1945
Why not sign up to get emails with all daily posts included?
Or Follow Us On Twitter #essentialsofrecovery
Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.This is a tough step and takes courage to do. It is, however, a step that can be done if you make sufficient effort.It is not new. The Catholic Church uses it in their confessional and the Psychiatrist uses it.Drinking is caused by inner conflicts and the only way to get rid of these conflicts is to bring them out in the open and destroy them. Wrongs cause conflicts, hence the necessity of this step.Take the first phrase, "Admitted to God." How do you do this? First learn humility so that you can ask help in a humble manner. If you have difficulty in admitting the actuality of a supreme power, work on the premise that there might be one. Once you get your mind in tune with the infinite it is not difficult to realize that you have no secrets from God."Admitted to ourselves:" This can only be done when we are honest with ourselves. In this program it is folly to try to kid yourself. Be ruthless in your soul searching and come clean.Great care should be taken in choosing "another human being." It must be someone you can trust. Your lawyer, your doctor, your priest or minister, another A.A., or a friend; someone who will act as a sounding board and keep your confidence.Once you take this step you will be astounded at the relief you feel. The burden of despair will be lifted from your back and you will be free.It is essential for every A.A. to realize the importance of taking this 5th step. By so doing, all enmities, resentments and wrong thinking may be cast out and we can continue to the next step with a clear conscience.It is advisable to repeat this step from time to time because it is human to err and even A.A.s are human.
Bert T.
AA Grapevine - March 1945
Why not sign up to get emails with all daily posts included?
Or Follow Us On Twitter #essentialsofrecovery
HEALING HEART AND MIND
Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.
-TWELVE STEPS AND TWELVE TRADITIONS, p. 55
Since it is true that God comes to me through people, I can see that by keeping people at a distance I also keep God at a distance. God is nearer to me than I think and I can experience Him by loving people and allowing people to love me. But I can neither love nor be loved if I allow my secrets to get in the way.
It’s the side of myself that I refuse to look at that rules me. I must be willing to look at the dark side in order to heal my mind and heart because that is the road to freedom. I must walk into darkness to find the light and walk into fear to find peace.
By revealing my secrets – and thereby ridding myself of guilt – I can actually change my thinking; by altering my thinking, I can change myself. My thoughts create my future. What I will be tomorrow is determined by what I think today.
Why not sign up to get emails with all daily posts included?
Or Follow Us On Twitter #essentialsofrecovery
God does for us“Ongoing recovery is dependent on our relationship with a loving God who cares for us and will do for us what we find impossible to do for ourselves.”
Basic Text, p. 99––––=––––How often have we heard it said in meetings that “God does for us what we cannot do for ourselves”? At times we may get stuck in our recovery, unable, afraid, or unwilling to make the decisions we know we must make to move forward. Perhaps we are unable to end a relationship that just isn’t working. Maybe our job has become a source of too much conflict. Or perhaps we feel we need to find a new sponsor but are afraid to begin the search. Through the grace of our Higher Power, unexpected change may occur in precisely the area we felt unable to alter.We sometimes allow ourselves to become stuck in the problem instead of moving forward toward the solution. At these times, we often find that our Higher Power does for us what we cannot do for ourselves. Perhaps our partner decides to end our relationship. We may get fired or laid off. Or our sponsor tells us that he or she can no longer work with us, forcing us to look for a new one.Sometimes what occurs in our lives can be frightening, as change often seems. But we also hear that “God never closes a door without opening another one.” As we move forward with faith, the strength of our Higher Power is never far from us. Our recovery is strengthened by these changes.––––=––––Just for today: I trust that the God of my understanding will do for me what I cannot do for myself.
Why not sign up to get emails with all daily posts included?
Or Follow Us On Twitter #essentialsofrecovery
A.A. Thought For The Day
The A.A. program is one of charity because the real meaning of the word charity is to care enough about other people to really want to help them. To get the full benefit of the program, we must try to help other alcoholics. We may try to help somebody and think we have failed, but the seed we have planted may bear fruit some time. We never know the results even a word of ours might have. But the main thing is to have charity for others, a real desire to help them, whether we succeed or not. Do I have real charity?
Meditation For The Day
All material things, the universe, the world, even our bodies, may be Eternal Thought expressed in time and space. The more the physicists and astronomers reduce matter, the more it becomes a mathematical formula, which is thought. In the final analysis, matter is thought. When Eternal Thought expresses itself within the framework of space and time, it becomes matter. Our thoughts, within the box of space and time, cannot know anything firsthand, except material things. But we can deduce that outside the box of space and time is Eternal Thought, which we can call God.
Prayer For The Day
I pray that I may be a true expression of Eternal Thought. I pray that God’s thoughts may work through my thoughts.
Why not sign up to get emails with all daily posts included?
Or Follow Us On Twitter #essentialsofrecovery
Tolerance in Practice, p. 158
“We found that the principles of tolerance and love had to be emphasized in actual practice. We can never say (or insinuate) to anyone that he must agree to our formula or be excommunicated. The atheist may stand up in an A.A. meeting still denying the Deity, yet reporting how vastly he has been changed in attitude and outlook. Much experience tells us he will presently change his mind about God, but nobody tells him he must do so.
“In order to carry the principles of inclusiveness and tolerance still further, we make no religious requirement of anyone. All people having an alcoholic problem who wish to get rid of it and so make a happy adjustment with the circumstances of their lives, become A.A. members by simply associating with us. Nothing but sincerity is needed. But we do not demand even this.
“In such an atmosphere the orthodox, the unorthodox, and the believer mix happily and usefully together. An opportunity for spiritual growth is open to all.”
Letter, 1940
Why not sign up to get emails with all daily posts included?
Or Follow Us On Twitter #essentialsofrecovery
Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.
–Step Five
Step Five can be scary. We’re to take the wrongs we listed in our Fourth Srep and share them with God, ourselves, and another person. We may look for an easier, softer way. But Step Five stops us.
We’re to share the exact nature of our wrong. Why? So we can take a load off ourselves. So we won’t use again. By totally sharing our past wrongs, we can belong once more. We can heal. We start to forgive ourselves. We become more humble. When you share your Fifth Step, holding nothing back. You deserve the peace this Step will bring you.
Prayer for the Day: Higher Power, give me courage to tell it all. Give me courage to admit just how wrong I had become.
Action for the Day: Step Five teaches me that sharing is important. I will find a friend and share my wrongs with that friend. I will hold nothing back.
Why not sign up to get emails with all daily posts included?
Or Follow Us On Twitter #essentialsofrecovery
SCRIPTURE
“Nobody ever outgrows Scriptures; the book widens and deepens with our years.”
–Charles Haddan Spurgeon
Not so long ago I had a narrow and rigid religious outlook that was based solely on my narrow belief system. I was addicted to my religious approach and any alternative or variation was condemned before investigation. I was a religious bigot. I was a hypocrite. I hid behind my dogma and practiced ritual.
Today I have a comprehensive view of religion and God, thanks to the influence of recovering alcoholics and the discovery of a spiritual program. Today I am able to see the depth and richness of scripture, a living library of books and experiences. Today I am able to see beyond the printed word to the message of healing and love that comes with honesty and acceptance. Now I know that the bigoted side of me was fearful and afraid of change. I needed rules to keep people from discovering what a lonely and spiritually bereft person I was. The rules and dogmas formed my prison bars. I was drowning in religiosity. Today I am free to be different. Today I am free to be me.
O wind of Truth, continue to blow and inspire us through our differences.
Why not sign up to get emails with all daily posts included?
Or Follow Us On Twitter #essentialsofrecovery
Reflection For The Day
For those of us who have lost our faith, or who have always had to struggle along without it, it’s often helpful just to accept — blindly and with no reservations. It’s not necessary for us to believe at first; we need not be convinced. If we can only accept, we find ourselves becoming gradually aware of a force for good that’s always there to help us. Have I taken the way of faith?
Today I Pray
May I abandon my need to know the why’s and wherefore’s of my trust in a Higher Power. May I not intellectualize about faith, since by its nature it precludes analysis. May I know that “head-tripping” was a symptom of my disease, as I strung together — cleverly, I thought — alibi upon excuse upon rationale. May I learn acceptance, and faith will follow.
Today I Will Remember
Faith follows Acceptance.
Why not sign up to get emails with all daily posts included?
Or Follow Us On Twitter #essentialsofrecovery
SHARING OUR STORIES
“You leave home to seek your fortune and, when you get it, you go home and share it with your family.”
–Anita Baker
For much of my life I tried to be “Strong.” I kept silent about my own suffering and focused instead on others people’s needs and how I could help them. Though I could listen and offer advice, I lacked empathy and understanding.
When my stoic, stubborn, and silent avoidance of my own struggles finally made my life unmanageable, I entered recovery. By listening to stories shared by others, I have been blessed. I have found that none of us walk this path alone. We learn from each other and from the strength of traditions. I have found empathy.
I came to see that my silence was born from weakness, not from strength. It was shame, fear, and pride, which kept me hiding. Now I find great joy and freedom in sharing my story with others. I am particularly grateful to God for the way He used my story with my Dad.
My crisis not only drove me to seek help, but it freed my Dad to get help too. If I had remained silent, not only would I have been destroyed, but I would have robbed my Dad of the acceptance and freedom to admit and seek the help he needed – and that has so profoundly changed his life.
One day at a time …
I will recognize that my history and my current experiences are not to be hidden in silence. I will share my story with others.
~Lisa V.
Why not sign up to get emails with all daily posts included?
Or Follow Us On Twitter #essentialsofrecovery
“All living creatures and all plants derive their life from the sun. If it were not for the sun, there would be darkness and nothing could grow the earth would be without life.”
–Okute, TETON SIOUX
This is why we call the sun, Father Sun. Father Sun shines life on Mother Earth and from this Father and Mother all life forms exist and continue to reproduce. The Sun shines on all; it is not selective. We should not allow anything to block the Sun from shining on the Earth. We must not pollute the air because the pollutants block the light of life to the Earth. If the Earth cannot receive this light, then life will start to be affected. We must live in harmony with the Sun and Earth. Otherwise, we are harming ourselves.
My Creator, give me the wisdom to live in harmony with all things.
Why not sign up to get emails with all daily posts included?
Or Follow Us On Twitter #essentialsofrecovery
Hold fast to dreams, For if dreams die, Life is a broken-winged bird That cannot fly
—Langston Hughes
Watching birds spread their wings and soar can remind us of the best in ourselves. In joyful moments we all feel our own desire to fly, to reach toward what we dream of doing.
Our dreams give us a direction to fly. Birds fly toward the light for joy, toward green leaves for shelter, to water and berries for food. In the same way, our dreams direct us to the course of our own joy, shelter, and nourishment.
Sometimes as we fly, we bump into disappointments. They may temporarily stun us or slow us down. But just like birds that are occasionally wounded, we can heal ourselves and fly again. We can choose to not let the hardships of life break our spirited wings. Rather, we can keep spreading our wings, soaring in the spirit of joy.
Am I flying today, or must I heal a wound first?
Why not sign up to get emails with all daily posts included?
Or Follow Us On Twitter #essentialsofrecovery
The aim of AA is not Sobriety but Happy Sobriety. The most effective and, incidentally, the soberest group, is the happiest group. It is possible that you can’t speak at meetings, maybe you are not in a position to “carry the message,” but you can and should show your happy sobriety in the radiance of your smile. It is our only advertisement and it should outshine in brilliance the gaudiest of neon sign.
The poor guy still in the gutter isn’t interested in your sobriety; he’s interested in the price of another drink. He is, however, very much interested in happiness. It’s what he has been looking for all his life and thought he could buy by the “fifth.”
Copyright Hazelden Foundation
Why not sign up to get emails with all daily posts included?
Or Follow Us On Twitter #essentialsofrecovery
Golden light skims azure bay,
Dense air heavy with laurel.
Windless dusk smears to night,
Sonorous pool in a sheltered grove.Though this world is turbulent, there are still days and places where we can be afforded some tranquility. When this happens, it is right to rest from the tribulations and striving of being in the world and to take advantage of what is offered. Sometimes it will be the peaceful feeling of sunset, when the blazing sun becomes reconciled with the horizon and a sense of acceptance lingers in the air. At other times, it will be the chance encounter with a secret place -- perhaps a grove of trees that promises a mysterious comfort.In such private places, we can often find peace. Such stillness can even be precious, as when we notice the deep voice of a stream which we were always too busy to hear before. Indeed, sometimes we are so worn out by our daily activities that we forget to notice our need for recharging.Renewal is a profound tonic. With sanctuary and rest, we can prepare to go forth again.
Why not sign up to get emails with all daily posts included?
Or Follow Us On Twitter #essentialsofrecovery
The real way circulates everywhere;
how could it require practice or enlightenment?
The essential teaching is fully available;
how could effort by necessary?
Furthermore, the entire mirror is free of dust;
why take steps to polish it?
Nothing is separate from this very place;
why journey away?
– Dogen 1227
Why not sign up to get emails with all daily posts included?
Or Follow Us On Twitter #essentialsofrecovery
