Trusting others
Personal RelationshipsSome people trust others too much, while a few seem to have no trust at all. Either stance is wrong and leads to some kind of trouble.As we grow in our Twelve Step program, we learn the truth about trust. We can trust others if our expectations aren’t too high. We have to remember, however, that as human beings they can fail us. However, it’s also unrealistic to be suspicious of everyone. The truth is that most people aren’t out to get us or to hurt us. They are pursuing their own interests, just as we must do.As we grow emotionally, we come to see that we have less difficulty trusting others. We no longer make outrageous demands on them or stretch their patience to the limits. We also realize that there are many times when we can work co-operatively with everybody’s interest in mind.I’ll think realistically about others today, being careful not to expect either too much or too little from the. I’ll certainly not expect more from them than I could reasonably expect from myself.
When we emerge from under our tons of troubles, get back on our feet and begin to live like other folks again, we somehow feel that the world has become a better place and that when our troubles vanished, all troubles vanished and there were few, if any, left in the world.The store of world troubles is as great now as ever – only different people are having them. If you have no troubles of your own, go out and find somebody else’s. They are not half so hard to carry, and your heart and soul need the exercise.Hazelden Foundation
~ Page 110 ~
Trouble: Constructive or Destructive?
“There was a time when we ignored trouble, hoping it would go away. Or, in fear and in depression, we ran from it, but found it was still with us. Often, full of unreason, bitterness, and blame, we fought back. These mistaken attitudes, powered by alcohol, guaranteed our destruction, unless they were altered.
“Then came A.A. Here we learned that trouble was really a fact of life for everybody—a fact that had to be understood and dealt with. Surprisingly, we found that our troubles could, under God’s grace, be converted into unimagined blessings.
“Indeed, that was the essence of A.A. itself: trouble accepted, trouble squarely faced with calm courage, trouble lessened and often transcended. This was the A.A. story, and we became a part of it. Such demonstration became our stock in trade for the next sufferer.”
~ LETTER, 1966 ~
© 1967 by Alcoholics Anonymous ® World Services, Inc
A.A. Thought for the Day
In the past, we kept right on drinking in spite of all the trouble we got into. We were foolish enough to believe that drinking could still be fun in spite of everything that happened to us. When we came into A.A., we found a lot of people who, like ourselves, had had fun with drinking, but who now admitted that liquor had become nothing but trouble for them. And when we found that this thing had happened to a lot of other people besides ourselves, we realized that perhaps we weren’t such odd ducks after all. Have I learned to admit that for me drinking has ceased to be fun and has become nothing but trouble?
Meditation for the Day
The life-line, the line of rescue, is the line from the soul to God. On one end of the life-line is our faith and on the other end is God’s power. It can be a strong line and no soul can be overwhelmed who is linked to God by it. I will trust in this life-line and never be afraid. God will save me from doing wrong and from the cares and troubles of life. I will look to God for help and trust Him for aid when I am emotionally upset.
Prayer for the Day
I pray that no lack of trust or fearfulness will make me disloyal to God. I pray that I may keep a strong hold on the life-line of faith.
© 1954, 1975, 1992 by Hazelden Foundation
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When we emerge from under our tons of troubles, get back on our feet and begin to live like other folks again, we somehow feel that the world has become a better place and that when our troubles vanished, all troubles vanished and there were few, if any, left in the world.
The store of world troubles is as great now as ever – only different people are having them. If you have no troubles of your own, go out and find somebody else’s. They are not half so hard to carry, and your heart and soul need the exercise.
Hazelden Foundation
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Reflection For The Day
I
n many aspects the Fellowship of The Program is like a reasonably happy cruise ship or, in time of trouble, like a convoy. But in the long run each of us must chart his or her own course through life. When the seas are smooth, we may become careless. By neglecting Step Ten, we may get out of the habit of checking our position. If we’re mindful of Step Ten, however, then we rarely go so far wrong that we can’t make a few corrections and get back on course again. Do I realize that regular practice of Step Ten can help me determine what other step is indicated to bring me into a happier frame of mind and into serenity?
Today I Pray
May step Ten be a sextant by which I read my whereabouts at sea, so that I can correct my course, re chart it if I am heading for shallow places. May I keep in mind that, if it weren’t for an all-knowing Captain, and the vigilance of my fellow crew members, this ship could be adrift and I could easily panic.
Today I Will Remember
To steer by a steady star.
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Page 28 ~
Troublemakers Can Be Teachers
Few of us are any longer afraid of what any newcomer can do to our A.A. reputation or effectiveness. Those who slip, those with mental twists, those who rebel at the program, those who trade on the A.A. reputation — all such persons seldom harm an A.A. group for long.
Some of these have become our most respected and best loved. Some have remained to try our patience, sober nevertheless. Others have drifted away. We have begun to regard the troublesome ones not as menaces, but rather as our teachers. They oblige us to cultivate patience, tolerance, and humility. We finally see that they are only people sicker than the rest of us, that we who condemn them are the Pharisees whose false rightousness does our group the deeper spiritual damage.
~ GRAPEVINE, AUGUST 1946 ~
© 1967 by Alcoholics Anonymous ® World Services, Inc
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We find in life exactly what we are looking for. In your drinking days you courted trouble constantly and you probably found more than your share of it.
Today we are looking for a better way of life and this, too, we find at every turn.
We get what we want if we put forth sufficient effort to look for it, if we have the ability to recognize it when we see it, and the tenacity to hold on to it when once we grasp it.
Published by Hazelden
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Eyeglasses And Attitudes
“Our best thinking got us into trouble…. Recovery is an active change in our ideas and attitudes.”
Basic Text p.53
In active addiction, the world probably looked like a horrible place. Using helped us tolerate the world we saw. Today, however, we understand that the world’s condition wasn’t really the problem. It was our ideas and attitudes about the world that made it impossible for us to find a comfortable place in it.
Our attitudes and our ideas are the eyeglasses through which we see our lives. If our “glasses” are smudged or dirty, our lives look dim. If our attitudes aren’t well focused, the whole world appears distorted. To see the world clearly, we need to keep our attitudes and ideas clean, free of things like resentment, denial, self-pity, and closed-mindedness. To insure our vision of life is in focus, we have to bring our ideas in line with reality.
In addiction, our best thinking kept us from clearly seeing either the world or our part in it. Recovery serves to correct the prescriptions in our attitudinal eyewear. By stripping away our denial and replacing it with faith, self-honesty, humility, and responsibility, the steps help us see our lives in a whole new way. Then the steps help us keep our spiritual lenses clean, encouraging us to regularly examine our ideas our attitudes, and our actions.
Today, seen through the clean lenses of faith and recovery the world looks like a warm, inviting place to live.
Just for today: I will view the world and my life through the clean spiritual lenses of my program.
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“If you get troubled, go and sit by the river. The flowing water will take your troubles away.”
–Joe Coyhis, STOCKBRIDGE-MUNSEE
Sometimes we get mixed up and we don’t know what to do. Go to the river or creek. Take your sage and tobacco; sit and be still. Talk to the water, offer tobacco and the healing water will take your problems downstream. Give thanks.
Great Spirit, heal my mind today, let me see love.
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The man who has the greatest trouble in getting our program is frequently the man who is above the average in education. He tries to open the door to our philosophy of living with his Phi Beta Kappa key. It just won’t fit.
The man who enters our door convinced that all he knows hasn’t been enough to keep him out of difficulty, who is willing to unlearn all those things he knows that are not so and who, in humility, is willing to open his mind and heart to the simple wisdom of those who have succeeded where he has failed, is almost a sure bet.
Hazelden Foundation
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