Daily Reflections
August 30
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!
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Twenty-Four Hours A Day
August 30
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.
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As Bill Sees It
August 30
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
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Walk In Dry Places
August 30
THE MASKS ARE FALLING
Openness Individuals and families can be quite successful at masking personal problems and feelings. This doesn’t always work very well with alcoholics, though some of us did manage to conceal our problem for long periods before our lives began to break down.
However, it is becoming more acceptable to admit to such problems, and it is no longer surprising to read that a prominent person is being treated for an addiction.
This new openness has also made it possible to abandon the masks we’ve been wearing to hide our feelings. When people learn they can be more open with their problems and need for help, it also becomes easier to admit that they are angry. fearful. unhappy, or even frightened.
Removing our masks and letting others see us as we are is only the first phase in the real honesty we’re seeking. After expressing ourselves authentically, do we find we like who we are?
Now that we know and admit the truth about ourselves, what are we going to do to make needed changes?
I will face who and what I really am today. I will use my strengths and not let any shortcomings keep me from being effective.
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Keep It Simple
August 30
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.
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Each Day a New Beginning
August 30
I like my friend for what is in her heart, not for the way she does things.
—Sandra K. Lamberson
We find good in situations, experiences and people when we look for it. Generally we find just what we expect to find. The power attaching to our attitudes is awesome. Often it is immobilizing; too seldom is it positive.
We each create the personal environment that our soul calls home, which means that at any moment we have the power to change our perspective on life, our response to any particular experience and most of all, our feelings about ourselves. Just as we will find good in others when we decide to look for it, we’ll find good in ourselves.
We are such special women, all of us. And in our hearts we want joy. What the program offers is the awareness that we are the creators of the joy in our hearts. We can relinquish the past and its sorrows, and we can leave the future in the hands of our higher power. The present is singular in its importance to our lives, now.
Behavior generally reveals attitudes, which are of the mind and frequently in conflict with the heart. I will strive for congruence. I will let my heart lead the way. It will not only find the good in others, it will imitate it.
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Father Leo’s Daily Meditation
August 30
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.
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Xtra Thoughts
August 30
“When anger spreads through the breast, guard thy tongue from barking idly.”
–Sappho
Give to the world the best you have and the best will come back to you.
–Madeline Bridges
Words are powerful, may I use them wisely.
–Shelley
Today I will do all that I am capable of doing at this time of my life to free myself of past mistakes. And then I will let go and live in my now…fully enjoying today.
–Ruth Fishel
Ability is what you’re capable of doing. Motivation determines what you do. Attitude determines how well you do it.”
– Lou Holtz
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Bible Scriptures
August 30
“The earth is the Lord’s, and all its fullness, the world and those who dwell therein.”
-Psalms 24:1
“Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid or terrified because of them, for the LORD your God goes with you; he will never leave you nor forsake you.”
-Deuteronomy 31:6
He gives strength to the weary and increases the power of the weak. Even youths grow tired and weary, and young men stumble and fall; but those who hope in the LORD will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint.
-Isaiah 40:29-31
Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up.
-Galatians 6:9
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Daily Inspiration
August 30
The best things in life aren’t really things at all. Lord, thank You for all that I am and for all that I am able to be and thank You for my family, my friends, and for all those that touch my life in a special way.
Spend less time trying to change and more time making the best of who you are. Lord, help me daily to put Your words into action.
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A Day At A Time
August 30
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.
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One Day At A Time
August 30
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.
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One More Day
August 30
The basic fact of today is the tremendous pace of change in human life.
– Jawaharial Nehru
Just when we convince ourselves that we are settled, something happens that causes us to change once again. We need to be chameleons, open to change and willing to adapt.
It’s not a simple process, for sometimes life throws us zingers we never expected. Not all change is positive, and it can be downright hard. Perhaps we may become grandparents quite unexpectedly, or we may need to more to a different city. We can lose a spouse or a job or our health. All these situations cause further change. Rising to the occasion teaches us that we are, finally, truly adult in our behavior.
I let go of old dreams each time I change. I am proud of my ability to adapt to new circumstances.
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Elder’s Meditation of the Day
August 30
“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
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Journey To The Heart
August 30
What Would Feel Good to You?
What do you want? What would feel good to you? Ask yourself that question often as you go through your day, as you live your life.
When you don’t know what to do next, when you’re not sure how to find the path that’s right for you, ask yourself what you want and what would feel good. That’s how you’ll discover what’s right for you.
What energizes you? Which friends feel good to be around? What work excites you, infuses you with passion? Which hobbies interest you? How do you want to spend your time? We have endured have to long enough. We have pushed ourselves through should too many times. There is a better and different way.
Learn to recognize what lifts your spirits. Become conscious of not only what you need, but also what you want and like, what feels right to you. At first, doing what you want and what feels good to you may be uncomfortable, especially if you’ve spent much of your life doing what doesn’t feel good to you. Learn to be comfortable with the new energy. Learn to become comfortable choosing what energizes you. By following your heart, by following your passion, you will find your path and you will find joy.
The possibilities for joy are limitless if we can do what feels good to us– in work, in life, in love, in play. Learn to become comfortable with joy. You have the power to create joy by choosing what feels good to you. The time for joy isn’t later. The time for joy is now.
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Today’s Gift
August 30
If I cry tears let them wash away your fears – make a rainbow of love for you.
—Thom Klika
It takes both sun and rain to make a rainbow in the sky. The rainbow is a rare and beautiful thing – each color brilliant beside the other. Rain falls to earth like the tears we all shed sometimes. Sunlight shines like the happiness we find inside when we feel peaceful.
The colors of the rainbow are like all the different feelings we have. Let’s say red is anger and green is fear and orange is joy and violet is contentment. All these feelings create a whole person, in the same way that all these colors make the whole rainbow. We become more colorful people as we learn to express all our emotions.
A person who is learning to share feelings radiates the same kind of beauty as a rainbow in the sky.
Who can I share a feeling with today?
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The Language of Letting Go
August 30
Accepting Our Best
We don’t have to do it any better than we can – ever.
Do our best for the moment, and then let it go. If we have to redo it, we can do our best in another moment, later.
We can never do more or better than we are able to do at the moment. We punish ourselves and make ourselves feel crazy by expecting more than our reasonable best for now.
Striving for excellence is a positive quality.
Striving for perfection is self-defeating.
Did someone tell us or expect us to do or give or be more? Did someone always withhold approval?
There comes a time when we feel we have done our best. When that time comes, let it go.
There are days when our best is less than we hoped for. Let those times go too. Start over tomorrow. Work things through, until our best becomes better.
Empowering and complimenting ourselves will not make us lazy. It will nurture us and enable us to give, do, and be our best.
Today, I will do my best, and then let it go. God, help me stop criticizing myself so I can start appreciating how far I’ve come.
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More Language Of Letting Go
August 30
Turn your day around
I got up and checked the calendar. The car had to go in for servicing. I hated driving it in, getting someone to follow me, then standing in line at the service garage. Besides, I was busy. My friend followed me to the garage, and I climbed into his car. Geez, it was hot. I wished I was at home, in the air-conditioned lodge.
“Want to go out to eat breakfast?” I asked.
“Not really,” he said.
“But the window washers will be at the house. We might as well wait until they leave. Even if we got home now, I won’t be able to write.”
“You’re right. Where do you want to eat?”
“Do you have any cash on you?” I asked. He didn’t. “Well then, we can’t go to our favorite restaurants. They don’t take checks or credit cards.”
We chose a restaurant neither of us liked. His waffle was pasty. I could taste the grits in my soggy pancakes from the premade mix that hadn’t been stirred. The syrup was immitation maple flavoring. The grapefruit juice was weak. I pushed my food around the plate, then stopped eating. My stomach already hurt.
We went to the cashier to pay for our food. We waited and waited while he did some other work, ignoring the fact that we were the only ones waiting in line. Finally, he turned to us and smiled. “Good news,” he said. “You’ve won a prize.”
“What is it?” I asked.
“A free sundae. You’ll get it when you come back to eat here next time.”
I started to tell him to give my surprise to the next child who came in, when he turned to me scowling. “Ma’am, we have a problem,” he said. “Your credit card was denied.”
“That’s impossible,” I said. “I pay my bill in full each month. Try again.”
He did. The card still didn’t go through.
My stomach really hurt by the time we got home. The bank had screwed up. The automatic payment to my credit card company had mysteriously been sent someplace else. By the time that problem got aolved, it was time to go pick up my car.
There was a long line ahead of me at the service garage. It had been 104 degrees in the car. I was almost passing out. And everyone ahead of me was ordering tires. I sat down on the bench to relax. Finally, my turn.
“Here’s your keys,” the man said. “Just a minute.” He turned and asked the mechanic, “Did you check the brakes?”
He said, “I forgot.”
“Sorry,” the man said. “It’ll just be another half hour.”
An hour later, on the way home, I stopped at the bank. I really needed some cash. The regular line was long, winding its way from the tellers to the door. The business line was long, too, but not as bad. I took my place. Fifteen minutes later, it was my turn. “This line is for people who have a business account,” the woman snapped.
“I do,” I whispered. “Look at the check.”
Much later that evening, when I finally started to write and my stomach began settling down from the pancake mix, a vision popped into my head. “What about two eggs, cooked in real butter, with mushrooms, a ground beef patty, and some toast?”
A few mintues later, he disappeared out the door. “Going to the store,” he hollered. “Be right back.”
We sat at the counter at 10:30 that night. The eggs were perfect. The mushrooms were stuffed with cream cheese. The toast was soft from butter. And the hamburger patties were done perfectly and smothered in A-1 sauce.
A peace settled in. I felt grateful and blessed. I remembered a conversation I had heard a long time ago. “Oh, I see it’s going to be one of those days,” a woman snapped to her boss. “Not unless you make it that way,” he said.
Stuff happens. But no matter what time it is, it’s never to late to say thanks, and have a good day.
God, help me know that between you and me, we have the power to eventually turn any day around.
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Touchstones Meditations For Men
August 30
Procrastination is the thief of time.
—Edward Young
When we have a problem with putting things off, we seem to add to our troubles by mentally flogging ourselves. We know we are losing time. We criticize ourselves for our irrational behavior. Whether we are putting off an important task in our lives or letting many little undone jobs accumulate, we could benefit from stopping the self-criticism and asking ourselves for the spiritual message in our actions. Perhaps we need some quiet time to do absolutely nothing. Maybe our perfectionism is paralyzing us. Is an “all or nothing” attitude telling us if we can’t do the whole job right away, there is no point in beginning? Unexpressed anger may be blocking us from doing what we need to do.
Whenever we find ourselves doing things that seem irrational we can ask, “What is the message from my Higher Power in this behavior?” This question will carry us much further toward spiritual growth than the mental criticism we are tempted to do.
Today, I will do what I can within the limits of one day, and I will stay in communication with my Higher Power.
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Daily TAO
August 30
Heart
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 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.
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Daily Zen
August 30
I leave to the highborn
All the honors
Of this dissolving world
A life of poverty
Has taught me to love
Haze and mist.
– Soseki
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Faith’s Check Book
August 30
Solace, Security, Satisfaction
Although my house be not so with God; yet he hath made with me an everlasting covenant, ordered in all things, and sure: for this is all my salvation, and all my desire, although he make it not to grow.
-2 Samuel 23:5
This is not so much one promise as an aggregate of promises—a box of pearls. the covenant is the ark which contains all things.
These are the last words of David, but they may be mine today. Here is a sigh: things are not with me and mine as I could wish; there are trials, cares, and sins. These make the pillow hard.
Here is a solace—”He hath made with me an everlasting covenant.” Jehovah has pledged Himself to me, and sealed the compact with the blood of Jesus. I am bound to my God and my God to me.
This brings into prominence a security, since this covenant is everlasting, well ordered, and sure. There is nothing to fear from the lapse of time, the failure of some forgotten point, or the natural uncertainty of things. The covenant is a rocky foundation to build on for life or for death.
David feels satisfaction: he wants no more for salvation or delectation. He is delivered, and he is delighted. The covenant is all a man can desire.
O my soul, turn thou this day to thy Lord Jesus, whom the great Lord has given to be a covenant to the people. Take Him to be thine all in all.
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This Morning’s Readings
August 30
“Wait on the Lord.”
—Psalm 27:14
IT may seem an easy thing to wait, but it is one of the postures which a Christian soldier learns not without years of teaching. Marching and quick-marching are much easier to God’s warriors than standing still. There are hours of perplexity when the most willing spirit, anxiously desirous to serve the Lord, knows not what part to take. Then what shall it do? Vex itself by despair? Fly back in cowardice, turn to the right hand in fear, or rush forward in presumption? No, but simply wait. Wait in prayer, however. Call upon God, and spread the case before Him; tell Him your difficulty, and plead His promise of aid. In dilemmas between one duty and another, it is sweet to be humble as a child, and wait with simplicity of soul upon the Lord. It is sure to be well with us when we feel and know our own folly, and are heartily willing to be guided by the will of God. But wait in faith. Express your unstaggering confidence in Him; for unfaithful, untrusting waiting, is but an insult to the Lord. Believe that if He keep you tarrying even till midnight, yet He will come at the right time; the vision shall come and shall not tarry. Wait in quiet patience, not rebelling because you are under the affliction, but blessing your God for it. Never murmur against the second cause, as the children of Israel did against Moses; never wish you could go back to the world again, but accept the case as it is, and put it as it stands, simply and with your whole heart, without any self-will, into the hand of your covenant God, saying, “Now, Lord, not my will, but Thine be done. I know not what to do; I am brought to extremities, but I will wait until Thou shalt cleave the floods, or drive back my foes. I will wait, if Thou keep me many a day, for my heart is fixed upon Thee alone, O God, and my spirit waiteth for Thee in the full conviction that Thou wilt yet be my joy and my salvation, my refuge and my strong tower.”
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This Evening’s Readings
August 30
“Heal me, O Lord, and I shall be healed.”
—Jeremiah 17:14
“I have seen His ways, and will heal him.”
—Isaiah 57:18
IT is the sole prerogative of God to remove spiritual disease. Natural disease may be instrumentally healed by men, but even then the honour is to be given to God who giveth virtue unto medicine, and bestoweth power unto the human frame to cast off disease. As for spiritual sicknesses, these remain with the great Physician alone; He claims it as His prerogative, “I kill and I make alive, I wound and I heal”; and one of the Lord’s choice titles is Jehovah-Rophi, the Lord that healeth thee. “I will heal thee of thy wounds,” is a promise which could not come from the lip of man, but only from the mouth of the eternal God. On this account the psalmist cried unto the Lord, “O Lord, heal me, for my bones are sore vexed,” and again, “Heal my soul, for I have sinned against thee.” For this, also, the godly praise the name of the Lord, saying, “He healeth all our diseases.” He who made man can restore man; He who was at first the creator of our nature can new create it. What a transcendent comfort it is that in the person of Jesus “dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily!” My soul, whatever thy disease may be, this great Physician can heal thee. If He be God, there can be no limit to His power. Come then with the blind eye of darkened understanding, come with the limping foot of wasted energy, come with the maimed hand of weak faith, the fever of an angry temper, or the ague of shivering despondency, come just as thou art, for He who is God can certainly restore thee of thy plague. None shall restrain the healing virtue which proceeds from Jesus our Lord. Legions of devils have been made to own the power of the beloved Physician, and never once has He been baffled. All His patients have been cured in the past and shall be in the future, and thou shalt be one among them, my friend, if thou wilt but rest thyself in Him this night.