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“And acceptance is the answer to all my problems today. When I am disturbed, it is because I find some person, place, thing, or situation - some fact of my life - unacceptable to me, and I can find no serenity until I accept that person, place, thing, or situation as being exactly the way it is...

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Daily Reflections, July 30

GIVING BACK 

. . . he has struck something better than gold. . . .He may not see at once that he has barely scratched a limitless lode which will pay dividends only if he mines it for the rest of his life and insists on giving away the entire product.

 ALCOHOLICS ANONYMOUS, p. 129 

My part of the Seventh Tradition means so much more than just giving money to pay for the coffee. It means being accepted for myself by belonging to a group. For the first time I can be responsible, because I have a choice. I can learn the principles of working out problems in my daily life by getting involved in the "business" of A.A. By being self-supporting, I can give back to A.A. what A.A. gave to me! Giving back to A.A. not only ensures my own sobriety, but allows me to buy insurance that A.A. will be here for my grandchildren.

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Reblogging myself from over a year ago. Because it's true.

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Masks

More than most people, the alcoholic leads a double life. He is very much the actor. To the outer world he presents his stage character. This is the one he likes his fellows to see. He wants to enjoy a certain reputation, but knows in his heart he doesn’t deserve it.

Alcoholics Anonymous, page 73.

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Why I am not following anyone...

This is a second blog, not my prime account. Remember when tumblr made it possible to run multiple tumblogs under one account? What they neglected to mention was that secondary blogs can't follow other users. Other users can, of course, follow this blog.

Kinda sucky for something that may require anonymity, eh?

So I'll be carrying the message, but without seemingly following anyone.

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A.A. does not teach us to handle our drinking. It teaches us how to handle sobriety.

Above all, we reject fantasizing and accept reality. The more I drank, the more I fantasized everything. I imagined getting even for hurts and rejections. In my mind's eye I played and replayed scenes in which I was plucked magically from the bar where I stood nursing a drink and was instantly exalted to some position of power and prestige. I lived in a dream world. A.A. led me gently from this fantasizing to embrace reality with open arms. And I found it beautiful! For, at last, I was at peace with myself. And with others. And with God.

Alcoholics Anonymous, "A.A. Taught Him to Handle Sobriety", page 559

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King Alcohol claims another of its shuddering denizens.

Amy Winehouse passed today. 

Such phenomenal talent. This damn disease.

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Fear somehow touched about every aspect of our lives. It was an evil and corroding thread; the fabric of our existence was shot through with it. It set in motion trains of circumstances which brought us misfortune we felt we didn’t deserve. But did not we often set the ball rolling ourselves? ————— The problem of resolving fear has two aspects. We shall have to try for all the freedom from fear that is possible for us to attain. Then we shall need to find both the courage and the grace to deal constructively with whatever fears remain.

Resolving Fear - Bill W. Alcoholics Anonymous pp. 67-68 Grapevine, January 1962 (via therecoveringalcoholic)

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From Step Six

When men and women pour so much alcohol into them­selves that they destroy their lives, they commit a most un­natural act. Defying their instinctive desire for self-preserva­tion, they seem bent upon self-destruction. They work against their own deepest instinct. As they are humbled by the terrific beating administered by alcohol, the grace of God can enter them and expel their obsession. Here their powerful instinct to live can cooperate fully with their Creator’s desire to give them new life. For nature and God alike abhor suicide.

                Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions, page 64

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From "Bill's Story"

Despite the living example of my friend there remained in me the vestiges of my old prejudice. The word God still aroused a certain antipathy. When the thought was expressed that there might be a God personal to me this feeling was intensified. I didn't like the idea. I could go for such conceptions as Creative Intelligence, Universal Mind or Spirit of Nature but I resisted the thought of a Czar of the Heavens, however loving His sway might be. I have since talked with scores of men who felt the same way.

My friend suggested what then seemed a novel idea. He said, "Why don't you choose your own conception of God?"

That statement hit me hard. It melted the icy intellectual mountain in whose shadow I had lived and shivered many years. I stood in the sunlight at last.

Alcoholics Anonymous, page 12

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"We have a Rule 62 violation on I-95, need immediate backup. Bring Big Books and the SWAT team!"