gift – Shoutout From The Pit

Thought to Consider

A.A. is not something you join, it’s a way of life.

The Road to Recovery

The road to recovery is always under construction.

Premature Funerals

“I have been to too many premature funerals due to our good friend alcohol.”

Spiritual and Physical Health

“When the spiritual malady is overcome, we straighten out mentally and physically.”

Control

“Most of us have been unwilling to admit we were real alcoholics. No person likes to think he is bodily and mentally different from his fellows. Therefore, it is not surprising that our drinking careers have been characterized by countless vain attempts to prove we could drink like other people. The idea that somehow, someday he will Control and Enjoy his drinking is the great obsession of every abnormal drinker. The persistence of this illusion is astonishing. Many pursue it into the gates of insanity or death.”

Sunlight

“It is plain that a life which includes deep resentment leads only to futility and unhappiness. To the precise extent that we permit these, do we squander the hours that might have been worthwhile. This business of resentment is infinitely grave. We found that it is fatal. For when harboring such feelings we shut ourselves off from the sunlight of the Spirit. The insanity of alcohol returns and we drink again. And with us, to drink is to die.”

To Handle Sobriety

“The more I drank, the more I fantasized everything . . . 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.”

Our Survival

“The HONESTY expressed by the members of A.A. in meetings has the power to open my mind. Nothing can block the flow of energy that HONESTY carries with it. The only obstacle to this flow of energy is inebriation, but even then, no one will find a closed door if he or she has left and chooses to return. Once he or she has received the gift of sobriety, each A.A. member is challenged on a daily basis to accept a program of HONESTY.”

Ego Deflation

All of A.A.’s Twelve Steps ask us to go contrary to our natural desires . . . they all deflate our egos. When it comes to ego deflation, few Steps are harder to take than Five. But scarcely any Step is more necessary to longtime sobriety and peace of mind than this one.

Big Book Quote

“We found that as soon as we were able to lay aside prejudice and express even a willingness to believe in a Power greater than ourselves, we commenced to get results, even though it was impossible for any of us to fully define or comprehend that Power, which is God.”

Prayer

“In A.A. we have found that the actual good results of prayer are beyond question. They are matters of knowledge and experience. All those who have persisted have found strength not ordinarily their own. They have found wisdom beyond their usual capability. And they have increasingly found a peace of mind which can stand in the face of difficult circumstances.”

The Way of Strength

“We need not apologize to anyone for depending upon the Creator. We have good reason to disbelieve those who think spirituality is the way of weakness. For us, it is the way of strength. The verdict of the ages is that men of faith seldom lack courage. They trust their God. So we never apologize for our belief in Him. Instead, we try to let Him demonstrate, through us, what He can do.”

Dianne

Thought to Consider…

Feed your faith and starve your doubts.
God seldom becomes a reality until God becomes a necessity.
When a person tries to control their drinking, they have already lost control.
My serenity is directly proportional to my level of acceptance.

AACRONYMS

A B C = Acceptance, Belief, Change
G I F T = God Is Forever There

“..with the alcoholic, whose hope is the maintenance and growth of a spiritual experience, this business of resentment is infinitely grave. We found that it is fatal. For when harboring such feelings we shut ourselves off from the sunlight of the Spirit. The insanity of alcohol returns and we drink again. And with us, to drink is to die.”

“We are like men who have lost their legs; they never grow new ones. Neither does there appear to be any kind of treatment which will make alcoholics of our kind like other men. We have tried every imaginable remedy. In some instances there has been brief recovery, followed always by a still worse relapse. Physicians who are familiar with alcoholism agree there is no such thing as making a normal drinker out of an alcoholic. Science may one day accomplish this, but it hasn’t done so yet.”

After that first drink, we had a single-track mind. It was like a railroad train. The first drink started it off and it kept going on the single track until it got to the end of the line, drunkenness. We alcoholics knew this was the inevitable result when we took the first drink, but still we couldn’t keep away from liquor. Our willpower was gone. We had become helpless and hopeless before the power of alcohol. It’s not the second drink or the tenth drink that does the damage. It’s the first drink.

“There is a principle which is a bar against all information, which is proof against all arguments and which cannot fail to keep a man in everlasting ignorance, that principle is contempt prior to investigation.”

“Experience taught us that to take away any alcoholic’s full chance for sobriety in A.A. was sometimes to pronounce his death sentence, and often to condemn him to endless misery. Who dared to be judge, jury, and executioner of his own sick brother?”

The Belief Will Come

“I don’t recall any immediate, dramatic change in my life. I began rereading the Big Book and the Twelve Steps, and now I found in these much that I had never found before. I didn’t reject any of it. I accepted it just as it was written. Nor did I read into it anything that wasn’t there. Again, nothing changed overnight. But, as time has passed, I have acquired a blind and, yes, childlike faith that, by accepting a God I don’t understand and the program of A.A. just as it is written, I can maintain my sobriety one day at a time.”

Cheerfulness

But we aren’t a glum lot . . . We absolutely insist on enjoying life . . . So we think cheerfulness and laughter make for usefulness. Outsiders are sometimes shocked when we burst into merriment over a seemingly tragic experience out of the past. But why shouldn’t we laugh? We have recovered, and have been given the power to help others.

GUIDANCE

As I began to understand my own powerlessness and my dependence on God, as I understand Him, I began to see that there was a life which, if I could have it, I would have chosen for myself from the beginning. It is through the continuing work of the Steps and the life in the Fellowship that I’ve learned to see that there is truly a better way into which I am being guided. As I come to know more about God, I am able to trust His ways and His plans for the development of His character in me. Quickly or not so quickly, I grow toward His own image and likeness. A God who intends for me a purpose, a meaning, and a destiny to grow, however… haltingly, toward His own likeness and image.