Can't drink

Thought for the Day
Everyone who comes into A.A. knows from bitter experience that he or she can't drink. I know that drinking has been the cause of all my major troubles or has made them worse. Now that I have found a way out, I will hang onto A.A. with both hands. Saint Paul once said that nothing in the world, neither powers nor principalities, life nor death, could separate him from the love of God. Once I have given my drink problem to God, should anything in the world separate me from my sobriety?

Meditation for the Day

Tolerance Keeps Us Sober

"Honesty with ourselves and others gets us sober, but it is tolerance that keeps us that way."

"Experience shows that few alcoholics will long stay away from a group just because they don't like the way it is run. Most return and adjust themselves to whatever conditions they must. Some go to a different group, or form a new one. "In other words, once an alcoholic fully realizes that he cannot get well alone, he will somehow find a way to get well and stay well in the company of others. It has been that way from the beginning of A.A. and probably always will be so."
LETTER, 1943

Living in the ever-present

How easily our minds jump from the present to the foibles of the past or our fears about the future. How seldom are our minds on this moment, and only this moment.

Before we picked up this book, where were our thoughts? We need to practice, with diligence, returning our minds to whatever the experience at hand. A truly creative response to any situation can only be made when we are giving it our undivided attention. And each creative response initiates an even more exciting follow-up experience.

All we have of life, all that it can offer us is here, now. If we close our mind to the present, this present, we'll only continue to do so when the tomorrow we dream of now becomes the present. There are no tomorrows.

The Simplest Prayer

How do we pray? With little experience, many of us don't even know how to begin. The process, however, is neither difficult nor complicated.

We came to Narcotics Anonymous because of our drug addiction. But underlying that, many of us felt a deep sense of bewilderment with life itself. We seemed to be lost, wandering a trackless waste with no one to guide us. Prayer is a way to gain direction in life and the power to follow that direction.

Because prayer plays such a central part in NA recovery, many of us set aside a particular time each day to pray, establishing a pattern. In this quiet time, we "talk" to our Higher Power, either silently or aloud.

Feelings and Surrender

Surrender is not something we can do in our heads. It is not something we can force or control by willpower. It is something we experience.

Acceptance, or surrender, is not a tidy package. Often, it is a package full of hard feelings - anger, rage, and sadness, followed by release and relief. As we surrender, we experience our frustration and anger at God, at other people, at ourselves, and at life. Then we come to the core of the pain and sadness, the heavy emotional burden inside that must come out before we can feel good. Often, these emotions are connected to healing and release at a deep level.

Surrender sets the wheels in motion. Our fear and anxiety about the future are released when we surrender.

God's Will Today

Sometimes, we really live the Third Step - and it's great! We don't regret the past, we aren't afraid of the future, and we're generally pleased with the present. Sometimes, though, we lose our vision of God's will in our life.

Many of us dream of erasing the mistakes of our past, but the past cannot be erased. Many of us are grateful this is so, for our past experiences have brought us to the recovery we enjoy today. By working the program, we can learn to accept the past and reconcile ourselves with it by amending our wrongs. Those same Twelve Steps can help eliminate our worries over the future. When we practice NA principles on a daily basis in all our affairs, we can leave the results up to our Higher Power.

Speaking from the heart

Thought for the Day
What makes an effective talk at an A.A. meeting? It is not a fine speech with fine choice of words and an impressive delivery. Often a few simple words direct from the heart are more effective than the most polished speech. There is always a temptation to speak beyond your own experience, in order to make a good impression. This is never effective. What does not come from the heart does not reach the heart. What comes from personal experience and a sincere desire to help the other person reaches the heart. Do I speak for effect or with a deep desire to help?

Meditation for the Day

Variety in experiences

Variety in experiences is necessary for our continued growth. We mistakenly think that the "untroubled" life would be forever welcome. It's the deep waves of life that teach us to be better swimmers.

We don't know how to appreciate the calm without the occasional storm that pushes us to new limits of ourselves. The calm following the storm offers us the time we need to become comfortable with our new growth.

Help Others

My lifetime listens to yours.
  —Muriel Rukeyser
Our experiences educate us to help show each other the way. Others' experiences, likewise, will help still others. We need to share our histories. And the program offers us the way. There is no greater honor we can give one another than rapt attention. We each want to be heard, to be special, to be acknowledged. And recognition may will be the balm that will heal someone's hurt today.

A new day faces us, a day filled with opportunities to really listen to someone who needs to be heard. And the surprise is that we will hear a message just right for us, where we are now.