A Little Help and Guidance

It is not your circumstances that need altering so much as yourself. After you have changed, conditions will naturally change. Spare no effort to become all that God would have you become. Follow every good leading of your conscience. Take each day with no backward look. Face the day's problems with God, and seek God's help and guidance as to what you should do in every situation that may arise. Never look back. Never leave until tomorrow the thing that you are guided to do today.

Three Things in Recovery

We're so glad to be free from liquor that we do something about it. We get into action. We come to meetings regularly. We go out and try to help other alcoholics. We pass on the good news whenever we get a chance. In a spirit of thankfulness to God, we get into action. The A.A. program is simple. Submit yourself to God, find release from liquor, and get into action. Do these things and keep doing them and you're all set for the rest of your life. Have I got into action?

Three things that contribute immensely to a successful recovery. Surrender, gratutude, and service.

When I surrendered my will and admitted that I could not recover on my own, my Higher Power stepped in and helped me with the guidance, will and strength necessary to overcome my character defects and steer clear of my addiction. Am I totally free of my flaws and completely absolved of my past behavior? Noooooooo..... Still more work to do and accountability to take.

That's where the third thing comes in. Service. Or action. Helping others in any way I can with whatever experience I can offer. Giving back some of what I've gotten. It helps me learn more about myself too.

Work went by fairly quickly. Am kinda looking forward to this Jazz Fest crowd to leave town. Maybe I should stop living in cities with high tourist traffic... LOL.

G'night, folks.

Give Yourself Some Credit

You are a human being. You are capable of wonderful, spectacular things. Nothing we do that is truly worthwhile is possible without the grace of God. Don't sell yourself short, though.

God has given us the power of choice and freewill. The good we do in this world comes from us... with His guidance. And we do our good in His name.

God is all around us. His spirit pervades the universe. And yet we often do not let His spirit in. We try to get along without His help and we make a mess of our lives. We can do nothing of any value without God's help. All our human relationships depend on this. When we let God's spirit rule our lives, we learn how to get along with others and how to help them.

I've found that I could not have been of truly effective service without His help. Nor could I help myself without the guidance of that Higher Power.

You are your own person. That's God's gift. So what are you going to do with it?

Goodnight :)

Faith and Strength

We strengthen our faith by working with other alcoholics and finding that we can do nothing ourselves to help them, except to tell them our own story of how we found the way out. If the other person is helped, it's by the grace of God and not by what we do or say. Our own faith is strengthened when we see another alcoholic find sobriety by turning to God. And finally we strengthen our faith by having quiet times every morning. Do I ask God in this quiet time for the strength to stay sober this day?

That's what I love about H&I. We go into hospitals and institutions and talk to the clients. We don't preach or throw around advice. Instead we tell our stories. We talk about the program, what it means to us, and where we are now. Afterward we answer questions to the best of our ability and offer support. We express our gratitude to our Higher Power and explain how recovery would be impossible without him.

And faith? My faith is strengthened whenever I see a newcomer introduce themselves at the beginning of a meeting or an old-timer pick up a 30 year chip.

My quiet times are right before I go to sleep and first thing in the morning before getting up. I pray for strength and guidance. I ask God for help because I know that without him, there's no telling where I would be.

Speaking of sleep... I'm headed that way soon. May try and watch Saturday Night Live first. Enjoy your evening and have a great day tomorrow!