~*~A.A. Thoughts For The Day~*~
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Service
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"Service gladly rendered,
obligations squarely met,
troubles well accepted or solved with God's help,
the knowledge that at home or in the world outside
we are partners in a common effort,
the well-understood fact that in God's sight
all human beings are important,
the proof that love freely given surely brings a full return,
the certainty that we are no longer isolated
and alone in self-constructed prisons,
the surety that we need no longer be square pegs
in round holes
but can fit and belong in God's scheme of things -
these are the permanent and legitimate satisfactions
of right living
for which no amount of pomp and circumstance,
no heap of material possessions,
could possibly be substitutes.
True ambition is not what we thought it was."
1952AAWS, Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions, p. 124
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Thought to Consider . . .
Service is love in work clothes.
G O D = Group Of Drunks
*~*~*~*~*^Just For Today!^*~*~*~*~*
"At the beginning I had liked this title very much. But as the book-naming discussion went on, I began to have certain doubts and temptations. From the start the title 'The Way Out' was popular. If we gave the book this name, then I could add my signature, 'By Bill W.'! After all why shouldn't an author sign his book? I began to forget that this was everybody's book and that I had been mostly the umpire of the discussions that had created it. In one dark moment I even considered calling the book 'The B.W. Movement.' I whispered these ideas to a few friends and promptly got slapped down. Then I saw the temptation for what it was, a shameless piece of egotism. So once more I began to vote for the title 'Alcoholics Anonymous.'"
2001 AAWS, Inc.; Alcoholics Anonymous Comes of Age, pgs. 165-66
". . .OF ALL PERSONS WE HAD HARMED"
"...and became willing to make amends to them all."
TWELVE STEPS AND TWELVE TRADITIONS, p. 77
One of the key words in the Eighth Step is the word all. I am not free to
select a few names for the list and to disregard others. It is a list of
all persons I have harmed. I can see immediately that this Step entails forgiveness because if I'm not willing to forgive someone, there is little
chance I will place his name on the list. Before I placed the first name on my list, I said a little prayer: "I forgive anyone and everyone who has ever harmed me at any time and under any circumstances."
It is well for me to contemplate a small, but very significant, two-letter
word every time the Lord's Prayer is said. The word is as. I ask, "Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us." In this case, as means, "In the same manner." I am asking to be forgiven in the same manner that I forgive others. As I say this portion of the prayer, if I am harboring hatred or resentment, I am inviting more resentment, when I should be calling on the spirit of forgiveness.
Copyright 1990 ALCOHOLICS ANONYMOUS WORLD SERVICES, INC.
*~*~*~*~*^As Bill Sees It^*~*~*~*~*
God Will Not Desert Us
"Word comes to me that you are making a magnificent stand in adversity - this adversity being the state of your health. It gives me a chance to express my gratitude for your recovery in A.A. and especially for the demonstration of its principles you are now so inspiringly giving to us all.
"You will be glad to know that A.A.'s have an almost unfailing record in this respect. This, I think, is because we are so aware that God will not desert us when the chips are down; indeed, He did not when we were drinking. And so it should be with the remainder of life.
"Certainly, He does not plan to save us from all troubles and adversity. Nor, in the end, does He save us from so-called death - since this is but an opening of a door into a new life, where we shall dwell among His many mansions. Touching these things I know you have a most confident faith."
LETTER, 1966
*~*~*~*~*^ Big Book Quote ^*~*~*~*~*
"When we became alcoholics, crushed by a self-imposed crisis we could
not postpone or evade, we had to fearlessly face the proposition that
either God is everything or else He is nothing. God either is or He
isn't."
~Alcoholics Anonymous, 4th Edition, We Agnostics, pg. 53~
*~*~*~*^Twenty Four Hours A Day^*~*~*~*
A.A. Thought for the Day
"We have an allergy to alcohol. The action of alcohol on chronic alcoholics is a manifestation of an allergy. We allergic types can never safely use alcohol in any form at all. We cannot be reconciled to a life without alcohol, unless we can experience an entire psychic change. Once this psychic change has occurred, we who seemed doomed, we who had so many problems that we despaired of ever solving them, find ourselves able to control our desire for alcohol." Have I had a psychic change?
Meditation for the Day
Ask God in daily prayer to give you the strength to change. When you ask God to change you, you must at the same time fully trust Him. If you do not fully trust Him, God may answer your prayer as a rescuer does that of a drowning person who is putting up too much of a struggle. The rescuer must first render the person still more helpless, until he or she is wholly at the rescuer's mercy. just so must we be wholly at God's mercy before we can be rescued.
Prayer for the Day
I pray that I may be daily willing to be changed. I pray that I may put
myself wholly at the mercy of God.
Hazelden Foundation PO Box 176 Center City, MN 55012
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