The key is that I have to stop what it is I’m thinking of, engulfed in, and consumed by in order to begin to see, not to see, but to begin to see, then there is much work to be done to continue to see, and more to continue to see more.
If I need accounting advice I go to my accountant. If I need legal advice I go to a lawyer. And if I need cooking advice, I go to Ms. Ray.. lol. But if I need advice on beating this drinking thing, on becoming recovered from the state that I was in, from escaping death that I was living. Then I go to someone who knows how to count, leagize, cook and get sober. Period.
Do you rely compleyely on self sufficeincy? Or do you have aworking knowledge of the 12 Steps and have you formed a relationship with a Higher Power that works miricals in your life?
“We admitted we were powerless over alcohol…”
The Doctor’s Opinion, xxv-xxxii.
ii
“…that our lives had become unmanageable.”
Chapter 3: More About Alcoholism, 30-43.
Good evening, everybody, this is the usual ________ night’s meeting of the _______ Men’s (and Women’s) Big Book Step Study Group and we will open the meeting in the usual manner with a moment of silence to do with as you wish.
Living in the solution is the answer to all of your problems. Living in the Soltuion is simply doing the oposite of what you’ve been doing all of your life, living in the problem, suffering, obsessing, agonizing. Your reward for all of that unhealthy living was to have anxiety, anger and depression. Your reward for living in the solution is to have peace of mind, to feel healthy and vibrant, to be spiritually connected and wholly useful.
Although we like to think that the people in our lives are well-adjusted, happy, healthy minded individuals, we sometimes realize that it just isn’t so. Personally, I’ve had moments where I’ll be skipping through my day, happy as can be, thinking life is grand and BAM, I’ll be blindsided by someone who manages to knock the happy wind out of my sails. Sometimes it is easy to write it off and other times, not so much.
Two opposites cannot inhabit the same person simultaniously. Happy/Sad, Angry/Friendly, Depressed/Elated. So when we are working selflessly with another Alcoholic, and giving of ourselves, our time and our energy without any desired compensation, then the selfishness that used to encompass the whole of our character slowly begins to die off.
I suffer from a spiritual malady that only a spiritual experience can grant me a daily reprieve based soley on my constant effort to enlarge uppon my spiritual life. Half measures avail me nothing. I cannot get sober on yesterdays work, no more than I can get a full stomache on yesterdays meal.
The AA Grapevine is the international journal of Alcoholics Anonymous. Written, edited, illustrated, and read by AA members and others interested in the AA program of recovery from alcoholism, the Grapevine is a lifeline linking one alcoholic to another.