More Recovery Readings - March

[bluidkiti]

March 1

You are reading from the book Today's Gift.
The only thing that makes life possible is permanent, intolerable uncertainty: not knowing what comes next. --Ursula LeGuin
The world around us changes constantly. Trees turn from green to beautiful shades of yellow, orange, and brown in the fall. Yet, even if we watched the trees carefully, every minute of the day, we could not actually see the colors change. Change requires time, preparation, and patience.
To make the changes we want, we need to let go of unhealthy but comfortable patterns that we're stuck in, the way the trees let their colors change and finally let go of their leaves altogether. We can't have total change right now, no matter how much we want it. It's important to accept both who we are now and who we are becoming. Just as the tree trusts without question that its leaves will grow and lets go of them when the time comes, we can believe in our own power to grow and let go of our accomplishments when the time is right.
When we do, we can be assured that our lives will blossom again, like trees in the spring coming to life after a cold winter.
Do I have any new blossoms today?


You are reading from the book Touchstones.
As my fathers planted/or me, so do I plant for my children. --The Talmud
The first seeds of this spiritual program were planted years ago by men who also were desperately in need. Rather than restrict their attention to their own painful circumstances, they broke through to a new creative idea - it is in helping others that we help ourselves. They reached out eagerly to help fellow men and women in need. In the process they carried the message to others and found new healing relationships for themselves. This program, which is saving our lives, is here because men before us were willing to reach out and pass it along.
We inherit countless resources and teachings from both our biological and our "foster" fathers in this program. The gift of a spiritually full life inspires and requires us to do as they did - pass it on. We keep the benefits of our recovery, not by holding on to them, but by planting new seeds from our harvest for those who come after us.
I will give freely of my time and resources because the giving enriches me.


You are reading from the book The Language Of Letting Go.
Letting Go of Anger
In recovery, we often discuss anger objectively. Yes, we reason, its an emotion were all prone to experience. Yes, the goal in recovery is to be free of resentment and anger. Yes, its okay to feel angry, we agree. Well, maybe. . ..
Anger is a powerful and sometimes frightening emotion. Its also a beneficial one if its not allowed to harden into resentment or used as a battering ram to punish or abuse people.
Anger is a warning signal. It points to problems. Sometimes, it signals problems we need to solve. Sometimes, it points to boundaries we need to set. Sometimes, its the final burst of energy before letting go, or acceptance, settles in.
And, sometimes, anger just is. It doesnt have to be justified. It usually cant be confined to a tidy package. And it need not cause us to stifle our energy or ourselves.
We don't have to feel guilty whenever we expense anger. We dont have to feel guilty.
Breathe deeply. We can shamelessly feel all our feelings, including anger, and still take responsibility for our behaviors.
I will feel and release any angry feelings I have today. I can do that appropriately and safely.


Today I will feel good about myself and accept myself just the way I am. I am open and ready to discover all the miracles of this day. --Ruth Fishel

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Journey to the heart for March

Find Healing and Magic Within Yourself

She was an Osage shaman. Her land, next to Cathedral Rock in Sedona, Arizona, was landscaped with a totem pole, a fire pit, a bridge leading to her house, and a garden of flowers and rocks. A river ran across her property, singing to all who quieted themselves enough to listen. A teepee stood close by, one used to house the sweat lodge ceremonies.

It was during one such ceremony I had met her. I returned later to talk with her for a while. She welcomed me back, welcomed all who visited her to return to her land. She didn’t call it her land, she called it the land. She said it belonged to us all.

“You don’t have to take this journey,” she said. “You don’t have to travel around searching for spiritual spots. All the wisdom, the experiences, the spiritual places you seek on this quest are within you.”

While it’s fun to go on a trip, and trips often coincide with going to new places in our personal lives, we don’t have to load up the car and hit the road to find what we’re looking for. The places of power we seek are within us. Places of comfort, joy, wisdom, silence, healing, peace. The places we visit often reflect those qualities, reinforce them, remind us that they’re there. But the places, the locations we visit, are only mirrors, extensions of ourselves.

The healing and magic we seek are not someplace else. They are within each of us.

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More Language Of Letting Go

Learn to say whatever

“Do you have issues with drama addiction?” I asked my daughter one day, in a serious interviewer kind of voice.

“Of course I do,” she said. “I’m the original drama queen.”

“Can I interview you about it?” I asked.

There was a long pause on the phone. “I’ve got a better suggestion,” she said. “Why don’t you interview yourself?”

I’ve been addicted to many things this lifetime– alcohol, heroin, morphine, Dilaudid, cocaine, barbituates, Valium, and any other substance that physically or psychologically promised to change the way I feel. I’ve been addicted to caffeine, tobacco and nicotine– cigarettes and Cuban cigars– and opium and hashish,too. I’ve been caught up in other people’s addictions to these substances as well. Some people might say I have an addictive personality. I don’t know if I agree with the concept that we can become addicted to people, but if the folks say you can are right. I’ve probably been addicted to certain of those,too.

But of all the addictions possible on this planet, I’ve found my addiction to drama absolutely the hardest to recognize, accept, deal with, and overcome. The rush of emotional energy I feel from drama at the theater, on television (small or big screen), in a book, and most preferably acted out in real life (mine) is the last legal, legitimate jones that society allows.

It’s not politically correct to smoke, act out sexually, be a nonrecovering alcoholic, or shoot drugs. But despite all the evolution in consciousness that’s unfolded and gotten us to this point, drama addiction is more than politically correct.

Drama addiction is in. Right now, for many people, it’s one of the only things giving meaning to life.

Potential guests line up, volunteering to have their relationship and court battles– things which once were guarded secrets– broadcast on international cable and satellite TV. Our society can’t wait to peek and snoop into their lives. Broadcasting real-life soap operas guarantees the ratings will soar.

In 1999, I wrote the above words in a chapter on drama addiction in my book called Playing It By Heart. But the concept of drama addiction, and transcending it, has been around for a long, long time.

In 1937, author Emmet Fox wrote an essay in Find and Use Your Inner Power. The essay’s title was “Don’t Be a Tragedy Queen.”

“Self pity, by making us feel sorry for ourselves, seems to provide an escape from responsibility, but it is a fatal drug nevertheless,” he wrote. “It confuses the feelings, blinds the reason, and puts us at the mercy of outer conditions. … Don’t be a tragedy queen– whether you are a man or a woman, for it is not a question of gender but of mental outlook. Absolutely repudiate a crown of martyrdom. If you cannot laugh at yourself (which is the best medicine of all), at least try to handle the difficulty in an objective way, as though it concerned somebody else.”

Maybe the antithesis to being a drama king or queen has been around even longer than that.

Three tiny Buddha statues sit before me on my writing desk. One is Serene. One is Smiling. One is Sorrowful, doubled over in compassion for the world. All you can see is the top of his head.

“The Kingdom of Heaven is within you,” Jesus said.

“Nirvana is a state of consciousness,” wrote Anne Bancroft, in an introduction to the Dhammapada, a book containing the teachings of Buddha.

Enlightenment and paradise aren’t places we visit. They’re within our hearts and heads.

Say, “It’s a nightmare,” if you must. Even say, “Oh my God, I can’t believe this is happening, much less happening to me.” But whether you say the words with calmness and serenity, bursting with laughter or a mere giggle, or doubled over with compassion for the pain of the world, learning to speak the language of letting go in the days, months, and years of the millennium ahead means learning to say whatever,too.

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Decorating Life
The World as Home

by Madisyn Taylor

Each day we choose to decorate our life just as we do our homes.


There are few things more thrilling than having a new house or an empty room to decorate. Our imaginations soar as we consider the many possibilities. In the same way, our lives offer us the opportunity to express ourselves within various contexts, to ask ourselves questions about what we want to see as we move through our days and how we want things to flow. Some people do this instinctively, moving through the various environments they inhabit and shifting the energy with their presence. These people have a knack for decorating life. This can be as simple as the way they dress, the way they speak, or the fact that they always bring a bouquet of wildflowers when they come for a visit.

As we move through the world, we make a statement, whether we intend to or not. We shift the energy one way when we enter a room dressed elegantly and simply, and another when we show up in bright, cheerful colors and a floppy hat. One is not better than the other. It is simply a question of the mood we wish to create. What we wear is just one choice we can focus on. The way we speak to people, or touch them, shifts the energy more profoundly than almost anything else. The words we speak and the tone in which we say them are the music we choose to play in the world that is our home. Some of us fill the space with passionate arias, others with healing hymns. Again, one is not better than the other. We are all called to contribute.

Just as we consciously create an environment within our homes, we can consciously choose to decorate life itself with our particular energy. Ideally, in doing so, we express our deeper selves, so that the adornments we add to the world make it more meaningful, more beautiful, and as welcoming as a beloved home. Published with permission from Daily OM

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A Day At A Time

Reflection For The Day

Now that we’re free and no longer chemically-dependent, we have so much more control over our thinking. More than anything, we’re able to alter our attitudes. Some members of Alcoholics Anonymous, in fact, choose to think of the letters AA as an abbreviation for “Altered Attitudes.” In the bad old days, I almost always responded to any optimistic or positive statement with “Yes, but…” Today, in contrast, I’m learning to eliminate that negative phrase from my vocabulary. Am I working to change my attitude? Am I determined to “accentuate the positive…”?

Today I Pray

May I find that healing and strength which God provides to those who stay near Him. May I keep to the spiritual guidelines of The Program. Considering the Steps, taking the Steps — one by one — then practicing them again and again. In this is my salvation.

Today I Will Remember

To practice at least one Step.

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One More Day

There is no way to peace. Peace is the way.
– A. J. Muste

So often we look for the easy answers and quick remedies. We want to reach our goals — now. Whatever we’re looking for (peace, love, acceptance) we may be making the mistake of seeing these qualities as concrete, hold-in-my-hand goals.

Gradually, we’re coming to the understanding that those qualities we seek are not destinations; they are paths and directions; we can consiously take. We can’t go out and find love, but we can choose to be loving. There is no path to peace or to acceptance or to understanding, but we can base our lives on these qualities, and by doing so we claim them.

What I seek may already be within my soul.

[bluidkiti]

March 2

You are reading from the book Today's Gift.
I was angry with my friend: I told my wrath, my wrath did end. I was angry with my foe: I told it not, my wrath did grow.
--William Blake
We have a right to claim our own feelings. Sometimes we get angry, but hold it inside because we think it's wrong to feel it. If anger builds inside us, it expands like a balloon ready to burst. If not released, it can make us depressed, or even physically ill. When we give ourselves permission to feel anger, we are better able to get rid of it in a healthy way. Our inner voice can tell us how to let go of our anger. And once we've released it, we can easily get in touch with the feelings that caused it.
When we recognize our anger for what it is--one feeling among many others that makes us unique--it loses its significance, and we can prevent it from consuming us. Indira Ghandi said, "You cannot shake hands with a clenched fist." When we let go of our anger we can honestly embrace each other with open arms.
Am I carrying around anger which could be released today?


You are reading from the book Touchstones.
The fir tree has no choice about starting its life in the crack of a rock.... What [nourishment] it finds is often meager, and above the ground appears a twisted trunk, grown in irregular spurts, marred by dead and broken branches, and bent far to one side by the battering winds. Yet at the top ... some twigs hold their green needles year after year, giving proof that - misshapen, imperfect, scarred - the tree lives. --Harriet Arrow
We often wish we had been born into better circumstances or blame our parents for our problems. Like the fir tree we could say, "If only I had taken sprout in a fertile meadow, life would be easier." "If only I had had a better life as a boy . . ." "If only I didn't have my particular hardships . . ."
By accepting the facts of our own lives, we mature into feelings of joy and pleasure alongside our griefs. Every man has to struggle with his own unique set of circumstances, even if they are not fair. Fairness is not an issue. Reality is what we have to deal with.
I will accept life on its own terms and rejoice in it.


You are reading from the book The Language Of Letting Go.
Feelings on the Job
Im furious about my job. Another man got a promotion that I believe I deserve. Im so mad I feel like quitting. Now my wife says I should deal with my feelings. What good will that does? He still got the promotion. --Anonymous
Our feelings at work are as important as our feelings in any other area of our life. Feelings are feelings - and wherever we incur them, dealing with them is what helps us move forward and grow.
Not acknowledging our feelings is what keeps us stuck and gives us stomachaches, headaches, and heartburn.
Yes, it can be a challenge to deal with feelings on the job. Sometimes, things can appear useless. One of our favorite tricks to avoid dealing with feelings is telling ourselves its useless.
We want to give careful consideration to how we deal with our feelings on our job. It may be appropriate to take our intense feelings to someone not connected to our workplace and sort through them in a safe way.
Once we've experienced the intensity of the feelings, we can figure out what we need to do to take care of ourselves on the job.
Sometimes, as in any area of our life, feelings are to be felt and accepted. Sometimes, they are pointing to a problem in us, or a problem we need to resolve with someone else.
Sometimes, our feelings are helping to point us in a direction. Sometimes, they're connected to a message, or a fear: Ill never be successful. . .. Ill never get what I want. . .. Im not good enough. . . .
Sometimes, the solution is a spiritual approach or remedy. Remember, whenever we bring a spiritual approach to any area of our life, we get the benefit.
We wont know what the lesson is until we summon the courage to stand still and deal with our feelings.
Today, I will consider my feelings at work as important as my feelings at home or anywhere else. I will find an appropriate way to deal with them.


Today I am letting go of all energy that is resisting the truth about me. That energy is being replaced with positive and loving energy, and I am accepting that I am okay just the way that I am. I am now open to see the miracle of love in my life. --Ruth Fishel

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Journey to the Heart

Value Your Past

Value your past and all the lessons you have learned.

How easy it is to diminish the importance of our past and look on our history with a critical eye. We see the mistakes, we see what we think we should have known, we see what we could have done better. What we forget is that the reason we are able to see so clearly is because of the past and because of what we have learned. Often, it is the very experiences we regret that have created this clear vision.

Value what you’ve learned in your past. Each lesson has led to the next. Every person and event in each part of your life has been invaluable in shaping and forming you– in creating the person you are today. Each part of your past, each person who has come into your life and shared experiences with you has helped you to open your heart more to life, love, God, others, and yourself. Even those experiences you think of as wrong, or mistakes, have been an important and necessary part in creating you. Sometimes, those experiences formed the most important parts of you because they created in you compassion and understanding for others. Often the most painful events of your life are the ones that opened you to your ability to bring healing, help, and hope to others. Your past taught you to love– others and yourself. It has helped you become a channel for Divine love and a force for good in this world.

When you look back at your past, look tenderly and gently at all you have been through. Look with the eyes of the soul. See that each experience was necessary to bring you home to your heart.

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More Language Of Letting Go

Don’t stir the emotional pot

“My bill collector called today,” a friend said to me one day. “I love it when she calls. Every time she does, we have a good fight. She tells me that I owe her company money. Then I say I know. She tells me that my balance is due. I tell her I know that,too. Then she asks why I haven’t sent a payment. I tell her that the reason I didn’t send a payment is because I told her last month I could send only twenty dollars a month and she said not to send it, because that wasn’t enough. That’s when the screaming starts. Then she yells at me to get a job. I scream back that I’m trying and she ought to get a better job herself. Then we both slam down the phone and don’t talk to each other until she calls again next month.”

Some of us intentionally stir up drama to release emotions, get the pot brewing, and add a little energy to our lives. Sometimes we can cause trouble in areas where we’d be better off without it. Turning our home into a battleground doesn’t leave us a good place to live.

Sometimes when we’re stressed, we just like to get those emotions out. And what better way to get them out than by engaging in a good, old-fashioned fight. Just make sure you’re not making an enemy out of someone whom you’d rather have as a friend. And check to see that you’re not taking your stress out on an innocent bystander, a lover, family, or friend.

God, help me let go of my need for dysfunctional drama in my life. Help me make sure I’m not taking my stress out on the people I love. If I am, show me another way to release my emotions.

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That Which Sustains You
Home and Land Meditation

Just as we take care of our friends and families, our homes and Mother Earth take care of us. Our homes give us a place of refuge—a sanctuary that stands between us and the elements of nature and the rest of the world. The earth is an unselfish giver of life and the steward of our physical and spiritual needs. The earth’s bountiful plant life nourishes us, gives us air, and offers us cooling shade. Her waters quench our thirst, and her beauty stirs our souls. Yet it is easy to take both of these wonderful sources of our blessings for granted. Expressing the gratitude you feel toward your home and the earth for the blessings each provides you can help you stay conscious of where many of the gifts in your life come from. Each time you give thanks, you’ll be reminded of the importance of caring for your home and for Mother Earth. There is a simple and beautiful meditation you can perform to show your gratitude. Begin by finding a quiet place where you can be alone. Sit comforta! bly and breathe deeply until you feel relaxed and then read the following out loud:

"Thank you, home, for allowing me to live within your walls. Thank you for giving me shelter, warmth, and security. Thank you for allowing me to live my life in your womb, for staying strong and sturdy, for supporting me, and for your beauty.

Thank you, earth, for the land that I live on and for allowing me to steward life with you. Thank you for allowing me to walk upon your soil, cultivate you, and live in partnership with you. Thank you for supporting my home and my family.

Thank you, plants, minerals, and animals that dwell on the land that I steward. Thank you for allowing me to experience your beauty, share in your wonderment of life, and for the honor of living with all of you on this earth. Thank you for the wisdom and joy you bring to humanity.

I honor you."

You can perform this meditation as often as you like and anytime you feel particularly thankful for the many blessings that you have received. Each time you do, you’ll reaffirm and strengthen your connection with all that protects, supports, and sustains you. Published with permission from Daily OM

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A Day At A Time

Reflection For The Day

Why don’t I spend part of today thinking about my assets, rather than my liabilities? Why not think about victories, instead of defeats — about the ways in which I am gentle and kind? It’s always been my tendency to fall into a sort of cynical self-hypnosis, putting derogatory labels on practically everything I’ve done, said or felt. Just for today, I’ll spend a quiet half hour trying to gain a more positive perspective on my life. Do I have the courage to change the things I can?

Today I Pray

Through quietness and a reassessment of myself, may I develop a more positive attitude. If I am a child of God, created in His image, there must be goodness in me. I will think about that goodness, and the ways it manifest itself. I will stop putting myself down, even in my secret thoughts. I will respect what is God’s. I will respect myself.

Today I Will Remember

Self-Respect is Respect For God.

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One More Day

Bitterness and anger seem to be very closely related and are interchangeable words for the same emotion.
– Robert Lovering

Why me? We may rage with anger or disbelief when we finally realize we may never fully regain good health. In the beginning, while we are still getting used to our new situation, this happens to most of us. And then we ask, “Why me?”

Having a chronic medical condition is not as likely to create bitterness as much as making poor choices about how to respond to it. If we choose loneliness or a lifestyle which allows no room for laughter, we choose bitterness.

By making healthier choices, we affirm our belief in ourselves, in the possibilities life has to offer. We feel more loving toward the people around us and in doing so, are more loving toward ourselves.

I can learn to balance my negative feelings with contentment and happiness. I can gain strength from my illness.

[bluidkiti]

March 3

You are reading from the book Today's Gift.
Nothing is troublesome that we do willingly. --Thomas Jefferson
Some of the necessary things we do are tiring and annoying. Many of these things we must do regardless of how we feel about them. Doing dishes day after day can be a tiresome job but, no matter how much we hate it, it must be done sooner or later. We might discover, if we look hard enough, how chores like this can actually be enjoyable, if we do them right. Perhaps dish washing is a time for listening to music and singing along, or an opportunity for conversation between family members as we help one another.
Our willingness to look for the hidden treasure and opportunities in tasks we might otherwise consider dreary will never fail to reward us.
What opportunity can I see in my next chore?


You are reading from the book Touchstones.
"Why are you rushing so much?" asked the rabbi. "I'm rushing after my livelihood," the man answered.
"And how do you know," said the rabbi, "that your livelihood is running on before you, so that you have to rush after it? Perhaps it's behind you, and all you need to do is stand still." --Tale about Rabbi Ben Meir of Berdichev
Most of us accept the standard ideas we were taught. "Men should be good providers." "We will get self-esteem from hard work." "It is a virtue to be productive." "It's better now to have too much time to think."
A major crisis can quickly change our perspective. Perhaps someone close to us dies, and we are faced with how temporary life is. Or we have a health crisis, or a relationship crisis, or an addiction crisis. The standard ideas come crashing down. We look closely at the rush of our lives and ask deeper questions: Are we hurrying to a worthwhile goal? Or are we losing out in our great rush? These doubts can teach us personal things that society can never teach us. Wisdom comes out of pain and the willingness to learn from it.
Today, I will allow some time to stand still and reflect.


You are reading from the book The Language Of Letting Go.
Accepting Ourselves
While driving one day, a woman's attention focused on the license plate of the car ahead. The license read: "B-WHO-UR." How can I? she thought. I don't know who I am!
Some of us may have felt confused when people encouraged us to be ourselves. How could we know ourselves, or be who we are, when, for years, many of us submerged ourselves in the need of others?
We do have a self. We're discovering more about ourselves daily. We're learning we're deserving of love.
We're learning to accept ourselves, as we are for the present moment--to accept our feelings, thoughts, flaws, wants, needs, and desires. If our thoughts or feelings are confused, we accept that too.
To be who we are means we accept our past--our history--exactly as is.
To be ourselves means we are entitled to our opinions and beliefs--for the present moment and subject to change. We accept our limitations and our strengths.
To be who we are means we accept our physical selves, as well as our mental, emotional, and spiritual selves, for now. Being who we are in recovery means we take that acceptance one step further. We can appreciate ourselves and our history.
Being who we are, loving and accepting ourselves, is not a limiting attitude. Accepting and loving ourselves is how we enable growth and change.
Today, I will be who I am. If I'm not yet certain who I am, I will affirm that I have a right to that exciting discovery,


Today I am open to all the powers of the universe. I am letting them work for me and carry me to my next step...JOY! --Ruth Fishel

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Journey to the Heart

Treasure Your Experiences

Gather experiences. Treat them as precious jewels.

The purpose of the journey is not to guard and restrain yourself. The purpose is to learn. You do not teach and lead your soul. Your soul leads and teaches you. It takes you wading across streams, strolling through meadows, deep into valleys, and high onto mountaintops. It takes you down winding, narrow roads and long fast-moving four-lane highways. It takes you into tiny cafes, bustling cities, and out-of-the-way hostels where people break bread and tell what they have learned.

Let yourself have all your experiences. Don’t limit or judge yourself or the adventure you have had. All were necessary, all were important, all have helped shape and form you. Your heart will lead you, guide you where you are to go. Don’t worry about getting lost or off track. Don’t worry about being wrong, or in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Gather experiences. Go through them. Select the gems from each. Listen while others tell their stories, their adventures, and show you their jewels, the triths that they have learned. Then, when your friends break and sip soup with others, open your heart and joyfully share what has happened to you along the way.

Having experiences is called living. Sharing experiences is called loving. Let yourself enjoy both.

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More Language Of Letting Go

Don’t take storms personally

Somewhere out in the Pacific, a storm brewed and swirled and thrashed and died without ever touching the land. Three days later, under a clear blue sky, the storm surge reached the California coast near Los Angeles. The sea threw rocks at my house, and the waves stacked up and crashed down against the pilings of the foundation. Farther up the street, the ocean ate the back porch of two houses. All night the shoreline trembled and shook from the power of the sea.

The next morning the tide pulled back, the swells calmed, and the sky stayed blue. I walked down the beach, impressed at the way the ocean had littered it with huge chunks of driftwood and rocks. Then I walked back upstairs and drank my morning coffee.

Sometimes, storms aren’t about us.

Sometimes, friends or loved ones will attack us for no apparent reason. They’ll fuss, fume, and snap at us. When we ask them why, they’ll say, “Oh, I’m sorry. I had a bad day at work.”

But we still feel hurt and upset.

Hold people accountable for their behavior. Don’t let people treat you badly. But don’t take the storms in their lives personally. These storms may have nothing to do with you.

Seek shelter if necessary. Get away from curt friends until they have time to calm down; then approach when it’s safe. If the storm isn’t about you, there’s nothing you need to do. Would you stop the ocean waves by standing in the surf with your arms outstetched?

Say whatever. Let the storms blow through.

God, help me not to take the storms in the lives of my friends and loved ones too personally.

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Quiet Please!
Taming Monkey Mind In Meditation

It’s been called the monkey mind – the endless chattering in your head as you jump in your mind from thought to thought while you daydream, analyze your relationships, or worry over the future. Eventually, you start to feel like your thoughts are spinning in circles and you’re left totally confused.

One way to tame this wild creature in your head is through meditation – although the paradox is that when you clear your mind for meditation you actually invite the monkey in your mind to play. This is when you are given the opportunity to tame this mental beast by moving beyond thought – to become aware of a thought rather than thinking a thought. The difference is subtle, but significant. When you are aware of your thoughts, you can let your thoughts rise and float away without letting them pull you in different directions. Being able to concentrate is one of the tools that allows you to slow down your thought process and focus on observing your thoughts.

To develop your concentration, you may want to start by focusing on the breath while you meditate. Whenever your monkey mind starts acting up, observe your thoughts and then return your focus to your breath. Some breathing meditations call on you to focus on the rise and fall of the breath through the abdomen, while others have you concentrate on the sound of the breath. Fire can also be mesmerizing, and focusing on a candle flame is another useful tool for harnessing the mind. Keep the gaze soft and unfocused while observing the color, shape, and movement of the flame, and try not to blink. Close your eyes when you feel the need and continue watching the flame in your head. Chanting, devotional singing, and mantras also still the mind. However you choose to tame the monkey mind, do so with firm kindness. The next time the chattering arises, notice it and then allow it to go away. With practice, your monkey mind will become quiet and so will you. Published with permission from Daily OM

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A Day At A Time

Reflection For The Day

I’ve begun to better understand myself since I’ve come to The Program. One of the most important things I’ve learned is that opinions aren’t facts. Just because I feel that a thing is so doesn’t necessarily make it so. “Men are not worried by things,” wrote the Greek philosopher Epictetus, “but by their ideas about things. When we meet with difficulties, become anxious or troubled, let us not blame others, but rather ourselves. That is: our ideas about things.” Do I believe that I can never entirely lose what I have learned during my recovery?

Today I Pray

May I learn to sort out realities from my ideas about those realities. May I understand that situations, things, — even people — take on the colors and dimensions of my attitudes about them.

Today I Will Remember

To sort the real from the unreal.

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One More Day

People, by and large, will relate to the image you project …. If you project the image of a sick, dependent person, that’s how you’ll be treated.
– Chyatte

Accepting chronic illness is not easy. Our whole lives are different. We can’t do all the things we used to do. We may feel changed and be afraid of the changes our illnesses will bring. But as we learn to project a strong, positive image, we feel better about ourselves.

For the benefit of ourselves, we must act as if we are doing all right. When we act as if we are strong, our new behavior can become a new habit, and that habit can actually develop greater emotional strength within us. We can put illness into perspective as being just one of the changes that occur during a lifetime.

Today, I will allow myself the right to change. I can survive my health change and live a worthwhile life.

[bluidkiti]

March 4

You are reading from the book Today's Gift.
I celebrate myself, and sing myself, and what I assume, you shall assume. --Walt Whitman
Some of us may think Walt Whitman must have been terribly conceited to have written words like that. But he wasn't. He knew himself well, and accepted himself, even his darker side. He could laugh at himself and celebrate his humanness.
And because he loved and accepted himself just as he was, others could do the same. That's difficult to understand sometimes, but it's true: no one else is going to love and accept us until we come to love and accept ourselves.
We teach others how to treat us by the way we treat ourselves, so perhaps it makes sense to apply a variation of the Golden Rule: "Do unto ourselves as we would have others do unto us."
Can I allow my kindness to myself overflow to another person today?


You are reading from the book Touchstones.
Heaven ne'er helps the men who will not act. --Sophocles
Growing into masculine wholeness is a journey into greater responsibility for our lives. We have choices to make every day. Taking responsibility means choosing between the options we have and then accepting the consequences. Sometimes both choices are undesirable, but we have to choose anyway. Do I expect to be perfect in my choices? Do I demand that someone else take responsibility for me? Do I defiantly refuse to accept the options I have?
This program seems like a paradox- the First Step asks us to accept our powerlessness, then we are expected to go on and stop being passive in our lives. The Serenity Prayer speaks to us about this dilemma. We ask for the serenity to accept what we cannot change and the courage to change what we can. Fully admitting our powerlessness sheds a burden and frees us to go on from there, actively doing what we can.
If something is awaiting my action today, may I have the courage to move forward with it. Even small movement is progress.


You are reading from the book The Language Of Letting Go.
Higher Power as a Source
I've learned I can take care of myself, and what I cant do, God will do for me. --Al Anon member
God, a Higher Power as we understand Him, is our source of guidance and positive change. This doesn't mean were not responsible for ourselves. We are. But we aren't in this alone.
Recovery is not a do it yourself project. We don't have to become overly concerned about changing ourselves. We can do our part, relax, and trust that the changes well experience will be right for us.
Recovery means we don't have to look to other people as our source to meet our needs. They can help us, but they are not the source.
As we learn to trust the recovery process, we start to understand that a relationship with our Higher Power is no substitute for relationships with people. We don't need to hide behind religious beliefs or use our relationship with a Higher Power as an excuse to stop taking responsibility for ourselves and taking care of ourselves in relationships. But we can tap into and trust a Power greater than ourselves for the energy, wisdom, and guidance to do that.
Today, I will look to my Higher Power as a source for all my needs, including the changes I want to make in my recovery.
I will not forget that every moment of every day I can be God-centered and joyous. The goal I'm striving toward will carry with it a special gift; it will offer the growing person within me an extra thrill, if I've attended to the journey as much as its end.


Today I will stop and ask, "How important is it?" When I find myself defending or trying to prove my point, I am in the process of learning to trust my own truth. When it feels right inside, I am seeing that is all that I need. --Ruth Fishel

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Journey to the Heart

One Step at a Time

One step at a time. That’s all you can take, That’s all you have to take,

Yes, you have visions you’ve created of where you want to go. But you don’t get there in one leap. You get there one step at a time. That’s how you receive your guidance. That’s how you respond to the guidance you’ve received.

Let your faith be strong. Your faith will keep you going through those moments in between steps. When your faith is strong, you don’t look in fear at the journey ahead, wondering if you will get all the guidance you need, or if you will get to where you’re going. You know you will, so take the simple steps, one at a time, that lie ahead. You take them in joy, because you know you’re being guided. You have faith that the simple steps you are led to do will take you to your destination.

One step at a time. That’s how you will get where you are going. You are being led, each step of the way.

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More Language Of Letting Go

Allow for differences

He’s rational. He wants examples of the problem and wants to focus on and find a solution.

She wants to talk about how she feels.

He wants to sit in front of the television and click the remote control.

She wants to cuddle on the couch and look into his eyes.

He deals with his stress by playing basketball with his friends, tinkering with the car or going for a hike.

She wants to go to a movie, preferably one that makes her cry.

I spent much of my life thinking that men and women– and generally all people– should just be the same. It took me a long time to realize that while we have much in common with other people, we’re each unique.

It took me even longer to realize that the practical application of this meant I had to learn to allow for differences between the people I loved and myself.

Just because we have something in common with someone, and might even think we’re in love, doesn’t mean that each person is going to respond and be the same.

So often in our relationships, we try to get the other person to behave the way we want. This forcing of our will on them will ultimately become a great strain. It can also block love. When we’re trying to change someone else, we overlook his or her gifts. We don’t value the parts of the person that are different from us, because we’re too busy trying to change the person into someone else.

Allow for differences, but don’t just allow. Appreciate the differences. Value what each person has to offer and the gifts each person can bring.

Learn to say whatever, with a spark of amusement and curiosity, when someone isn’t the same as you. Try getting a kick out of the unique way each person approaches life.

God, help me understand the rich gifts that letting go of control will bring to my life.

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The Energy of an Embrace
Hugs

The need to touch and be touched is established early in our lives, as we develop and grow in the omnipresent embrace of our mother’s womb. Once we are born, separated from that sanctuary of connectivity, we begin to crave the physical embrace of our parents. As we age, we become more independent. Yet during times of triumph or trouble and during those moments when we are in need of reassurance, we can’t help but long for a hug.

Because a hug requires two active participants, each individual taking part in the embrace experiences the pleasure of being embraced and the joy that comes from hugging someone. As both individuals wrap their arms around one another, their energy blends together, and they experience a tangible feeling of togetherness that lingers long after physical contact has been broken. A heart hug is when you put your left arm over someone’s shoulder and your right arm around their waist. As they do the same to you, your hearts become aligned with one another other and loving, comforting energy flows between the two of you to flood your souls with feelings of love, caring, and compassion.

A hug is a pleasurable way to share your feelings with someone who is important to you. Depending on your relationship with the other person and the kind of message you wish to send to them, a hug can communicate love, friendship, romance, congratulations, support, greeting, and any other sentiment you wish to convey. A hug communicates to others that you are there for them in a positive way. In an instant, a hug can reestablish a bond between long lost friends and comfort those in pain. The next time you hug someone, focus all of your energy into the embrace. You will create a profound connection that infuses your feelings and sentiments into a single beautiful gesture. Published with permission from Daily OM

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A Day At A Time

Reflection For The Day

We may not know any specifics about the activities of today; we may not know whether we’ll be alone or with others. We may feel the day contains too much time — or not enough. We may be facing tasks we’re eager to complete, or tasks we’ve been resisting. Though the details of each person’s day differ, each person’s day does hold one similarity: We each have the opportunity to choose to thing positive thoughts. The choice depends less on our outside activities than on our inner commitment. Can I accept that I alone have the power to control my attitude?

Today I Pray

May I keep the fire of inner commitment alive through this whole, glorious day, whether my activities are a succession of workaday tasks or free-form and creative. May I choose to make this a good day for me, and for those around me.

Today I Will Remember

Keep the commitment.

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One More Day

Whatever limits us, we call fate.
– Ralph Waldo Emerson

We like to plan ahead, but w cannot plan for the ravages of chronic illness. No one expects to travel down the winding road of an unhidden, unwanted trip. Unused to the whims of a chronic illness, we may at first try to chart, plan, and control its course. We may dwell too much on the medical conditions.

We cannot change the course of illness, but we can influence its twists and turns by keeping a positive frame of mind. Rather than being obsessed with how our medical conditions are affecting us, we can focus on the many things we can still do. Can we enjoy a sunset? Watch a child smile? Can we listen to music or pursue a handcraft? Our angry, dour thoughts can be replaced so easily with pleasant dreams, fond memories, and hope for the future.

I am feeling comfortable once again as I finally realize that I can still make choices in how I want to live my life.

[bluidkiti]

March 5

You are reading from the book Today's Gift.
The farmer may only be planting a seed, but if he opens his eyes he is feeding the whole world. --Omaha Bee
A traveler journeying through a small village came upon some workers building an impressive structure. "What are you doing?" he asked. The first worker, a young, impatient man, replied in disgust, "I am making three dollars an hour and I'm getting very tired!" The visitor asked another man the same question. "I'm mixing concrete, as you can plainly see," came the sarcastic reply. Finally, a woman working nearby left her wheelbarrow full of bricks and approached the stranger. "We are building a hospital," she said with pride. "Now we will be able to care for all the region's people. Babies will be born here. Lives will be saved."
The stranger looked at the woman with admiration and spoke directly to her. "I know, for this is my hospital. Only you hold the vision of what it is you are creating." The wealthy benefactor then put the woman in charge of construction so his hospital would be built by one who truly understood.
Will I see the importance of even the small things I do today?


You are reading from the book Touchstones.
If not for the beast within us we would be castrated angels. --Hermann Hesse
Let's not confuse the surrender, humility, and serenity of this program with the perfection of angels. Today we are more alive because we are no longer destroying ourselves, or numbing ourselves, or shaming ourselves. We are men with the strength we need to meet the problems and excitements of the day. We may also get ourselves into trouble by our shortsightedness or mistaken ideas. That is why we need to continue to take inventory of ourselves and continue to be accountable.
We are on a spiritual path that leads toward fuller manhood. We accept the beast within. More than that, we like him and take pleasure in him. He has the same source as our spiritual strength. As we get better acquainted with him, he brings a sense of awe and mystery about the untamed parts of ourselves. He instills us with zest and vitality that we release as explosions of energy and power. He is in the music we love and in our dancing. He comes out in our daydreams and night dreams - in our labor and sweat. And he is in our trickery and humor.
I am filled with gratitude for the beast within.


You are reading from the book The Language Of Letting Go.
Be Who You Are
When I meet people or get in a new relationship, I start putting all these repressive restrictions on myself. I cant have my feelings. Cant have my wants and needs. Cant have my history. Cant do the things I want, feel the feelings Im feeling, or say what I need to say. I turn into this repressed, perfectionistic robot, instead of being who I am: Me. --Anonymous
Sometimes, our instinctive reaction to being in a new situation is: Don't be yourself.
Who else can we be? Who else would you want to be? We don't need to be anyone else.
The greatest gift we can bring to any relationship wherever we go is being who we are.
We may think others wont like us. We may be afraid that if we just relax and be ourselves, the other person will go away or shame us. We may worry about what the other person will think.
But, when we relax and accept ourselves, people often feel much better being around us than when we are rigid and repressed. Were fun to be around.
If others don't appreciate us, do we really want to be around them? Do we need to let the opinions of others control our behavior and us?
Giving ourselves permission to be who we are can have a healing influence on our relationships. The tone relaxes. We relax. The other person relaxes. Then everybody feels a little less shame, because they have learned the truth. Who we are is all we can be, all were meant to be, and its enough. Its fine.
Our opinion of ourselves is truly all that matters. And we can give ourselves all the approval we want and need.
Today, I will relax and be who I am in my relationships. I will do this not in a demeaning or inappropriate way, but in a way that shows I accept myself and value who I am. Help me, God, let go of my fears about being myself.


Today I will accept what I have and what I am and what I see in this moment. I will be fully alive in this moment and feel the joy of knowing that it is all that there is right now. --Ruth Fishel

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Journey to the Heart

Operate from Desire, Not Will

There are times when we need to force ourselves to put one foot in front of the other and do what needs to be done. But when we operate that way for too long, we can be separated from our heart, separated from our desres, instincts, and healthy inclinations. Separated from that part of us that lives and loves naturally. Separated from joy.

After years of grieving the loss of my son, I needed to come back to life. To do that, I had to force myself through the motions of living, those acts that I knew would create a good life for myself and my daughter. I was operating from sheer will, and that will was struggling hard to overcome the desire to give up. After a time of doing that though, I noticed that forcing myself forward had come habitual. Somewhere along the journey, I had forgotten about relaxing, trusting my heart, trusting my desires to carry me through. I became tired. Tired of forcing myself. Tired of pushing through.

I realized something else. It was safe to let go of willing my way through life. I had climbed the mountain. I was over the top. I was coming alive again. I had survived the toughest time. It was okay to relax and trust the guidance and desires of my heart. It was safe to relax and enjoy life again, to celebrate being alive.

If you’ve been operating from will, that was probably what you needed to do at that point in your life. It helped you survive, learn the lessons, get to the place you are now. But it no longer fits, not on a journey of joy. Not on the journey to the heart.

Let desire and inclination replace will. Let your heart and soul lead you forward. Then trust that they will, and trust where they lead. Let living from your heart’s desires reconnect you to joy.

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More Language Of Letting Go

Don’t let anger run your life

Cheryl’s husband was a tyrant. His anger controlled most of her moves. He didn’t get angry often, but when he did, he exploded in a rage. He broke things; he carried on. His rage terrified her.

“I’ve never done well with anger,” Cheryl said, “either my own, or someone else’s. I spent my childhood walking on eggshells, trying not to annoy my dad. Then I married a man whom I allowed to completely control me by the mere threat of his rage.”

Whether we call them rageholics, tyrants, or bullies, a lot of people in our world get their way by being mean. We may find ourselves instinctively walking on eggshells around these people, praying to God we don’t set them off.

Anger is a powerful emotion. But we don’t have to let anybody else’s rage take control of our lives. If somebody you know or love is a bully or a tyrant, don’t take it on yourself. Stop walking on eggshells and letting their rage control your every step. Instead of taking on their problem, try something different. Give their problem with being a bully back to them.

How do you deal with anger? Does somebody in your life use anger as a way of controlling you? It may be time to let go of your fear of setting off people.

If you are in a dangerous situation, then by all means, get out. If you are just allowing yourself to be controlled by the fear of an emotional outburst, then learn to say whatever when someone spouts off.

God, please don’t let anyone’s anger, including my own, be the master of my life.

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Positivity Revisited
Keeping a Diary with Purpose

by Madisyn Taylor

A diary that is kept for a specific purpose can be a great way to focus on a specific issue that you want to work through.


A diary can play many roles. It can be a confidant, a vehicle of self expression, a tool that facilitates clarity of thought, or a repository of dreams. A diary can also be a powerful source of comfort during challenging or traumatic periods. When you record those insights and incidents that clearly demonstrate you are on the right track, you can return to your words days, weeks, or months later and find uniquely soothing reassurance. A diary with a specific purpose can be a good tool for keeping track of experiences before the passage of time can skew your perception of events. It reflects the immediacy of your life and thus provides you with a landmark to return to when you begin to doubt yourself. If doubt does arise, simply open your diary to reaffirm your experiences. The confidence, surety, passion, and bravery you felt in a single moment is preserved, giving you a means to recapture those feelings in any place, at any time.

Your diary serves as a repository of personalized encouragement. Since a diary is, by its very nature, as individual as you are, you should give some thought to the type of diary that will serve you best. A synchronicity-and-connections diary might describe those instances where seemingly random occurrences came together in a meaningful way, propelling you forward. Or you may find strength in the pages of a pride diary that makes note not only of those times you felt proud of yourself but also precisely why you were pleased with your efforts. And a cause-and-effect diary can help you become more decisive by reminding you of all the wise, life-affirming choices you have made. Your diary should be small enough to be readily portable and on hand whenever possible because the faster you put your thoughts down on paper, the more authentic your declarations are apt to be.

Regardless of the type of focused diary you choose to keep, your recollections will create a positive feedback loop that helps you cope with doubt in a constructive way. Reading through your diary when life seems uncertain can show you that your misgivings are unfounded. As you draw consolation from your uplifting words, you will know without a doubt that you are indeed living your purpose and following the path that you committed to before birth. Published with permission from Daily OM

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A Day At A Time

Reflection For The Day

Before I became sober in The Program, I blamed all my problems on other people, or on places and things. Now I’m learning to look squarely at each difficulty, not seeking whom to “blame,” but to discover how my attitude helped create my problem or aggravate it. I must also learn to face the consequences of my own actions and words, and to correct myself when I’m wrong. Do I practice the Tenth Step by continuing to take personal inventory? When I am wrong, do I promptly admit it?

Today I Pray

May I know the blessed relief and unburdening that comes when I admit I have done something wrong. May I learn — perhaps for the first time in my entire life — to take responsibility for my own actions and to face the consequences. May I learn again how to match actions with consequences.

Today I Will Remember

To take responsibility for my own actions.

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One More Day

Our sweetest songs are those that tell of saddest thoughts.
– Percy Bysshe Shelley

Our inner messages are much like tuning a radio; we choose what we want to hear. With a turn of the radio dial, the music changes from mellow and happy to sad and lonely and back again.

The inner messages we choose to hear may fill our days with memories that are difficult to hear. But we can tune our minds to more positive thoughts, by noticing the beauty of our surroundings, by focusing on more pluses and on fewer minuses. We can, willingly, switch our minds to thoughts that are better for us and for our health.

Why should we listen to the sad, lonely sounds when we have other choices? We can choose a daily program to suit our goals and needs, one that enhances desires and improves general well-being.

Today, I will turn my personal dial to more positive messages.

[bluidkiti]

March 6

This Mouse must give up one of the Mouse ways of seeing things in order that he may grow. --Hyemeyohsts Storm
There is an American Indian tale of a mouse who heard a roaring in his ears and set out to discover what it was. He encountered many animals who helped him on his way. Finally, the mouse had a chance to offer help to another. He gave away his eyes to help two other animals.
Without his sight, defenseless, he waited for the end. Soon he heard the sound eagles make when they dive for their prey. The next thing the mouse knew, he was flying. He could see all the splendor around him. Then he heard a voice say, "You have a new name. You are Eagle."
Like the mouse, we also feel something inside us we'd like to explore. That secret, like all others, has its answer hidden deep within us, yet right under our very nose. Often, we merely have to give up our eyes and see in a different way. When we do this, we are rewarded with a new kind of vision, one that lets us discover our true potential.
How can I look at things differently today?


You are reading from the book Touchstones.
A boy must be initiated into the world of men. It doesn't happen by itself; it doesn't happen just because he eats Wheaties. And only men can do this work. --Robert Ely
Many of us grew into manhood with a surface picture of what it means to be masculine. We had images of tough guys playing rough, but we weren't emotionally close enough to another man to really know him. Many of us never knew our fathers' strengths, passions, and weak points. It left us with a distorted picture of masculinity and not with an inner knowing. Getting close to other men is a new experience, and it may feel frightening or threatening.
We can develop close friendships with other males and let them know us as we are, rather than as this picture we try to imitate. This kind of relationship in play and work and troubled times is a central part of our spiritual recovery. Close relationships with other men teach us confidence in ourselves and give us inner security.
I will be aware today of men with whom 1 can develop a friendship and will take one small step toward them.


You are reading from the book The Language Of Letting Go.
Peace
Anxiety is often our first reaction to conflict, problems, or even our own fears. In those moments, detaching and getting peaceful may seem disloyal or apathetic. We think: If I really care, Ill worry; if this is really important to me, I must stay upset. We convince ourselves that outcomes will be positively affected by the amount of time we spend worrying.
Our best problem solving resource is peace. Solutions arise easily and naturally out of a peaceful state. Often, fear and anxiety block solutions. Anxiety gives power to the problem, not the solution. It does not help to harbor turmoil. It does not help.
Peace is available if we choose it. In spite of chaos and unsolved problems around us, all is well. Things will work out. We can surround ourselves with the resources of the Universe: water, earth, a sunset, a walk, a prayer, a friend. We can relax and let ourselves feel peace.
Today, I will let go of my need to stay in turmoil. I will cultivate peace and trust that timely solutions and goodness will arise naturally and harmoniously out of the wellspring of peace. I will consciously let go and let God.


I am learning to trust my instincts and move away from unpleasant and stressful people, places and things. I no longer have to stay in situations that bring me unhappiness and pain. I am turning around today to see the joy. --Ruth Fishel

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Journey to the Heart

Let Your Sexuality Be Connected to Your Heart

He was a handsome man. An acotr. “Something happened to me lately,” he shared. “It’s about my sexuality. I used to be sexual when and where I felt like it. No more. And it’s not connected to fear of disease, although that’s certainly a concern. What happened to me is that my sexuality has become connected to my heart.”

Let go of sexual shame. Embrace your sexuality. Value your senses, all of them– touch, smell, taste, seeing, and hearing. Value your other senses,too– your intuition, your spirituality, your spirit’s reaction to the world that dances around you. Open up to colors, textures, scents, and sounds.

Open up to your energy, all of it, including your sexuality. Let yourself see that all expressions of your love and your being are beautiful. Let yourself learn to express and receive love in sensual ways, ways that work for you.

Be done with sexual shame. Trust your body and what it likes. We aren’t disconnected parts. Open up. Discover your sexuality. Let it be connected to your heart.

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More Language Of Letting Go

Neutralize conflicts

Unless you want a fight or an argument, don’t give people anything to push against.

Here is a key to harmonizing with people who are upset or have a point of view different from your own. Stay so relaxed when you talk to them that you allow yourself to empathize with how they think and feel. That doesn’t mean that you give in to people’s every whim. It means, instead, that you are so clear and focused that you can genuinely let other people be who they are, too.

It’s both naive and egotistical to think that everyone thinks and feels the same as us. It’s ridiculous to beliieve that everyone will agree with our point of view. One of the true signs of a person who is growing in consciousness is that he or she recognizes that each person has individual motives, desires, and feelings.

“Instead of meeting a verbal attack with a verbal conterattack you respond first by coming around to your attacker’s point of view, seeing the situation from his or her viewpoint,” wrote George Leonard in the Way of Akido.

He was talking about using a concept called “blending” to deal with verbal confromtations in our daily lives. “The response, whether physical or verbal, is quite disarming, leaving the attacker with no target to focus on. It’s a means by which you can multiply your options in responding to any kind of attack.”

If the person espousing his or her point of view is just trying to get us to react or has no desire for reconciliation, we can still neutralize the conflict by staying relaxed, letting the other person be, and responding by saying “hmmmm.” It’s a polite way of saying whatever, when expressing your disagreement would only lead to a senseless fight. At the least, you’ll become a great conversationalist, a respectable art to be acquired. At best, you’ll bring about world peace, at least in your corner of the world.

God, help me be so clear on who I am that I can generously afford to let other people be who they are,too. Help me to set aside my defensive behavior, and teach me to blend with other people and see their point of view while not relinquishing my own.

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Exploring an Alternate Universe
What Makes People Tick?

by Madisyn Taylor

Interacting peacefully with people from all walks of life is a matter of first understanding where they are coming from.


All people have their own way of being in the world. It is easiest to comprehend this basic yet profound fact when we consider that every human being on the planet occupies a distinct role in the universe. We grow up in different environments, affected by a unique range of influences. The preferences, values, and beliefs we embrace are frequently related intimately to our origins. And the need to individualize our experiences is instinctive, as doing so enables us to cope when we must face challenges on our own. Consequently, each of us has developed a perspective that is uniquely ours. Interacting peacefully and constructively with people from all walks of life is a matter of first understanding where they are coming from. Then we can adjust our expectations so that we avoid making undue assumptions about what they are about.

In the face of emerging interpersonal conflict, it is easy to assume that others are being difficult, unreasonable, or stubborn. We are apt to grow frustrated when someone in our environment does not share our opinions or feel compelled to support us in our endeavors. It is likely that the individual or individuals before us may simply possess differing notions with regard to what is and what is not important in this life. We can ease the tension that exists between us by reaffirming our belief in the fundamental right of all beings to determine their own destinies. To foster a harmonious relationship, we need to do our best to relate to the unique universes they inhabit. And as we discover what makes them tick, our ability to find a mode of interaction that is pleasing to both of us is enhanced.

When there are barriers keeping you from connecting with someone else, think of questions you can ask them to gain a more thorough understanding of their point of view. You may discover that in addition to the differences in perspective dividing you, they are subject to insecurities and other personal issues that influence their way of seeing the world. It is likely that you will never fully grasp the myriad complexities embodied by humanity, but you can go a long way toward encouraging mutually satisfying relations by reaching out to others in the spirit of sympathetic comprehension. Published with permission from Daily OM

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A Day At A Time

Reflection For The Day

There is no advantage, no profit and certainly no growth when I deceive myself merely to escape the consequences of my own mistakes. When I realize this, I know I’ll be making progress. “We must be true inside, true to ourselves, before we can know a truth that is outside us,” wrote Thomas Merton in No Man Is An Island. “But we make ourselves true inside by manifesting the truth as we set it.” Am I true to myself?

Today I Pray

May I count on my Higher Power to help me carry out the truth as I see it. May I never duck a consequence again. Consequence-ducking became a parlor game for chemically addictive persons like me, until we lost all sense of relationship between action and outcome. Now that I am healing, please God, restore my balance.

Today I Will Remember

Match the Act with the consequence.

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One More Day

The unfortunate thing about this world is that good habits are so much easier to give up than bad ones.
–Somerset Maugham

Old habits often die hard, especially bad ones. We may need to be tactfully silent when we become irritated with the behavior or habits of our loved ones. It may seem at times as though everyone around us is either nail biting, smoking, cussing, or overeating. When illness enters the scene, or any other stressor for that matter, bad habits tend to resurface. We may be less tolerant of others’ faults and even of their good health.

It’s hard to put away old habits, especially the old pattern of being critical, but we can learn to let go. Even with extra stress in our lives we can begin to work on developing new habits. We can learn to recognize the growth we’ve achieved and to feel proud.

I can begin today to develop strong, new habits and to hold on to my old, strong habits.

[bluidkiti]

March 7

You are reading from the book Today's Gift.
He who distributes the milk of human kindness cannot help but spill a little on himself. --James Barrie
We like ourselves best when we like those around us. When we smile at them, they smile back; when we ask them, they tell us about themselves. When we scowl at people, they'll frown back; when we ignore them, they'll walk away.
It's true that we get back what we put into things, whether it's work, play, love, or gardening. We decide by the extent of our commitment how valuable or enjoyable or depressing an experience can be for us.
Our actions toward others come right back to us. When we smile at people, they smile back, and we feel good. Sometimes feeling good about ourselves depends on feeling good about others. When we send out that smile of ours, those who get it pass it on, and we have added power to the happiness of the world.
What can I do to show my fondness for others today?


You are reading from the book Touchstones.
A controller doesn't trust his/her ability to live through the pain and chaos of life. There is no life without pain just as there is no art without submitting to chaos. --Rita Mae Brown
It is very hard for most of us to see how controlling we are. We may feel uptight or careful, but we haven't seen it as controlling ourselves or controlling how people respond to us. We may be worried about a loved one's behavior or safety, but not realize our hovering over that person is a controlling activity. We may be keenly aware of other people's controlling behavior with us, but unaware we have equaled their control by monitoring them and trying to change their behavior.
What a moment of spiritual adventure it is to risk living through the pain! When we do not seek an escape or a quick fix but have patience with the process, new possibilities often do develop. We can only let go of our control - or turn it over to our Higher Power. And we will do it and forget, taking control back within minutes or within an hour. Then we let go again.
Today, I will submit to the insecurity of a changing universe and have faith that 1 can live through the process and grow.


You are reading from the book The Language Of Letting Go.
Fulfillment
Everything I need shall be provided today. Everything. Say it, until you believe it. Say it at the beginning of the day. Say it throughout the day.
Sometimes, it helps to know what we want and need. But if we don't, we can trust that God does.
When we ask, trust, and believe that our needs will be met, our needs will be met. Sometimes God cares about the silliest little things, if we do.
Today, I will affirm that my needs will be met. I will affirm that God cares and is the Source of my supply. Then I will let go and see that what I have risked to believe is the truth.


It is exciting to know that my thoughts and my actions in the present moment condition the next moment. I am responsible for my future. Today I am bringing awareness to my self-talk and replacing all negative thoughts with positive thoughts as soon as they appear on my mindscape. --Ruth Fishel

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Journey to the Heart

Redefine Service

Service is a key, an important one. It’s a key to joy, to love. And a gold key to the journey.

How long we thought service meant doing everything for everyone. How long we thought service had to be hard, taxing, boring– that it meant doing something we didn’t want to do to help someone who didn’t want to be helped.

Now, we’re defining service differently. Service is joyful. It’s an attitude, a belief, a way of looking at ourselves and our lives. Our very life is service. Our being is service. Service arises and springs naturally out of self-love. It arises from being who we are and from doing the things we want to do and are led to do. The things that bring us the most joy will bring the most service to the world. Doing things we don’t want to do will leave us and the world around us cold, untouched, unmoved.

Service is love and joy. Service is being who you are. Bask in self-love. Service will flow naturally from that. It will be freely given and freely received. And now what you do will really help.

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More Language Of Letting Go

Recognize manipulations

Herein lies an irony: the person who is trying to manipulate you views you as having greater strength or power than he or she does.
–George H. Green and Carolyn Cotter

Stop Being Manipulated

George Green and Carolyn Cotter describe manipulation as an encounter in which someone else attempts to control how you feel, behave, or think– without your permission– and it causes you discomfort as a result.

Most of us use manipulation, from time to time, to get what we want. Sometimes our manipulations are harmless’ even cute. Both people know a low-grade manipulation is at hand. Both people basically want what the manipulator is working so hard to get– dinner out, a movie, a walk through the park. It’s not a big deal.

Other times, the stakes are higher and the people involved don’t agree. That’s when manipulations can be harmful. When we don’t know what we want, when we’re not clear with others and ourselves about how we feel, a manipulation is in the air.

Sometimes manipulationx are conscious and deliberate. Other times they’re unconscious, foggy attempts to get what we want.

“Let’s simplify our definition of manipulation,” suggest Green and Cotter. “If an encounter leaves you feeling crummy, it probably involves manipulation of some sort.”

Isn’t it ironic that sometimes the very feeling we’re trying to deny is exactly what we need to be feeling to take care of ourselves?

Next time you’re faced with a situation that leaves you feeling crummy, take a moment to see if a manipulation was involved. Remember that whenever others try to manipulate you, they perceive you as having something they want and as being more powerful than they are. If you’re powerful enough to be a target for a manipulation, you’re powerful enough to take care of yourself.

God, help me let go of my belief that I need to manipulate other people to get what I want. Help me stop letting others manipulate me.

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Letting Go of Understanding
Deeper Meanings

by Madisyn Taylor

We don't always need to know the deeper meaning of everything that happens in our lives.


All of us who seek to be conscious and aware regard our experiences as teachers, and we try to discern what lessons we are learning from the things that happen in our lives. Sometimes the lesson is very clear from the get-go, and other times we have to really search to understand the deeper meaning behind some event. While this search often yields results, there also comes a point in the search where what we really need to do is move forward. It is possible that we are not meant to know the deeper meaning of certain occurrences. Answers may come later in our lives, or they may come as a result of letting go, or they may never come.

We are all part of a complex system of being, and things work themselves out in the system as a whole. Sometimes we are just playing a necessary part in that process with a result larger than we can understand. It may have very little to do with us personally, and while that can be hard to understand, it can also free us from overthinking the matter. Sometimes it is best to see it in terms of karma, a past debt we have been able to repay in this way, or as the clearing of energy. We can simply thank the event for being part of our experience and let it go. This completes the process that the occurrence has made possible.

To make this letting go official, we can perform a ritual, make a final journal entry on the subject, or sit in meditation with the intention of releasing the event from our consciousness. As we do so, we summon it one last time, honoring it with our attention, thanking it, and saying good-bye. We then let it go out the door, out the window, out the top of our heads, or into the earth through the bottoms of our feet, liberating ourselves from any burden we have carried in association with it. Published with permission from Daily OM

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A Day At A Time

Reflection For The Day

It’s time for me to realize that my attitude — toward the life I’m living and the people in it — can have a tangible, measurable and profound effect on what happens to me day by day. If I expect good, then good will surely come to me. And If I try each day to base my attitude and point of view on a sound spiritual foundation, I know it will change all the circumstances of my life for the better, too. Do I accept the fact that I have been given only a daily reprieve that is contingent on my spiritual condition?

Today I Pray

since my illness was spiritual — as well as physical and emotional — may I mend spiritually through daily communion with God. May I find a corner of quiet within me where I can spend a few moments with Him. May He make His will known to me. May I worship Him from that inner temple that is in myself.

Today I will Remember

To spend a quiet moment with God.

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One More Day

Life if you will, is a work of art, and if we have paid loving attention to its details, we will be able to take pride in the finished product.
– Harold Kushner

Without even realizing it, we often do things that are good for us and make us happy. We do something that creates well-being, and we have a successful day. When we pay attention to actions that create well-being we can have a successful week. Taking good care of our homes makes us feel proud and so does helping a fellow human being in need. Making volunteer work a part of how we live, showing kindness to others and ourselves, reaching out — all these choices enhance our well-being.

When we pay attention to those around us, a transformation occurs within our spiritual selves. Then we shall have given ourselves the gift of a meaningful life.

I will pay loving attention to the details of my day.

[bluidkiti]

March 8

You are reading from the book Today's Gift.
Laughter by definition is healthy. --Doris Lessing
A hearty laugh can warm a cold room and make our spirits soar. But many of us are afraid to laugh, especially when we make mistakes. We think we're supposed to be perfect, and we don't allow ourselves to make mistakes. However, we're not a mold punched out by a machine. We're human beings, with all our wonderful flaws. It is those flaws that make our lives interesting and surprising. Who knows when we might accidentally bump into a chair or catch our sweater on a doorknob? We needn't feel self-conscious, it happens to many of us.
The ability to laugh at ourselves is a gift from God. All we need to do is grab it and use it. Then we will see how healthy and powerful laughter can be.
Can I find the humor in my mistakes today?


You are reading from the book Touchstones.
Before the rain stops we hear a bird. Even under the heavy snow we see snowdrops and some new growth. --Shunryu Suzuki
The signals that new growth is underway are often very small at first. It's sometimes discouraging when we are trying to remake our lives and all we can see for our efforts is minor growth. That is how the natural world works, and we are part of this world. When the little sprouts of growth first develop under the snow in spring we don't even see them unless we search. Yet, they signal the beginnings of a total transformation. Time will bring vast changes, but only little signs are showing first.
Today, we may search for signs of progress in our lives. The little things we see may signal bigger transformations yet to come. To be true to them in the long run we must accept them - even welcome them - as they are today.
I will notice the subtle movements toward health and renewal in my life. Welcoming them will encourage them.


You are reading from the book The Language Of Letting Go.
Surrender
Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God, as we understood Him. --Step Three of Al Anon
Surrendering to a Power greater than ourselves is how we become empowered.
We become empowered in a new, better, more effective way than we believed possible.
Doors open. Windows open. Possibilities occur. Our energy becomes channeled, at last, in areas and ways that work for us. We become in tune with the Plan for our life and our place in the Universe.
And there is a Plan and Place for us. We shall see that. We shall know that. The Universe will open up and make a special place for us, with all that we need provided.
It will be good. Understand that it is good, now.
Learning to own our power will come, if we are open to it. We do not need to stop at powerlessness and helplessness. That is a temporary place where we re evaluate where we have been trying to have power when we have none.
Once we surrender, it is time to become empowered.
Let the power come, naturally. It is there. It is ours.
Today, I will be open to understanding what it means to own my power. I will accept powerlessness where I have no power; I will also accept the power that is mine to receive.


With every breath that I take, healing is taking place. I relax safely in the knowledge that positive, healing energy is working in my life today. I am being renewed and refreshed and energized. --Ruth Fishel

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Journey to the Heart

Your Dreams Are Important

A woman told me about a dream she had, one that was bothering her deeply. “What do you think it means?” she asked.

“I don’t know,” I replied. “Besides, it doesn’t matter what I think. The important thing is what you think. What’s it telling you?”

We dream two kinds of dreams– waking dreams and sleeping dreams. Both are powerful forms of consciousness. Our sleeping dreams, the images that dance in our minds while we sleep, hold many clues to life, growth, the future, the past, healing, and our connections with others. They may reveal suppressed emotions. They may be bits and pieces of prophecy. They may be symbols of truths we’re about to learn.

Our waking dreams are important,too. We go about daily with our expectations, wants, desires, hopes– our heart’s plan for the future. We may not express these dreams. We may not even realize we are superimposing them on our lives, much the same way we can forget what we dream when we sleep.

There’s power in allowing ourselves to become conscious of our dreams. What are our dreams telling us about what we want, fear, hope for, desire? Expressing our dreams will connect us to our consciousness and a higher consciousness. Expressing them will connect us to the creative force. Tapping into our dreams helps us tap into creativity– creativity for our lives, creativity for projects, the powerful creative force of the universe.

There’s power in dreaming, whether we’re asleep or awake. Take time to honor and express your dreams.

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More Language Of Letting Go

Learn to deal with manipulations

Even if you understand and follow all of the rules for more effectively engaging manipulators, life with them is not likely to be easy.
–George K. Simon Jr.

Sometimes they want something. Sometimes they want someone. Sometimes they want someone to give them something or to feel a particular way. They want power, in some way, shape, or form. Manipulators prey on our weak spots.

Obsession and guilt are weapons.

Manipulators get us to use these weapons on ourselves.

Sometimes we can disengage from manipulators– walk away, set a clear limit, be done with them. Other times, it’s not that easy. We may be at least temporarily stuck with a boss or authority figure who indulges in heavy manipulation. One of our children may be going through a relentlessly manipulative period. We may have a parent whom we care about deeply who has adapted manipulation as a way of life.

Learn how to effectively deal with manipulators. Not everyone means what they say. People fling words about to hit our guilty, vain, or frightened spots. Recognize that tinge of guilt or coercion you feel when other people are trying to force you to do it their way. Learn to recognize when others are telling you what they believe you want to hear. Learn to not react, stay clear, practice nonresistence, and stay true to yourself.

Be gentle with yourself, if you have a manipulator in your life. You’re not responsible for the other person’s attempts at manipulation. You’re responsible for staying clear.

God, help me let go of the weak spots in myself that allow me to fall prey to manipulations. Help me stay clear of guilt and obsession so I can decide what’s best for me.

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Defense Mechanisms
Beyond Behavior

by Madisyn Taylor

We can let go of our defense mechanisms when we are ready to be truly honest with ourselves.


We all have defense mechanisms that we’ve developed over time, often without being aware of it. In times of trouble, the behaviors that have worked to get us past challenges with the least amount of pain are the ones that we repeat; even when part of us knows they no longer work. Such behavior is a natural response from our mental and physical aspects. But because we are spiritual beings as well, we have the ability to rise above habits and patterns to see the truth that lay beyond. And from that moment on, we can make choices that allow us to work directly from that place of truth within us.

Most of our defense mechanisms were developed in childhood; from the moment that we realized crying would get us the attention we craved. Passive aggressive ways of communicating may have allowed us to get what we needed without being scolded, punished or laughed at, so we learned to avoid being direct and honest. Some of us may have taken refuge in the lives of others, discovering ways to direct attention away from ourselves entirely. Throwing ourselves into projects or rescuing others from themselves can be effective ways to avoid dealing with our own issues. And when people are truly helped by our actions, we get the added bonus of feeling heroic. But while defenses can keep away the things we fear, they can also work to keep our good from us.

When we can be honest with ourselves about what we truly desire, then we can connect our desires to the creative power of the spirit within us. Knowing that we are one with the energy of the universe allows us release any need for defense. Trusting that power, we know that we are exactly where we are meant to be, and that challenges bring gifts of growth and experience. When we can put down arms raised in defense, then we are free to use our hands, minds, hearts and spirits to mold and shape our abundant energy to create and live our lives. Published with permission from Daily OM

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A Day At A Time

Reflection For The Day

Merely to change my behavior, and what I say and do, doesn’t prove there’s been a change in my actual inner attitude. I’m deceiving myself if I believe I can somehow completely disguise my true feelings. They’ll somehow come through, prolonging the difficulties in my relationships with others. I have to avoid half-measures in getting rid of the trouble-some emotions I’ve been trying to hide. Have I taken an honest inventory of myself?

Today I Pray

May I know that feelings will come out somehow — sometimes barely disguised as behavior that I cannot always understand. But that perhaps in more acceptable to me than the root emotion that caused it. May I be completely and vigilantly honest with myself. May I be given the insight that comes through depending upon a Higher Power.

Today I Will Remember

Feelings can come out “sideways.”

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One More Day

We cannot learn without pain.
– Aristotle

It is said that pain and experience are life’s two greatest teachers. What good would it be if we felt pain each day but never learned from it? And what good would it be if we coasted through life without experiencing joy along with sorrow?

There can be no depth of personality or depth of character if our lives have been perfect. Experience etches our hearts and souls, gives us depth, and deepens the horizon of our days. No individual has lived a life completely without pain, without sorrow. We can move beyond our pain and sorrow to grow in new directions.

I can accept the lessons I am learning of tolerance to living a less-than-perfect life. These lessons help me grow.

[bluidkiti]

March 9

You are reading from the book Today's Gift.
There is no such thing as a long piece of work, except one that you dare not start. --Charles Baudelaire
A big assignment can be scary to face. We may start to think that how we do on the assignment will determine if we're good or bad people. The more we think about it, the harder that task seems. The key to overcoming our negative feelings is to say to ourselves that we are capable of finishing our projects. We must say it over and over until we start believing it's true. Then we can attack the assignment with vitality and positive energy we didn't know we had.
We can make up our minds to do our best and accept that from ourselves. We say Edison was a genius, but our light bulbs still burn out regularly. Even Einstein was wrong once in a while, and he knew it, but that didn't stop him from trying.
When we feel afraid to start something because it seems too big a job, let's stop and think what the first step would be, and do each small step in its own time.
What can I start that I've been putting off?


You are reading from the book Touchstones.
We all wear masks, and the time comes when we cannot remove them without removing some of our own shin.
--Andre Berthiaume
The masks men wear are as varied as those who wear them, but their purpose is quite simple. We wear masks to hide our real faces from those around us and even from ourselves. There are seductive masks, innocent masks, white knight masks, tough guy masks, black sheep masks, lone wolf masks, and many more. Sometimes we want to take on another identity so others won't see our insecurities. Or we think taking the form of someone else will give us power over others, or they will like us better, or we can escape ourselves.
The cost of wearing a mask is not getting a chance to develop our real personalities. What masks are we attached to? Are we willing to give them up in the interest of our spiritual growth?
May I have the courage to drop my phony masks in order to grow stronger in self knowledge.


You are reading from the book The Language Of Letting Go.
Taking Care of Ourselves
We cannot simultaneously set a boundary and take care of another persons feelings. Its impossible; the two acts contradict.
What a tremendous asset to have compassion for others! How difficult that same quality can make it to set boundaries!
Its good to care about other people and their feelings; its essential to care about ourselves too. Sometimes, to take good care of ourselves, we need to make a choice.
Some of us live with a deeply ingrained message from our family, or from church, about never hurting other peoples feelings. We can replace that message with a new one; one that says its not okay to hurt ourselves. Sometimes, when we take care of ourselves, others will react with hurt feelings.
That's okay. We will learn, grow, and benefit by the experience; they will too. The most powerful and positive impact we can have on other people is accomplished by taking responsibility for ourselves, and allows others to be responsible for themselves.
Caring works. Caretaking doesn't. We can learn to walk the line between the two.
Today, I will set the limits I need to set. I will let go of my need to take care of other peoples feelings and instead take care of my own. I will give myself permission to take care of myself, knowing its the best thing I can do for others and myself.


Today I know that I am in charge of the quality of my life. I am growing in the ability to become aware of the thoughts that have been controlling me. --Ruth Fishel

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Journey to the Heart

Let Your Visions Guide You

Visions are different from dreams. A vision is a picture that comes from the soul and comes out through the heart.

A vision is a small glimpse of light that shines and shows us our path. It is a quick flash of something that hasn’t happened yet. It may tell us something about today or ten years from now. Visions occur when our souls look at the map for our lives, get a sense of where we’re going, and tell our hearts how to find that place. The more conscious and clear and direct we are, the more we can tune into and help create the highest vision for our lives.

What do you want? What would feel right? What do you see yourself doing? Be clear and concise, then let it go. Sometimes when we run out of dreams, we have to rely on our visions, these small glimpses of light, to lead the way. Learn to see the visions in your heart. Learn to trust them. Learn to help create them. Allow them to manifest themselves. When the path is dark, learn to be comfortable with these small bursts of light.

Let your visions guide you home.

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More Language Of Letting Go

Know your limits

While it’s good to be compassionate, we can become overly compassionate,too. Don’t work so hard at not judging other people that you forget to pay attention to what you don’t like.

“I know what it feels like to be abandoned and left. I don’t like the feeling, so I’m not going to leave my boyfriend,” Clara says. She’s living with a man who abuses her, emotionally and physically.

“I’m not going to judge her,” Ralph says about his new wife. She’s using cocaine and stealing money from him to get high. “She’s had a hard life, and I haven’t walked in her shoes.”

“I need to be compassionate and nonjudgemental with my son,” Robert says about a child who’s driving him to distraction with his manipulations and lies. “He’s had a hard life. His mother died when he was three. And I’m the only person he’s got left.”

You can set boundaries with someone, without judging that person. You can decide that behaviors are inappropriate and hurt you, without condemning that person.

Don’t forget, you have a right to say “ouch.”

We can say whatever with compassion and still take care of ourselves.

God, help me set appropriate limits with the people in my life.

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Capturing Life’s Flavor
Taking a Field Trip

When we were children, few words were more exciting to hear than the phrase "field trip." Field trips were a break from schoolwork and an opportunity to go on an adventure with friends. Now that we are grown ups, taking a field trip can be just as fun and memorable – if only we were willing to sign our own permission slips so we could go on one.

Allowing yourself to get stuck in your routine can make life seem boring. Adding a touch of variety to your life in the form of a field trip can break up the monotony of your days and lead you to adventure. Unlike the jaunts that were regulated by teachers or monitored by parents, taking a field trip as an adult can lead you anywhere you want. You can go on a daylong retreat or spend just a few hours at your destination. A field trip can be an opportunity to explore a new landscape or discover something about yourself. Taking a day trip to another town or visiting an unfamiliar spot in your neighborhood can be educational and fun. There is also much to be said for finding a beautiful spot under a tree where you can read a book. You can even go to one of your favorite spots and allow yourself to experience it as if you were visiting there for the first time. Going on a field trip is as much a state of mind as it is a change in the scenery.

During a “grown up” field trip, schedules, clocks, and duties are put aside so you can focus wholeheartedly on mindfully enjoying yourself. Planning a field trip can be almost as fun as going on one. A field trip is an excursion to look forward to and an experience to be savored after the fact. Wherever you decide to go and whatever you decide to do, going on a field trip can add much pleasure and excitement to your life. Published with permission from Daily OM

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A Day At A Time

Reflection For The Day

We learn in The Program and its Twelve Steps that as we grow spiritually, we find that our old attitudes toward our instinctual drives need to undergo drastic revisions. Our demands for emotional security and wealth,for personal prestige and power, all have to be tempered and redirected. We learn that the full satisfaction of these demands cannot be the sole end and aim of our lives. But when we’re willing to place spiritual growth first — then and only then do we have a real chance to grow in healthy awareness and mature love. Am I willing to place spiritual growth first?

Today I Pray

May my development as a spiritual person temper my habitual hankerings for materil security. May I understand that the only real security in life is spiritual. If I have faith in my Higher Power, these revisions in my attitudes will follow. May I grow first in spiritual awareness.

Today I Will Remember

Value the life of the spirit.

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One More Day

Don’t waste today regretting yesterday instead of making a memory for tomorrow.
– Laura Palmer

Our youthful dreams were filled with grand expectations of our impact on the world. Some of those goals were reached; many were not.

Now, it’s easier to accept that not all our plans will come to pass. In accepting that, we are able to set new goals that better reflect our dreams and ideals today. For a while it may seem as though we are “just surviving,” but we can have more.

At our stage of life we are capable of making mature decisions, of setting more realistic goals. Each day we can reflect upon our accomplishments and upon the joy of family, friends, and job. Finally, we can feel comfortable with ourselves, and we can look forward to our tomorrows.

Yesterday is gone and unchangeable, but today is real and is mine to use.

[bluidkiti]

March 10

You are reading from the book Today's Gift.
The older you get the more you realize that kindness is synonymous with happiness. --Lionel Barrymore
Once in a while, we forget about the kind things people have done for us. Do we remember the next-door neighbor who helped us get our kite out of a tree, or the brother who helped us finish a project for school? If we think about these kindnesses, we will remember how happy we were to receive them.
These people and others may need a kindness we can give. Our next-door neighbor may get sick and need us to go to the store, a brother or sister may need to borrow a radio, or the elderly person down the street may need the lawn mowed. Whenever we take the time to give a kindness, we will find that like the boomerang, it returns to us in the form of happiness.
Will I be alert to my chances to give kindness today?


You are reading from the book Touchstones.
There is no king who has not had a slave among his ancestors, and no slave who has not had a king among his. --Helen Keller
The human race is a huge mixture of dignity and degradation and every man inherits the blend. We can respect the slave in us for his endurance and suffering. And the king in us earns our respect for his leadership and justice. Are we ashamed of who we are or where we have come from? Then we may have to look deeper and ask if we are really different from any other man.
Do we believe we must conform to some mold of acceptability, some proper appearance? Are we so focused on the surface that we miss the deeper values of our humanness? Sometimes we take on a reverse smugness and become judgmental of the person who looks successful or speaks well. We think, "I can't like him, he's in a different class." We all need acceptance and respect, and in this program we are equals from the first day.
God, grant me the self esteem to accept the whole mixture that comes together in me and in the people around me.


You are reading from the book The Language Of Letting Go.
Living with Families
I was forty-six years old before I finally admitted to myself and someone else that my grandfather always managed to make me feel guilty, angry, and controlled. --Anonymous
We may love and care about our family very much. Family members may love and care about us. But interacting with some members may be a real trigger to our codependency - sometimes to a deep abyss of shame, rage, anger, guilt, and helplessness.
It can be difficult to achieve detachment, or an emotional level, with certain family members. It can be difficult to separate their issues from ours. It can be difficult to own our power.
Difficult, but not impossible.
The first step is awareness and acceptance - simple acknowledgment, without guilt, of our feelings and thoughts. We do not have to blame our family members. We do not have to blame or shame ourselves. Acceptance is the goal - acceptance and freedom to choose what we want and need to do to take care of ourselves with that person. We can become free of the patterns of the past. We are recovering. Progress is the goal.
Today, Higher Power, help me be patient with myself as I learn how to apply recovery behaviors with family members. Help me strive today for awareness and acceptance.


I am open and willing to take a step forward in a new direction. I am no longer allowing myself to stay stuck by old thoughts and feelings. This new place is exciting and energizing. --Ruth Fishel

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Journey to the Heart

Beware of Gossip

Gossip is a seductive pastime that can be harmful to others, harmful to ourselves. Some gossip is innocent.We chatter about the experiences of others lightly, joyfully, in a way that doesn’t hurt. Other gossip isn’t so innocent. It’s rooted in anger, jealousy, betrayal, and sometimes hatred. We feel deprived and cheated– hurt-so we want to hurt another.

Would you stand and throw darts at someone? Would you pick up a knife and stab that person in the back? I think not. Yet, when we gossip, we do the same thing. Words, especially those coated with emotion, carry energy, sometimes potentially damaging energy. When we hurt another, we hurt ourselves. Both are injured. We need to deal with our feelings of anger, hurt, betrayal, or jealousy before they wound through gossip.

While walking this journey, you must learn of the dangers. Gossip is one of them. Heal the feelings underneath so you can speak lightly with words of love.

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More Language Of Letting Go

Let it be

Life is a series of letting go’s– an “infinite” series of letting go’s. All things in life are given us on loan. Stand face-to-face with life, learn to let go, and whatever comes our way– success or failure, joy or sorrow, support or betrayal, light or darkness– it all blesses us. Once we have learned to let go, we are prepared for whatever life gives us. And death itself is nothing to be feared.
–Matthew Fox

For many years, I resisted the concept of letting go. I resisted mostly because I didn’t understand what people were talking about. I’d be loudly obsessing about something. “Just let go,” they’d say. “Okay,” I’d say. Then I’d walk away and wonder what they meant, and mostly how to do it. Soon, I caught on. If I didn’t want people harping on me about letting go, I needed to obsess silently. Privately. Or at least in the presence of someone who wouldn’t lecture me about letting go.

As the years wore on, I was forced into letting go. Eventually I even wrote a book called The Language of Letting go. I thought it was the end of my need to practice letting go.

When my son died, I learned that writing the book was only a prelude, an introductory course in letting go. Over the years that followed, I gradually began to learn a new respect for this behavior called letting go.

Letting go is a behavior we can practice each day, whatever the circumstances in our lives. It’s a behavior that benefits relationships we want to work. It’s a helpful behavior in insane relationships, too. It’s a useful tool to use when we really want to bring something or someone into our lives, and in accomplishing our goals. It’s a helpful tool to use on outdated behaviors such as low self-esteem and manipulation.

Letting go takes the emotional charge, the drama, out of things and restores us to a sense of balance, peace, and spiritual power.

Letting go works well on the past and the future. It brings us into today.

Paraphrasing the mystic writer Matthew Fox, everything that comes, comes to pass. Denystify letting go. It’s not as complicated as it sounds. Learning the art of letting go really means learning to calmly let things be.

God, help me learn to let go.

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You Deserve To Have Your Dreams Come True
Personal Power

Many of us have do not understand what personal power means. We have been given the false notion that power is bad—that it is something we use to exert our will upon others. In fact, when our personal power is intact, we are neither overbearing nor meek. We have a clear sense of our strength and the impact we can have on others. This actually enables us to be more sensitive. Personal power is what permits us to work on behalf of our dreams and desires. It allows us to realize that we are worthy and deserve to be heard. In addition, our personal power lets us extend the respect we know that we deserve to the people around us. There is no reason to be afraid or ashamed of fully owning your power.

In the chakra system, the solar plexus is the seat of personal power. One way to evaluate your sense of power is to breathe into this part of the body. If it feels tight or nervous, it is an indication that you may not be fully expressing your power. You can heal this imbalance by expanding the area of the solar plexus with your breath. You can also visualize a bright yellow sun in this part of your body. Allow its heat to melt any tension, and let its light dissolve any darkness or heaviness. Repeating this exercise on a regular basis can restore and rejuvenate your sense of power.

Another way to nurture your personal power is to honor your dreams and desires by making concrete plans to manifest them in the world. Start by making a list of things you want, and let yourself think big. Choose one goal from the list and commit to bringing it to fruition. In addition, break the goal into tasks that you can work on each day. Know that you deserve to have your dreams come true and that you have the power to bring them into being. Published with permission from Daily OM

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A Day At A Time

Reflection For The Day

In a letter to a friend, AA’s co-founder Bill W. once wrote, “Nothing can be more demoralizing than a clinging an d abject dependence upon another human being. This often amounts to the demand for a degree of protection and love that no one could possibly satisfy. So our hoped-for protectors finally flee, and once more we are left alone — either to grow up or to disintegrate.” We discover, in The Program, that the best possible source of emotional stability is our Higher Power. We find that dependence upon His Perfect justice, forgiveness and love is healthy, and that it works where nothing else will. Do I depend on my Higher Power?

Today I Pray

May I realize that I am a dependent person. I have depended upon chemicals to alter my moods and attitudes. I have also developed parasitic attachments for others. May I stop making unrealistic emotional demands on others, which only serve to choke off mature human relationships and to leave me bewildered and let down. Only God can provide the kind of whole-heated love which I, as a dependent person, seem to need. May I depend first upon God.

Today I Will Remember

God offers perfect love.

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One More Day

You cannot teach a man anything. You can only help him find it within Himself.
– Galileo

We can’t avoid the crises, large or small, that are a normal part of living. Automobile accidents, spending more money that we can afford, stubbed toes, rain on vacations — these things happen to everyone. No one is exempt. But we can learn from our negative experiences. We learn to be more careful, to hold our tongues, to be more responsible.

No one can teach us how to live. We have to learn by ourselves. And eventually we’re better able to handle our own problems, sometimes even with grace and finesse. We can share what we have learned with others, we can help pave the way for them, but invariably they too will have to do it for themselves.

Life hands me situations. I have the ability to make them into positive experiences.

[bluidkiti]

March 11

You are reading from the book Today's Gift.
Being a healthy parent means being firm but nurturing, giving children a decent sense of the boundaries along with lots of unconditional love. --Karen Shaud
In a healthy family, life goes along and everybody pitches in to do the housework. Some people wonder why housework is such a big deal. It is because people need to contribute to a group in order to feel they belong to it. Housework makes us part of the same group--our house, our family. We make our house comfortable so we can feel comfortable and safe in it. We show love for ourselves by making our surroundings likeable. And when we do physical work, we can do our inner housekeeping, letting go of negative feelings that pile up during the day.
On days when life feels out of control, we feel good when we do one simple job: clean the messy desk, wash dirty dishes, shovel the snowy walk. In this way we regain control of our feelings as well as a perspective on those things within our control.
What simple work do I need to do to feel better today?


You are reading from the book Touchstones.
One must not hold one's self so divine as to be unwilling occasionally to make improvements in one's creations.
--Ludwig van Beethoven
We addicted and codependent men too often feel ashamed of our mistakes. It pains us to admit there is room for improvement in what we have done. When we do see that our work can be improved, shame overwhelms us. Our oversensitivity to flaws puts us in a kind of competition with God. We are not yet resigned to letting ourselves be fully human - and letting God be God. Life is much calmer when we remember that who we are and what we do are not the same.
We are deeper and richer than any object we create or any job we hold. A genius like Beethoven could see he needed to make occasional improvements in his composition, and we can follow his model. Allowing for imperfection, we are better prepared to deal with it, and we are liberated to do our jobs and live our lives more fully.
I will be content to let God be God and accept my life with all its need/or improvements.


You are reading from the book The Language Of Letting Go.
Letting Go of Confusion
Sometimes, the way is not clear.
Our minds get clouded, confused. We aren't certain what our next step should be, what it will look like, what direction we are headed.
This is the time to stop, ask for guidance, and rest. That is the time to let go of fear. Wait. Feel the confusion and chaos, and then let it go. The path will show itself. The next step shall be revealed. We don't have to know now. We will know in time. Trust that. Let go and trust.
Today, I will wait if the way is not clear. I will trust that out of the chaos will come clarity.


Today I continue to let go of all thoughts that continue to pull me out of the present and bringing me to the past and the future. I am becoming more and more open to letting the power of good and love into my life. --Ruth Fishel

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Journey to the Heart

Enjoy the Changing Scenery

How easy it is to think, I will be feeling like this forever. But look at how quickly the scenery changes!

In the space of a few hours while driving down the highway, we can see mountains, deserts, a petrified forest, and iron-rich mesas. In the space of a day we can see courage, faith, despair, desolation, anger, healing, and joy. If there’s one thing that’s true, it’s this: the universe is always changing. It is constant, continual evolution.

The same holds true for the minutes, hours, and days of our lives. We are continually changing and shifting. Each emotion, attitude, and experience– each piece of scenery– leads into the next. Put them all together and what do you have? A grand journey– an exciting trip that leads to someplace worth going and someplace worth being, each moment you are here.

Look at how quickly the scenery changes. Learn to enjoy the view.

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More Language Of Letting God

Things happen

A healthy friend dies participating in a sport she loves. A husband works hard on his marriage only to come home one day and find his wife in bed with another man.

A knock at the door, and a starving family opens it to find bags of groceries piled anonymously on the porch. A large order comes in just as a company is getting ready to close its doors, and the owner’s dream is given new life.

Sometimes life twists. Sometimes it goes the other way,too. Things happen. Sometimes we label these events good, sometimes bad. We cannot always see the reason or purpose in them, but most of us choose to believe there’s a Divine plan.

I don’t know why I’ve received some of the blessings I’ve been given. I don’t know why some of the sorrow has come my way. All I can do is trust that whatever comes my way, there’s a lesson at hand.

Are you focusing on the circumstances of your life instead of the lessons? The circumstances are the tools. Be involved in them. Feel the pain of loss and the elation of victory. Let compassion work its way into your soul. Learn caring and kindness for others and yourself,too.

Instead of asking why, learn to ask what the lesson is. The moment you become ready to accept it, the lesson will become clear.

God, help me accept all the twists and turns along my way. Help me learn to say whatever to the good and the unfortunate incidents that come my way.

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Set Yourself Free
Letting Go of Perfection

It is good to remember that one of our goals in life is to not be perfect. We often lose track of this aspiration. When we make mistakes, we think that we are failing or not measuring up. But if life is about experimenting, experiencing, and learning, then to be imperfect is a prerequisite. Life becomes much more interesting once we let go of our quest for perfection and aspire for imperfection instead.

This doesn’t mean that we don’t strive to be our best. We simply accept that there is no such thing as perfection—especially in life. All living things are in a ceaseless state of movement. Even as you read this, your hair is growing, your cells are dying and being reborn, and your blood is moving through your veins. Your life changes more than it stays the same. Perfection may happen in a moment, but it will not last because it is an impermanent state. Trying to hold on to perfection or forcing it to happen causes frustration and unhappiness.

In spite of this, many of us are in the habit of trying to be perfect. One way to nudge ourselves out of this tendency is to look at our lives and notice that no one is judging us to see whether or not we are perfect. Sometimes, perfectionism is a holdover from our childhood—an ideal we inherited from a demanding parent. We are adults now, and we can choose to let go of the need to perform for someone else’s approval. Similarly, we can choose to experience the universe as a loving place where we are free to be imperfect. Once we realize this, we can begin to take ourselves less seriously and have more fun. Imperfection is inherent to being human. By embracing your imperfections, you embrace yourself. Published with permission from Daily OM

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A Day At A Time

Reflection For The Day

Since I came to The Program, I’ve begun to recognize my previous inability to form a true partnership with another person. It seems that my egomania created two disastrous pitfalls. Either I insisted upon dominating the people I knew, or I depended on them far too much. My friends in The Program have taught me that my dependence meant demand — a demand for the possession and control of the people and the conditions surrounding me. Do I still try to find emotional security either by dominating or being dependent on others?

Today I Pray

May I turn first to God to satisfy my love-hunger, knowing that all He asks from me is my faith in Him. May I no longer cast emotional nets over those I excessively dependent upon them — which is just another form of domination. May I give others the room they need to be themselves. May God show me the way to mature human relationships.

Today I Will Remember

To havve faith is His Love.

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One More Day

The hopeful man sees success where others see failure, sunshine where others see shadows and storm.
– O.S. Marden

Once in a while we lose sight of the world around us and get caught up in how miserably we are feeling. We may be in physical or emotional pain and become self-absorded. Or we may be unhappy because things are not going exactly the way we want.

But we can imagine, just for a moment, a beautiful watercolor picture of a sunrise — the promise of a brand-new day. The hues are gentle pastels. The colors blend together subtly, gently, with no perceptible break from one section to another. We can relax in the beauty and serenity of the scene. We can enjoy it with no other motive than pleasure. Positive imagery can help us enhance the beauty of the moment.

I am overwhelmed by nature’s beauty and by the great joy I feel. I can call back these same feelings by visualizing them in my mind.

[bluidkiti]

March 12

You are reading from the book Today's Gift.
Gentleness is not a quality exclusive to women. --Helen Reddy
Each of us has our soft side: maybe it's when we're petting a kitten, caring for a baby robin with an injured wing, or soothing a crying child who is afraid. Behaving in a gentle way toward others gives us warm feelings inside. It also encourages others to treat us gently, too.
We don't always feel like being gentle. If we're sad or worried about school or a friend, we might not even notice the people around us who need our gentleness. But when we remember gentleness, it lifts our spirits. Two people will always be happier when we're gentle--the person we've been gentle to and ourselves.
Who can I share my gentleness with today?


You are reading from the book Touchstones.
No sooner do we think we have assembled a comfortable life than we find a piece of ourselves that has no place to fit in.
--Gail Sheehy
We usually think of children going through stages. If we talk about a man going through a stage, there is usually a tone of a put down in it. But adults go through stages in their lives too. We have different drives and needs at 22 than we had at 16. Age 40 brings a different experience than 30. It would be sad to reach age 60 or 70 and have no more wisdom than we had twenty years earlier. An adult life crisis can come anytime. We may have grown out of a formerly comfortable job. Perhaps we feel new urgings for a more satisfactory relationship than we have settled for. From our recovery experience we know that crisis can bring growth.
Courage is required of us from the cradle to the grave. Change continues throughout life With courage, we can face our crises and the changes that come, and eventually we find the gift of new growth.
Help me find courage enough to live this day and meet the challenges it brings.


You are reading from the book Each Day a New Beginning.
Love is not getting, but giving. It is sacrifice. And sacrifice is glorious! --Joanna Field
How easily we mistake attention for love. Even more easily, we trick ourselves into thinking our ability to control someone signifies love - especially theirs for us. But love is something far different from either attention or control. Far different.
Love frees others from our grasp--and lets them return on their own. Love is placing another's personal needs above our own, without regret. Love is selfless, yet it exhilarates the self. Giving love softens our edges, completes us, and connects us to the people with whom we are fulfilling our destinies.
Wanting love is a normal human desire, not one we should deny. And we shall receive love, the less our emphasis is on getting it, the more on giving it. We invite love when we freely and honestly give it. Another invitation for love comes from loving ourselves; self-hatred, which trapped many of us for years, hampers us no longer.
Love inspires--ourselves and those we give it to. It brightens our way, lessens our burdens, makes possible our rightful unfolding.
I won't look for love today. I will just give it. It will bless me tenfold.


You are reading from the book The Language Of Letting Go.
Timing
If we could untangle the mysteries of life and unravel the energies, which run through the world; if we could evaluate correctly the significance of passing events; if we could measure the struggles, dilemmas, and aspirations of mankind, we could find that nothing is born out of time. Everything comes at its appointed moment. --Joseph R. Sizoo
Timing can be frustrating. We can wait and wait for something to happen, and it seems to be forever until it comes to pass. Or, suddenly, an event or circumstance is thrust upon us, catching us by surprise. Believing that things happen too slowly or too quickly is an illusion. Timing is perfect.
Today, I will trust and work with Divine Order. I will accept the timing in my life today and in my past as being perfect.


I can be centered and at peace inside when the world is going my way, as well as when things are happening that are not my choice. I am learning to focus on this newly found inner peace, especially at times of confusion and stress. --Ruth Fishel

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In God’s Care

God made the world round so we would never be able to see too far down the road.
~~Isaak Dinesen

When our addictive behaviors had control of us, we probably would have laughed if someone told us we would be in a Twelve Step program someday. We spent a lot of our time trying to control and predict the future, and we fought anything that threatened the delusion that we could.

When we were ready, our program was there. We discovered that this is a daily program, that by letting God unfold our life twenty-four hours at a time we are released from our obsession to control everything. One of the best gifts of our program is discovering that our Higher Power is in charge of every situation. And as a result, our obsessive need to control no longer controls us.

So now we are free to fully experience this moment. We can trust we will benefit somehow because each moment is a gift from God.

Whatever God wants me to know today is sufficient.

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Journey to the Heart

You Have the Power to Redefine Your World

One power we gain on our journey to the heart is the ability to redefine what we believe. We learn to see things in a new way.

We usually have a definition for most areas of our lives, particularly important areas such as work, love, money, and ourselves, but we’re not always conscious of it. The experiences we go through can help our definitions surface, help us see more clearly how we define these areas. That’s called growth. This growth, this process of redefining, will happen naturally on our path. But we can also consciously, actively work on our definitions.

Ask yourself if you’re defining something or someone right now in a way that you’d like to change. Perhaps a work relationship, a love relationship, a project, or an issue is causing you distress. You may find you have the power to redefine this area in a way that minimizes or reduces your pain.

A healing professional and friend once taught me a technique that can be used on any subject you’re trying to define. On a sheet of paper write down everything you currently believe, including and especially everything negative, about the subject or issue. Include all the “I Can’t's” and the “Wny Nots.” That’s your current definition.

On a clean sheet of paper write down how you want to redefine this area, and your involvment in it. Write down everything you want it to be, what you wish for it, what you think the highest truth possible about this subject could be.

Burn the paper with the old definitions. Let the smoke clear away from your eyes. Save your new definition. Then watch how the new definition comes to life and take shape.

You don’t have to let past definitions of life, love, God, and yourself limit you anymore. You are free to redefine and help create the life you choose; you’re free to see life in a new way.

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More Language Of Letting Go

Don’t cut yourself on your gifts

Mishaps are like knives, that either serve us or cut us, as we grasp them by the blade or by the handle.
–James Russel Lowell

Success rains down for no apparent reason. Tragedy strikes like a freight train. We’re left to deal with the results. We can allow our egos to swell over our sudden good fortune, or we can humbly accept the fruit of our labor and continue to better ourselves. We can lie down and give up after a tragedy, or we can grieve, get up, and begin taking steps to move on with our lives.

Look at the situations in your life. Have you been given success? Are you learning the lessons of loss? Perhaps yours is the gift of the ordinary. Don’t walk too boastfully through your successes, nor remain too long in your grief. And don’t sleep through an ordinary life. You’ll lose your sense of wonder and awe, and when it ends, you won’t know where you’ve been.

We cannot always control what will happen to us. We need to let go of any false thoughts that we can. We can choose how we’ll handle the situation just like we choose how we’ll pick up a knife– by grabbing the handle or the blade.

Watch out for the cutting edge.

What you do with what you have been given is important.

God, thank you for what I’ve been given.

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Cause, Effect, and Transformation
Feeling Depleted

by Madisyn Taylor

If you are feeling depleted, your body is asking you to take time to make some real changes in your life.


There are times in our lives when it seems our bodies are running on empty. We are not sick, nor are we necessarily pushing ourselves to the limit—rather, the energy we typical enjoy has mysteriously dissipated, leaving only fatigue. Many people grow accustomed to feeling this way because they do not know that it is possible to exist in any other state. The body’s natural state, however, is one of energy, clarity, and balance. Cultivating these virtues in our own bodies so that we can combat feelings of depletion is a matter of developing a refined awareness of the self and then making changes based on our observations.

A few scant moments of focused self-examination in which you assess your recent schedule, diet, and general health may help you zero in on the factors causing your depletion. If you are struggling to cope with an overfull agenda, prioritization can provide you with more time to sleep and otherwise refresh yourself. Switching to a diet containing plenty of nutritious foods may serve to restore your vigor, especially when augmented by supplements like B vitamins or ginseng. Consider, too, that a visit to a healer or homeopath will likely provide you with wonderful insights into your tiredness. But identifying the source of your exhaustion will occasionally be more complicated than spotting a void in your lifestyle and filling it with some form of literal nourishment. Since your earthly and ethereal forms are so intimately entwined, matters of the mind and heart can take their toll on your physical self. Intense emotions such as anger, sadness, jealousy, and regret need fuel to! manifest in your consciousness, and this fuel is more often than not corporeal energy. Conversely, a lack of mental and emotional stimulation may leave you feeling listless and lethargic.

Coping with and healing physical depletion will be easier when you accept that the underlying cause might be more complex than you at first imagined. A harried lifestyle or a diet low in vital nutrients can represent only one part of a larger issue affecting your mood, stamina, and energy levels. When you believe that you are ultimately in control of how you feel, you will be empowered to transform yourself and your day-to-day life so that lasting fatigue can no longer gain a foothold in your existence. Published with permission from Daily OM

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A Day At A Time

Reflection For The Day

If we examine every disturbance we haved, great or small, we’ll find at the root of it some unhealthy dependency and its cnsequent unhealthy demand. So let us, with God’s help, continually surrender these crippling liabilities. Then we cna be set free to live and love. W may then be able to Stwlfth-Step ourselves, as well as others, into emotional sobriety. Do I try to carry the message of The Program?

Today I Pray

Ma I first get my emotional and spiritual house in order before I seek to carry out serious commitments in human relationships. May I look long and thoroughly at “dependency” — upon alcohol or other drugs or upon other human beings — and recognize it as the source of my unrest. May I transfer my dependency to God, as I understand Him.

Today I Will Remember

I am God-dependent.

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One More Day

Never bend your head. . . Look at the world straight in the face.
– Helen Keller

Pride is elusive when we’re hurting emotionally. We may act and feel overwhelmed. It is very difficult to be mindful of all we can accomplish and we may focus on what is out of our reach. Or we may tend to hide from our problems by withdrawing from social gatherings or by isolating ourselves emotionally. feeling ashamed that we are hurting makes asking for help very hard.

Now, as we hide less often from our feelings we find it easier to face the world straight on. We may not have made this transition easily or even by ourselves, but we are making it with the help of loving friends. Increasingly we accept our limitations, make the effort to do what we can, and ask for help when we must. And with this, we raise our heads with pride.

I need not be ashamed when I must ask others for help.

[bluidkiti]

March 13

You are reading from the book Today's Gift.
I never dreamed of so much happiness when I was the ugly duckling. --Hans Christian Andersen
The ugly duckling was not really ugly at all, he was just different. The other ducks teased and pecked and even bit him until the ugly duckling flew away. He wandered around for a year, and was treated as an outcast everywhere. In the spring, he saw a group of swans on a lake, and wanted very much to join them. As he swam out toward them, he was astounded to notice his reflection in the water--he was a swan! The other swans welcomed him warmly, and found him to be beautiful.
Most of us go through times when we feel different from those around us. These are painful and lonely times, but it doesn't mean there is anything wrong with us. Like the ugly duckling, we will come into a time when we will be loved. All the pain and loneliness we have felt will help us fully appreciate the acceptance when we find it.
How can I treasure the ways I am different from others today?


You are reading from the book Touchstones.
Victory is won not in miles but in inches. Win a little now, hold your ground, and later win a little more. --Louis L'Amour
How much fuller each day feels when we can be patient and accept the inches we have progressed. Yet, we are aware of large problems which require miles of progress. We may want others in our lives to change quickly, we may be impatient with a work situation, or we may feel angry about an addiction.
Perhaps the spiritual message to us is we need to surrender to time. We are on the road moving in the direction of recovery. The forces of progress are at work. Our growth now may come in learning patience and trusting this process. Looking back we might see a mile of progress. It was made an inch at a time.
Today, I will accept my progress. There are many rewards already.


You are reading from the book Each Day a New Beginning.
People need joy. Quite as much as clothing. Some of them need it far more. --Margaret Collier Graham
Life is not without pain and travail. They are necessary to new awareness which prompts growth. And the gift of growth is joy. Pain and joy are thus intertwined. It is possible to feel only the burden of pain and not the exhilaration of joy, however.
Before seeking help to change our lives, many of us were heavily burdened by pain. But we were unable to open ourselves to the knowledge made possible by that pain. We were on a treadmill, accumulating painful experiences at every step, unable to capture the joy that was ever present.
We can have hope. Joy does await each of us today. We must open our eyes to it, just as we must open our hearts to one another. We must be willing to peel away the layers of pain to expose the core, the seedling of joy. And we need joy in our lives, just as surely as we need rest and a good diet. We need the light heart that joy fosters for a better perspective on the many experiences we'll face today, and every day.
Recovery has given me this new option. It guarantees me that every hurdle will be lightened. The knowledge that joy is inherent, within every experience, is mine, now and forever.


You are reading from the book The Language Of Letting Go.
Clarity and direction
In spite of our best efforts to work our programs and lean on Gods guidance, we sometimes don't understand what's going on in our life. We trust, wait, pray, listen to people, listen to ourselves, and the answer still does not come.
During those times, we need to understand that we are right where we need to be, even though that place may feel awkward and uncomfortable. Our life does have purpose and direction.
We are being changed, healed, and transformed at levels deeper than we can imagine. Good things, beyond our capacity to imagine, are being prepared and brought to us. We are being led and guided.
We can become peaceful. We do not have to act in haste or urgency just to relieve our discomfort, just to get an answer. We can wait until our mind is peaceful. We can wait for clear direction. Clarity will come.
The answer will come, and it will be good for us and those around us.
Today, God, help me know I am being guided into what's good about life, especially when I feel confused and without direction. Help me trust enough to wait until my mind and vision are clear and consistent. Help me know that clarity will come.


I have a purpose today. As I let go and let God, This purpose is becoming more and more clear. My heart is full of joy and love as I move towards God's Will for me. --Ruth Fishel

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Journey to the Heart

Connect to Creativity

The more open and connected you are to the world around you, the more creative you will become.

You will become more creative in your own growth and in how you live your life. You will be more creative in problem solving in work and play. You’ll be more willing to try new things– whether it’s learning to play a flute, build a stone fence, ride a horse, or create a Japanese garden in your front yard. You’ll find yourself more open in solving problems with loved ones, trying less traditional approaches than you might have considered in the past. You’ll find yourself gaining insights, information, and healing from sources you may have previously overlooked. Your participation in all your activities will be less controlled and more spontaneous.

You will hear the universe prompting you more. You will imagine more. You will recognize the quiet voice of intuition, the voice of your heart. You will see possibilities. And because you are open to your heart, the guidance of your inner voice, you will know what to do, and when to do it.

The more connected you are to the universe, to life, to yourself, the more creative you will be.

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More Language Of Letting Go

Say whatever when it’s out of your hands

We cannot control everything that happens to us. But we can control our response to those things. We cannot control the feelings of others– their fear, their power trips, their issues. All that we can choose is how we want to respond.

Maybe you have been wronged. Maybe you have had a dream taken from you due to the actions of another. What are you going to do about it? You can give up and give in, or you can make the best of the situation, move on if you can, or make a life where you are.

Say whatever.

Learn to live and let live.

You can start over, again and again, if necessary.

God, give me the strength to stand up when the actions or thoughts of others drag me down. Help me practice right thought and right action. Help me walk the path that is set before me, no matter what it may bring.

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The Question of Worthiness
Shifting into Gratitude

by Madisyn Taylor

When we question whether or not we are worthy of something it is important at that time to shift into gratitude.


We all know what it’s like to finally get something we want, only to find ourselves feeling as if we don’t deserve it. Whether it’s a car, a new job, or a date with someone wonderful, we suddenly feel as if we are not up to it. Something in us wants to reject this gift from the universe, perhaps because it requires that we think of ourselves in a new way or makes us question why we should have something that others don’t have. If these feelings of unworthiness are not consciously acknowledged, they can lead us to sabotage ourselves out of the gift being offered. Perhaps the best way to avoid rejection and sabotage is to simply shift into a state of gratitude, bypassing the question of worthiness altogether.

The question of whether we or anyone else deserves something is not really in our jurisdiction. These themes play themselves out in ways we can’t fully comprehend—on the level of the soul, over the course of many lifetimes. What we do know is that the universe has its own way of shifting the balance over the course of time so that all things are ultimately fair. We can trust in this process and understand that when a gift comes our way, it is because we are meant to have it. Otherwise, it would not be available to us. Accepting the gift with gratitude and using it to the best of our ability is true humility.

When we receive a gift and find that feelings of unworthiness crop up, we can simply acknowledge the feelings and then remind ourselves that they are beside the point. We might say to ourselves, “I am meant to have this.” As we allow ourselves to accept the gift, we might feel tenderness in our hearts that naturally shifts into a deep feeling of gratitude. As we sit for a moment, consciously holding the gift in our hands or in our hearts, we say “yes” to the universe’s many blessings, and we also say “thank you.” Published with permission from Daily OM

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A Day At A Time

Reflection For The Day

All my life, I looked to others for comfort, security and all the other things that add up to what I now call serenity. But I’ve come to realize that I was always looking in the wrong place. The source of serenity is not outside, but within myself. The kingdom is within me, and I already have the key. All I have to do is to be wiling to use it. Am I using the tools of The Program on a daily basis? Am I Willing?

Today I Pray

God gave me the courage to seek out the kingdom inside myself, to find that well-spring within me which has its source in the never-ending, life-giving river of God. May my soul be restored there. May I find the serenity I seek.

Today I Will Remember

To seek the inner Kingdom.

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One More Day

The longer I live the more beautiful life becomes.
–Frank Lloyd Wright

When we were younger, day and night were two separate entities. Day was when we played and night was when we slept. The distinction is not that sharp as we get older, especially if we have any problems with disturb our sleep. Worry and pain have a tendency to make nights much longer — and lonelier.

What looked hopeless the night before can take on a whole new light in the morning. It would be wonderful if we could learn to treat each new day with the same freshness we had as children. We can learn, once again, to experience and to savor each each moment. Once we separate the more likely we are to allow ourselves wonderful days again.

My expectations are that I will achieve the best of reach day has to offer.

*****

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In God’s Care

Inspirations never go in for long engagements; they demand immediate marriage to action.
~~Brendan Francis

God speaks to us in many ways at many times. If we are spiritually alert, we will know it when it happens. A stray thought occurs; we overhear a bit of conversation; a passage in something we are reading suddenly stands out–and we know we have connected. A feeling of assurance and peace comes over us.

The trouble is that we might acknowledge this contact only briefly, and then it slips away. The time to act passes. The favor we could have done; the advice of support we could have offered; the help we could have given or received–all are missed opportunities.

When God speaks, we must do more than listen.

Today I will act when inspired.

[bluidkiti]

March 14

You are reading from the book Today's Gift.
Each man with a new idea is a crank until the idea succeeds. --Mark Twain
What does it mean to be different? How does it feel? Is it okay to act or look or be different from everyone else at times? Sometimes, maybe even most of the time, it feels safer to blend into the crowd. We don't want to stick out like a sore thumb. But sometimes it's when we are different that we discover new things no one has ever thought of or done before.
We don't want to spend our whole lives doing only what others do. And there are times when we must take a stand if what others are doing is wrong. Perhaps it's good practice to try to do some little things differently once in a while, to stand out from the crowd, just to get use to it. After all, if no one ever dares to be different, how would our world ever change for the better?
What little thing can I do to stand out from the crowd today?


You are reading from the book Touchstones.
This above all, to refuse to be a victim. Unless I can do that I can do nothing. --Margaret Atwood
Men have often become victims by seeing themselves as saviors. We forgot that we have needs too. We thought if we gave enough, our needs would eventually be met. In the process we became great controllers, not for the sake of power, but to make everything okay. We turn ourselves inside out to make our mates happy or to please our children or friends. But being a savior is a disrespectful role to play. When people became angry with us for it, we absorbed their anger and felt misunderstood.
No relationship is healthy for either person if one is victim. We must do our loved ones the favor of letting them see our strength--let them bump up against it--even when that means we say a loud and strong no! After we have said no, our yes is much more believable.
Today. I will take responsibility for my own life and try not to be a savior for others. I won't undermine my relationships by being a victim.


You are reading from the book Each Day a New Beginning.
The child is an almost universal symbol for the soul's transformation. The child is whole, not yet divided. . .when we would heal the mind. . .we ask this child to speak to us. --Susan Griffin
Was there ever a time when we did not feel divided from ourselves? Occasionally we get a glimpse of what such spiritual wholeness would be like, but most of the time we struggle with feelings of conflict, unevenness, a divided heart. Perhaps, "the child" is a metaphor for a spiritual guide, like our own higher power, that can help us in our journey toward self-acceptance.
"I may not be perfect, but parts of me are excellent," writes author Ashleigh Brilliant. If we can be happy with this proud, funny boast then perhaps we can stop berating ourselves for our imperfections. If we dwell on our own contradictory impulses, we give them too much important, too much power.
Let me trust to my glimpses of harmony and wholeness and be grateful for the richness of my spirit.


You are reading from the book The Language Of Letting Go.
Trusting Ourselves
Trust can be one of the most confusing concepts in recovery. Who do we trust? For what?
The most important trust issue we face is learning to trust ourselves. The most detrimental thing that's happened to us is that we came to believe we couldn't trust ourselves.
There will be some who tell us we cannot trust ourselves, we are off base and out of whack. There are those who would benefit by our mistrusting ourselves.
Fear and doubt are our enemies. Panic is our enemy. Confusion is our opposition. Self-trust is a healing gift we can give ourselves. How do we acquire it? We learn it. What do we do about our mistakes, about those times we thought we could trust ourselves but were wrong? We accept them, and trust ourselves anyway.
We know what is best for us. We know what is right for us. If we are wrong, if we need to change our mind, we will be guided into that--but only by trusting where we are today.
We can look for others for support and reinforcement, but trust in ourselves is essential.
Do not trust fear. Do not trust panic. We can trust ourselves, stand in our own truth, stand in our own light. We have it now. Already. We have all the light we need for today. And tomorrow's light shall be given to us then.
Trust ourselves, and we will know whom to trust. Trust ourselves, and we will know what to do. When we feel we absolutely cannot trust ourselves, trust that God will guide us into truth.
God, help me to let go of fear, doubt, and confusion--the enemies of self-trust. Help me go forward in peace and confidence. Help me grown in trust for myself and You, one day at a time, one experience at a time.


I will value myself today both for my perfections and especially for my imperfections. --Ruth Fishel

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Journey to the Heart

Observe Yourself

Watch yourself. That’s not a grim admonition. It’s a call to observe yourself and is a helpful tool on the journey.

When you get stuck in a behavior, stuck in a pattern, stuck in a place, a thought, a feeling, a job, or a relationship and you don’t know how to get unstuck, watch yourself. When you’ve tried everything you know and your feelings and old ways of reacting still come to the fore– even when you don’t want them to and especially when you’ve made an effort to do things differently– watch yourself. When it feels hopeless, when it seems things will never change or shift, when you can’t help yourself and it doesn’t look like those around you can either, look at yourself.

The act of watching ourselves, neutrally observing ourselves without judgement or reproach, can be a powerful tool for change. If you’ve tried and tried to change but it hasn’t worked, then watch yourself. Watch what you say, what you think, how you feel, how you act, how you react. Don’t try to stop yourself. Don’t judge. Just observe. Do it as long as you need to, although it may not take long.

Watch yourself. Then watch how you grow and change.

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More Language Of Letting Go

Learn something new about yourself

Wildfires scorch large chunks of the Western United States every summer. It’s part of the natural cycle of things. After a while, nature decides that it’s time to start over and a patch of the woods goes up in smoke.

This year, one fire burned near Mesa Verde National Park in southwesten Colorado. I read the news wires with interest, hoping that the archeological sites there wouldn’t be destroyed. The crews worked on the fires, and though there was damage in the area, the main ruins were left unharmed. While the fires had burned thousands of acres around the park, they had also done something else– they had burned away the undergrowth that had sprung up around twelve perviously undiscovered sites.

Sometimes life sends fires raging through our lives,too. Those fires are also part of the natural cycle of things. Life, nature, our Higher Power says it’s time to start over again.

Use misfortune as an opportunity. Who knows? That fire rampaging through your life just might clear away the brush of the past. Keep your heart open and stay aware. You might learn something new and previously undiscovered about yourself.

God, help me stay alert to the lessons of today.

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In God’s Care

We are all special cases.
~~Albert Camus

We spend so much time and energy comparing ourselves to others and far too frequently end up feeling inferior. Perhaps someone at work is more articulate than we are or an acquaintance always seems more striking and self-assured. And most of you know couples who seem to have the perfect relationship while we continue to struggle in ours or have no significant other.

On occasion we might even feel superior to some people–like the gruff man in line ahead of us at the bank or the rude cashier at the grocery store. But in all cases, the moment we compare and thus create a separation between ourselves and others, we deny the blessing of God’s all-encompassing plan for each of us.

We are all one in God. When we realize our connection to one another, we learn our task is to care for each other rather than artificially set ourselves apart.

I will look around me carefully today and notice how I’m connected to others rather than how I’m separate.

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Giving Your Gifts to the World
Being Happy with Your Job

In our search to define ourselves, we often look to our job to show us our worth. Society does not judge all professions equally, however, and it is not uncommon for the individuals who hold what others may consider to be ordinary or menial jobs to feel that they themselves are ordinary or menial. Yet, in truth, many wonderful and wise people throughout history have held what have typically been perceived as ordinary jobs, and this in no way has had any bearing on whether or not they have managed to contribute their skills and talents to the world. Whether you work in business, education, medicine, retail, or another profession, you worth is inherent to who you are and not what you do for a living.

A job that you enjoy, lets you meet your needs, and allows you to live in accordance with your values will always be more gratifying than a high-status job that you dislike. But while experiencing professional satisfaction can be a vital part of being fulfilled by your work, it is important to remember that it is possible to find happiness in any job. This is because what you do is often less important than how you do it. Your attitude and intention can turn a mediocre job into work that fulfills you because of the way that you approach it. If you do your job well and what you do benefits others, then you are doing work that is making this world a better place.

If you are happy in your current line of work and feel that it allows you to be yourself and live authentically while meeting your emotional and physical needs and allowing time for you to enjoy the fruits of your labor, then you have found a job that adds value to your life. If you are a waitress, then be the best waitress you can, take pride in your work and others will notice your passion. You can contribute your talents and skills to this world while doing any job. It is not the kind of work you do that allows you to be of service. It is you who must choose to be of service through the work that you do. Published with permission from Daily OM

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A Day At A Time

Reflection For The Day

One thing that keeps me on the right track today is a feeling of loyalty to other members of The Program, no matter where they may be. We depend on each other. I know, for example, that I’d be letting them down if I ever took a drink. When I came into The Program, I found a group of people who were not only helping each other to stay sober, but who were loyal to each other by staying sober themselves. Am I loyal to my group and to my friends in The Program?

Today I Pray

I thank God for the loyalty and fellowship of the group and for the mutuality of commitment that binds us together. May I give to the group in the same proportion that I take from it. Having been a taker during so many of my years, my giving used to be no more than a commodity, for which I expected to be paid in approval or love or favors. May I learn the joy of pure giving, with no strings attached, no expectations of reward.

Today I Will Remember

A perfect gift asks nothing in return.

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One More Day

A cheerful face is nearly as good for an invalid as healthy eather.
–Benjamin Franklin

Health changes, like other changes in life circumstances, cna undermine friendships. When we are dealing with chronic pain or discomfort or when we have become impaired with illness, some friends just aren’t sure how t act under the new circumstances.

People who love us want to help us; they want to be with us. The hard part for u is how to let them. Visits won’t be easy for us or them at first because our lives and relationships are changed by illness. But soon we realize that we still care for and need these special people and that we want to show our affection, during the trying times as well as during the better times.

I can find comfort and stability by maintaining my friendships.

[bluidkiti]

March 15


You are reading from the book Today's Gift.
The difficulty in life is the choice. --George Moore
How we choose to spend our time says much about what is important to us. If we have no goals, we may try to kill time. If we have too many goals, there may not be enough time in the day to do all we set out to do. We must make some choices based on our values. We may need to take more time for some things, and let go of others. For example, this year will we try to learn to play the guitar? Perhaps we have finally decided to drop out of that club which seems to have little purpose. Will we give more time to work, or less time? With each of these choices, we shape our lives. We can do it with the touch of an artist if we pay attention to the choices we are making.
What is truly important to me today?


You are reading from the book Touchstones.
It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye. --Antoine de Saint Exupery
It has been said that intuition is a talent of women, but in this program we, as men, are learning to listen to our own inner feelings. This is a strength which has nothing to do with gender. Many times we have a quiet inner knowing of something, but in the past we developed insensitivity to these messages. Our growing self respect includes the ability to stand up for what simply feels right. We don't have to prove anything to ourselves. If we dismiss our own private feelings, all we have left to go on is someone else's idea of reality.
This realm of inner feeling is the realm of wisdom. It is the creative part, the mysterious part, the spiritual part. It is the foundation of honesty with ourselves. In these quiet moments, we are more able to perceive what we know in our hearts. As we grow, we respect and trust it more.
Help me respect my private messages from within.


You are reading from the book Each Day a New Beginning.
Flattery is so necessary to all of us that we flatter one another just to be flattered in return. --Marjorie Bowen
We are all deserving of unconditional love and acceptance. And all the people in our lives, past and present, deserve our unconditional love and acceptance, too. However, it's doubtful that we either feel it all of the time from others or give it away.
It's human of us to find fault--to have expectations that are too high. But for this we pay a price. Instead of experiencing our lives serenely, contentedly, flowing with what is, we often criticize, judge, and feel generally disgruntled throughout the day. What a waste! We do have another choice, fortunately. We can let go and let God, and live and let live. Also we can recall, today and every day, that we are all special individuals in this world who are loved, fully, by our Creator.
The greatest contribution we can make to the lives of others is to be affirming. We can let our spouse, children, and friends know we care about them. That we love and accept them. The love that we also long for will come back to us. We thrill at being affirmed. And we will thrill at affirming.
It feels good to help another feel appreciated. Love and acceptance is my lifeline, from God around us all.


You are reading from the book The Language of Letting Go.
Removing the Victim
Dont others see how much Im hurting? Cant they see I need help? Dont they care?
The issue is not whether others see or care. The issue is whether we see and care about ourselves. Often, when we are pointing a finger at others, waiting for them to have compassion for us, its because we have not fully accepted our pain. We have not yet reached that point of caring about ourselves. We are hoping for awareness in another that we have not yet had.
It is our job to have compassion for ourselves. When we do, we have taken the first step toward removing ourselves as victims. We are on the way to self-responsibility, self-care, and change.
Today, I will not wait for others to see and care; I will take responsibility for being aware of my pain and problems, and caring about myself.


My Higher Power guides me in directions that fills positive needs in my life today. I have grown to see that my true needs are love and peace and joy. --Ruth Fishel

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Journey to the Heart

Learn to Say Good-Bye

Sometimes we need to say good-bye. Some good-byes come suddenly, without warning. Others are anticipated. Sometimes they’re a relief. And sometimes they hurt deeply. We say good-bye to things, people, and places. We say good-bye to beliefs and behaviors that become outdated.

Occasionally along the journey we need to say good-bye to something else,too– our dreams.

Dreams are precious. They become embedded in our minds and our hearts. When they die, it can be painful to let go of them. But if we’re not careful, dead dreams we haven’t released can sabotage our lives and hearts. We will continue to try to place people and things in the vacant roles in our dreams. Our dead dreams will, in fact, be controlling our lives and blocking our hearts. Living with dreams that are dead closes the door to finding new visions and creating new dreams.

If you can’t see today or tomorrow clearly because of yesterday’s dreams, it may be time for a funeral. Tenderly take your dearest dreams, your highest hopes and aims– the ones from yesterday that are now never to be– and place them gently in the ground. Tell them how dear they were, and are. But tell them also, it’s time to say good-bye. Cover them up. Dry your eyes.

And open yourself to the new hopes and dreams of today.

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More Language Of Letting Go

Let go of the controls

“You have the controls,” my fllight instructor says. “No, you have the controls,” I say back. “No I don’t,” he says. “You do.”

My banter with my flight instructor can be amusing at times. It’s not so funny when we fight about issues of power and control in our lives. And usually it goes the other way. We don’t want to give the controls to someone else; we want those reins ourselves.

We want to get our way. And we get upset when things don’t work out. Sometimes, after we’ve been working on ourselves and our control issues for a while, we begin to get complacent. Because we’ve been so effectively using and directing our power, we rarely get in battles we can’t win. Things work out smoothly. We mostly get our way, because we’re not trying to control what we can’t. That’s when it’s easy to think we’re more powerful than we are.

Are you engaged in a power struggle with someone or something you can’t change? Spend a moment thinking about it. Is that really the way you want to use your energy and power, trying to do the impossible, creating rifts, and fighting battles you can’t win? When we try to control someone else or events beyond the scope of our power, we lose.

When we learn to discern the difference between what we can change and what we can’t, we usually have an easier time expressing our power in our lives. Because we’re not wasting all our energy using our power to change things we can’t, we have a lot of energy left over to live our lives.

Learn to say whatever when you don’t get what you want. Learn to let things be the way they are.

God, help me let go of my need to control and to be open to the flow of the universe.

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In God’s Care

You should practice humility first toward man, and only then toward God. He who despises men has no respect for God.
~~Paracelsus

It is easier for us to be humble before God than before people. When we have to admit we need help, we are swallowing a a dose of humility, but if it’s just between us and God, it’s not as hard to take.

Being humble with our fellow human beings is different. An act of humility before a visible, breathing, thinking witness may be frightening. The witness, after all, could be judgmental.

Are we afraid to be vulnerable? More importantly, can we afford not to be? When we can face fellow suffers and admit the need for help, recovery begins. Humbling ourselves in this way is our introduction to Divine power: through the compassion our brothers and sisters show for us, we come to know the love of God.

I receive help for all my spiritual needs by being open, first to my brothers and sisters. and then to God.

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The Valley of Despair
Seeds of Light

by Madisyn Taylor

Even in our darkest times, there are seeds of light within ourselves, we need only call them forward.


Anyone who has walked through the valley of despair and come out the other side knows that even in that darkness, seeds of light can be found. Often their tendrils reach out of the gloom and into the daylight alongside the journeyer who emerges from that deep sorrow. When we find ourselves in a place of despair, it can help us to know this, so that we don’t give up. We can stop, take a deep breath, and remind ourselves that we will find ourselves on the other side of this troubled time, and that we may even emerge with something new to offer.

It seems that despair has been around for as long as humans have been able to express themselves, and many of the great artists, teachers, and visionaries have labored through times of depression and hopelessness. Their words, images, and lives can serve as beacons in the darkness, even if they can’t always immediately lead us out. In the end, we must find our own way, and this is why despair often overwhelms us when it comes; we doubt that we have the resources to contend with such a formidable presence all by ourselves. This is when we must come to our own aid and know in our hearts that we have what it takes to keep moving forward in the general direction of the light.

Even though we must ultimately rely on ourselves, this doesn’t mean we can’t ask for help. Our friends and families can help us, as can our inner guides and helping spirits. They can serve the purpose of a fire that burns throughout the night, keeping us warm, and providing a light by which we might see the changes we may need to make in order to move forward. In addition, there truly are seeds of light inside us, however small, waiting to unfurl their green shoots, if only we will give them the time. Published with permission from Daily OM

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A Day At A Time

Reflection For The Day

There have been days during my recovery when just about everything seemed bleak and even hopeless. I allowed myself to become depressed and angry. I see now that it doesn’t matter what I think, and it doesn’t matter how I feel. It’s what I do that counts. So when I become anxious or upset, I try to get into action by going to meetings, participating, and working with others in The Program. If God seems far away, who moved?

Today I Pray

May I not be immobilized by sadness or anger to the point of despair. May I look for the roots of despair in my tangle of emotions, sort out the tangle, pulll out there culprit feelings, acknowledge that they belong to me. Only then can I get into gear,m take action,m begin to accomplish. May I learn to make use of the energy generated by anger to strengthen my will and achieve my goals.

Today I Will Remember

To sort out my feelings.

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One More Day

A man without a plan for the day is lost before he starts.
– Levis K. Bendele

Some mornings we are tempted, especially when we are having more than our usual share of pain, to resist the demands and responsibilities of the day before us. We are enticed by the thought5 of making a cup of coffee, climbing back into bed with the newspaper, and hiding from the world.

Although emptying, this is usually not a good plan for us, and what we need is a plan that encourages us to live the day fully. We may actually have to contrive a plan to push us into action. Personal care, chores needing to be done, letters or phone calls to friends, a trip to the store for groceries — these emphasize our importance and the importance of the day. Without a plan, we risk wasting twenty-four hours in loneliness and self-pity.

I and this day are important, and my plan reflects this.