Feb. 29, 2024 - Readings in Recovery: Today's Gift from Hazelden Betty Ford Foundation

 

Thursday, Feb. 29, 2024

Today’s Gift from Hazelden Betty Ford Foundation is:

Making a decision to let God give us guidance eases our burdens.

Our first introduction to Step Three scares many of us. “You mean I can’t do what I want anymore, that I’m no longer in charge of me?” we ask. What we come to understand from the shared wisdom of other people is that a caring God, however we define God, will give us comfort, direction, and the sense that we are no longer ever alone. And once we have grown used to relying on our Higher Power for help, we won’t want to go back to how we lived before.

How many years did we struggle to make the right decision? Oftentimes our decisions affected more people than just ourselves. We fretted over the long-term effects. But no longer do we need to lose sleep over any situation. Our reliance on the guidance we have been promised will take the worry out of our lives, giving us time to accomplish goals that have been long forgotten.

I feel as if I’ve been given a new lease on life. What a good landlord my Higher Power is.

Hazelden Foundation

Feb. 29, 2024 - Readings in Recovery: Step by Step

 

Step by Step

Thursday, Feb. 29, 2024

Today, understand that even if my last drink was years ago, my next drunk, like the guy whose last drunk was 24 Hours ago, is just one drink away. My quantity of sobriety says little about its quality, and I have to re-examine that quality if my sobriety is riddled with anger, frustration, despair, hopelessness and a brain that processes my world with the same mind soaked by my last drunk. And even if my last drunk was months or even years ago, my next one is just as close as for the man who woke up with a hangover this morning. Quality — not quantity. This is the what recovery is about. And our common journey continues. Step by step. — Chris M., 2024

Feb. 29, 2024 - Readings in Recovery: Twenty-Four Hours a Day

 

Twenty-Four Hours a Day

Thursday, Feb. 29, 2024

AA Thought for the Day

“The alcoholic is absolutely unable to stop drinking on the basis of self-knowledge. We must admit we can do nothing about it ourselves. Will power and self-knowledge will never help in the strange mental blank spots when we are tempted to drink. An alcoholic mentally is in a very sick condition. The last flicker of conviction that we can do the job ourselves must be snuffed out. The spiritual answer and the program of action are the only hope. Only spiritual principles will solve our problems. We are completely helpless apart from Divine help. Our defense against drinking must come from a Higher Power.”

Have I accepted the spiritual answer and the program of action?

Meditation for the Day

Rest now until life, eternal life, flowing through your veins and heart and mind, bids you to bestir yourself. Then glad work will follow. Tired work is never effective. The strength of God’s spirit is always available to the tired mind and body. He is your physician and your healer. Look to these quiet times of communion with God for rest, for peace, for cure. Then rise refreshed in spirit and go out to work, knowing that your strength is able to meet any problems because it is reinforced by God’s power.

Prayer for the Day

I pray that the peace I have found will make me effective. I pray that I may be relieved of all train during this day.

Hazelden Foundation

Feb. 29, 2024 - Readings in Recovery: A Day at a Time

 

A Day at a Time

Thursday, Feb. 29,  2024

Reflection for the Day

Inventory-taking isn’t always done in red ink. It’s a rare day when we haven’t done something right. As I uncover and face my shortcomings, my many good qualities will be revealed to me also, reminding me that they have the same reality as my faults. Even when we’ve tried hard and failed, for instance, we can chalk that up as one of our greatest credits of all. I’ll try to appreciate my good qualities because they not only offset the faults, but give me a foundation on which to grow. It’s just as self-deceptive to discount what’s good in us as to justify what is not.

Can I take comfort in my positive qualities, accepting myself as a friend?

Today I Pray

If I find only defects when I look in that Fourth Step mirror, may I be sure that I am missing something – namely my good points. Although my ultra-modesty may be approved socially, may I learn that it is just as dishonest as rationalizing away my faults. Even an out-and-out failure, if examined from all sides, may turn up a plus along with the obvious minuses.

Today I Will Remember

To give myself, if not an A for effort, at least an average B minus.

Hazelden Foundation

Feb. 29, 2024 - Readings in Recovery: The Eye Opener

 

The Eye Opener

Thursday, Feb. 29, 2024

The older some of us get in AA, the more we notice a tendency on our part to become a little bit less tolerant, a little less understanding of our relationship with the man still having trouble. We have been so long removed from the actual suffering that we are losing some of our understanding.

This is a good time to pick out the messiest case we can find and get back in the groove again. We can’t afford to forget that we, too, are alcoholics and, but for the Grace of God, we would be in just as bad shape.

We may be years away from our last drunk, but we are only one drink away from our next one. Don’t lose the common touch.

Hazelden Foundation

Feb. 29, 2024 – Rise ‘n shine for a beautiful Thursday and Leap Day

 

Good morning with hopes of a fantastical and worthwhile Thursday for everyone …and without the garbage of people and things that aren’t worth our attention

Feb. 28, 2024 - Readings in Recovery: Today's Gift from Hazelden Betty Ford Foundation

 

Wednesday, Feb. 28, 2024

Today’s Gift from Hazelden Betty Ford Foundation is:

Reflection for the Day

Before we came to recovery, fear ruled our lives. Tyrannized by our addictions and obsessions, we feared everything and everybody. We feared ourselves and, perhaps most of all, feared fear itself. These days, when I am able to accept the help of my Higher Power, it makes me feel capable of doing anything I am called upon to do. I am overcoming my fears and acquiring a comfortable new confidence.

Can I believe that “courage is fear that has said its prayers?”

Today I Pray

May my Higher Power help me overcome my obsessive fears. I have been running scared for so long it has become a habit. Higher Power, help me to see that I may be purposely clinging to my fears to avoid making decisions, perhaps even to shirk the responsibility of success.

Today I Will Remember

Fear keeps me safe from risk taking.

Hazelden Foundation

Feb. 28, 2024 - Readings in Recovery: Step by Step

 

Step by Step

Wednesday, Feb. 28, 2024

Today, take the Program from theoretical to practical application to both recovery and life. If I hear “Easy Does It,” I cannot use it as “permission” to neglect daily responsibilities and what must be done today. Instead, it means not to expect too much of either myself or another person. And “Let Go and Let God” does not mean I can expect my Higher Power to tend to what is my responsibility and within my capability. Realize I am letting go of my own will for myself and letting God tell me what His will is for me. “One (drink) is one too many and never enough”  tells me, simply, not to try to find out what “never enough” is and not to try the first one at all. “Making amends”  isn’t simply saying, “I’m sorry,” but is acceptance of consequences and working harder if some of those amends are rejected. “One Day at a Time” is simple: today is all I’ve got and yesterday can’t be undone or redone, and tomorrow is not guaranteed. Even it is, I have to give today my best shot because it may well reverberate into tomorrow. Today, move from theory to the practical, and it’s time to roll up the sleeves. And our common journey continues. Step by step. — Chris M., 2024

Feb. 28, 2024 - Readings in Recovery: Twenty-Four Hours a Day

 

Twenty-Four Hours a Day

Wednesday, Feb. 28, 2024

AA Thought for the Day

We should be free from alcohol for good. It’s out of our hands and in the hands of God, so we don’t need to worry about it or even think about it any more. But if we haven’t done this honestly and fully, the chances are that it will become our problem again. Since we don’t trust God to take care of the problem for us, we reach out and take the problem back to ourselves. Then it’s our problem again and we’re in the same old mess we were in before. We’re helpless again and we drink.

Do I trust God to take care of the problem for me?

Meditation for the Day

No work is of value without preparation. Every spiritual work must have behind it much spiritual preparation. Cut short times of prayer and times of spiritual preparation and many hours of work may be profitless. From the point of view of God, one poor tool working all the time but doing back work because of lack of preparation, is of small value compared with the sharp, keen, perfect instrument working for only a short time but which turns out perfect work because of long hours of spiritual preparation.

Prayer for the Day

I pray that I may spend more time alone with God. I pray that I may get more strength and joy from such times, so that they will add much to my work.

Hazelden Foundation

Feb. 28, 2024 - Readings in Recovery: A Day at a Time

 

A Day at a Time

Wednesday, Feb. 28, 2024

Reflection for the Day

We’re taught in The Program and the Twelve Steps that the chief activator of our defects has been self-centered fear — mainly fear that we would lose something we already possessed or that we would fail to get something we demanded. Living on the basis of unsatisfied demands, we obviously were in a state of continual disturbance and frustration. Therefore, we are taught, no peace will be ours unless we find a means of reducing these demands.

Have I become entirely ready to have God remove all my defects of character?

Today I Pray

May I make no unrealistic demands on life which, because of their grandiosity, cannot be met. May I place no excessive demands on others which, when they are not fulfilled, leave me disappointed and let down.

Today I Will Remember

The set-up for a let-down.

Hazelden Foundation

Feb. 28, 2024 - Readings in Recovery: The Eye Opener

 

The Eye Opener

Wednesday, Feb. 28, 2024

Many of us would have been ready to do something about our drinking problem years before we did, except for the obstinate determination not to allow the wife, mother or boss to tell us what to do.

Hazelden Foundation

Feb. 28, 2024 – Good morning with determination to make it a great Wednesday

 

Good morning from Woodstock to help get this gorgeous Wednesday off to a great start …and don’t blow any of it on people and things that aren’t deserving of our efforts

Feb. 27, 2024 - Readings in Recovery: Today's Gift from Hazelden Betty Ford Foundation

 

Tuesday, Feb. 27, 2024

Today’s Gift from Hazelden Betty Ford Foundation is:

New Routine

I think we all still have a little manipulation left in us, no matter where we’re at in sobriety. The Navy highly recommended I attend meetings, and I had to go get that stupid paper signed. I picked the treatment center director’s wife to be my sponsor, because I thought it would look good on my record. They would be at the meetings, but I didn’t know they didn’t keep a record of my attendance. I honestly thought there was some chart or whatever.

Well, the thing is, they adopted me and treated me like a daughter. My first sponsor even coached me through labor with my oldest son. We developed such a close bond that, as the years went by, people new to the area thought my sponsor and her husband were my parents.

They spoiled me. They fed me. They picked me up and we’d go to their miniature farm. They’d have barbecues, meetings, and Easter egg hunts there. I told myself, Let’s just try this on for size, because what’s happening now is way better than what was happening. I can deal with this.

As I travel the road of recovery, I willingly welcome new people and new horizons into my life.

— Mary H., U.S. Navy, 1984–2004

Hazelden Foundation

Jan. 27, 2024 - Readings in Recovery: Step by Step

 

Step by Step

Tuesday, Feb. 27, 2024

Today, gratitude to our Higher Power that we are the ones blessed with the grace to recover and a commitment to live only the current 24 Hours, not looking back to drag the emotional and physical wreckage of yesterday into today and not looking to tomorrow because it may never come. We embrace with gratitude, humility and a pledge to be of good to others that we are not among the casualties of alcoholics who did not survive their last drunk, who did not choose what we as survivors did — recovery. And our common journey continues. Step by step. — Chris M., 2024

Feb. 27, 2024 - Readings in Recovery: Twenty-Four Hours a Day

 

Twenty-Four Hours a Day

Tuesday, Feb. 27, 2024

AA Thought for the Day

When we came into AA, the first thing we did was to admit that we couldn’t do anything about our drinking. We admitted that alcohol had us licked and that we were helpless against it. We never could decide whether or not to take a drink. We always took the drink. And since we couldn’t do anything about it ourselves, we put our whole drink problem into the hands of God. We turned the whole thing over to that Power greater than ourselves. And we have nothing more to do about it, except to trust God to take care of the problem for us.

Have I done this honestly and fully?

Meditation for the Day

This is the time for my spirit to touch the spirit of God. I know that the feeling of the spirit-touch is more important than all the sensation of material things. I must seek a silence of spirit-touching with God. Just a moment’s contact and all the fever of life leaves me. Then I am well, whole, calm and able to rise and minister to others. God’s touch is a potent healer. I must feel that touch and sense God’s presence

Prayer for the Day

I pray that the fever of resentment, worry and fear may melt into nothingness. I pray that health, joy, peace and serenity may take its place.

Hazelden Foundation

Feb. 27, 2024 - Readings in Recovery: A Day at a Time

 

A Day at a Time

Tuesday, Feb. 27, 2024

Reflection for the Day

If I live just one day at a time, I won’t so quickly entertain fears of what might happen tomorrow. As long as I’m concentrating on today‘s activities, there won’t be room in my mind for worrying. I’ll try to fill every minute of this day with something good — seen, heard, accomplished. Then, when the day is ended, I’ll be able to look back on it with satisfaction, serenity and gratitude.

Do I sometimes cherish bad feelings so that I can feel sorry for myself?

Today I Pray

That I will get out of the self-pity act and live for today. May I notice the good things from dawn to nightfall, learn to talk about them and thank God for them. May I catch myself if I seem to be relishing my moans and complaints more often than appreciating the goodness of my life.

Today I Will Remember

Today is good.

Hazelden Foundation

Feb. 27, 2024 - Readings in Recovery: The Eye Opener

 

The Eye Opener

Tuesday, Feb. 27, 2024

We know from past experiences that we actually invited all our troubles to enter our lives. We left the door wide open for them. Getting sober does not necessarily mean we have closed all the doors, for some of us have only closed the front door and left the back door wide open.

The chances are that you are not only vulnerable through the door marked Alcohol. As you advance to the front, watch well both flanks and the rear.

Hazelden Foundation

Feb. 27, 2024 – Good morning and let’s aim for a fantastic Tuesday

 

Good morning and let’s head out with determination to make it a productive and positive Tuesday …without the crap of people and things that don’t warrant our time

Feb. 26, 2024 - Readings in Recovery: Today's Gift from Hazelden Betty Ford Foundation

 

Monday, Feb. 26, 2024

Today’s Gift from Hazelden Betty Ford Foundation is:

Solving problems

If we start the morning feeling hopeless, our day doesn’t stand a chance. But if we ask our Higher Power for help in the morning and then accept the help throughout the day, we won’t have to solve any problems alone.

We will see that problems can be resolved, and we are responsible only for our efforts.

Do I leave the solutions to my Higher Power?

Higher Power, grant me the strength to ask for help and simply to do my part well.

Today I will work on three problems and leave the solutions to my Higher Power. The problems are…

Hazelden Foundation

Feb. 26, 2024 - Readings in Recovery: Step by Step

 

Step by Step

Monday, Feb. 26, 2024

Today, understand we cannot take Step Seven of asking a Higher Power to “remove our shortcomings”  without first surrendering completely to the Sixth Step of being “entirely ready.”  If we cling onto some character defect, we probably have not been honest in our Fourth Step of “a searching and fearless moral inventory …”  Some — if not all — of those character defects likely triggered our drinking, at first abusively and eventually addictively. Holding onto them even with an honest desire to let go of them may threaten the quality of our sobriety — maybe recovery itself. An “honest desire” to surrender our defects, then, is not sufficient. Because the Program is one of action, we must be active in releasing our defects and not taking them back. Our thoughts, feelings and actions of yesterday influence our tomorrows; thus, what we do today may well impact tomorrow, and a history of carrying those deadly character defects from yesterday into tomorrow is self-destruction. Today, if we are mired in defects that we know contributed to our drinking, let’s review our Fourth to see if it wasn’t as “searching and fearless”  as it should be. And our common journey continues. Step by step. — Chris M., 2024

Feb. 26, 2024 - Readings in Recovery: Twenty-Four Hours a Day

 

Twenty-Four Hours a Day

Monday, Feb. 26, 2024

AA Thought for the Day

When we came into AA, we came to believe in a Power greater than ourselves. We came to believe in that Divine Principle in the universe which we call God, and to which we can turn for help. Each morning we have a quiet time. We ask God for the power to stay sober for the next 24 hours. And each night we thank Him for helping us to keep sober that day.

Do I believe that each man or woman I see in AA is a demonstration of the power of God to change a human being from a drunkard to a sober person?

Meditation for the Day

I should pray for faith as a thirsty person prays for water in a desert. Do I know what it means to feel sure that God will never fail me? Am I sure of this as I am sure that I still breathe? I should pray daily and most diligently that my faith may increase. There is nothing lacking in my life because, really, all I need is mine, only I lack the faith to know it. I am like a rich man’s child who sits in rags when all around me are stores of all I could desire.

Prayer for the Day

I pray for the realization that God has everything I need. I pray that I may know that His power is always available.

Hazelden Foundation

Feb. 26, 2024 - Readings in Recovery: A Day at a Time

 

A Day at a Time

Monday, Feb. 26, 2024

Reflection for the Day

“What if …”  How often we hear these words from newcomers to The Program. How often, in fact, we tend to say them ourselves. “What if I lose my job …,”  “What if my car breaks down …,”  “What if I get sick and can’t work …,”  “What if my child gets hooked on drugs?”  What if – anything our desperate imaginings can project. Only two small words, yet how heavy-laden they are with dread, fear and anxiety. The answer to, “What if …,”  is, plainly and simply, “Don’t project.”  We can only live with our problems as they arise, living one day at a time.

Am I keeping my thoughts positive?

Today I Pray

May I grow spiritually, without being held back by anxieties. May projected fears not hobble my pursuits or keep me from making the most of today. May I turn out fear by faith. If I will only make a place for God within me, He will remove my fears.

Today I Will Remember

I can only borrow trouble at high interest rates.

Hazelden Foundation

Feb. 26, 2024 - Readings in Recovery: The Eye Opener

 

The Eye Opener

Monday, Feb. 26, 2024

Frequently we are asked, “Why waste your money on that guy? He’s a phony if ever I saw one.”  We have all heard this and often it was true but, after all, the monetary loss each month was way below our old whiskey bills. Every once in a while, the long shot does come in and the payoff is tremendous.

It is simply a case of betting on people instead of horses. These bets on people can’t lose, for if the phony abuses your generosity, the fault is his, not yours, and he is debited and you are credited by the Great Bookkeeper who has charge of the Treasury where “neither moth nor rust doth corrupt and where thieves do not break through and steal.”

Hazelden Foundation

Feb. 26, 2024 – Rise ‘n shine for this magnificent Monday and brand new week

 

Good morning and don’t be lazy cat and get out there and master another Monday and new week …and anything and anyone standing in the way of a productive and worthwhile day

Feb. 25, 2024 - Readings in Recovery; Today's Gift from Hazelden Betty Ford Foundation

 

Sunday, Feb. 25, 2024

Today’s Gift from Hazelden Betty Ford Foundation is:

Obstacles

Everybody encounters obstacles in life. There are the structural or societal obstacles that are difficult to break through unless you have the right amount of privilege and power. There are also the health and genetic obstacles that we can’t control. But what about the obstacles that we can control?

Usually, it’s easier to recognize external obstacles or limiting forces outside of ourselves than to acknowledge the obstacles that are self-imposed or self-created. Insecurity and self-doubt are the biggest self-imposed obstacles that I’ve had to overcome.

We can look at obstacles as signposts and indicators. We can observe them and be clear about them, but I’ve figured out the importance of not bulldozing or pushing through our obstacles. Rather, we can find a resting place to reflect and then design the best way forward. Sometimes obstacles are not meant to be overcome. I know this because I have been my own greatest obstacle throughout my life.

What obstacles do you face today? We may not be able to control all of them, but we can choose how we cope with them.

Hazelden Foundation

Feb. 25, 2024 - Readings in Recovery: Step by Step

 

Step by Step

Sunday, Feb. 25, 2024

Today, admit that I abused, misused, took for granted and literally threw away through my drinking and actions all that I had been GIVEN unconditionally — love, respect, self-respect, integrity, friends, family, innocence — and traded it for selfishness, insecurity, fear, regret, pain, agony, anguish, loss and time that will never be recovered. Now, I am forced to admit I cannot expect to be given what I drank away — nor should I be enabled in regaining what I lost — without earning it. And I have the tools to begin the rebuilding process, courtesy of the 12 Steps. So simple! But the work to apply those tools forces me to ask my Higher Power, on bended knee, for the strength, courage, honesty, discipline, integrity and selflessness to earn back what I have lost and not demand nor expect them to be handed to me. And, if I do the job right, I may get back more than I lost. Today, I accept I must remake myself and, with the Program, I’ve got the tools to do it. All that remains is my choice to pick them up and put them to use. Today, I pick them up and begin the rebuilding process. And our common journey continues. Step by step. — Chris M., 2024

Feb. 25, 2024 - Readings in Recovery: Twenty-Four Hours a Day

 

Twenty-Four Hours a Day

Sunday, Feb. 25, 2024

AA Thought for the Day

Some people find it hard to believe in a Power greater than themselves. But not to believe in such a Power forces us to atheism. It has been said that atheism is blind faith in the strange proposition that this universe originated in a cipher and aimlessly rushes nowhere. That’s practically impossible to believe. I think we all can agree that alcohol is a power greater than ourselves. It certainly was in my case. I was helpless before the power of alcohol.

Do I remember the things that happened to me because of the power of alcohol?

Meditation for the Day

The spiritual and moral will eventually overcome the material and unmoral. That is the purpose and destiny of the human race. Gradually the spiritual is overcoming the material in our minds. Gradually the moral is overcoming the unmoral. Faith, fellowship and service are cures for most of the ills of the world. There is nothing in the field of personal relationships that they cannot do.

Prayer for the Day

I pray that I may do my share in making a better world. I pray that I may be part of the cure for the ills of the world.

Hazelden Foundation

Feb. 25, 2024 - Readings in Recovery: A Day at a Time

 

A Day at a Time

Sunday, Feb. 25, 2024

Reflection for the Day

Before we came to The Program, fear ruled our lives. Tyrannized by our addictions and obsessions, we feared everything and everybody. We feared ourselves and, perhaps most of all, feared fear itself. These days, when I am able to accept the help of my Higher Power, it makes me feel capable of doing anything I am called upon to do. I am overcoming my fears and acquiring a comfortable new confidence.

Can I believe that “courage is fear that has said its prayers …?”

Today I Pray

God grant that through faith in Him I may overcome my obsessive fears. I have been running scared for so long it has become a habit. God help me to see that I may be purposely clinging to my fears to avoid making decisions, perhaps even to shirk the responsibility of success.

Today I Will Remember

Fear keeps me safe from risk-taking.

Hazelden Foundation

Feb. 25, 2024 - Readings in Recovery: The Eye Opener

 

The Eye Opener

Sunday, Feb. 25, 2024

Few of us who are successfully working the AA Program have failed to notice the almost immediate influence our sobriety has brought about, not only in our homes and jobs but in the community as well.

Some of us who a short time ago stood before the judge and got the usual “$10 or 10 days” are now frequently closeted in the Judge’s Chambers at his invitation to assist him in his handling of the alcoholic problem.

We know what we were, we know what we are, now let us be what we can be.

Hazelden Foundation