June 5, 2024 - Readings in Recovery: Today's Gift from Hazelden Betty Ford Foundation

 

Wednesday, June 5, 2024

Today's Gift from Hazelden Betty Ford Foundation is:

Let's not exclude compassion for ourselves when we feel compassion.

It is easier to feel compassion for friends and family members who are in pain than it is to feel compassion for ourselves. But we have suffered too, or we wouldn't be in the Twelve Step program, and we wouldn't have opened this book. Pain is consistent with being human. How we handle it, how long we harbor it, how willing we are to give it up -- these are ways we differ from one another.

To give up pain we first need to feel compassion for ourselves and the struggles we have had. We need to acknowledge that we have done our best. We need to be willing to care for the small child within who perhaps has always felt unworthy and inadequate. And after nurturing ourselves, we'll be more able to give up the pain that may block our growth and to help others by our example.

None of us can do it all alone. I will love myself and help my inner child handle all of life today.

Hazelden Foundation