Daily Reflections
April 12
GIVING UP INSANITY
… where alcohol has been involved, we have been strangely insane.
–ALCOHOLICS ANONYMOUS, p. 38
Alcoholism required me to drink, whether I wanted to or not. Insanity dominated my life and was the essence of my disease. It robbed me of the freedom of choice over drinking and, therefore, robbed me of all other choices. When I drank, I was unable to make effective choices in any part of my life and life became unmanageable. I ask God to help me understand and accept the full meaning of the disease of alcoholism.
Twenty-Four Hours A
Day
April 12
A.A. Thought for the Day
This sober world is a pleasant place for an alcoholic to live in. Once you’ve gotten out of your alcoholic fog, you find that the world looks good. You find real friends in A.A. You get a job. You feel good in the morning. You eat a good breakfast and you do a good day’s work at home or outside. And your family loves you and welcomes you because you’re sober. Am I convinced that this sober world is a pleasant place for an alcoholic to live in?
Meditation for the Day
Our need is God’s opportunity. First, we must recognize our need. Often this means helplessness before some weakness or sickness and an admission of our need for help. Next comes faith in the power of God’s spirit, available to us to meet that need. Before any need can be met, our faith must find expression. That expression of faith is all God needs to manifest His power in our lives. Faith is the key that unlocks the storehouse of God’s resources.
Prayer for the Day
I pray that I may first admit my needs. I pray that then I may have faith that God will meet those needs, in the way which is best for me.
Walk in Dry Places
April 12
Beating Depression
Emotional Fortitude
If you’re seeking a lively meeting discussion topic, bring up depression. It’s so closely tied to alcoholism that some people even think alcoholics are attempting to “treat” depression when they drink. Others feel that depression shows they’re not “working” the program.
Overcoming depression is a monumental undertaking, but that doesn’t mean it cannot be done. The dearly mistake is that believe your circumstances are so hopeless that there’s no solution. Sometimes, as AA co-founder Bill Wilson contended (based on personal experience), depression actually corrects itself in time. Stay sober, live rightly, keep physically and mentally active, and in time some depressive mood swings will ease. Even more serious clinical depression can be treated.
It’s human to be temporarily depressed about a terrible failure or setback. The Twelve Steps are tools for coping with unpleasant situations, but we still might feel bad about tem for a time. The really good news is that enough fortitude will see us through for the long term. We have much experience to show that this is true.
Whether today’s mood is up or down, I’ll hold to the view that the Twelve Steps will help me defeat mental depression in time. My Higher Power assures me that joy and peace are my rightful state of mind.
Keep It Simple
April 12
Life I love you, all is groovy.
–Paul Simon
Prayer for the Day: Higher Power, help me let go of my fears and enjoy life. I haven’t always known how to enjoy life, but Working the Twelve Steps is more than recovery from alcohol or other drug addiction. It’s also about how to enjoy life. Our illness pulled us toward death. Our spirits were dying, and maybe our bodies were dying. Now our spirits are coming to life. We feel more alive than ever before. Our feelings are coming alive. We feel hope and faith, love, and joy, and even hurt and fear. We notice the sunshine as well as the clouds. We know life needs both sunshine and rain, both joy and pain. We are alive. You can teach me. All life is from You, so teach me to be free in Your light and love.
Action for the Day: Right now, I can think of at least three things in life that make me feel like sunshine. What are they?
What matters is what’s in our hearts. “The reason angels can fly is that they take themselves so lightly,” G. K. Chesterton once wrote: Once you stop taking yourself so seriously and let go of the gravity of all that you do, you can learn to fly, too. God, help me lighten up.
–Melody Beattie
“Humility leads to strength and not to weakness. It is the highest form of self-respect to admit mistakes and to make amends for them.”
–John (Jay) McCloy
Learning is an upward, ever-evolving process. We will never reach the point where we’ve learned all we need to know. Every aspect of life contains lessons. We can choose to discard them or to embrace them. Lessons embraced lead to wisdom.
–Mary Manin Morrissey
We can stop waiting for others to give us what we need and take responsibility for ourselves. When we do, the gates to freedom will swing wide. Walk through.
–Melody Beattie
Believe and the healing will come.
–Gary Barnes
Each of us is a unique expression of God’s beauty.
–Jane F. Maxwell
Father Leo’s Daily
Meditation
April 12
SUFFERING
“Every man, on the foundation of his own sufferings and joys, builds for all. ”
–Albert Camus
In my pain I am able to reach out to others. When I share my pain, I not only understand but I am understood. It is my pain and suffering that unites me with others. Other people become a part of my life and are involved in who I am.
Through my shared feelings, other people begin to share. Trust develops across this bridge of understanding. Feelings unite the world.
Lord, You created us in ONENESS – help us in our struggle to unite.
Daily Inspiration
April 12
Forget the hurts and unkindnesses of all yesterdays so that today you will have room to be joyful and at peace. Lord, bless me with the ability to let go of that which causes me pain so that I may not miss the great joys that today will bring.
Small acts of kindness make lasting memories. Lord, help me to remember that it is a privilege to pause for those moment in which I can really make a difference.
Elder’s Meditation
of the Day
April 12
“Dissimilar things were fitted together to make something beautiful and whole.”
–Nippawanock, ARAPAHOE
Sometimes we look at something close up and it appears to be ugly; but then we drop back and look at it as a whole and it is beautiful. If we look at an insect close up, it may be ugly, but if we drop back and look at the whole insect it becomes beautiful. We can drop back even more and observe what its role and purpose is, and the insect becomes even more beautiful and whole. How are we looking at ourselves? Are we focused on something ugly about ourselves, or are we dropping back and looking at ourselves as a whole? We all have purpose, and we are all beautiful.
Grandfather, today, let me see the beauty of the whole.
Today’s Gift
April 12
I come into the peace of wild things who do not tax their lives with forethought of grief.
—Wendell Berry
Blessed are all birds and animals, the wildest beasts, and, yes, all serpents, too, for they live in nature, in a state of natural grace. They live beyond the rules of evil and good. Their instincts are obedient only to the laws of survival, growth, and health. And as their lives unfurl in obedience to these laws, they suffer no shame, regret, or sin. Nor do they curse their failures, or themselves.
We can learn much from them. They harbor no evil toward one another, and they trust their own inner sense of how to live, and that their Higher Power makes sure everything which befalls them is for the best. Yes, they are blessed, and so are we, the highest animal.
What guilt can I free myself from today, just by letting go?
Touchstones
Meditations For Men
April 12
Anyone who lives art knows that psychoanalysis has no monopoly on the power to heal … Art and poetry have always been altering our ways of sensing and feeling – that is to say, altering the human body.
—Norman O. Brown
A man can lead a healing life on many levels. On one level, many of us have turned to healing professionals for help. That may strengthen our program and be very beneficial for many of our problems.
Relationships heal when they are loving, affirming, reliable, committed, and loyal. Nature heals: a tree, a walk through tall grass, a dry seedpod, or a potted plant gives life when we turn in its direction. Beauty heals: music, a poem, a novel, or a picture may move us to another plane and teach us about life. Meditation heals: solitude, quiet relaxation, prayer, and cosmic consciousness bring an inner peace. Laughter heals. Physical activity heals. Doing something for others helps us. At the basic level, accepting ourselves as lovable men, just as we are, is the foundation for all healing.
The forces for renewal and wholeness are varied. May I reach out to them and be healed by them.
Daily TAO
April 12
AWARENESS
Outer eyes
Cannot see themselves.
The inner eye
Is its own reflection
When we look we can see many things, but the eyes cannot see themselves without the help of a mirror. We are not used to introspection. Although the followers of Tao say to look within to gain self-awareness, we will be confused if we use the attitudes formed by looking with our eyes.
That is why it is important to make a clear distinction early on. Do not try to understand yourself with the attitudes of physical seeing. Look within using inner vision.
For centuries, people of many different cultures have referred to the “mind’s eye,” or the “inner eye,” or the “third eye.” These are all indications that there is a separate way of looking within. In meditation, it is important to discover and utilize this mode of introspection. We must go beyond thought, go beyond visualization, go beyond imagination and actually open a part of the mind that most people leave dormant. This inner eye has a location, buried deep in the brain. When it is opened, it is our way of receiving more subtle experiences than we receive in our physical states. Perhaps looking and seeing are misleading terms, after all. We don’t necessarily “see” images through this inner eye: We gain direct awareness that is beyond the image.
Daily Zen
April 12
Oh Buddhas
Of unexcelled complete enlightenment,
Bestow your invisible aid
Upon this hut I open
On the mountain top.
– Saicho (767-822)