Daily Reflections
March 20
LOVE AND TOLERANCE
Love and tolerance of others in our code.
-ALCOHOLICS ANONYMOUS, p. 84
I have found that I have to forgive others in all situations to maintain any real spiritual progress. The vital importance of forgiving may not be obvious to me at first sight, but my studies tell me that every great spiritual teacher has insisted strongly upon it. I must forgive injuries, not just in words, or as a matter of form, but in my heart. I do this not for the other persons’ sake, but for my own sake. Resentment, anger, or a desire to see someone punished, are things that rot my soul. Such things fasten my troubles to me with chains. They tie me to other problems that have nothing to do with my original problem.
Twenty-Four Hours A Day
March 20
A.A. Thought For The Day
When we were drinking, we used to worry about the future. Worry is terrible mental punishment. What’s going to become of me? Where will I end up? In the gutter or the sanitarium? We can see ourselves slipping, getting worse and worse, and we wonder what the finish will be. Sometimes we get so discouraged in thinking about the future that we toy with the idea of suicide. In A.A. have I stopped worrying about the future?
Meditation For The Day
Functioning on a material plane alone takes me away from God. I must also try to function on a spiritual plane. Functioning on a spiritual plane as well as on a material plane will make life what it should be. All material activities are valueless in themselves alone. But all activities, seemingly trivial or of seemingly great moment, are all alike if directed by God’s guidance. I must try to obey God as I would expect a faithful, willing servant to carry out directions.
Prayer For The Day
I pray that the flow of God’s spirit may come to me through many channels. I pray that I may function on a spiritual plane as well as on a material plane.
Walk in Dry Places
March 20
Think, Think, Think
Prudence.
It’s hard to believe, but some AA members insist that newcomers shouldn’t think. “Whoever said you should think?” some members are told. The newcomer is apparently supposed to suspend all thinking for several months until reaching a certain level of recovery.
This is nonsense, and it also contradicts AA teaching. If we don’t want people to use their heads, why do we have printed cards on meeting room walls that say, “Think, Think, Think”? We are always capable of thinking, even in moments of deep despair. Indeed, we could not keep from thinking.
A constructive approach to thinking is to form complete sentences from the slogan on the wall: THINK what might happen if I take one drink. THINK of the wonderful new life that awaits me in sobriety. THINK about ways of improving myself and following a more satisfactory lifestyle.
It’s also important to remember that good thinking will drive out bad thinking…. But good thinking has to be cultivated.
I’ll keep my thinking centered today on the good things that can be done in life. I’ll focus my attention only on matters that are under my control, and I know that better thinking will bring better conditions.
Keep It Simple
March 20
You can make more friends in two months by becoming interested in other people than you can in two years of trying to get other people interested in you.
–Dale Carnegie
We wanted friends, but our addiction wanted all our attention. We had no time to be close to others.
Well, stand aside, addiction! The program has taught us that others are important. Our purpose is to help others. People have become what’s important to us.
Now we listen to others. We help them do what they want to do, not what we want them to do. We help people instead of use them. Friendship is now a way of life. And another promise of the program becomes a part of us.
Prayer for the Day: Higher Power, help me to know that I’m here to help others, not just myself. Through others, I find myself.
Today’s’ Action: Today I’ll help someone the way he or she wants to be helped.
“There is only one small letter between the words CAN and CAN’T…and that one letter will TOTALLY change your destiny.”
-–Doug FirebaughHappiness is intrinsic, it’s an internal thing. When you build it into yourself, no external circumstances can take it away. That kind of happiness is a twenty-four-hour thing.
–Leo F. BuscagliaGod, if I can’t see the joy in life, help me look again.
–Melody BeattieNow and then I like to lift my eyes up from the details of daily life and remember the bigger picture, and take a breath of God, and feel and remember that ultimately, it’s all okay.
–Dan MillmanGod wants us to give from the heart when we see a need.
–Nancy Shelton
Father Leo’s Daily Meditation
March 20
APATHY
“Science may have found a cure for most evils; but it has found no remedy for the worst of them all — the apathy of human beings.”
— Helen Keller
I read today of a woman who ate herself to death. Friends and family when interviewed said, “She simply didn’t seem to care.” She had stuffed her feelings for so long that she had forgotten what they were; she had lost her spirituality. Apathy kills people.
So long as people do nothing, the disease of addiction gets worse and more victims are claimed. Apathy feeds ignorance because it stops activity; apathy stops life.
The antidote for apathy is spirituality. The spiritual person is alive with positive attitudes and creative hope — he is infectious. People are challenged to discover a meaning to life in their own lives. Hope produces recovery; recovery produces a message that must be shared; in the message is the miracle of life.
I pray that in the face of apathy I can discover hope.
Daily Inspiration
March 20
To run the life’s race successfully we must run toward life, not away from it. Lord, bless me with the courage to meet my challenges as they happen and never allow fear to set up roadblocks.
No one can live for himself alone for then he will have no purpose in life. To give of self is one of life’s greatest joys and blesses us with a full and rich life. Lord, help me to be selfless and loving to those around me.
Elder’s Meditation of the Day
March 20
“You have wandered away from your teachings. You must concentrate on your spiritual teachings. Don’t be sidetracked.”
–Henry Quick Bear, LAKOTA
Why are the Elders always telling us to know The culture and listen to the teachings? When we go off track, why do the Elders say, return to the teachings? The teachings tell us how to live in harmony with the Laws and principles of the Great Spirit. Living means life a good life, a happy life. Many of us have grown up without the teachings and the culture, that is why we don’t know how to live. To improve on relationships, to treat our children with honor, and to respect our Elders, we need to live by the old teachings again.
Great Spirit, today, show me how to live.
Journey to the Heart
March 20
Learn to Heal Yourself
Sometimes we trick ourselves. If we feel unhappy, troubled, or scared, we race toward what we think will make us feel better. In desperation, in fear, we grasp for something, anything to stop our pain. Finding that job. Making more money. Getting married. Having a relationship. If I get that one thing I need, then I’ll be happy. Then my pain will stop.
Sometimes it’s true that finding the solution to a problem improves the quality of our lives. Having enough money enables us to fix the furnace when it breaks. Having people in our lives we love and who love us can be an important part of our happiness. Having work to do that we enjoy and that we feel is worthwhile helps us feel good about ourselves.
But when we’re in pain– no matter what’s causing it– the way to heal that pain doesn’t come from outside of ourselves. External circumstances don’t make internal emotions disappear. Even if we get what we think we want, the painful emotion we haven’t had the strength or courage to face will still be there.
The way to heal pain, the only way, is to feel and release it. Your pain is your pain. Your fear, desperation, and resentments are yours, too. All these emotions belong to you. Feel them, learn from them, and let them go.
Walk courageously each step of the path on the journey to the heart. Enjoy when the universe sends you its gifts– a lover, some money, a good job. But know the ultimate key to happiness lies not in external things, but within you. Feel all your feelings. Learn to heal yourself.
Today’s Gift
March 20
I want, by understanding myself, to understand others.
—Katherine Mansfield
Growing up to be the best people we can be is a lifelong process. As teenagers, we may have thought that twenty-one would be a magic year for us because then we would become adults. We’d be grown up and able to handle any problems that came along, if any did.
But the older we get, the more we realize that growing up is a process that never ends. We are always becoming the people we are capable of being. We’re always learning new things about ourselves, and in that process, we’re always coming to new understandings about other people and how we can get along with them.
How wonderful that life always offers us room to grow! It makes new discoveries possible all through our lives, and ensures us that we will always have something to offer.
What discovery have I made just today?
Touchstones Meditation For Men
March 20
New life comes from shedding old skins and pressing through the darkness toward the light. Spring is the season of new beginnings and of growth.
—Karen Kaiser Clark
All of us in this program have had great turning points in our lives. In these new beginnings we have pressed onward or groped through the darkness, hoping to find the light, much like a new sprout arising from the cold soil in spring. Our recovery has pointed us toward the light. As spiritually alive men, we also have smaller beginnings all the time. Spring exists for us on the inside regardless of the time of year.
On this particular day, we can think about the changes we see growing in our lives. It may be unclear to some of us just what is changing or how. We may not be able to name the change or describe it until it’s in the past. Springtime brings a feeling of liberation, and our growth in this program frees us from muddled thinking, denial, addictions, and codependency.
I am thankful for new beginnings in the world and the eternal spring within my being.
Daily TAO
March 20
SPRING
Sun and moon divide the sky,
Fragrance blooms on pear wood bones:
Earth awakens with a sigh.
Wanderer revels on the path alone.
It is the time of equinox, when day and night are briefly equal. This day signals the beginning of spring, the increasing of light, and the return of life to the frozen earth.
Of course, this day only represents a moment in time. Spring has long been returning, and we know that summer will soon follow. The cycle of the seasons will continue in succession. There is no such thing as a true stopping in time, for all is a continuum. Nature makes its own concordances as a mere outgrowth to its movement; it is we who see structure and give names to pattern.
But who can begrudge temporary pleasures to a solitary traveler? Let us go out and enjoy the day, revel in the coming of spring, rejoice in the warming of the earth. For though the ground may be covered with frost, movement and growth are taking place all around us. Beauty bared fills our eyes and makes us drunk. As we wander the endless mountains and streams, filling our lungs with the breath of the forests, let us take comfort in being part of nature. For life has enough misery and misfortune. Philosophy reminds us enough of the transience of life. Give us the charm of the ephemeral, and let it silence all who would object.
Daily Zen
March 20
Don’t be concerned with
who is wise and who is stupid.
Do not discriminate the
sharp from the dull.
To practice whole-heartedly
is the true endeavor of the way.
Practice-realization is not
defiled with specialness;
it is a matter for every day.
– Dogen (1227)