Daily Reflections
May 31
READINESS TO SERVE OTHERS
… our Society has concluded that it has but one high mission–to carry the A. A. message to those who don’t know there’s a way out.
-TWELVE STEPS AND TWELVE TRADITIONS, p. 151
The “Light” to freedom shines bright on my fellow alcoholics as each one of us challenges the other to grow. The “Steps” to self- improvement have small beginnings, but each Step builds the “ladder” out of the pit of despair to new hope. Honesty becomes my “tool” to unfurl the “chains” which bound me. A sponsor, who is a caring listener, can help me to truly hear the message guiding me to freedom.
I ask God for the courage to live in such a way that the Fellowship may be a testimony to His favor. This mission frees me to share my gifts of wellness through a spirit of readiness to serve others.
Twenty-Four Hours A
Day
May 31
A. A. Thought for the Day
I shall not wait to be drafted for service to A. A. I Shall volunteer. I shall be loyal in my attendance, generous in my giving, kind in my criticism, creative in my suggestions, loving in my attitudes. I shall give to A. A. my interest, my enthusiasm, my devotion, and most of all, myself. Do I also accept this as my AA. credo?
Meditation for the Day
Prayer is of many kinds, but of whatever kind, prayer is the linking up of the soul and mind to God. So, if prayer is only a glance of faith, a look or a word of love, or just a feeling of confidence in the goodness and purpose in the universe, still the result of that prayer is added strength to meet all temptations and to overcome them. Even if no supplication is expressed, all the supply of strength that is necessary is secured, because the soul, being linked and united to God, receives from Him all spiritual help needed. The soul, when in its human body, still needs the things belonging to its heavenly habitation.
Prayer for the Day
I pray that I may be taught how to pray. I pray that I may be linked through prayer to the mind and will of God.
Walk in Dry Places
May 31
Are Sobriety Dates
Important?
Practical Thinking
Observing anniversaries of getting sober has become a time-honored custom in AA. Many group name lists include the individual members’ sobriety dates. It’s also customary in many groups to celebrate anniversaries with cakes and to award coins with numerals denoting years of sobriety.
To outsiders, this custom may seem frivolous. What is the benefit in celebrating the day one too the last drink or in adding up the number of sober years?
These celebrations of sobriety dates actually underscore the important goal of staying continuously sober. We may know alcoholics who “went back out” from time to time, and then failed to come back at all. Members who slip and do come back to tell us that it was an agonizing experience, and that they feared they wouldn’t have another chance to lead a sober life. We also hear people say: “I may have another drunk in me, but I’m not sure I can find another sobering up.”
The message is clear: Get sober mark that date, and continue to build on it. We stress the importance of sobriety when we acknowledge the importance of sobriety dates.
I’ll stay sober today. Whatever my length of sobriety, I want to honor it and build on it.
Keep It Simple
May 31
You grow up the day you have your first real laugh at yourself.
–Ethel Barrymore
There was a time when we wouldn’t let anyone laugh at us–even ourselves. We had to much shame. We had to much pain. We took the world too seriously. If we laughed it was at others–not at ourselves. Over time , real honest laughter returns to us. Laughter is a way of accepting ourselves as human. To be human means we can make mistakes. It means we can lighten up. It also means growing up. And growing up means being happy with all of who we are–even parts of us that may seem odd or funny. If we can’t laugh at ourselves, we shut ourselves off from the world. We shut ourselves off from the parts of us we need to accept. Am I willing to accept the fact that I’m human.
Prayer for the Day: Higher Power, You made laughter. Help me us it to make my life easier. Help me accept all of me a funny mistake I’ve made.
Action for the Day: Today, I’ll share with someone close to me a funny mistake I’ve made.
How can we possibly describe feeling the Presence of God? It is the difference between being a child left alone in an empty house at night and a child who knows that her mother is in the next room. Even though she can’t see or hear her mother, she feels comforted by her warm, loving, protective presence. And while a human parent can’t always be with us, our spiritual parent will never abandon us.
–Mary Manin Morrissey
“A good love relationship can reinforce self-esteem, but it cannot create it. Many people carry a lot of unfinished business from childhood into relationships, and look to their partners to fulfill their unmet needs. So you get immature, dependency-type relationships that tend not to work.
The more you can complete unfinished business from childhood, the better your chance in relationships as an adult.”
–Nathaniel Branden, The Art of Living Consciously
Forgiveness is an inner correction that lightens the heart. It is for our peace of mind first. Being at peace, we will now have peace to give to others, and this is the most permanent and valuable gift we can possibly give.”
–Gerald Jampolsky
Father Leo’s Daily
Meditation
May 31
AMBITION
“Show me a thoroughly satisfied man – and I will show you a failure.”
–Thomas Alva Edison
I need to strive for new things in my life. I need to push out into new areas and discover the richness of God’s world. I need to explore the varied creativity of creation.
There is so much that I have not done because of the wasted years of my addiction. So much that I have not seen, countries that I have not visited, languages that I have not learned and experiences that I have missed. My compulsive and obsessive behavior left me a prisoner of self – and also a victim of self.
The spiritual recovery I enjoy today says it is okay for me to have things, enjoy things and do things.
Help me to realize the energy and ambition You have created within me.
Daily Inspiration
May 31
To feel good about yourself, do things that really matter to you. Lord, help me to know my priorities and act in a manner that will fulfill them.
Loneliness happens when you build walls instead of bridges. Lord, bless me with a welcoming spirit for those that might need me today.
Elder’s Meditation
of the Day
May 31
“Sell a country? Why not sell the air, the great sea, as well as the Earth? Did not the Great Spirit make them all for the use of his children?”
–Tecumseh, SHAWNEE
The White Man’s way is to possess, control, and divide. It has always been difficult for Indian people to understand this. There are certain things we cannot own that must be shared. The Land is one of these things. We need to re-look at what we are doing to the Earth. We are digging in her veins and foolishly diminishing the natural resources. We are not living in balance. We do not own the Earth; the Earth owns us. Today, let us ponder the true relationship between the Earth and ourselves.
Great Spirit, today, let me see the Earth as you would have me see Her.
Journey to the
Heart
May 31
Let Yourself Be Alive
In Sedona, as I drove from the sweat lodge back to the room I was renting. I felt exhilarated. My excitement wasn’t only about the experience I had just been through. For so long I had limited my choices, limited my freedom. I was thrilled that I was finally giving myself permission to live more fully.
Have you been limiting your choices, telling yourself there are only a few options available? Have you been limiting your choices, saying you’ve seen and done everything you can in this world? Have you been limiting yourself and your life, then wondering why life is so limiting?
Set yourself free. Give yourself permission to experience and taste more of life. You are here to live your life– fully, richly, passionately. The journey has been about more than cleansing, healing, and spiritual growth. You have a body, emotions, passion, and thought. You are here to bring all parts to life, to connect the parts, and to fully live your life.
Partake of the abundance of the universe. You’re sitting at a banquet table. Let yourself feast. Move on from monitoring, watching, limiting. Experience all of life that you can.
Today’s Gift
May 31
It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye.
–Antoine de St. Exupery
A tuning fork is a small tool that is used to tune musical instruments. It is tapped softly and then set down. As it vibrates, it gives off a musical tone. When its vibrations perfectly match the vibrations of the note played on the instrument, the instrument is in tune. When the note matches the tuning fork, this can be both felt and heard.
Our hearts work like a tuning fork. When the heart feels completely in tune with a decision or thought or action in our lives, then we know it is the right one for us. We can actually feel the harmony inside our bodies.
Sometimes what we know deep in our hearts gets clouded over by doubts and questions and other people’s opinions and judgments. We need to clear away such clouds and listen to our hearts, for our hearts carry the wisdom of God.
Am I in tune with my heart today?
Touchstones
Meditation For Men
May 31
Compassion is the ultimate and most meaningful embodiment of emotional maturity. It is through compassion that a person achieves the highest peak and deepest reach in his or her search for self-fulfillment.
–Arthur Jersild
Being compassionate is similar to what we call support in this program. We get outside our own self-centered egos and care about someone beyond ourselves. In the process we are helped and changed – perhaps more than the person we are helping.
As we mature, we learn that not all help is beneficial. It is more helpful to confront a friend in his delusion than to accept his misguided actions. Such tough honesty supports his strength and his ability to work the Steps. Sometimes it is hard to be a friend to a man in great pain. We might prefer to pull away rather than be with him as he suffers, but we can be more compassionate if we accept our powerlessness to cure his pain. Compassion has a reverberating effect in relationships. Not only do we give it and grow from the experience, we also become the receivers of what we send out.
Today, I will practice compassion in my relationships.
Daily TAO
May 31
ACTUAL
The actual
Is only actual
In one place
And one time.
When one listens to a barking dog, one might imagine emotion, pain, reaction, anxiety, and self-identification, but actually there is nothing there — just sound from a long and deep corridor, channeled out of nothingness and fading into nothingness again.
Like that dog, we may all strive, but there is truly nothing to be done. If we look deeply into our lives, there is only a thin veneer of self-generated meaning over an immense ocean of nothingness.