One night at my old group, we discussed Tradition Four. Ego and chaos is comfortable and not always easy to recognize when we are in it. Personally, I need to remember that it is part of my disease not my recovery.

I know I had ego when I came in. I enjoyed getting to read the longest Step or Tradition when they were passed around the room. I liked to put my 2 cents in and then I learned I wasn't suppose to cross talk. I had people disagree with me and I would say, "How can you disagree, you were not there, you didn't walk in my shoes." I learned people have a right to their opinion and just possibly, he had been in the same situations and he had some kind of enlightenment that I didn't receive.

There was a guy who always started his share with, "Keep an open mind." In truth it was an ego thing. He relapsed at 22 years sober after being in a relationship with a girl half his age. She stayed sober to the best of my knowledge.

We don't have a right to play God with someone else's life.

AA-related 'Alconym' . . .

S I T = Stay In Today.

It is much easier to stay in today when I realize that I don't quit forever and ever and that all I have to do is stay sober for 24 hours. My day can start any time and this is especially true, when I have such a disruptive sleep pattern. Some days are short while others are long. Some days up four hours, down four hours. Other times, up from 26-36 hours with a couple of hours sleep in between. Each time I wake up, it is a new day.

During those long hours of no sleep, I have often had to surrender, ask for help and surrender my day. With fibromyalgia, polymyalgia, and osteo it was difficult to find acceptance. Yet when I acknolwdge the problem, ask for help, I can deal with things know that they are subject to change. Take an inventory as to what brought me to that particular space, change th things a can, and turn over the rest.

We can do what I can't do alone. Coming here and sharing my experience, strength, and hope, helps me to get out of my pain and if I look for them, the words of wisdom are there. Sometimes my fingers walk on the keyboard and I have to read what I tyed when they are finished.

So glad this is a one day at a time program.

The Ten Points
(The Ten Points are a summary of the lifesaving directions given in chapter five of Alcoholics Anonymous – the AA Big Book)

1. Completely give yourself to this simple Program.
2. Practice rigorous honesty.
3. Be willing to go to any lengths to recover.
4. Be fearless and thorough in your practice of the principles.
5. Realize that there is no easier, softer way.
6. Let go of your old ideas absolutely.
7. Recognize that half measures will not work.
8. Ask God’s protection and care with complete abandon.
9. Be willing to grow along spiritual lines.
10. Accept the following pertinent ideas as proved by All Addicts Anonymous experience:
(a) that you cannot manage your own life;
(b) that probably no human power can restore
you to sanity;
(c) that God can and will if sought.

24-communications.com/092011/092011.pdf


So many people say, "I tried that fellowship and it didn't work for me." Other people would say, "I went there and I ended up relapsing."

Many people think that relapse is a recovery tool. It can be used as a symptom of our disease and is part of our disease, not a part of our recovery.

There are some suggestions to follow, things I often call 'darn well betters' or you will relapse. IMHO it is whether you want recovery and whether you are willing to do the do thngs in order to obtain it. The program works if you WORK for the program.

The program works when you work for it. It isn't a quick fix program to life's solutions. We are works in progress. Each day is a new beginning.

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I like this. I don't do mornings well. Perhaps it is because I have been arguing about going to sleep, and I get my nights and days turned around. Often pain wakes me up, and I am more apt to have feelings of resentment instead of gratitude.

At this moment, our ability to create the day is at its most powerful, and we can offer ourselves fully to the creative process by filling this moment with whatever inspires us most.

Looks like I need to pray and ask for a new attitude. I do often pray for new clarity and awareness through out the day. I know I can stay clean and sober if I turn my day over to my Higher Power. By surrendering my day, I am empowered to do what I need to do for today. I have gotten away from daily affirmations. Must try to remember to start doing them again.

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There was a time I thought it all grand,
To get high right out of hand.

'Cause I doing doing harm,
Setting off no alarms.

And the folks thought of me as some what peculiar.

But at some point it got out of hand.
And despite promises of "never again,"
I found myself drinking over and over on end.

And the folks said, "you may have a problem."

I kept up the rationale:
"It's still my life, even for just a while. . ."

The "while" got busted,
And the disease I had entrusted

Led me straight to the road of
RECOVERY!!!!!!!!!

Written by Knothead

Love it! I am always grateful when someone share, especially when it is their own personal experience, strength, and hope.

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Posted on another site in 2008

Here I am 8 years later, waiting to see my heart specialist. I think it is my medication for my heart that is causing my problems.

Life happens, you never know what it is going to hand us. I am so grateful that this is a one day at a time program.

I am so grateful this is a spiritual program. Don't leave anyone outside the circle. There is love and healing for everyone.

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This may be a duplicate. It is something I posted on another site in 2010.

The last line is so true. I can remember being upset that I stayed in denial for so long and missed out on so much of my life.

I also know that no one could have told me I was an alcoholic. The program didn't begin to really work for me until I could get past the denial and quit comparing my journey to that of others. I had to get in touch with my feelings and then I could identify with others.

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I certainly know that the Serenity Prayer is about acceptance. For me, it is about knowing the difference about what I can change or what I can't. I find that I could have made it much easier on myself by quitting the debating society.

Have to accept where they are at in their program. As my sponsor use to say to me, be grateful that you aren't in the same place. There is always someone who 'knows' how it is done. I may know something but in the moment, it flies out the window and comes back later to bite me in the butt and I think, now why didn't I do that before.

Accepting ourselves and others is not easy. We can say the words but it is an altogether different thing when it comes to feeling it. Even more difficult to let it go.

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Something I think was on the old site.

Love the quote here, they are so true in my life. From the time I found AA 25 years ago, using was not an option. For me, it was to die and I chose to live.

Thanksgiving is an all year found thing for me even though I lag behind expressing it each day. Thanksgiving is my favourite holiday because I love the Fall and all the trimmings to a Thanksgiving dinner.

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There are a couple of people that live in Grand Forks, ND who come down to Mayville almost every Thursday for our AA meeting here. Well, On Friday, Nov 25th, they are going to get their 2 year chip at an AA meeting in Grand Forks. I am going to surprise them and come up to the meeting. I want to support them and celebrate their sobriety with them. It is what we do...we are there for each other in good times and in bad, share in laughter and in tears.

This struck me, because we are all addicts and alcoholics, but we are all different ages, we all have different skills, different levels of education, different ways of doing things because of experience and opportunity, and when we come into recovery, we either want the sun, the moon and the stars, or we just want back what we lost, or we just want our own little space and have some peace and serenity.

I took courses and went back to school and all it did was make me realize that I had done my time and I had absolutely no desire to go back into the rat race and compete in the big old world for big bucks and live on the edge out there now that I had some peace and serenity. I didn't need much to live on, never had it, so why should I need it now. People just didn't understand this, they told me I should go out and be a working and useful member of society. Well I did go out and volunteer, I had no problem with that as long as it was recovery related, and went into jails, detox, recovery houses, and into the Community with the Literacy Council and Hamilton Housing Computer Access Program. There was service with in AA and NA as well and that had to come first. It is because of service that I have long term recovery. AA works if you work for AA. NA works if you work for NA.

What do I look for. One day of sobriety, this 24 hours with out using people, places and things. It isn't about alcohol and drugs and hasn't been for 21 years. I don't abuse my medication. It is about my thinking, my actions during the day when it comes to my medication, my food, how I inter-act with other people, how I speak to others, what kind of message I carry to others, carrying the message on the internet, and maintaining my emotional sobriety, one day at a time. It is my thinking that is the root of my dis-ease. I try not to have hissy fits any more. I try not to curse someone and run them down or put them down. A person may come to mind and I may try to figure them out, but then I try to turn them over to my God and He generally lets me know if I am suppose to detach from the person and gives me the good orderly direction I need. Detachment doesn't mean I don't love the person, it just means I don't always allow them in my space.

I can still turn a blind eye. I can still look at things with tunnel vision and have to ask for a wider perspective. That is when I try to remember to ask for my own knowingness about something, my own view of a situation rather than take someone else's word. If I didn't see or hear it, it is gossip, so I try to figure it out for myself and what it means to me.

Today I try to step back before I act. I try not to react, I pray that I will be given the pause to stop and think. As an Aires, we are often reactive people. My definition of an Aires is "The left foot is moving forward and the right foot doesn't know it has to move yet."

I forgot to say, this took a long time and a lot of practice. This is a program of practice, practice, practice. This is my 25 year anniversary and there are days, when I still don't get it right. That doesn't mean I pick up a drink, it just means I have to make an amend to my God, to myself, or another suffering addict or an Earthling that my cross may path.

Shared this on another site in 2012, and while reading it, I thought how narrow minded people can be about the "addict" just like the stigma attached to alcoholics.

People see the guy on Skid Row, with his/her brown paper bag and bottle and they are all type cast and many stay in denial and die. They don't even recognize that the problem isn't what is in the bottle, it is but a symptom of their disease.

The same with the addict, it doesn't matter what substance he/she uses, it all leads to the same soul sickness. There are drugs that call attention to themselves and then there are those that people tend to overlook, and think that they don't have a problem. All those other 12 Step programs out there that seldom get mentioned: Gambling, sex, work, religion, food, computers, codependency, relationships, and the list goes on and on.

I am so glad that the 12 Steps are applicable to all areas of my life. Substitution doesn't work. I tried it, and all I did was have more addictions to deal with on a daily basis.

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Just had the thought, when we do something wrong, or what we perceive to be wrong because of old tapes, how often do we blame our parents instead of taking responsibility for our own decisions.

When I surrender and put my day and ME in my God's Care, then I under His/Her care and direction and it is up to me as to how I follow direction, because I am granted freedom of choice.

Just for today, I choose not to use. I choose not to use my parents as a scapegoat and take responsibility for my own disease. I am powerless over them, and they are powerless over me, unless I give them the power.

With the holidays coming on, I have to look at each day as another 24 hours. If I am in today, worrying about Christmas, I have to ask myself, "Why are you doing that?" Christmas isn't here yet. Even when it gets here, I need to turn my will and my life into the hands of my Higher Power and ask for help to get through the day. When my life is in my God's hands, I am given that pause to stop and think and ask myself, "Why are you doing that." My sobriety comes first, everything else is secondary, including my family and friends. Without my sobriety, I have nothing. Certainly nothing worth celebrating, and for me to use is to die, so why would I be doing something that would jeoprodize my life.

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Why?
Why do I feel this way?
Why do I feel so alone
So different,
So separate.
I know I am not different
Unique in my own journey,
Yet not so unique in my differences
From others who have traveled this journey.
Today I feel alone.
Is it my own separateness.
Am I isolating my spirit as well as my body?
I share with others
Yet seem apart.
No one close
Am I looking for acceptance
Validation for who I am?
Is it my right?
I am comfortable with me
Or so I thought.
Yet why this feeling of being alone.
No one caring...
No one sharing...
No one showing any interest in what I do.
Is it the ego?
Is it the pride?
Why have all the words dried up inside?
How do I get them out?
Express all the pain and the sorrow
Letting you know how much I hurt
To heal, to let go, to live and to dare to dream
Of a better tomorrow
A better day with hope
Someone to love
Someone I who loves
Someone who knows
Someone who shares
Someone who cares.

Something I wrote in February 14, 2005 that I found posted on another site. I think it was probably posted here and copied to another site, and I then copied it to another site, and now back on here. LOL!

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Don't Let Anyone Walk Around In Your Head with their Dirty Shoes On

We tend to let others control our lives. We allow people to rob us of our dreams. Just when we think we've got it together, someone will make a statement or remark about how we should act or what we should be and we allow those remarks to make us question and doubt ourselves. We give these people power over us. No one else should control our lives. We are in control of our own lives and destiny with the help of our Higher Power. We cannot live our lives through other people's thoughts or action. We don't have to allow ourselves or our thoughts to be controlled by someone else's judgement.

- Original Source Unknown

How often we allow others to rent space in our head. We don't even charge them rent. Most times, they don't even know they are there.

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