[bluidkiti]

November 25


Early Version of the Seventh Step Prayer

Dear God,

I am coming to You on my knees in all humility to humbly ask You to forgive all my past wrongs and to remove all my defects of character. I want to start a new life today, and I ask You to help me do so and to keep helping if I keep asking.

In Step Three, I turned my will and my life over to Your care. Thank You for taking complete control of my life, and thank You for this opportunity to wipe my slate clean and start my life anew. In Steps Four, Five and Six I have completed my moral inventory and admitted to myself and another person the exact nature of my wrongs. I now admit these wrongs to You, God.

I am entirely ready to ask and pray now that You please remove from me every single defect of character. Specifically, I ask You to remove the following shortcomings listed in my Fourth Step moral inventory:
(Read aloud here those defects from your list.)

Thank You, God, for this opportunity for a new beginning in my life and a chance to be a part of the solutions in life instead of the problems. Please grant me wisdom, knowledge and strength as I go out from here to do Your work and live the Victorious Life You designed for me.

Thank You, God, for the steps which will make Your plan for my life clear to me. Thank You and praise Your name.
Amen

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Just a Thought

I can help other alcoholics. I am of some use in the world. I have a purpose in life. I am worth something at last.

My life has a direction and a meaning. All that feeling of futility is gone. I can do something worthwhile. God has given me a new lease on life so that I can help other alcoholics. He has let me live through all the hazards of my alcoholic life to bring me at last to a place of real usefulness in the world. He has let me live for this. This is my opportunity and my destiny.

So ............

I am worth something! Will I give as much of my life as I can to A.A.?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Just a Contemplation

Guiding Principle

All of us have our own battles to win, the battle between the material view of life and the spiritual view. Something must guide our lives. Will it be wealth, pride, selfishness, and greed or will it be faith, honesty, purity, unselfishness, love, and service? Each one has a choice. We can choose good or evil. We cannot choose both. Are we going to keep striving until we win the battle? If we win the victory, we can believe that even God in His heaven will rejoice.

Today, I seek to choose the good and resist the evil. Also, I pray that I will not be a loser in the battle for righteousness.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Room for Improvement

We have come to believe that A.A.'s recovery Steps and Traditions represent the approximate truths which we need for our particular purpose. The more we practice them, the more we like them. So there is little doubt that A.A. principles will continue to be advocated in the form they stand now.
If our basics are so firmly fixed as all this, then what is there left to change or to improve?
The answer will immediately occur to us. While we need not alter our truths, we can surely improve their application to ourselves, to A.A. as a whole, and to our relation with the world around us. We can constantly step up the practice of 'these principles in all our affairs.'

From: Grapevine February, 1961

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Just a Quote

"We must be willing to get rid of the life we've planned, so as to have the life that is waiting for us. The old skin has to be shed before the new one can come." -- Joseph Campbell