Monday 10 February 2014

Alcoholics Anonymous | Feb 10 2004 - 2014 | DonInLondon | Step 2 "Sanity"

Alcoholics Anonymous Blog & Video | Feb 10 2004 - 2014 | DonInLondon | Step 2 "Sanity"

 

February 10 Video

 

DonInLondon February 10, 2014: step two month: "came to believe that a power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity." Being restored to sanity on a daily basis means some of the other steps are working as well. In my life, when I feel pride, ego and fear rising inside me, no doubt I feel something is very wrong, and there is an answer. I need to gain perspective, and this is done with courage to change, have faith in the next right thing and hopefully confidence will grow. Fear pride and ego is all about step six and the triggers which make life difficult. Courage, faith and confidence is all about step seven which makes life easier as we learn what we can do and cannot do in the moment of now.

 

Simply writing a couple of sentences about what I need to do today, changes my perspective, and I can ask for help from those I feel antagonise me or have antagonised me in the past. You never know what might happen, by asking for help. And the truth is informed, we find out who can help, who is willing to help in an open and honest way, and exactly we learn how we are powerless over what goes on in another person's head, the places which cannot be changed, and things are often set in stone, so why crack my head against stone which is immovable. And the same is true of attitudes and beliefs in some people today, set in stone, and not budging in their beliefs and opinions.

 

I went to the early-morning meeting of Fellowship and always I feel better in the company of people I am learning to love unconditionally day by day. I do love them, sometimes I like their behaviour, sometimes it's very confusing and sometimes I just don't understand what's going on in the heads of my friends. Generally, however we do share our feelings and we know what's going on. And we learn from each other in the moment of now.

 

This morning’s meeting was all about step three: "made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood him," and the good news is that everybody has an opinion about God in their lives one way or another. And seven billion people make up their minds about God in their lives every day. As Gandhi said: "God is truth and God is love." And we learn the wisdom of life as we go, so I have no problem. Surrendering to the truth of now, the bit I know and the bits you know, makes for the big picture of truth and without you I don't get very far. So step three is pretty easy, if we can surrender to the truth as it is and not some notions, beliefs and opinions we have developed over the years which might be quite erroneous and unhelpful in the moment of now.

 

Surrendering to the truth is rather difficult when we find it quite unacceptable. Who wants to open the door to truth, especially when it's not our way of wanting the world to be? Not very many people really want the truth, they prefer something they can own and control and manipulate to suit their purpose. Unfortunately, life is not like that, and getting to the truth can be quite difficult on our own. Asking for help, sharing what we know and then listening to others, improves our perspective today. Job done? Yes, until later, when everything may happen to change the truth of now. And we need to be flexible and accepting of reality.

 

In my humble opinion, surrendering to the truth is not about making life my way, its accepting life the way it is. And being able to get the most out of it by being emotionally aware in the reality of now. Sometimes surrendering to the truth means I don't get my way, or anywhere near it, indeed hopefully with the help of other people, I find myself in a better position to face the world and have freedom to choose what to do, based on truth, rather than fiction. And this is how it works for me. And for some people it works quite differently, they say: "let go and let God." I don't know about that, I'd rather work at life, and face the challenge of truth and surrender to it, rather than let go and hang about waiting for something to happen on my own. On my own nothing much works, and simply by asking for help, the whole world opens up yet again. Serenity and peacefulness? By-products of hard work in action in the reality of now.

 

And I spoke to my sister about matters concerning local government, and medical issues which are not being addressed and are being miss-communicated for whatever reason. Patience, tolerance and love are all part of the scenario. I care about myself enough to complain and find out what's going on, and I am ready to accept whatever truth can be found. Usually takes a bit of time, meanwhile I have made clear where responsibility and accountability lies. The next step is to wait. And get on with my life today.

 

DonInLondon 2004 - 2013

 

Alcoholics Anonymous | February 10 2013 | AA 12 Steps In Action | Step 2 "Sanity" | "of course I could be wrong!" Said by Ram Dass, also known as Richard Alpert. Being restored to sanity is not listening or believing in one person, it is about accessing the higher power. Came to believe that a power greater than me will restore me to sanity. Always the many voices, sharing experience strength and hope in fellowship which help me keep sober today. And then the cacophony of all the voices in the world helps me keep sober one day at a time. And it’s important to get to trust our own feelings, trust others enough to share their opinions and beliefs, and then work out what is right for me or you. I will never have all the answers to your problems today, because usually I am dealing with all the stuff I have going on and on, and I relate how fellowship helps me every day...

 

Some of the obvious insanity, as a newcomer: whether you are male or female, life is still going on and emotional and spiritual is developing every single day. By the time I got to fellowship, my emotional and spiritual life had become very ugly and horrible and desolate. But when I really engaged with fellowship and said to myself, I would be all in to try to be sober and accept the painful transition, physical pain, and also an emotional mess, my reality was profoundly black and bleak. And I was very afraid, fear drove most of my actions. Emotionally and physically very ill, the reality was to live in meetings and be in fellowship, as much as I could through the waking hours of each day...

 

Higher power and humans! It can be very attractive to be drawn to people who seem to have all the answers. I certainly do not have all the answers when it comes to recovery. And I learned early on in recovery, there are many people who look like they are sober, and well balanced emotionally and spiritually. Not necessarily so, and the same applies to me. We are what we are just for one day. So the emotional and spiritual wisdom in fellowship is only as good as the day as we are there. Some days we hear something very profound and it shifts our perspective. And then the next day, the same person who was so profound, the day before, is shattered by something that has happened. And then it is how we understand how others cope with reality and the shattering of their serenity which illuminates how we get on and live in the moment of now. No single human has the answer for you, I don't have the answers for you, you develop your answers as you can. And as your emotional and spiritual balance allows. Just for today… And…

 

Overreliance on one person, overreliance on me and my outlook is profoundly wrong in my opinion. Sometimes I connect and share something useful, and sometimes I am simply the wrong person to be listening to. It is that simple and good news, when I am wrong for you in my outlook and opinions, the common ground in fellowship is about sober and listening to everyone and how it impacts is as it may be just for one day. So some days I am helpful and say something useful, and other days. I'm completely useless and say nothing which is useful to you, that's how fellowship works, because in meetings there are many voices and opinions about sobriety and we will connect with someone hopefully. Even when we don't connect with someone, or the many, all we need do is find a new source of experience strength and hope. And where I live, I have gratitude, because there are many meetings and many people who help me one day at a time...

 

Romance and finance: new to sobriety, romance and relationships are very tortured because we don't know or understand our emotional and spiritual imbalance. Our feelings all over the place, extreme and hurting, we can look the safe haven in all the wrong places. And financially, we may be okay or completely broke, and the fellowship is not there to provide support in the material sense. Although many do find a roof over their heads through discussion and suggestion, and offers of help hopefully made with unconditional love. But in the main my suggestion is, fellowship is for sobriety, and not relationships in early days. Or rather relationships based on learning, support and not being told what to do. There are no guru's as such in life, unless you make them a guru. It's the collective wisdom in fellowship, learning the truth and love of now. And it would be insane to think of relationships which would harm your sobriety today.… I don't know how many of us deny the truth when it comes to relationships in early days, our thinking tells us we can, and our feelings are all over the place!

 

I feel pretty good this morning, seeing my best friend briefly last night in a meeting was great. And I was able to get to two meetings, and the topic in both meetings was gratitude. I suppose the people who spoke first were old timers, and they shared about how grateful they were to be sober. And the outlook for the future was freedom to make the best choices. I can say I was at these meetings and how they impacted on me, but I cannot share the specific content personal to persons unknown, and anonymity is key. A lot of people have died recently, and how to cope with grief and loss has been profound. And friends I have known have passed recently. I was grateful that they were sober and they have been there for me in my early days. They help me learn what it is to cherish people, and not treat them with superficiality or indifference...

 

Although life will be good, bad and ugly from time to time and all mixed up together, we learn what we can and cannot do and the wisdom in the moment. Dealing with loss is all part of early recovery, loss of our best friend, substance, and losing the way we used to fix ourselves with people, places and things. And the deeper we feel grief, the deeper we have felt real life, because we can only cherish others when we allow them to cherish us, and how we learn to cherish ourselves by being sober just for today. Sober comes first, and then the rest of life happens. There are things we will never control, usually our own emotions because we react and respond to life, at the same time if we know our feelings, we can think and then understand the actions which are possible and not possible today… We become sensitive to life in the moment, we get to understand how we connect and how we are included where we can be. And we also learn there are places and people where we need be excluded either by our own choice or the choices of people who are better off in their own opinion, not knowing us anymore. All about learning how to love, be loved back and find useful endeavours as sobriety develops our emotional and spiritual outlook today…

 

I feel overreliance on single sources in recovery is as dangerous as overreliance on any single source of wisdom in the wider world of life. Truth, love and wisdom is always developed through many contacts and learning what is right and what is wrong, the can do and the cannot do in the moment of now. We are easily led in early recovery, that people are useless to us or likely to be profoundly helpful. And that is why it is so important to listen to the similarities of the many, to see the broader picture of recovery and not just one element or one human, equally as fallible and equally able to be wrong as you can be today. We keep on learning the truth, love and wisdom of now, it does not reside in one person or one book, it resides in reality as we see it and others see it today. And it can get quite argumentative, quite heated and distorted, the nature of humanity trying to work together in the moment of now. And so that is why we have judgement, we develop our common senses and we develop gumption and the broader picture of life as recovery opens the path to living reality, whatever that might be today...

 

 

Alcoholics Anonymous | February 10 2012 | AA 12 Steps In Action | Step 2 "Sanity" | Today's AA daily: "I don't run the show" helps me understand that much of what I was taught is not going to keep me sober one day at a time. Standing on my own two feet: never showing weakness, putting on a brave face and relying on my ego to cover up my lack of confidence, courage and faith.

 

Being self-reliant; it can be a good trait and resilience and determination are all part of making good in life. Overreliance on our desire to be self-sufficient can be part of a stubborn and defiant approach to dealing with addiction. We still feel we are at fault and can judge ourselves so harshly as failures, we can drink ourselves to death…

 

In our alcoholism, a self-inflicted wound leads to the toughest love regime we apply to ourselves. Tough love applied, every time we fail, we do more self-harm and lose sight of the twelve steps. The twelve steps are all about progress not perfection, tolerance and love. How to be open honest and willing to change and be open to help and support in fellowship. We do not run the whole show…

 

"Let go and let God?" Whatever you perceive he, she or it to be, the proposition that we can let go and ask the help feels right for me. And I cannot speak for anyone else, at the same time I am happy to ask for help and have the humility to accept support, love and tolerance, try new ways to live with support and stop going it alone today…

 

I'm very happy to be on the world stage as a part player, not being an Oracle, not knowing the answers to even the most basic ways to live. Living with humility and openness means I can listen, and learn from others how to be sober, and especially learn how to love, be loved back without conditions and simply useful in some way today…

 

It can be a wonderful world again, and because we live and it is difficult some of life will be quite horrible and most often our true source of learning. Learning to be happy, learning to be sad, learning to love and understanding why sometimes we can hate what people do including ourselves…

 

Letter to a friend struggling with the word God: I feel the good news is that there are over 7 billion people on the planet now and each one has a definition of God inside us. And all these definitions are right for each individual, be they atheist, agnostic or believer or any combination of these over the years of living.

 

I too struggled with the word God. And probably still do from time to time. What makes it all work for me is understanding that there are higher powers all around me all the time.

 

And so the debate about God is not really an issue, just for me I don’t mind what definition anybody else has. I am happy that I can let go being self-sufficient and the source of knowledge and next actions. The whole reading of the chapter on acceptance being the key and the whole world being stage and we are merely players, brings into sharp focus that there are many ways to simply letting in "the good" around us.

 

And of course I will have problems with the word God and what other people anticipate and expect him, she or it to be able to do for us… All the steps, acceptance and can do, can’t do and knowing the wisdom resides in life, experience and asking for help.

 

I don’t edge good out, I ask for good to come in, by conscience inside me and the inner voice that always talks to me, the good conscience of those around me and the collective conscience of where mankind may be headed…

 

I don’t know the answers, at the same time the question of god is a good one, because if we are thinking about it, we are feeling the whole impact of a new way of life and it keeps us on track.

 

I love the word humility and I am so pleased to be a learner each and every day. I may know a little bit more about me and life by the time I get to bed tonight. The gift of no certainty and acceptance and challenge make everything worthwhile one day at a time…

 

"Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity"

 

DonInLondon 2005-2011

 

Yesterday, a chair from an old timer celebrating 35 years sober, and several more around the same time! The theme was living reality, AA for sober, outside help for other emotional and physical. Several newcomers appreciated the “reality check,” that AA keeps us sober and we get freedom to work on everything else. Real experience, really helpful and no denials …

 

Needs met wants forgotten...

 

Stephen Covey "Every human has four endowments- self-awareness, conscience, independent will and creative imagination. These give us the ultimate human freedom... The power to choose, to respond, to change." Insanity caused by addiction produces extremes of behaviour, what I would describe as the thin edge of experience. Extremes of feeling, unnaturally sustained, always elusive and never as powerful as the first time... The deep of experience built on time...

 

AA Daily: I DON'T RUN THE SHOW ~ FEBRUARY 10, When we became alcoholics, crushed by a self-imposed crisis we could not postpone or evade, we had to fearlessly face the proposition that either God is everything or else He is nothing. God either is, or He isn’t. What was our choice to be? ALCOHOLICS ANONYMOUS, p.53

 

Today my choice is God. He is everything. For this I am truly grateful. When I think I am running the show I am blocking God from my life. I pray I can remember this when I allow myself to get caught up into self. The most important thing is that today I am willing to grow along spiritual lines, and that God is everything. When I was trying to quit drinking on my own, it never worked; with God and A.A., it is working. This seems to be a simple thought for a complicated alcoholic.

Step Two Video 12 And 12

Step Two Video 12 And 12

 

 

Step One Video 12 & 12

Step One Video 12 & 12

 

AA Big Book Video | Chapter 1 | Bill's Story |

AA Big Book Video | Chapter 1 | Bill's Story |

 

AA Big Book Video | Chapter 2 | There Is A Solution |

AA Big Book Video | Chapter 2 | There Is A Solution |

 

 

AA Big Book Video | Chapter 3 | More About Alcoholism |

AA Big Book Video | Chapter 3 | More About Alcoholism |

 

 

AA Big Book Video | Chapter 4 | We Agnostics |

AA Big Book Video | Chapter 4 | We Agnostics |

 

 

AA Big Book Video | Chapter 5 | How It Works |

AA Big Book Video | Chapter 5 | How It Works |

 

Alcoholics Anonymous Videos, AA is for Alcoholics, AA 12 Steps, Addiction And Recovery, DonInLondon, Don Oddy,

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