AA Thought for the Day (courtesy AA-Alive.net) February 3, 2022 Spiritual Approach "As to two of you men, whose stories I have heard, there is no doubt in my mind that you were 100% hopeless, apart from divine help. Had you offered yourselves as patients at this hospital, I would not have taken you, if I had been able to avoid it. People like you are too heartbreaking. Though not a religious person, I have profound respect for the spiritual approach in such cases as yours. For most cases, there is virtually no o ...Continue Reading

AA Thought for the Day (courtesy AA-Alive.net) February 2, 2022 Tormenting Ghosts If we have swept the searchlight of Step Four back and forth over our careers, and it has revealed in stark relief those experiences we'd rather not remember, if we have come to know how wrong thinking and action have hurt us and others, then the need to quit living by ourselves with those tormenting ghosts of yesterday gets more urgent than ever. We have to talk to somebody about them. - Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions, (Step Five) ...Continue Reading

AA Thought for the Day (courtesy AA-Alive.net) February 1, 2022 Conditions We thought "conditions" drove us to drink, and when we tried to correct these conditions and found that we couldn't to our entire satisfaction, our drinking went out of hand and we became alcoholics. It never occurred to us that we needed to change ourselves to meet conditions, whatever they were. - Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions, (Step Four) p. 47 Thought to Ponder If you want to change who you are, change what you do. AA-rela ...Continue Reading

AA Thought for the Day (courtesy AA-Alive.net) January 31, 2022 Only You Can Decide Consider your drinking carefully in the light of what you may learn from these pages. Determine, for yourself, whether or not alcohol has truly become a problem for you. And remember that you will always be most welcome to join the thousands of men and women in A.A. who have put their drinking problems behind them and now lead "normal" lives of constructive, day-by-day sobriety. - This Is A.A. An introduction to the A.A. Rec ...Continue Reading

AA Thought for the Day (courtesy AA-Alive.net) January 30, 2022 ~ Scroll Down for Share ~ Rigorous Honesty Who wishes to be rigorously honest and tolerant? Who wants to confess his faults to another and make restitution for harm done? . . . No, the average alcoholic, self-centered in the extreme, doesn't care for this prospect—unless he has to do these things in order to stay alive himself. - Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions, (Step One) p. 24  Thought to Ponder Honesty is the absence of the intent to deceive. ...Continue Reading

AA Thought for the Day (courtesy AA-Alive.net) January 29, 2022 Entirely Ready So Step Six—"Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character"—is A.A.'s way of stating the best possible attitude one can take in order to make a beginning on this lifetime job. This does not mean that we expect all our character defects to be lifted out of us as the drive to drink was. A few of them may be, but with most of them we shall have to be content with patient improvement. The key words "entir ...Continue Reading

AA Thought for the Day (courtesy AA-Alive.net) January 28, 2022 A Vital Part Outline the program of action, explaining how you made a self-appraisal, how you straightened out your past and why you are now endeavoring to be helpful to him. It is important for him to realize that your attempt to pass this on to him plays a vital part in your own recovery. Actually, he may be helping you more than you are helping him. - Alcoholics Anonymous, (Working With Others) p. 94 Thought to Ponder We must give it away to keep it. ...Continue Reading

AA Thought for the Day (courtesy AA-Alive.net) January 27, 2022 Decide for Himself If he is sincerely interested and wants to see you again, ask him to read this book in the interval. After doing that, he must decide for himself whether he wants to go on. He should not be pushed or prodded by you, his wife, or his friends. If he is to find God, the desire must come from within. - Alcoholics Anonymous, (Working With Others) p. 95 Thought to Ponder Expectations are premeditated resentments. AA-related 'Alconym' D E T ...Continue Reading

AA Thought for the Day (courtesy AA-Alive.net) January 26, 2022 New Treasure Joy at our release from a lifetime of frustration knew no bounds. Father feels he has struck something better than gold. For a time he may try to hug the new treasure to himself. He may not see at once that he has barely scratched a limitless lode which will pay dividends only if he mines it for the rest of his life and insists on giving away the entire product. - Alcoholics Anonymous, (The Family Afterward) pp. 128 - 129 Thought to Ponder ...Continue Reading

AA Thought for the Day (courtesy AA-Alive.net) January 25, 2022 This Physical Factor It did not satisfy us to be told that we could not control our drinking just because we were maladjusted to life, that we were in full flight from reality, or were outright mental defectives. These things were true to some extent, in fact, to a considerable extent with some of us. But we are sure that our bodies were sickened as well. In our belief, any picture of the alcoholic which leaves out this physical factor is incomplete. - A ...Continue Reading

AA Thought for the Day (courtesy AA-Alive.net) January 24, 2022 Tradition One Our A.A. experience has taught us that: Each member of Alcoholics Anonymous is but a small part of a great whole. A.A. must continue to live or most of us will surely die. Hence our common welfare comes first. But individual welfare follows close afterward. - Alcoholics Anonymous, (Appendix I, The A.A. Tradition) p. 563 Thought to Ponder There is no strength without unity. AA-related 'Alconym' A A's - R - U S  =   Alcoholics Ano ...Continue Reading

AA Thought for the Day (courtesy AA-Alive.net) January 23, 2022 ~ Scroll Down for Share ~ Step Two "Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity." "Sanity" is defined as "soundness of mind." Yet no alcoholic, soberly analyzing his destructive behavior, whether the destruction fell on the dining-room furniture or his own moral fiber, can claim "soundness of mind" for himself. Therefore, Step Two is the rallying point for all of us. - Twelve Ste ...Continue Reading

AA Thought for the Day (courtesy AA-Alive.net) January 22, 2022 Continue to Watch Continue to watch for selfishness, dishonesty, resentment, and fear. When these crop up, we ask God at once to remove them. We discuss them with someone immediately and make amends quickly if we have harmed anyone. Then we resolutely turn our thoughts to someone we can help. Love and tolerance of others is our code. - Alcoholics Anonymous, (Into Action) p. 84 Thought to Ponder The 3 A’s -- Awareness, Acceptance, Action. AA-related 'Al ...Continue Reading

AA Thought for the Day (courtesy AA-Alive.net) January 21, 2022 Making Good Sometimes we hear an alcoholic say that the only thing he needs to do is to keep sober. Certainly he must keep sober, for there will be no home if he doesn’t. But he is yet a long way from making good to the wife or parents whom for years he has so shockingly treated. - Alcoholics Anonymous, (Into Action) p. 82 Thought to Ponder Without change I am just a non-drinking drunk. AA-related 'Alconym' A C T I O N  =   Any Change To Impr ...Continue Reading

AA Thought for the Day (courtesy AA-Alive.net) January 20, 2022 Convinced From this doctor, the broker had learned the grave nature of alcoholism. Though he could not accept all the tenets of the Oxford Groups, he was convinced of the need for moral inventory, confession of personality defects, restitution to those harmed, helpfulness to others, and the necessity of belief in and dependence upon God. - Alcoholics Anonymous, (Foreword To The Second Edition) p. xvi Thought to Ponder AA is not something we join; it's a ...Continue Reading