*AA Thought for the Day* (courtesy AA-Alive.net) *May 9, 2019* *Quick Inventory* The quick inventory is aimed at our daily ups and downs, especially those where people or new events throw us off balance and tempt us to make mistakes. In all these situations we need self-restraint, honest analysis of what is involved, a willingness to admit when the fault is ours, and an equal willingness to forgive when the fault is elsewhere.  - Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions, (Step Ten) p. 91 Thought to Ponder I can’t fix ...Continue Reading

*AA Thought for the Day* (courtesy AA-Alive.net) *May 8, 2019* *Guidance For Our Lives* We discover that we do receive guidance for our lives to just about the extent that we stop making demands upon God to give it to us on order and on our terms. Almost any experienced A.A. will tell how his affairs have taken remarkable and unexpected turns for the better as he tried to improve his conscious contact with God.  - Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions, (Step Eleven) pp. 104 - 105 Thought to Ponder The Three " ...Continue Reading

*AA Thought for the Day* (courtesy AA-Alive.net) *May 7, 2019* *Success* Now that we're in A.A. and sober, and winning back the esteem of our friends and business associates, we find that we still need to exercise special vigilance. As an insurance against "big-shot-ism" we can often check ourselves by remembering that we are today sober only by the grace of God and that any success we may be having is far more His success than ours.  - Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions, (Step Ten) p. 92 Thought to P ...Continue Reading

*AA Thought for the Day* (courtesy AA-Alive.net) *May 6, 2019* *Spiritual Matters* Faced with alcoholic destruction, we soon became as open minded on spiritual matters as we had tried to be on other questions. In this respect alcohol was a great persuader. It finally beat us into a state of reasonableness. Sometimes this was a tedious process; we hope no one else will be prejudiced for as long as some of us were.  - Alcoholics Anonymous, (We Agnostics) p. 48 Thought to Ponder The ultimate defense against the fi ...Continue Reading

AA Thought for the Day (courtesy AA-Alive.net) May 5, 2019 ~ Scroll Down for Share ~ *Bondage of Self* We were now at Step Three. Many of us said to our Maker, as we understood Him: "God, I offer myself to Thee—to build with me and to do with me as Thou wilt. Relieve me of the bondage of self, that I may better do Thy will. Take away my difficulties, that victory over them may bear witness to those I would help of Thy Power, Thy Love, and Thy Way of life. May I do Thy will always!"  - Alcoholics Anony ...Continue Reading

*AA Thought for the Day* (courtesy AA-Alive.net) *May 4, 2019* *Building an Arch* Carefully reading the first five proposals we ask if we have omitted anything, for we are building an arch through which we shall walk a free man at last. Is our work solid so far? Are the stones properly in place? Have we skimped on the cement put into the foundation? Have we tried to make mortar without sand? If we can answer to our satisfaction, we then look at Step Six.  - Alcoholics Anonymous, (Into Action) pp. 75 - 76 Though ...Continue Reading

*AA Thought for the Day* (courtesy AA-Alive.net) *May 3, 2019* *Pocket Our Pride* We pocket our pride and go to it, illuminating every twist of character, every dark cranny of the past. Once we have taken this step, withholding nothing, we are delighted. We can look the world in the eye. We can be alone at perfect peace and ease. Our fears fall from us. We begin to feel the nearness of our Creator.  - Alcoholics Anonymous, (Into Action) p. 75 Thought to Ponder Swallowing my pride will not get me drunk. AA-rela ...Continue Reading

*AA Thought for the Day* (courtesy AA-Alive.net) *May 2, 2019* *Step Five* Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs. This is perhaps difficult—especially discussing our defects with another person. We think we have done well enough in admitting these things to ourselves. There is doubt about that. In actual practice, we usually find a solitary self-appraisal insufficient. Many of us thought it necessary to go much further.  - Alcoholics Anonymous, (Into Action) p. ...Continue Reading

*AA Thought for the Day* (courtesy AA-Alive.net) *May 1, 2019* *Tradition One* "Our common welfare should come first; personal recovery depends upon A.A. unity." Eventually, of course, we cooperate because we really wish to; we see that without substantial unity there can be no A.A., and that without A.A. there can be little lasting recovery for anyone. We gladly set aside personal ambitions whenever these might harm A.A. We humbly confess that we are but "a small part of a great whole."  - ...Continue Reading

*AA Thought for the Day* (courtesy AA-Alive.net) *April 30, 2019* *Alcoholic Or Not?* We do not like to pronounce any individual as alcoholic, but you can quickly diagnose yourself. Step over to the nearest barroom and try some controlled drinking. Try to drink and stop abruptly. Try it more than once. It will not take long for you to decide, if you are honest with yourself about it. It may be worth a bad case of jitters if you get a full knowledge of your condition.  - Alcoholics Anonymous, (More About Alcoholi ...Continue Reading

*AA Thought for the Day* (courtesy AA-Alive.net) *April 29, 2019* *The Right Thing* When I am willing to do the right thing, I am rewarded with an inner peace no amount of liquor could ever provide. When I am unwilling to do the right thing, I become restless, irritable, and discontent. It is always my choice. Through the Twelve Steps, I have been granted the gift of choice. I am no longer at the mercy of a disease that tells me the only answer is to drink.  - Alcoholics Anonymous, (My Chance to Live) p. 317 T ...Continue Reading

AA Thought for the Day (courtesy AA-Alive.net) April 28, 2019 ~ Scroll Down for Share ~ *Quit Playing God* He is the Father, and we are His children. Most good ideas are simple, and this concept was the keystone of the new and triumphant arch through which we passed to freedom. When we sincerely took such a position, all sorts of remarkable things followed. We had a new Employer. Being all powerful, He provided what we needed, if we kept close to Him and performed His work well.  - Alcoholics Anonymous, (How It ...Continue Reading

*AA Thought for the Day* (courtesy AA-Alive.net) *April 27, 2019* *Pride In Reverse* As we morbidly pursue this melancholy activity, we may sink to such a point of despair that nothing but oblivion looks possible as a solution. Here, of course, we have lost all perspective, and therefore all genuine humility. For this is pride in reverse. This is not a moral inventory at all; it is the very process by which the depressive has so often been led to the bottle and extinction.  - Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions, ...Continue Reading

*AA Thought for the Day* (courtesy AA-Alive.net) *April 26, 2019* *Pride* For pride, leading to self-justification, and always spurred by conscious or unconscious fears, is the basic breeder of most human difficulties, the chief block to true progress. Pride lures us into making demands upon ourselves or upon others which cannot be met without perverting or misusing our God-given instincts.  - Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions, (Step Four) pp. 48 - 49 Thought to Ponder Swallowing my pride will not get me drun ...Continue Reading

*AA Thought for the Day* (courtesy AA-Alive.net) *April 25, 2019* *"Number One" Offender* Resentment is the "number one" offender. It destroys more alcoholics than anything else. From it stem all forms of spiritual disease, for we have been not only mentally and physically ill, we have been spiritually sick. When the spiritual malady is overcome, we straighten out mentally and physically.  - Alcoholics Anonymous, (How It Works) p. 64 Thought to Ponder We are prisoners of our own resentments ...Continue Reading