Recovery
Meditations: October 27th
Living in the Present
“As long as you are
seeking to find happiness somewhere,
you are overlooking
where true happiness is.”
Gangaji
Happiness is always somewhere else, isn’t it? It is all too
human to put off our happiness until a more appropriate or perfect time.
Ideally, we know that happiness is not a matter of timing; it is a state of
mind caused by even the smallest actions that we take (or fail to take) each
day. However, I often used to remark to others that, “One day I will be happy
when I get thin.” I got much thinner, but never thin enough, it seems. “One day
I will take a night course.” I was so busy working, “on-call”, and doing things
for others that I never managed to find the time.
“One day I will start this new food Plan,” I’d promised
myself. It had worked for others. I truly wanted to give myself a chance to see
if it could work for me too, yet I approached it haphazardly, at first. On
paper, any food plan is just a diet, unless, you have a Sponsor, use the Tools,
and work the Steps! I’d been told this over and over, and later--lived the
actual experience of doing it my way. As long as I told myself, “One day I will
find the time for me,” it didn’t come about!
One day at a time...
I now realize that as
long as I keep looking to the future in order to allot myself wonderful
challenges and small joys, I am choosing to postpone my happiness until my life
is perfect, which is never in the realm of reality. I believe that this is why
those who have gone before us in recovery suggest that we live life on life’s
terms to the best of our ability just “One day at a time.”
~ January K.
************************************
Each Day A New Beginning
—S. H.
We will not be free from all difficulties today, or during any period of our lives. But we have the personal power to eliminate the threat, the sting of any challenge. But it's our vision of circumstances that gives them their interpretation.
At this moment, we are defining our experience. We are labeling events good or bad, valuable or meaningless. And our growth, particularly this day, is greatly influenced by the value judgments we attach to our experiences.
As we grow stronger emotionally and spiritually, we learn that all difficulties are truly opportunities for exceptional growth and increased awareness of the truth of existence. All experiences can be taken in stride if we are trustful of their intended blessing.
We are sharing this life, every moment of it, with a power greater than ourselves. We need not worry about any circumstance. Always we are watched over. We never need struggle alone.
We can let go of our problems. It's ourselves and that attitude we have cultivated that makes any situation a problem. We can turn it loose and therein discover the solution.
I will not make mountains out of the molehills of my life.
From Each Day
a New Beginning: Daily Meditations for Women by Karen Casey © 1982,
1991 by Hazelden Foundation.
Food For Thought
A good meal for us is an abstinent meal. Fancy frills and gourmet delights are not good if they threaten our abstinence. Because we have over emphasized food in the past, we tend to be too concerned about what we will have for dinner - and lunch - and breakfast.
It is a relief to come to the conclusion that whatever we have to eat is good if it fits our food plan. We do not have to spend a lot of time and energy deciding what we will eat today. If what we choose does not turn out to be especially pleasing, we are free to choose something else tomorrow.
Most of us are familiar with the basic principles of good nutrition. By abstaining from compulsive overeating, we are giving our bodies the best possible treatment. By avoiding refined sugars and starches, we eliminate empty calories and choose those foods with the protein, vitamins, and minerals necessary for good health. Whatever we eat, the abstinent meal is a good meal.
Thank You for good, abstinent meals.
From Food for
Thought: Daily Meditations for Overeaters by Elisabeth L. ©1980, 1992
by Hazelden Foundation.
The Language of Letting Go
Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God, as we understood Him, praying only for knowledge of His will for us and the power to carry that out.
—Step Eleven of Al Anon
"... praying only for knowledge of His will for us and the power to carry that out" means that we ask on a daily basis to be shown the plan for that day. We also ask our Source for the power we need to carry that through. We will get a yes to both requests.
We do not ask other people to show their will for us. We ask God. Then we trust that we'll be empowered to carry God's will through.
God never, never asks us to do anything that He would not equip us to do. He never asks us to do anything we can't do. If we are to do it, we will be empowered. That's the easy part of this program. We never have to do more than we can, or anything we can't. If we want to worry and fuss we can, but we don't need to. That is our choice.
I have learned, through difficult and good times that this Step will carry me through. When I don't know what to do next, God does. Working this Step, one day at a time, will take us to places we could never have traveled on our own. Simple acts, done daily in accordance to God's will for us, lead to a Grand Plan for our life.
Today, I will focus on asking God to show me what He wants me to do. I will ask God for the power to do that; then I will go ahead and get the job done. God, help me let go of my fears about living life one day at a time. Help me trust that when life is lived simply and in trust, a beautiful mosaic called "my life" will be woven. I am being divinely led, guided, and cared for.
From The
Language of Letting Go by Melody Beattie ©1990, Hazelden Foundation.
Today's thought from the Hazelden Betty Ford Foundation is:
We learn from making mistakes and repairing them.
We do not believe in perfection, we believe in mending. We make progress toward a goal, but we seldom move in a straight line toward it without missteps. Life is like a zigzag chain of events that first brings everything together just as we want and then spills it all over again. We try to do our best, but inevitably we make mistakes. So a large part of normal daily life is spent mending.
When we accept imperfection as a fact of life, we make peace with the constant need for repairs. Saying I made a mistake and I owe you an apology is never fun, but when we do it we grow stronger. Every disappointment, every complaint, points to an underlying hope or wish. We can use them to point us to repairs we would like to make. We do not learn anything new from correctly repeating what we already know. We learn from making mistakes and repairing them.
Select one complaint or one mistake that you want to mend and turn it into a learning experience.
We learn from making mistakes and repairing them.
We do not believe in perfection, we believe in mending. We make progress toward a goal, but we seldom move in a straight line toward it without missteps. Life is like a zigzag chain of events that first brings everything together just as we want and then spills it all over again. We try to do our best, but inevitably we make mistakes. So a large part of normal daily life is spent mending.
When we accept imperfection as a fact of life, we make peace with the constant need for repairs. Saying I made a mistake and I owe you an apology is never fun, but when we do it we grow stronger. Every disappointment, every complaint, points to an underlying hope or wish. We can use them to point us to repairs we would like to make. We do not learn anything new from correctly repeating what we already know. We learn from making mistakes and repairing them.
Select one complaint or one mistake that you want to mend and turn it into a learning experience.
You are reading from the book:
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