For Today: May 4th

Healing is a matter of time, but it is sometimes also a matter of opportunity.

Hippocrates

“It takes what it takes” is the way one of our OA sayings puts it. That is indisputable, of course, healing is in God’s time and will not be rushed simply because we demand it.

It is well, however, to watch for opportunity. A member with many years of abstinence recall that all she did her first two years was slip, leave OA in disgust and come back. During that period, she had several spiritual experiences---fleeting moments when she felt free of the obsession and sensed a need to begin immediately to find a sponsor and start working the steps. But each time, she let the feeling pass without acting on it. It took her two years of binging and weight gain to take the opportunity held out to her.

Today, she accepts that this too may be considered “God’s timetable,” but points out that it was she, not God, who passed up her chances.

For Today: I look for every opportunity to recover—to have abstinence with peace of mind and to realize all the other promises of this program.

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It's easy to slip back into the old ways and to lose sight of my OA program if I'm not careful. Food lurks around every corner & it's easy to convince myself how One Bite Won't Hurt.  When I keep abstinence as my top priority, I do not waver from my Food Plan because I KNOW just HOW much one bite CAN hurt me. 

Attending OA meetings helps me stay connected to other compulsive overeaters & for some reason, the meetings drive home the seriousness of the disease.  When I hear and share stories with others, I realize I am not alone & that helps me tremendously. When I see a member who's been in recovery for 20 years, I see the miracle that is God.

For today, I pray to take every opportunity I can to stay in Recovery, one day at a time.