Each Day a New Beginning: September 30th

Birds sing after a storm; why shouldn't people feel as free to delight in whatever remains to them?
—Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy

We choose the lives we lead. We choose sadness or happiness; success for failure; dread or excited anticipation. Whether or not we are conscious of our choices, we are making them every moment.

Accepting full responsibility for our actions is one of the requirements of maturity. Not always the easiest thing to do, but necessary to our further development. An unexpected benefit of accepting our responsibility is that it heightens our awareness of personal power. Our well being is within our power. Happiness is within our power. Our attitude about any condition, present or future, is within our power, if we take it.

Life is "doing unto us" only what we allow. And it will favor us with whatever we choose. If we look for excitement, we'll find it. We can search out the positive in any experience. All situations present seeds of new understanding, if we are open to them. Our responses to the events around us determine whatever meaning life offers. We are in control of our outlook. And our outlook decides our future.

This day is mine, fully, to delight in - or to dread. The decision is always mine.

From Each Day a New Beginning: Daily Meditations for Women by Karen Casey © 1982, 1991 by Hazelden Foundation.

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Living the 'victim' mentality is a choice......however, not a choice that will keep me sober & at a healthy weight.  If I feel self pity that I can't have my cake & eat it too, then I will go back to overeating & drinking myself into a stupor.  If I choose sadness, failure & dread, I will justify why I 'need' to practice my addictions to stay happy.

If I do not change everything about my life, and actively seek OUT new people, places & things, I will not keep myself in recovery status. I will continue feeling sorry for myself that addiction has 'ruined' my life.  It hasn't 'ruined' my life.........it's been a huge blessing in many ways.  Had I not developed addictions, I never would have found Recovery and learned a new & BETTER way to live! I would have remained stuck in my own head, thinking the same thoughts over & over & OVER again, insisting that life was 'no good' without booze & food.  I never would have seen that I was enslaved to food & drink, having NO freedom to Be all that God intended me TO be.

Developing a new lifestyle is crucial to long term recovery.  If I want to stay sober, I will not surround myself with people who drink.  If I want to maintain a healthy body weight through abstinence from compulsive overeating, I will not cook elaborate meals in the kitchen, nor surround myself with delicious foods that I can't eat AND maintain abstinence at the same time.  I will not tempt myself unnecessarily. Tempting myself gives me license to feel self-pity.  Instead, I will give myself permission TO be happy, addiction free & living in the light instead of the darkness.

The only thing that has to change is EVERYTHING, if I am to maintain Recovery.  I know that I will have bad days, where life feels terrible. I will recognize this as a part OF Recovery, without believing the bad day will last forever. I will actively seek out new ways to re-direct my thinking towards healthful & useful pursuits.  

There are many tools I use to maintain my abstinence, but none of them is as important to me as service. I do a lot of service, but it’s not for fame or glory: I do service in order to keep my program strong.

 

For today, I will get out of my own head & give service to someone in need.