Recovery Meditations: October 14th
Patience
“Patience and perseverance have a magical effect
before which difficulties and obstacles vanish.”
John Quincy Adams
When I first walked through the meeting doors, I wanted recovery and I wanted it now! Give me the magic wand, I’ll waive it, then get on with my life—I thought.
One of the most difficult things I’ve had to learn is the art of patience and allowing God to work within his own time while I do the footwork to the best of my ability. It is my belief that the universe and my Higher Power will order the next level of my physical recovery. Physical recovery does not grow without spiritual progress. This Program is a journey, not a crash-course in fad dieting.
When I struggled with bouts of pride connected to my levels of patience and God’s timing, I knew I was uncovering yet another character flaw that could delay my spiritual recovery. Spiritual recovery, as “Old-timers” have told us again and again, is the actual foundation of the program. The “inner” person will eventually make its way to the outer person.
One day at a time...
Today I will slow down, take a deep breath, and just remind myself that my Higher Power is in control and that my natural pattern will develop under His nurture, care, and control.
~ January
Each Day a New Beginning
The balance between mind and spirit
comes hard for me. The eternal split. Two entities, perfectly aware and
yet perfectly unwilling to cooperate.
—Mary Casey
The program directs our spiritual growth, a human aspect that had atrophied, if ever it had existed, for most of us before abstinence. And the process of developing our spiritual nature is painstaking. Living by our wits, or the fervent application of "situational analysis" had been our survival tools for months or years.
To return repeatedly to the old tools for quick solutions to serious situations is second nature. Learning to rely on spiritual guidance for solutions and to use it to sharpen our analytical focus takes patience and continual effort.
Within our spiritual realm we find our connection to God. We have been given the wisdom; all the knowledge we need is at our fingertips. The confidence to move ahead and offer our special talent to others comes from our Spirit. We are all that we need to be. Our mind and our Spirits, in concert, can tackle any challenge and succeed.
My mind and my Spirit can become compatible entities with the development of my trust in each. Knowledge plus courage can move mountains. I have been given both.
—Mary Casey
The program directs our spiritual growth, a human aspect that had atrophied, if ever it had existed, for most of us before abstinence. And the process of developing our spiritual nature is painstaking. Living by our wits, or the fervent application of "situational analysis" had been our survival tools for months or years.
To return repeatedly to the old tools for quick solutions to serious situations is second nature. Learning to rely on spiritual guidance for solutions and to use it to sharpen our analytical focus takes patience and continual effort.
Within our spiritual realm we find our connection to God. We have been given the wisdom; all the knowledge we need is at our fingertips. The confidence to move ahead and offer our special talent to others comes from our Spirit. We are all that we need to be. Our mind and our Spirits, in concert, can tackle any challenge and succeed.
My mind and my Spirit can become compatible entities with the development of my trust in each. Knowledge plus courage can move mountains. I have been given both.
From Each Day a New Beginning: Daily Meditations for Women by Karen Casey
© 1982, 1991 by Hazelden Foundation.
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Food for Thought
Surrender
Continuing to take the first three Steps enables us to become increasingly surrendered to our Higher Power. Our goal is to let our egotistical selves be dissolved in a greater Self, so that the Higher Power lives through us. The loss of ego frightens us and attacks our illusions of self-sufficiency.
Here is where we can be grateful for our disease. If we were not convinced of our helplessness in the face of our obsession with food, we would not be desperate enough to surrender to a Higher Power. Only after we have tried and failed over and over again in our battle with compulsive overeating are we willing to accept the OA program.
We surrender in order to stop eating compulsively. We gain infinitely more than we had expected. Not only does our Higher Power give us abstinence from compulsive overeating, but also more than that He gives us Himself. No longer do we live as an isolated, weak self, but in us lives the Power of the universe.
May we surrender completely to Your power.
Continuing to take the first three Steps enables us to become increasingly surrendered to our Higher Power. Our goal is to let our egotistical selves be dissolved in a greater Self, so that the Higher Power lives through us. The loss of ego frightens us and attacks our illusions of self-sufficiency.
Here is where we can be grateful for our disease. If we were not convinced of our helplessness in the face of our obsession with food, we would not be desperate enough to surrender to a Higher Power. Only after we have tried and failed over and over again in our battle with compulsive overeating are we willing to accept the OA program.
We surrender in order to stop eating compulsively. We gain infinitely more than we had expected. Not only does our Higher Power give us abstinence from compulsive overeating, but also more than that He gives us Himself. No longer do we live as an isolated, weak self, but in us lives the Power of the universe.
May we surrender completely to Your power.
From Food for Thought: Daily Meditations for Overeaters by Elisabeth L.
©1980, 1992 by Hazelden Foundation
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The Language of Letting Go
Controlling Versus Trust
There was a time in my life when I felt so afraid of and overwhelmed by the very act of living that I actually wanted to make out a schedule for each day of my life for the next five years. I wanted to include all the chores I had to do, when I would do them, even when I would schedule relaxation. I wanted to get some order into what felt overwhelming. I wanted to feel like I was in control.
—Anonymous
Controlling is a direct response to our fear, panic, and sense of helplessness. It is a direct response to feeling overwhelmed, and to distrust.
We may not trust ourselves, our Higher Power, the Plan, the Universe, or the process of life. Instead of trusting, we revert to control.
We can approach this need to control by dealing with our fear. We deal with fear by trusting - ourselves, our Higher Power, the love and support of the Universe, the Plan, and this process we call life and recovery.
We can trust that when things don't work out the way we want, God has something better planned.
We can trust ourselves to get where we need to go, say what we need to say, do what we need to do, know what we need to know, be who we need to be, and become all we can become, when we are intended to do that, when we are ready, and when the time is right.
We can trust our Higher Power and the Universe to give us all the direction we need.
We can trust ourselves to listen, and respond, accordingly.
We can trust that all we need on this journey shall come to us. We will not get all we need for the entire journey today. We shall receive today's supplies today, and tomorrow's supplies tomorrow. We were never intended to carry supplies for the entire journey. The burden would be too heavy, and the way was intended to be light.
Trust in yourself. We do not have to plan, control, and schedule all things. The schedule and plan have been written. All we need to do is show up.
The way will become clear and the supplies will be amply and clearly provided, one day at a time.
Trust, my friend, in today.
Today, I will trust that I will receive all I need to get me through today. I will trust that the same shall happen tomorrow.
There was a time in my life when I felt so afraid of and overwhelmed by the very act of living that I actually wanted to make out a schedule for each day of my life for the next five years. I wanted to include all the chores I had to do, when I would do them, even when I would schedule relaxation. I wanted to get some order into what felt overwhelming. I wanted to feel like I was in control.
—Anonymous
Controlling is a direct response to our fear, panic, and sense of helplessness. It is a direct response to feeling overwhelmed, and to distrust.
We may not trust ourselves, our Higher Power, the Plan, the Universe, or the process of life. Instead of trusting, we revert to control.
We can approach this need to control by dealing with our fear. We deal with fear by trusting - ourselves, our Higher Power, the love and support of the Universe, the Plan, and this process we call life and recovery.
We can trust that when things don't work out the way we want, God has something better planned.
We can trust ourselves to get where we need to go, say what we need to say, do what we need to do, know what we need to know, be who we need to be, and become all we can become, when we are intended to do that, when we are ready, and when the time is right.
We can trust our Higher Power and the Universe to give us all the direction we need.
We can trust ourselves to listen, and respond, accordingly.
We can trust that all we need on this journey shall come to us. We will not get all we need for the entire journey today. We shall receive today's supplies today, and tomorrow's supplies tomorrow. We were never intended to carry supplies for the entire journey. The burden would be too heavy, and the way was intended to be light.
Trust in yourself. We do not have to plan, control, and schedule all things. The schedule and plan have been written. All we need to do is show up.
The way will become clear and the supplies will be amply and clearly provided, one day at a time.
Trust, my friend, in today.
Today, I will trust that I will receive all I need to get me through today. I will trust that the same shall happen tomorrow.
From The Language of Letting Go by Melody Beattie
©1990, Hazelden Foundation
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Argue not concerning God.
--Walt Whitman
Newcomer
It's obvious from what I hear people saying in meetings that God is a pretty important part of Twelve Step programs. What if I don't believe in God or a Higher Power?
Sponsor
We don't need religion in order to recover. The only requirement for membership is a desire to stop using our preferred addictive substance or behavior. To recover, we have to put down what we're addicted to, and we have to come to meetings. Not easy, perhaps, but simple and clear.
Whether or not we believe in God, most of us recognize that we don't live entirely independently. The phrase "a power greater than ourselves," from Step Two, is a reminder to me that I don't run the universe. Whatever I believe about God's existence, I have to accept that I myself am not God - if I'm going to recover. I can't control my addiction on my own. Willpower stopped working for me some time ago; I owe this newfound willingness to recover to someone or something that isn't my intellect or will.
Those who reject traditional concepts of God can still point to something inside - what some call their "better self," their "sense of right and wrong," their "higher self," or their "spirit" - that got them here. The desire for wholeness has somehow proved stronger than the impulse toward self-destruction.
Today, I accept that I'm not all-powerful.
You are reading from the book:
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