10/12/2023 0 Comments Daily reflections aa february 24thPutting another person’s needs first is what most of us were trained to do when growing up. I have sacrificed everything in my life that I consider precious in order to advance the political career of my husband. Today I’ll expect the best, but I will know that I also have the spiritual resources to deal with the worst that can happen. We cannot use another’s failure as an excuse for negligence on our part. At the same time, we can grow by becoming more reliable and dependable ourselves. Our personal responsibility is to do our best even when others fall short of our expectations. It’s possible, too, that we’ve been unrealistic in some of our expectations and have set ourselves up for disappointments. They are not here to please or satisfy us. Our best course is to live without expecting too much from others. Their mistakes and lapses come from the human shortcomings all of us have. While never losing trust in others, we must accept them as fallible people. Our growth, however, should teach us that such failures are part of life. If we have been counting on them, their nonperformance can cause us real anger and frustration. either intentionally or because of indifference or incompetence. There will be times when other people will disappoint us. Provided we strenuously avoid turning these realistic surveys of the facts of life into unrealistic alibis for apathy or defeatism, they can be the sure foundation upon which increased emotional heath and therefore spiritual progress can be built. This is an exercise in acceptance that we can profitably practice every day of our lives. Again and again, we shall need to return to that unflattering point of departure. This is to adopt a realistic humility without which no genuine advance can even begin. Our very first problem is to accept our present circumstances as they are, ourselves as we are, and the people about us as they are. Too often we are heard to say, ‘If it weren’t for him (or her), how happy I’d be!” This is a most subtle and perverse form of self-satisfaction, which permits us to remain comfortably unaware of our own defects. “Too much of my life has been spent in dwelling upon the faults of others. I pray that I may not give up in the final stretch. I pray that I may press on until the goal is reached. They never knew how near the goal they were or how near they were to victory. The saddest records made by people are those who ran well, with brave stout hearts, until the sight of the goal and then some weakness or self-indulgence held them back. ![]() The goal of the spiritual life is in sight. In a race, it is when a goal is in sight that heart and nerves and muscles and courage are strained almost to the breaking point. ![]() When I think of liquor now, do I think of it as something that I can never tolerate again? After that, if we took one drink we would sooner or later end up drunk. Sometimes we can’t help thinking: Why can’t we ever drink again? We know it’s because we’re alcoholics, but why did we have to get that way? The answer is that at some point in our drinking careers, we passed what is called our “tolerance point.” When we passed this point, we passed from a condition in which we could tolerate alcohol to a condition in which we could not tolerate it at all. ![]() It does not make me better than anyone else, and it is not a particularly reliable tool for recovery, for it is a power greater than myself who will restore me to sanity–not a high IQ or a college degree. I try to remember that intelligence is a God-given attribute that I may use, a joy–like having a talent for dancing or drawing or carpentry. To the intellectually self-sufficient man or woman, many A.A.’s can say, “Yes, we were like you–far too smart for our own good … Secretly, we felt we could float above the rest of the folks on our brain power alone.”Įven the most brilliant mind is no defense against the disease of alcoholism.
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