From the Book

Things My Sponsors Taught ME
By Paul H.

On the Present

Now is all we have. The past is just that and the future is out of reach. If we make a deal with ourselves to stay sober now, and keep it, we’re home free.

A.A. teachings again and again emphasized the need to live in the present, to avoid projection on the future, or dwelling on the past. We can do nothing about our program, about our sobriety, about our recovery, except now. Whatever we did or didn’t do yesterday is done. It either helped or hindered our recovery, but it’s beyond our capacity to change in any way.

We can either fear or look forward to tomorrow. We can prepare for it or not. But e can’t do the slightest thing about tomorrow’s recovery. We can’t take a drink tomorrow, or refrain from taking one. As my sponsors said, if we can get a handle on staying sober today, we’re home free.


Please share your Experience, Strength, and Hope

From the Book

Things My Sponsors Taught ME
By Paul H.

ABOUT THE OLD AND THE NEW YOU IN ALCOHOLICS ANONYMOUS

On Changing Your Ways

If you keep on doing what you used to do, you’ll keep getting what you used to get.

This quote came to me from a recovering priest, not from my sponsor, but it’s too good to leave out. What you used to get was drunk, and this quote is strong advice to change the spots on your alcoholic leopard, or you’ll get drunk again. Cheating on your expense account, on your wife or husband, or on your income taxes is all the same; if that’s what you were doing you’d better do something about it, or those old ways will trip you up again.

The moral inventory we are asked to make in Step Four does not contain the words ‘searching and fearless” for nothing. We have to search deeply, or we simply won’t do a thorough job; a sloppy job is almost always worse than a job not done at all. “Fearless” means we must not allow fear to keep us from being searching and thorough, because the alternative to sobriety does not bear thing about.

Please share your Experience, Strength, and Hope

From the Book

Things My Sponsors Taught ME
By Paul H.

On Buying Cigarettes

If you have to smoke, at least by your cigarettes in a drugstore, not in a liquor store, no matter how much cheaper they are.

If you are both a smoker and a recovering alcoholic, the wisdom of A.A. is, “Take care of one addiction at a time.” My sponsor thought the effort of achieving stable sobriety was so important that they didn’t recommend I stop smoking at the same time. “Wait awhile,” they said, “get your drinking out of the way first. Then, when you’re sober, you can afford to think about your smoking.” Sobriety must not share the top spot on your priorities list with anything, or else you may no maintain it. Most successful ex-smoker I know (and that includes myself) used the Twelve Step program for overcoming that addiction, too. But all of them waited until they were sober to quit smoking.


Please share your Experience, Strength, and Hope

From the Book

Things My Sponsors Taught ME
By Paul H.

On Hanging Out with the Old Gang

You need new playgrounds and new playmates.

My first sponsor recommended I tell all of my friends I had stopped drinking. One friend dropped me after I told him, and I think it was because I threatened him by my sobriety. If I had a drinking problem, he may have thought he did, too, and he couldn’t handle that. All of my true friends were unanimously glad I had quit. They had been praying for me, or worried they’d have to go to my funeral. My news to them was nothing but heaven-sent. My sponsor didn’t tell me to stay away from taverns and wild parties; they told me to find new playgrounds and new playmates. Alcoholics have friends who are still in alcoholic mind-sets. We need to avoid this because it’s familiar and comfortable to us and dangerous to our newfound sobriety. “Feel depressed? Get drunk and it’ll all go away!” That’s an example of the way we thought and of the way some of our old playmates still think. We simply cannot afford that sort of thinking.

Please share your Experience, Strength, and Hope

From the Book

Things My Sponsors Taught ME
By Paul H.

On Expecting Praise for Being in A.A.

You shouldn’t expect a medal for finally doing what you were supposed to do in the first place.

Many of us, including myself, feel at first that the world should applaud us for joining A.A. What we’re actually doing is saving our own skins. Self-preservation is a survival skill of normal people. When we finally get around to a little self-preservation instead of self-destruction, we have no right to expect admiration from society.

We join A.A. not for the approval of others, but for our own survival. We stay in A.A. to continue breathing, no to get public acclaim. If we are in A.A. for public notice, we’re high risks to get drunk again.

Please share your Experience, Strength, and Hope

From the Book

Things My Sponsors Taught ME
By Paul H.


ABOUT HIGHER POWERS AND PRAYER

On Belief in a Higher Power

Don’t sweat it. Keep on bringing your body to a meeting and eventually your brain will come along, too.

I’ve already used the above quote in talking about understanding Step Two. The quote bears repeating because our sobriety will be shallow and fragile without understanding and believing in a Higher Power. Some alcoholics are satisfied and believing in a Higher Power. Some alcoholics are satisfied with a concept of electricity or nuclear energy or a steam radiator as Higher Powers. They reason that these are incomprehensible to them and stronger than they are. Electricity, nuclear energy, and steam radiators, however, didn’t help me get sober, and I will not recognize as a Higher Power anything that didn’t help me.

My sponsors are part of my Higher Power, God, as I choose to understand Him. My home group helped me get sober, and it’s a Higher Power to me; I recognize my home group’s actions as God’s actions. A.A. helped me get sober, and it’s also a Higher Power to me. I firmly believe God inspired Bill W. and Dr. Bob. It’s not important that you accept or reject the notion of God as your Higher Power, but it is supremely important to understand that when two or more alcoholics are gathered together, a group is a Higher Power for everybody in it; the group knows more about living sober than any single member

Please share your Experience, Strength, and Hope

From the Book

Things My Sponsors Taught ME
By Paul H.

On Religion and A.A.

It’s perfectly all right to go to church, and it may even help your recovery, but it isn’t necessary.

A.A. is a spiritual program of recovery, but it is not associated with any religious denomination. If A.A. were a Christian organization, where Jewish, Buddhist, Moslem, and atheistic alcoholic go? A.A.’s cofounders kept religion out of the fellowship, thereby assuring its success.

The distinction between spirituality and religion, however, bothers many people. A.A. members recognize that judging others is something they are not qualified to do. Keeping an alcoholic away from the fellowship because of a religious belief amounts to judging that alcoholic. We can’t do that, and that’s way A.A. has no connection (and seeks none) with any religious denomination.

I have experienced Christian love in A.A. meetings; I’ve also been around some of the least religious people I know at those same meetings.

The criticism that A.A. is nonreligious should be answered as follows: that A.A. is nonreligious should be answered as follows: there are good reasons for the separation of church and state, and there are equally good reasons for the separation of church and A.A.


Please share your Experience, Strength, and Hope

From the Book

Things My Sponsors Taught ME
By Paul H.

On the Grace of God

Whenever you see a drunk, remember that it is, but for the grace of God, yourself you see.

We may have a tendency to dwell on our accomplishments. This is silly, particularly with respect to recovery from alcoholism. For some incomprehensible reason, in some inexplicable way, God (by whatever way we understand God) gave us recovery. Therefore, the only difference between us and the drunks we see around us is not some superiority of ours, but the grace of God.

Some theologians have trouble with the concept of the grace of God; arguments abound. Alcoholics in recovery have no trouble at all with the concept. As we come into contact with those yet drunk, we must keep the thought in our minds that we are no better. But for some reason (which has nothing to do with our merits) we are more blessed than them. If our main response to that isn’t gratitude, we’re headed for another drink.

Please share your Experience, Strength, and Hope

From the Book

Things My Sponsors Taught ME
By Paul H.

On the Serenity Prayer

If you’re in a real pinch, try the short form of the Serenity Prayer: “Screw it.” You’ll be surprised how effective it can be.

The beloved Serenity Prayer, as used by A.A., is said as follows: “God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change; the courage to change the things I can; and wisdom to know the difference.” The short form of the Serenity Prayer as quoted is not irreverent. It is prayer. It is a way of saying, “I can’t stop to be formal right now. I’m in a bad place and I need to get rid of these bad feelings. Help me understand that “This, too, will pass,’ and stay with me until it does.”

From time to time, things happen with no warning. Until we develop our A.A. muscles, we need something to help us through the unpredictable crises; the short form is an excellent way. It is short and sweet, it shows a certain amount of wry humor, and, most important of all, it works!


Please share your Experience, Strength, and Hope

From the Book

Things My Sponsors Taught ME
By Paul H.

On Manners

As a child, you learned to say “please” and “thank-you.” Let your first prayer of the day be a “please” for sobriety, and your last prayer of the night be a “thank-you” for a sober day.

My sponsors believe we have a right to ask for help in staying sober. This doesn’t mean we’re entitled to ask God to keep us sober; we can ask for help, but the job is ours. There is a proverb from my home country---“pray for potatoes, but grab a hoe.” ---that says the same thing. An even older saying is: “Without God, we cannot; without us, God will not.” We ask for God’s help, not his performance; that’s our department.

We must also have gratitude. We beg for help, and it is forthcoming. If we fail to acknowledge the gift, it may be withdrawn, and by now we can be certain where that leads.

So, then, every morning we should pray: “please help me to stay sober today.” And every night: “Thank-you for a sober day.”


Please share your Experience, Strength, and Hope

From the Book

Things My Sponsors Taught ME
By Paul H.

On the Answering of Prayers

If you pray right, your prayers are answered. Of course, if you pray wrong, they’re answered, too.

Praying right, to my sponsors, is praying daily for help with sobriety, coupled with gratitude for the help received. As they pointed out, these prayers have a way of being answered positively each time. By following the advice of my sponsors, I have had my prayers answered affirmatively for almost 5,000 consecutive days.

On the other hand, prayers such as, “I’ll do anything you want if you’ll only get me out of this mess,” are generally considered by my sponsors to be prayers that are badly directed.

There’s a story of a little girl whose birthday was approaching; her father heard her praying for a puppy. She didn’t get a puppy on her birthday, and her father teased her about her prayer being unanswered. Her reply was, “God did answer my prayer. He said ‘No.’ “ If we expect a deity or any other source to get us sober and keep us that way, we’re doomed to disappointment. These prayers are answered, but negatively. For the alcoholic, this means staying in the alcoholic quagmire and very possible dying in it.


Please share your Experience, Strength, and Hope

Things My Sponsors Taught ME
By Paul H.

ABOUT ANTABUSE AND TREATMENT

On the advisability of Taking Antabuse

Sure it’s a crutch, but a crutch is very useful if you have a broken leg. Eventually, broken legs heal.

Antabuse is a drug that makes it nearly impossible to drink alcohol. The metabolism of alcohol into carbon dioxide and water is interrupted by Antabuse at the acetaldehyde stage; acetaldehyde is a toxic substance which, given high enough levels, produces a range of unpleasant symptoms. Antabuse has been prescribed most often for alcoholics who have been unsuccessful in stopping drinking.

Opinion on using Antabuse varies widely. Some alcoholics think it’s not appropriate to use; they rely instead on the A.A. program. Others point out that, at some time, the alcoholic must get off the drug. Others think it’s great. Treatment professionals also disagree. My sponsors’ point is that there are times, particularly when an alcoholic has a history of relapse, when Antabuse is appropriate. An alcoholic may not be able to abstain long enough to understand A.A.’s message, so we are grateful that Antabuse is available. It’s a temporary measure, to be sure, and the Antabuse user needs to understand that Antabuse is not a lifelong prescription nor a substitute for A.A. membership.

There are legends about Antabuse. Some old-timers will claim to have used alcohol and Antabuse at the same time; they say they drink and get sick and drink and get sick, and at some point they drink and don’t get sick. Others claim the bad effects of Antabuse pass after awhile.

If Antabuse is in your system, you can’t pretend it isn’t and drink. There will be a reaction and it is definitely an unpleasant one. Those who brag about drinking while on Antabuse are those who were dragged into A.A. kicking and screaming, if they ever got the message.


Please share your Experience, Strength, and Hope