[bluidkiti]

September 6

You are reading from the book Today's Gift.
I never lose sight of the fact that just being is fun. --Katharine Hepburn
The first good news each day is that we wake up. We are breathing. Our heats are beating, our minds working. The adventure of living begins. What does the day hold in store? We have no way of knowing what surprises lie in wait for us today.
We may look forward, not just to the expected, but to the unexpected. Whom shall we meet? What will we see? What will we learn? How will we be entertained? What changes to help others will come our way? What chances to love and be loved?
Now that our eyes are opened to today's beauty, let us remain alert for new sights. Let us cry when sad, smile when touched, and laugh at what is funny in a whole new lifetime before us.
What can I be thankful for today?


You are reading from the book Touchstones.
I learned to listen to my body with an inner concentration like meditation, to get guidance as to when to exercise and when to rest. I learned that healing and cure are active processes in which I myself needed to participate. --Rollo May
In our spiritual growth, one of our movements is from passive to active, from helpless to responsive. For example, we are passive if we don't take responsibility for our bodies and don't care for our wellness and conditioning. Do we passively leave our health in the doctor's hands?
Do we take responsibility for our relationships? Are we active in nurturing them? We could add our own interests and positive energy to enrich them.
Our Higher Power speaks to us in a quiet, subtle voice, which can easily be ignored until we learn to listen. It takes courage to listen to this inner voice. When we listen, we develop a relationship that is a strong force moving us into recovery. We are still powerless over many things, but we can make active choices in how we will grow and how we will respond.
I will be guided in my choices by my inner voice.


You are reading from the book Each Day a New Beginning.
We can build upon foundations anywhere if they are well and firmly laid. --Ivy Compton-Burnett
Recovery is a process, one that rebuilds our lives. And the Twelve Steps provide the foundation to support our growth as healthy, productive women. But each Step must be carefully and honestly worked, or the whole foundation will be weakened.
How lucky we are to have found this program and the structure it offers. We looked for structure in our past. We searched, maybe for years, running from one panacea to another, hoping to find ourselves. Booze--pills--food--lovers--causes; none gave us the security we longed for. We couldn't find ourselves because we hadn't defined ourselves. At last we've come home. Self-definition is the program's guarantee. Not only can we discover who we are, now, but also we can change, nurture those traits that we favor, diminish those that attract trouble.
My actions today are the key. They tell who I am at this moment. Who I become is up to me. I will pick a Step and reflect before I move ahead. The strength of my foundation depends on it.


You are reading from the book The Language of Letting Go.
The Good in Step Ten
Step Ten says: "Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it." It does not suggest that we ignore what is right in our life. It says we continue to take a personal inventory and keep a focus on ourselves.
When we take an inventory, we will want to look for many things. We can search out feelings that need our attention. We can look for low self-esteem creeping back in. We can look for old ways of thinking, feeling, and behaving. We can look for mistakes that need correcting.
But a critical part of our inventory can focus on what we're doing right and on all that is good around us.
Part of our codependency is an obsessive focus on what's wrong and what we might be doing wrong - real or imagined. In recovery we're learning to focus on what's right.
Look fearlessly, with a loving, positive eye. What did you do right today? Did you behave differently today than you would have a year ago? Did you reach out to someone and allow yourself to be vulnerable? You can compliment yourself for that.
Did you have a bad day but dealt effectively with it? Did you practice gratitude or acceptance? Did you take a risk, own your power, or set a boundary? Did you take responsibility for yourself in a way that you might not have before?
Did you take time for prayer or meditation? Did you trust God? Did you let someone do something for you?
Even on our worst days, we can find one thing we did right. We can find something to feel hopeful about. We can find something to look forward to. We can focus realistically on visions of what can be.
God, help me let go of my need to stay immersed in negativity. I can change the energy in my environment and myself from negative to positive. I will affirm the good until it sinks in and feels real. I will also strive to find one quality that I like about someone else who's important to me, and I will take the risk of telling him or her that.

Today I'm listening to my self-talk with a non-judgemental ear. It is okay to make mistakes today. I'm giving myself positive messages with permission to accept both my victories and defeats. --Ruth Fishel

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Journey To The Heart

Imagine All the Possibilities

Think of all the possibilities for your life– for love, for work, for growth. Think of all the possibilities for adventure, for fun, and for service. This day, this week, this month, this year abounds with possibilities. Each task you have to do, each problem you encounter and need to solve abounds with possibilities. Your life abounds with possibilities.

For a long time, we only saw some of the possibilities life held. We’d look at a situation and see the possibilities for guilt, victimization, sadness, and despair. We’d tell ourselves there was only one choice, or no choice, or that something had to be done in a particular way– the hardest and dreariest way possible. We’d neglect to envision the other option– the choices for joy, for making my event more fun, more pleasant, more enjoyable.

You don’t need to limit yourself anymore. You’ve opened your heart. Now open your mind. Look around. See all the possibilities. The universe is teaming with them. It will lead and guide you into this abundance if you ask it for help and them allow that to happen.

Open to life’s abundance. Open to all its possibilities. The more open you become, the more creative you’ll be– in work, in play, in love, in life. The more creative you are, the more possibilities you’ll see.

*****

more language of letting go
Stand up to your fear of abandonment

"I'm in a relationship with someone who isn't good for me," a woman said to me one day. "My boyfriend manipulates me, and he often doesn't tell me the truth. But every time I get ready to kick him to the curb, my fear of abandonment sets in."

Many of us have a fear of abandonment. Some of us let it rule our lives. We'll do anything just so that person doesn't walk out and leave us alone.

I spent many years letting fear of abandonment control me. After a while, I finally wore out that belief. I just got sick and tired of worrying about whether I was good enough for that person.

Then a new thought set me free. If you don't want to be my friend or my lover, or my employer, I don't want you in my life.

No more emotional blackmail. No more stress. No more having to second-guess what that other person is feeling.

Are you spending your time worried about someone leaving you? Does your fear of being abandoned leave you feeling like an underdog in your relationship? Let it go. Stand fast. And listen to what I'm about to tell you. If that person doesn't want to be in your life, just let him or her leave. Do you want someone in your life who really doesn't want to be there? Of course not. Let him or her go.

Once you adopt this belief, it's easy to send the bad relationships packing, and the good people want to stay.

God, help me believe that I deserve only the best of relationships.

*****

A Matter of Significance
Recognizing Your Value

by Madisyn Taylor

Change your thinking to knowing that your life matters and that you are important.


It can be easy sometimes to buy into the illusion of our own insignificance. We may see large corporations or institutions, celebrities or successful people in our community, and compare ourselves to them, thinking that their fame or material power affirm how little our own lives amount to. But nothing could be further from the truth. Every single one of us matters—tremendously. Our very existence affects countless people in countless ways. And because we are each essentially a microcosm of the larger universe, our internal experiences affect the whole of life more than we could ever imagine. The world simply could not exist as it does now if you, or any one of us, were not in it.

Perhaps you are aware that on some level you believe your life does not matter. If this thought resonates within you, maybe it is time to explore why you feel this way. You may have formed self-rejecting or belittling beliefs as a child to keep yourself safe or to help you make sense of confusing situations. You may have felt unseen or unheard and decided that there was something wrong with you, rather than with the attention span of the people around you. Spend some time looking into where these feelings of insignificance first took root, and see what changes you might be able to make in your life and in your heart.

This one belief in your own unimportance could be limiting you and impacting your life in enormous ways. When you shift your perceptions around your own ability to affect your life and impact the world, you may discover wonderful parts of yourself that you had long ago forgotten. There may even be exciting new parts that you never even knew existed. When you gain awareness of how much your life really does matter, new sources of energy can emerge and your sense of connection with the world is renewed. Published with permission from Daily OM

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A Day At A Time
September 6

Reflection For The Day

“During acute depression,” wrote A.A. co-founder Bill W., “avoid trying to set your whole life in order at once. If you take on assignments so heavy that you are sure to fail in them at the moment, then you are allowing yourself to be tricked by your unconscious. Thus you will continue to make sure of yo8ur failure, and when it comes you will have another alibi for still more retreat into depression. In short, the ‘all or nothing’ attitude is a most destructive one. It is best to begin with whatever the irreducible minimums of activity are. Then work for an enlargement of these — day by day”. When I’m discouraged by setbacks, am I willing to start over?

Today I Pray

When I am immobilized by depression, may I set small, reasonable goals — as miniature perhaps as saying hello to a child, washing my own coffee cup, neatening my desk, offering a short prayer. May I scrap my own script for failure, which sets me up for deeper depression.

Today I Will Remember

Goals set too high set me back.

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One More Day
September 6

Lie down and listen to the crabgrass grow, the faucet leak, and learn to leave them so.
– Marya Mannes

Sometimes we are driven by a need to get everything done. We have an inner sense of what we should be, and we work toward meeting that expectation. But we may strive beyond those goals because of what we believe our friends, our coworkers, and even the advertising media expect of us.

Only we decide which expectations to satisfy. But first, we must be sure that the things we strive for are really our needs and goals. If an alphabetized spice rack or an organized workbench gives us no satisfaction, why should we alphabetize or organize? If an imperfect lawn doesn’t bother us, we can let go of our concern and let the crabgrass grow.

Today, I will hold on only to my goals and expectations. I will let go of those which give me no joy.

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Food For Thought

The Pause that Refreshes

For strength, we are learning to lean on our Higher Power instead of food. We have undoubtedly taken many “breaks” which involved ingesting one or another addictive substance. Instead of making us stronger, those substances eventually made us weaker. Thanks to OA, we are finding a dependable source of refreshment.

Starting the day with a few minutes of contact with God enables us to draw from His strength that which we need. Throughout the day, when we become weary or perplexed or pressured, we can pause to renew that contact. It is a constant source of Power whenever we open ourselves to it.

Allowing ourselves to become too busy is asking for trouble. We can concentrate actively for only so long without a period of rest and relaxation. Frequent time out each day to consult with our Higher Power makes our work more effective and our leisure more creative.

I seek Your presence, Lord.