[bluidkiti]

August 10

You are reading from the book Today's Gift.
It may be those who do most dream most. --Stephen Leacock
Where would we be without the dreamers of the world--the ones who took the time to balance on the edge of wonder? Amazing connections, powerful images, and creative ideas come to us in daydreams. They creep in when we least expect them, like sleek cats, then make their presence known to us with a gentle pounce.
When we give ourselves permission to daydream--to sit for a while and do nothing but be quiet with our thoughts, we give ourselves a precious gift. And who knows, we just might be giving the world a priceless gift, too! Out of the seeds of some of our dreams, great ideas will blossom.
What first step can I take today to make a dream come true?


You are reading from the book Touchstones.
According to the teachers, there is only one thing that all people possess equally. This is their loneliness. --Hyemeyohsts Storm
Many of us have tried to find a way to outwit our loneliness, or to escape its truth. We have learned that we cannot. As fathers looking at our children we may wish to spare them this pain. As men with our mates, we have dreamed of an ideal connection where all loneliness was dispelled.
We can't obliterate loneliness. But we can learn to accept and deal with it. There is no need to compulsively cover all traces and all reminders that we are alone. We can accept this universal truth. We are alone, but so is everybody. We can make true contact with each other out of our aloneness. True intimacy with another man or woman comes out of first seeing our separateness, and then bridging the gap.
Today, I accept the feeling of loneliness as part of life. I can make contact with my brothers and sisters, knowing we are all in the same condition.


You are reading from the book Each Day a New Beginning.
...the growth of understanding follows an ascending spiral rather than a straight line. --Joanna Field
We each are traveling our own, very special path in this life. At times our paths run parallel to each other. On occasion they may intersect. But we do all have a common destination: knowledge of life's meaning. And we'll arrive at knowledge when we've arrived at the mountain's summit, separately and yet together.
We do not go straight up the side of the mountain on this trip. We circle it, slowly, carefully, sometimes losing our footing, sometimes back-tracking because we've reached an impasse. Many times we have stumbled, but as we grow in understanding, as we rely more and more on our inner strength, available for the taking, we become more sure-footed.
We have never needed to take any step alone on this trip. Our troubles in the past were complicated because we did not know this; but now we do. Our lifeline is to our higher power. If we hang onto it, every step of the way will feel secure. The ground will be stable under us.
I am on a path to full understanding. I am learning to trust the lifeline offered by the program and God and my friends. As I learn, my footing is less tentative, and it supports me more securely.


You are reading from the book The Language of Letting Go.
Letting Go of Perfection
As I journey through recovery, more and more I learn that accepting myself and my idiosyncrasies - laughing at myself for my ways - gets me a lot further than picking on myself and trying to make myself perfect. Maybe that's really what it's all about - absolute loving, joyous, nurturing self-acceptance. --Anonymous
Stop expecting perfection from yourself and those around you.
We do a terrible, annoying thing to others and ourselves when we expect perfection. We set up a situation where others, including ourselves, do not feel comfortable with us. Sometimes, expecting perfection makes people so uptight that they and we make more mistakes than normal because we are so nervous and focused on mistakes.
That does not mean we allow inappropriate behaviors with the excuse "nobody's perfect." That doesn't mean we don't have boundaries and reasonable expectations of people and ourselves.
But our expectations need to be reasonable. Expecting perfection is not reasonable.
People make mistakes. The less anxious, intimidated, and repressed they are by expectations of being perfect, the better they will do.
Striving for excellence, purity in creativity, a harmonious performance, and the best we have to offer does not happen in the stymied, negative, fear-producing atmosphere of expecting perfection.
Have and set boundaries. Have reasonable expectations. Strive to do your best. Encourage others to do the same. But know that others and we will make mistakes. Know that others and we will have learning experiences, things we go through.
Sometimes, the flaws and imperfections in ourselves determine our uniqueness, the way they do in a piece of art. Relish them. Laugh at them. Embrace them, and ourselves.
Encourage others and ourselves to do the best we can. Love and nurture others and ourselves for being who we are. Then realize we are not merely human - we were intended and created to be human.
Today, God, help me let go of my need to be perfect and to unreasonably insist that others are perfect. I will not use this to tolerate abuse or mistreatment, but to achieve appropriate, balanced expectations. I am creating a healthy atmosphere of love, acceptance, and nurturing around and within me. I trust that this attitude will bring out the best in other people and in me.


Today I know my Higher Power is guiding me through the changes I choose to make in my life. I have all the energy I need today to make these changes as easily and effortless as I wish. --Ruth Fishel

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Journey to the Heart
Find Places of Healing

Find places of healing. Discover people, things, and places that nourish your soul, bring you back to center, help you heal.

Life is not an endurance contest. Not anymore. We are not in a race to see how long we can go without, how much we can go without, how much pain we can stay in. Although sometimes we go through dry spells and droughts, we are not cactuses.

There is a place in each of us that wants to heal, that can heal, that will heal. It's a peaceful place, one of nourishment, replenishment, peace, safety, comfort, and joy. It's a place of love and acceptance. It's a place of forgiveness, honesty, openness, nurturing, and kindness. You can find it quickly, if that's what you're seeking. You will recognize it instantly because of how it feels. It will bring you back to center. It will bring you back to calm. It will bring you back to joy.

Find places of healing. Then go there often. They are yours for the asking, yours for the seeking. Healing places are an important part of the journey.

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more language of letting go
It's all a gift

Men are not angered by mere misfortune but by misfortune conceived as injury. And the sense of injury depends on the feeling that a legitimate claim has been denied.
--C.S. Lewis, The Screwtape Letters

Oh, the grousing about we do, especially when we feel denied of one thing or another-- some reward, or achievement, or position that we felt belonged to us.

How enraged we may become when a wish, a hope, a dream, or a want is blatantly denied.

How easy it is to be jealous of the success or happiness of another, even convincing ourselves that the person has laid claim to something that rightfully belonged, instead, to us.

The lesson here is simple.

Remember to be grateful. God doesn't owe us anything. All of it is a gift.

God, thanks for everything, jusr as it is.

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Worthiness
Accepting Our Calling

by Madisyn Taylor

Our worth of being on the planet at this time cannot be judged as we are all worthy and essential to being here now.

The issue of worthiness may come up in many areas of our lives, as we ask, often unconsciously, whether we are worthy of success, love, happiness, and countless other things, from supportive relationships to a beautiful home. In the end, though, it all comes down to one thing: our willingness to claim our space in this life as humans on this planet at this time. When we accept our divinity, we no longer question whether we are worthy, because we know that we are meant to be here to fulfill a particular purpose, a purpose that no one other than us can fulfill.

There are no replacements who can take over and live our lives for us, no other person who has had the experiences we have had, who has access to the same resources and relationships, who carries the same message to share with the world. Our purpose may be large or small, and in most cases it is multi-leveled, with important actions taking place on the interpersonal level, as well as in terms of the work we do in the world. Small acts of kindness share the stage with large acts of sacrifice, and only through accepting and honoring our divinity can we know what we are called to do and when.

Ultimately, we are all equally, exactly, completely worthy of being here in this life. Moreover, we are all essential to the unfolding plan of which we are each one small, but important, part. If we suffer from low self worth, it is because we have lost track of understanding this truth, and allowing it to guide our actions in the world. Seeing ourselves as part of something larger, as beings called to serve, is the ultimate cure for feelings of unworthiness. In the end, it’s not about evaluating ourselves as worthy or unworthy, so much as it’s about accepting that we have been called here to serve and taking the steps required to listen and respond to what our lives are asking us to do. Published with permission from Daily OM

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One More Day

Few men are so miserable as not to like to talk of their misfortunes…. – Maria Edgeworth

“Don’t get stuck in a conversation with Harry. He’ll bore you to death telling you his problems.” We have all had the experience of being warned away from a certain person. There have probably even been times when we were the “Harry” others tried to avoid. It’s normal to dwell on our troubles, and we all like to talk about them. There is an added responsibility on our shoulders now that there is a medical problem present.

We can minimize that problem by becoming aware of what we are doing and by saving our long medical conversations for the people who really care and need to know. Otherwise, we will find that our friends will slip away, uncertain of how to bear the burden of our changed health.

Caution will become my watchword as I learn to live with my altered health problems.

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A Day At A Time

Reflection For The Day

We’ve been our own worst enemies most of our lives, and we’ve often injured ourselves seriously as a result of a “justified” resentment over a slight wrong. Doubtless there are many causes for resentment in the world, all of them providing “justification.” But we can never begin to settle all the world’s grievances or even arrange things so as to please everybody. If we’ve been treated unjustly by others or simply by life itself, we can avoid compounding the difficulty by completely forgiving the persons involved and abandoning the destructive habit of reviewing our hurts and humiliations. Can i believe that yesterday’s hurt is today’s understanding, rewoven into tomorrow’s love?

Today I Pray

Whether I am unjustly treated or just think I am, may I try not to be a resentful person, stewing over past injuries. Once I have identified the root emotion behind my resentment, may I be big enough to forgive the person involved and wise enough to forget the whole thing.

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In God’s Care
August 10, 2013God has an exasperating habit of laying his hands on the wrong man.
~~Joseph D. Blinco

At times it seems grossly unfair that we are in the position we find ourselves. Either we aren’t ready to deal with the circumstances we encounter, or the people we find ourselves with don’t understand our problems. We feel we’re with the wrong people in the wrong place at the wrong time. But is this true?

How many times have we heard a nugget of wisdom from an unlikely source? Each of us can remember the comfort of a smile, a kind word, or a piece of sound advice from someone whom we least expected it from. Perhaps this was God’s way of reminding us that we all have value to each other and to God. We are never in the wrong place or in the wrong hands.

I will try to remember that there is a purpose for everything in my life.

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Day By Day

Adapting to the world“Live only in today; don’t worry about tomorrow.” That’s a fine ambition, we may think, but what does it mean? “Living in today” means dealing only with what is at hand now and the available courses of action.

If we are worrying about matters in the past or future, or out of our realm, we can disengage ourselves from them. We cannot bend the world to our will.

Am I learning to fit myself to the world?

Higher Power, help me remember to conquer myself, not the world.

Today I will practice adapting myself to whatever happens by

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Food For Thought

No Compromises

Where abstinence is concerned, there can be no compromising. In order to control our illness, we are willing to go to any lengths to maintain abstinence. Nothing else is as important to us.

If we are eating in a restaurant where the right kind of vegetable is not available, we can order two salads or do without a vegetable for one meal, rather than substitute a starch which will activate our disease. We learn what we can handle and what is not for us, and then we act on that knowledge in every situation. To compromise “just this once” is an invitation to trouble.

Just as we have a certain way of eating for the maintenance of our recovery, so we have a way of living based on the principle of rigorous honesty. Honesty in all of our activities is what makes us strong and effective. Where the core principles of our program are concerned, we do not compromise.

By Your grace, may I maintain my integrity in all situations.