More Recovery Readings - April

[bluidkiti]

April 29

You are reading from the book Today's Gift.
If there is a God, there must also be a Goddess. Neither is more important than the other, both are in balance, together they create a Whole. --Marion Weinstein
In the olden days, the Goddess was seen as a Trinity: the Maiden or Virgin, the Mother, and the Crone. The Virgin was one-in-herself, owned by no man. The Mother was the one in the fullness of her creative powers, whether creating children, works of art, or other work out in the world. The Crone was the wise old woman.
Both women and men connected with the Triple Goddess. To women, the Goddess was a symbol of their innermost selves and the beneficent, nurturing, liberating power within. The Crone, for example, showed them that all phases of life are sacred, that age is a blessing rather than a curse. To men, the Goddess represented their connection with their own hidden female selves.
We are all made up of aspects of both sexes. This is our balance. When we accept what we know to be truly ourselves, which is often much more than the old role models for men and women allow, we become complete men and women.
What male and female strengths do I have within me?


You are reading from the book Touchstones.
I've never started a fight, but I never pulled back from a fight either. --Billy Martin
Sometimes we walk around with chips on our shoulders. We're like a tightly wound spring ready to jump at the slightest trigger, when other times we would let the same event go unnoticed. We even say self-righteously, "I didn't start it." Now that we are becoming more responsible for ourselves, we are owning our part in relationships. Maybe we have a problem with being like a spring ready to jump. When we are like that, we are difficult to live with or be around.
We can change by getting in touch with our pain. We need to explore our feelings. Perhaps we need to be honest with ourselves about low self-esteem, about feelings of loneliness or fear. Then we must talk with another person or our group about our feelings and continue to talk about them. In this way we become reconciled to ourselves and to our friends around us.
God, help me accept my own pain, and help me be tolerant of my friends' mistakes.


You are reading from the book Each Day a New Beginning.
Love between two people is such a precious thing. It is not a possession. I no longer need to possess to complete myself. True love becomes my freedom. --Angela L. Wozniak
Self-doubt fosters possessiveness. When we lack confidence in our own capabilities, when we fear we don't measure up as women, mothers, lovers, employees, we cling to old behavior, maybe to unhealthy habits, perhaps to another person. We can't find our completion in another person because that person changes and moves away from our center. Then we feel lost once again.
Completion of the self accompanies our spiritual progress. As our awareness of the reality of our higher power's caring role is heightened, we find peace. We trust that we are becoming all that we need to be. We need only have faith in our connection to that higher power. We can let that faith possess us, and we'll never need to possess someone else.
God's love is ours, every moment. Recognition is all that's asked of us. Acceptance of this ever-present love will make us whole, and self-doubt will diminish. Clinging to other people traps us as much as them, and all growth is hampered, ours and theirs.
Freedom to live, to grow, to experience my full capabilities is as close as my faith. I will cling only to that and discover the love that's truly in my heart and the hearts of my loved ones.


You are reading from the book The Language of Letting Go.
Initiating Relationships
Often, we can learn much about ourselves from the people to whom we are attracted.
As we progress through recovery, we learn we can no longer form relationships solely on the basis of attraction. We learn to be patient, to allow ourselves to take into account important facts, and to process information about that person.
What we are striving for in recovery is a healthy attraction to people. We allow ourselves to be attracted to who people are, not to their potential or to what we hope they are.
The more we work through our family of origin issues, the less we will find ourselves needing to work through them with the people were attracted to. Finishing our business from the past helps us form new and healthier relationships.
The more we overcome our need to be excessive caretakers, the less we will find ourselves attracted to people who need to be constantly taken care of.
The more we learn to love and respect ourselves, the more we will become attracted to people who will love and respect us and who we can safely love and respect.
This is a slow process. We need to be patient with ourselves. The type of people we find ourselves attracted to do not change overnight. Being attracted to dysfunctional people can linger long and well into recovery. That does not mean we need to allow it to control us. The fact is, we will initiate and maintain relationships with people we need to be with until we learn what it is we need to learn - no matter how long we've been recovering.
No matter who we find ourselves relating to, and what we discover happening in the relationship, the issue is still about us, and not about the other person. That is the heart, the hope, and the power of recovery.
We can learn to take care of ourselves during the process of initiating and forming relationships. We can learn to go slowly. We can learn to pay attention. We can allow ourselves to make mistakes, even when we know better.
We can stop blaming our relationships on God, and begin to take responsibility for them. We can learn to enjoy the healthy relationships, and remove ourselves more quickly from the dysfunctional ones.
We can learn to look for what's good for us, instead of what's good for the other person.
God, help me pay attention to my behaviors during the process of initiating relationships. Help me take responsibility for myself and learn what I need to learn. I will trust that the people I want and need will come into my life. I understand that if a relationship is not good for me, I have the right and ability to refuse to enter into it - even though the other person thinks it may be good for him or her. I will be open to the lessons I need to learn about me in relationships, so I am prepared for the best possible relationships with people.


It is exciting to know that my thoughts and my actions in the present moment condition the next moment. I am responsible for my future. Today I am bringing awareness to my self-talk and replacing all negative thoughts with positive thoughts as soon as they appear on my mindscape. --Ruth Fishel

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Journey To The Heart

Comfort Makes Everything Better

With comfort comes nurturing, genuine acceptance, and love. Comfort doesn’t involve any expense. It comes from the heart. It goes right to the heart.

Look at how much better you feel when you receive comfort, when you comfort yourself, when you allow the universe to comfort you. Look at how those around you respond when you give comfort. A comforted person feels renewed. Healed. Genuinely okay. When you’re comforted, the pain and stress that has awakened you each morning dissipates. You open your eyes and feel happy to be here. Happy to be you. You know, really know, that all is well. Finally, you feel safe.

When many of us were young, we ran to our mother, grandmother, or aunt to make a skinned knee, a bruised ego better. Now we are grown, but there’s another mother who can do that,too. Some call her the nurturing, feminine side of God. She is all that is in the universe, and in each of us, that is loving, tender, and gentle. And her comfort really does make everything better.

Comfort heals. It brings joy to the spirit. Comfort renews power,vitality. Comfort opens you up like the sun unfolds the petals of a fragrant and beautiful flower. Simply put, comfort will make you and those around you happy.

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More Language Of Letting Go

Ask God what to do

I was in treatment for chemical dependency. All I wanted to do was get high, cop some dope,do what I’d done for the past twelve years–obliterate myself. As a last ditch, almost hopeless gesture, I looked at the ceiling in my stark room, the place I had been assigned to sleep. I prayed, God, if there is a program to help me stop using, please help me get it. Twelve days later, sobriety fell down upon me, changing me at the very core of my being, altering the entire course of my life.

I divorced my husband and took on the single-parenting and single-financing role, continuing to pursue my dream of being a writer. My kitchen cupboards were nearly bare of food. I’m not that hungry, but the children are, I prayed. “Don’t worry,” an angelic voice whispered in my ear. “Soon you’ll never have to worry about money again– unless you want to.” An immutable peace settled over me. No food or money fell from the sky. But the peace, a peace as tangible and thick as butter and as healing as the oils of heaven themselves, spread throughout my life.

Years later, my son was stapped to a hospital bed. I touched his foot, his hand. I knew, despite the whooshing of the breathing apparatus, that he was not in that shell anymore. Then the plug got pulled. “No hope, no hope, no hope,” are the only words I can remember. Now, the whooshing sound turns to silence. I say good-bye, walk out of the room, just put one foot in front and walk.

“Just pick me up, and get me some drugs,” I say to a friend, three days later. “I’ve got to have some relief from this pain.” Driving around in the car, hours later, I look at the fresh box of syringes on the seat next to me. “Tell me what you want to put in them,” he says. “Cocaine? Dilaudid? What?” His irritation is as obvious as my hopelessness. My mind runs through the routine. Dilaudid? A medical prescription. If I needed it, legitimately needed it, a doctor would prescribe it for me. No prayers. No hopes. Just simple words came out, this time. “Just take me home,” I said. “I don’t really want to get high.”

Prayer changes things. Prayer changes us. Prayer changes life. Sometimes an event has been manifested that needs to be stopped, midair. Don’t pray just when you’re in trouble. Pray every day. Surround yourself with prayer. You never know when you might need an extra miracle.

Today, if I’ve tried everything else, I’ll try prayer,too.

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In God’s Care

Character consists of what you do on the third and fourth try.
~~James A. Michener

The need to be an expert right away continues to cause many of us unnecessary pain. When we fail to do something perfectly on our first attempt, we often feel defeated and our self-esteem takes a dive.

Working a Twelve Step program has taught us to expect spiritual progress, not perfection. With patient attention and perseverance we will reach the level of attainment we’re meant to reach in whatever we try.

Lasting self-esteem comes when we remember to measure our worth by God’s unconditional love. We no longer have to prove anything to anyone. Each new day we seek God’s will for us; we accept our shortcomings; and we promptly admit when we’re wrong. We are thus free to enjoy our particular abilities and achievements as gifts from God.

I will measure my accomplishments today by how much I enjoy making my best effort at whatever I do. The rest, I’ll turn over to God.

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Enlightenment at Home
Right Where We Are

by Madisyn Taylor

Not everyone will feel the need to travel afar to become enlightened as that can happen right where you are.


Many spiritual seekers feel called to far-flung places across the globe in the interest of pursuing the path of their enlightenment. This may indeed be the right course of action for certain people, but it is by no means necessary to attaining an enlightened consciousness. Enlightenment can take root anywhere on earth, as long as the seeker is an open and ready vessel for higher consciousness. All we need is a powerful intention, and a willingness to do the work necessary to moving forward on our path.

In terms of spiritual practice, at this moment, there are more tools available to more people than at any other time in history. We have access to so much wisdom through the vehicles of books, magazines, the Internet, television, and film. In addition, the time-honored practice of meditation is free, and sitting quietly everyday, listening to the universe, is a great way to start the journey within. There is further inspiration in the fact that the greatest teachers we have are our own life experiences, and they come to us every day with new lessons and new opportunities to learn. If we look at the people around us, we may realize that we have a spiritual community already intact, and if we don’t, we can find one, if not in our own neighborhood, then on-line.

Meanwhile, if we feel called to travel in search of teachers and experiences, then by all means, we should. But if we can’t go to India, or Burma, or Indonesia, or if we don’t have the desire, this is not an obstacle in terms of our spiritual development. In fact, we may simply be aware that our time and energy is best spent in our own homes, with our meditation practice and all the complications and joys of our own lives. We can confidently stay in one place, knowing that everything that we need to attain enlightenment is always available right where we are. Published with permission from Daily OM

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A Day At A Time

Reflection For The Day

As I grow in The Program — sharing, caring, and becoming more and more active — I find that it’s becoming easier to live in the Now. Even my vocabulary is changing. No longer is every other sentence salted with such well-used phrases as “could’ve,” “should’ve,” “would’ve,” “might’ve.” What’s done is done and what will be will be The only time that really matters is Now. Am I gaining real pleasure and serenity and peace in The Program?

Today I Pray

That I may collect all my scattered memories from the past and high-flown schemes and overblown fears for future and compact them into the neater confines of Today. Only by living in the Now may I keep my balance, without bending backwards to the past or tipping forward into the future. May I stop trying to get my arms around my whole unwieldy lifetime and carry it around in a gunny sack with me wherever I go.

Today I Will Remember

Make room for today.

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One More Day

You grow up the day you have the first real laugh — at yourself. – Ethel Barrymore

If we are always serious and never see the funny side of life, there will be no respite from our illness. It takes fewer muscles to laugh than to cry. We’ll breathe easier and deeper, and we’ll be much more content when we laugh.

We can choose to pay attention to why other people are laughing and learn to laugh along with them. We can try everyday — even every hour — to find the positive or humorous side of life, for laughter helps us put things into perspective. It lends hope and meaning to life.

I will open my eyes to the funny side of life and laugh with others.