More Recovery Readings - August

[bluidkiti]

August 11

You are reading from the book Today's Gift.
Friends are people who help you be more yourself, more the person you are intended to be. --Merle Shain
Sometimes a teacher, sometimes a neighbor, almost always our moms and dads encourage us to try new activities or to improve our schoolwork, sports, drawing, or gardening. Because they are our friends, they want us to be the best we can be.
Not everyone knows how to be a friend. Some people only criticize, and never praise. People who never encourage or praise us are usually unhappy with their own achievements. They don't mean us harm. Perhaps they just need a friend, too. Not only do we each need friends to help us grow, we need to be friends to others. To encourage and praise those who need it will help us in return.
Whose friend can I be today?


You are reading from the book Touchstones.
I'd like to get away from earth awhile and then come back to it and begin again. --Robert Frost
Do we think it's weak to need a break? Do we ignore the need to recharge our batteries? Responsibility for our own lives requires us to recognize the need to restore our energy. Maybe our former escape from the world was by using food, or drugs, or spending money, or sexual release, or preoccupation with another person.
Now, since we are developing the ability to be with ourselves, we can take a break from the world and come back restored. This meditation time generates more energy for our lives. Recreation with friends, a walk, a movie, or a concert does the same. Taking responsibility to get away is a good cure for self-pity and exhaustion.
Today, I will be aware of my need to restore my energy.


You are reading from the book Each Day a New Beginning.
Imagination has always had powers of resurrection that no science can match. --Ingrid Bengis
In the imagination are transmitted messages, from God to us. Inspiration is born there. So are dreams. Both give rise to the goals that urge us forward, that invite us to honor this life we've been given with a contribution, one like no other contribution.
Our imagination offers us ideas to ponder, ideas specific to our development. It encourages us to take steps unique to our time, our place, our intended gifts to the world. We can be alert to this special "inner voice" and let it guide our decisions; we can trust its urgings. It's charged with serving us, but only we can decide to "listen."
The imagination gives us another tool: belief in ourselves. And the magic of believing offers us strength and capabilities even beyond our fondest hopes. It prepares us for the effort we need to make and for handling whatever outcome God has intended.
My imagination will serve me today. It will offer me the ideas and the courage I need to go forth.


You are reading from the book The Language of Letting Go.
Healing
Let healing energy flow through your body.
The healing energy of God, the Universe, life, and recovery surrounds us. It is available, waiting for us to draw on it, waiting for us to draw it in. It's waiting at our meetings or groups, on the words of a whispered prayer, in a gentle touch, a positive word, a positive thought. Healing energy is in the sun, the wind, and the rain, in all that is good.
Let healing energy come. Attract it. Accept it. Let it soak in. Breathe in the golden light. Exhale. Let go of fear, anger, hurt, and doubt. Let healing energy flow to you, through you.
It is yours for the asking, for the believing.
Today, I will ask for, and accept, the healing energy from God and the Universe. I will let it flow to me, through me, and back out to others. I am part of, and at one with, the continuous cycle of healing.


I will take time today to stop and give a gift to someone needy, smile at a stranger or help a small child. I will take the time to do at least one thing that I usually find myself too busy to do, and I will inwardly smile at myself, taking the time to experience the feelings of my own kindness. --Ruth Fishel

*****

You Deserve to Have Your Dreams Come True
Personal Power

Power is not about exerting our will over others, it is about being in complete truth with yourself.


Many of us have do not understand what personal power means. We have been given the false notion that power is bad—that it is something we use to exert our will upon others. In fact, when our personal power is intact, we are neither overbearing nor meek. We have a clear sense of our strength and the impact we can have on others. This actually enables us to be more sensitive. Personal power is what permits us to work on behalf of our dreams and desires. It allows us to realize that we are worthy and deserve to be heard. In addition, our personal power lets us extend the respect we know that we deserve to the people around us. There is no reason to be afraid or ashamed of fully owning your power.

In the chakra system, the solar plexus is the seat of personal power. One way to evaluate your sense of power is to breathe into this part of the body. If it feels tight or nervous, it is an indication that you may not be fully expressing your power. You can heal this imbalance by expanding the area of the solar plexus with your breath. You can also visualize a bright yellow sun in this part of your body. Allow its heat to melt any tension, and let its light dissolve any darkness or heaviness. Repeating this exercise on a regular basis can restore and rejuvenate your sense of power.

Another way to nurture your personal power is to honor your dreams and desires by making concrete plans to manifest them in the world. Start by making a list of things you want, and let yourself think big. Choose one goal from the list and commit to bringing it to fruition. In addition, break the goal into tasks that you can work on each day. Know that you deserve to have your dreams come true and that you have the power to bring them into being. Published with permission from Daily OM

*****

Journey to the Heart
Trust Yourself

When you look around, feel insecure, and wonder who you can trust, know you can trust yourself.

We often stand like little children, holding out our hands, waiting for someone to lead us somewhere, anywhere. We hope that someone can show us what we need to do next. We think, Maybe someone else knows better. But that thought is often the beginning of trouble. If we choose to let others lead us around, we'll soon find out that they don't know what's best for us.

If we abdicate responsibility for our choices,we may become angry, sometimes full of rage at others for running our lives, for telling us what to do. We need to take responsibility. We need to trust ourselves.

Sometimes we do get clues or hints from others. Sometimes we get direction from outside ourselves. But it must resonate with our heart. It must resonate with what we know to be true.

And the direction we take, what we do next, needs to be our choice, because whether we see it or not, it is our choice.

Trust and respond to your own heart. Trust the wisdom and guidance within you.

*****

more language of letting go
Pray for those you resent

My favorite story about praying for those I resent is one I told in Playing It By Heart, Here it is again.

Years ago, when I spotted the Stillwater Gazette, the oldest family-owned daily newspaper in existence, I knew I wanted to work there. I could feel it-- in my bones and in my heart. When I went in to the offices to apply for the job, however, the owner didn't have the same feeling I did. He had an opening for a reporter, but he wanted to hire someone else. Abigail, he said, was the right one for this jib.

I prayed for Abigail every day. I asked God to take care of her, guide her, and bless her richly and abundantly. I prayed for her because that's what I had been taught to do-- pray for those you resent. Sometimes I prayed for her three or four times each day. I prayed for her this much because I resented her that much.

God, I hated Abigail.

For the next months, almost half a year, I tromped down to the Gazette once a week, begging to be hired. Finally, I got a job there. But it wasn't the one I wanted. Abigail, bless her heart, had mine.

She got the best story assignments. She worked so quickly and with such journalistic ease.

So I kept praying, "God bless Abigail," because that's all I knew to do.

Over the months, as I got my lesser assignments from the editor--lesser than Abigail's, that is-- I began to watch her work. She wrote quickly and efficiently. Got right to the point. She was a good interviewer,too. I started pushing myself to write better, and more quickly. If Abigail can do it, so can I, I told myself. My enemy began to inspire me. Over the weeks and months that transpired, I spent more and more time around Abigail. I listened to her talk. I listened to her stories. Slowly, my enemy became my friend.

One day, Abigail and I were having coffee. I looked at her, looked straight in her eyes. And suddenly I realized, I didn't hate Abigail anymore. She was doing her job. I was doing mine.

Soon, I got an offer from a publisher to write a book. I was glad I didn't have Abigail's job, I wouldn't have had time to write that book. Then one day in June 1987, that book hit the New York Times best-seller list.

Years later, I wrote the story about Abigail in Playing It By Heart. The book got published. I returned to Minnesota to do a book signing. I was in the bookstore's bathroom, washing my hands, when a woman approached me.

"Hi Melody," she said. I looked at her, confused. "It's Abigail," she said. Abigail wasn't her real name; it was a name I had given her in the story. But with those words, I realized she had read the story. She knew she was Abigail, and she knew how I once felt.

We joked about it for a few moments. I asked her how her life was. She said she had quit writing and had become a wife and mother. I said I was still writing, and my years as a wife and mother were for the most part over.

Resentments are such silly little things. Envy is silly,too. But those silly little things can eat away at our hearts. Sometimes, people are put in our lives to teach us about what we're capable of. Sometimes, the people we perceive as enemies are really our friends. Is there someone in your life you're spending energy feeling envious of or resentful toward? Could that person be there to teach you something about yourself that you don't know or to inspire you along your path? You'll not know the answer to that question until you get the envy and resentment out of your heart.

God, thank you for the people I resent and envy. Bless them richly. Open doors for them, shower them with abundance. Help me know that my success doesn't depend on their failure, it's equivalent to how much I ask you to bless them.

*****

A Day At A Time
August 11

Reflection For The Day

When I dwell on piddling things that annoy me — and they sprout resentments that grow bigger and bigger like weeds — I forget how I could be stretching my world and broadening my outlook. For me, that’s an ideal way to shrink troubles down to their real size. When somebody or something is causing me trouble, I should try to see the incident in relation to the rest of my life — especially the part that’s good and for which I should be grateful. Am I willing to waste my life worrying about trifles which drain my spiritual energy?

Today I Pray

May God keep me from worrying unduly about small things. May He, instead, open my eyes to the grandeur of His universe and the ceaseless wonders of His earth. May He grant me the breadth of vision which can reduce and small fretful concern of mine to the size of a fly on a cathedral window.

Today I Will Remember Microscopic irritations can ruin my vision.

*****

One More Day
August 11

Before an important decision someone clutches your hand — a glimpse of gold in the iron-gray, the proof of all you have never dared to believe.
– Dag Hammarskjold

There is nothing quite as lonely as having to make a decision. Imagine the feelings a family goes through when a beloved pet has to be put to sleep. The parents, because they truly understand the situation, must be the decision makers. If we are considering a job change, it will affect our immediate family and our friendships.

When a person extends a helping hand, we welcome it as a starving person would welcome food, for it offers affirmation and empathy. The decision is still difficult, but we have the inner strength to carry us through.

I believe in myself, but will welcome the support of others in my decision making.

**************************************************

Food For Thought

Sloppy Thinking

If we begin to entertain thoughts of slight deviations from our food plan, thoughts of former binge foods, thoughts that maybe once in a while we could eat “normally,” we put ourselves on shaky ground. Our disease is never cured, and sloppy thinking can lead to a weakening or loss of control.

“Normal” eating for us is abstinence. Our food plan is what saves us from bizarre eating behavior. There is no such thing as taking a vacation from abstinence.

The less we think about food, the better off we are. To remember the so-called pleasure we once associated with certain foods may cause us to forget the inevitable pain and anguish which eating them eventually produced. We do not want to ever return to the misery of compulsive overeating.

Giving our minds to our Higher Power ensures positive, healthy thinking.

Take my thoughts, Lord, and straighten them out.