12 Step Spiritual Readings for September
| Feel free to post any of this months (September) 12 step readings or spiritual quotes you connect with in the comment section. |
Twenty-Four Hours A Day
A.A. Thought For The Day
Be careful not to brand new prospects as alcoholics. Let them draw
their own conclusion. But talk to them about the hopelessness of
alcoholism. Tell them exactly what happened to you and how you
recovered. Stress the spiritual feature freely. If they are agnostics
or atheists, make it emphatic that they do not have to agree with
your concept of God. They can choose any concept they like,
provided it makes sense to them. The main thing is that they be
willing to believe in a power greater than themselves and that they
live by spiritual principles.” Do I hold back too much in speaking
of the spiritual principles of the program?
Meditation For The Day
“I will never leave or forsake thee.” Down through the centuries,
thousands have believed in God’s constancy, untiringness, and
unfailing love. God has love. Then forever you are sure of His
love. God has power. Then forever you are sure, in every
difficulty and temptation, of His strength. God has patience. Then
always there is One who can never tire. God has understanding.
Then always you will understand and be understood. Unless you want
Him to go, God will never leave you. He is always ready with
power.
Prayer For The Day
I pray that I may feel that God’s love will never fail. I pray that I
may have confidence in His unfailing power.
01/09/2021 12 Step Spiritual Reading
California Colin :)
Twenty-Four Hours A Day
A.A. Thought For The Day
Continuing the answers to the question of how a person can live
without liquor and be happy, we say: “You will be bound to the other
A.A.s with new and wonderful ties, for you and they will escape
disaster together and all will commence shoulder to shoulder the
common journey to a better and more satisfactory life. You will know
what it means to give of yourself that others may survive and
rediscover life. You will become happy, respected, and useful once
more. Since these things have happened to us, they can happen to
you.” Have these things happened to me?
Meditation For The Day
God manifests Himself in human lives as strength to overcome evil
and power to resist temptation. The grace of God is that power which
enables a human being to change from a useless, hopeless individual
to a useful, normal person. God also manifests Himself as love–love
for other people, compassion for their problems, and a real
willingness to help them. The grace of God also manifests itself as
peace of mind and serenity of character. We can have plenty of power,
love, and serenity in our lives if we are willing to ask God for
these things each day.
Prayer For The Day
I pray that I may see God’s grace in the strength I receive, the love
I know, and the peace I have. I pray that I may be grateful for the
things I have received through the grace of God.
Carly
NA Just For Today
A Growing Concept Of God
“The only suggested guidelines are that this Power be loving, caring, and greater than ourselves. We don’t have to be religious to accept this idea. The point is that we open our minds to believe.”
Basic Text, p.24
In a lifelong process of coming to believe, our understanding of God will change. The understanding we have when new ill recovery will not be the same when we have a few months clean, nor will that understanding be the same when we have a few years clean.
Our initial understanding of a Power greater than ourselves will most likely be limited. That Power will keep us clean but, we may think, nothing more. We may hesitate to pray because we have placed conditions on what we will ask our Higher Power to do for us. “Oh, this stuff is so awful, even God couldn’t do anything,” we might say, or “God’s got a lot of people to take care of. There’s no time for me!”
But, as we grow in recovery, so will our understanding. We’ll begin to see that the only limits to God’s love and grace are those we impose by refusing to step out of the way. The loving God we come to believe in is infinite, and the power and love we find in our belief is shared by nearly every recovering addict around the world.
Just for today: The God I am coming to understand has a limitless capacity for love and care. I will trust that my God is bigger than any problem I may have.
pg. 278
Tracey (California) :)
As Bill Sees It
Neither Dependence nor Self-Sufficiency, p.265
When we insisted, like infants, that people protect and take care of
us or that the world owed us a living, then the result was
unfortunate. The people we most loved often pushed us aside or
perhaps deserted us entirely. Our disillusionment was hard to bear.
We failed to see that, though adult in years, we were still behaving
childishly, trying to turn everybody–friends, wives, husbands, even
the world itself–into protective parents. We refused to learn that
overdependence upon people is unsuccessful because all people
are fallible, and even the best of them will sometimes let us
down, especially when our demands for attention become
unreasonable.
********************************
We are now on a different basis: the basis of trusting and relying
upon God. We trust infinite God rather than our finite selves. Just to
the extent that we do as we think He would have us do, and humbly
rely on Him, does He enable us to match calamity with serenity.
1. 12 & 12, p.115
2. Alcoholics Anonymous, p.68
Davey saying hi and this one gets me :)
September 26
Daily Reflections
OUR CHILDREN
The alcoholic may find it hard to re-establish friendly
relations with his children. . . . In time they will see
that he is a new man and in their own way they will let
him know it. . . . From that point on, progress will be
rapid. Marvelous results often follow such a reunion.
ALCOHOLICS ANONYMOUS, p. 134
While on the road to recovery I received a gift that
could not be purchased. It was a card from my son in
college, saying, “Dad, you can’t imagine how glad I
am that everything is okay. Happy Birthday, I love you.”
My son had told me that he loved me before. It had been
during the previous Christmas holidays, when he had said
to me, while crying, “Dad, I love you! Can’t you see what
you’re doing to yourself?” I couldn’t. Choked with emotion,
I had cried, but this time, when I received my son’s card,
my tears were tears of joy, not desperation.
Carly (New York)
As Bill Sees It
Behind Our Excuses, p.267
As excuse-makers and rationalizers, we drunks are champions. It
is the business of the psychiatrist to find the deeper causes for
our conduct. Though uninstructed in psychiatry, we can, after a
little time in A.A., see that our motives have not been what we thought
they were, and that we have been motivated by forces previously
unknown to us. Therefore we ought to look, with the deepest respect,
interest, and profit, upon the example set us by psychiatry.
********************************
“Spiritual growth through the practice of A.A.’s Twelve Steps,
plus the aid of a good sponsor, can usually reveal most of the
deeper reasons for our character defects, at least to a degree that
meets our practical needs. Nevertheless, we should be grateful that
our friends in psychiatry have so strongly emphasized the necessity to
search for false and often unconscious motivations.”
1. A.A. Comes Of Age, p.236
2. Letter, 1966
Jason
Twenty-Four Hours A Day
A.A. Thought For The Day
Having got this far, shall we pause and ask ourselves
some searching questions? We need to check up on ourselves
periodically. Just how good an A.A. am I? Am I attending
meetings regularly? Am I doing my share to carry the load?
When there is something to be done, do I volunteer? Do I
speak at meetings when asked, no matter how nervous I am?
Do I accept each opportunity to do twelfth-step work as a
challenge? Do I give freely of my time and money? Am I
trying to spread A.A. wherever I go? Is my daily life a
demonstration of A.A. principles? Am I a good A.A.?
Meditation For The Day
How do I get strength to be effective and to accept
responsibility? By asking the Higher Power for the strength
I need each day. It has been proved in countless lives that
for every day I live the necessary power shall be given me.
I must face each challenge that comes to me during the day,
sure that God will give me the strength to face it. For every
task that is given me, there is also given me all the power
necessary for the performance of that task. I do not need to
hold back.
Prayer For The Day
I pray that I may accept every task as a challenge.
I know I cannot wholly fail if God is with me.
Sheila
Walk In Dry Places
All we need to know.
Maintaining
Seen from today’s perspective, the early AA members had rather
narrow attitudes toward the study of alcoholism. They became restless
and fidgety if member started discussing psychological aspects of the
problem or gave other indications that they were trying to learn more
about the disease.
While we don’t need to hold such narrow attitudes today, we should at
least concede that we don’t need complex information to stay sober.
All we have to know is that we have a very compulsive problem that
can be arrested by eliminating the first drink.
Even today, nobody fully knows why the first drink is so deadly for
people like us. Our experience and the experience of others tells us
that it is. That knowledge alone can be an important building block in
finding and maintaining sobriety.
While being open-minded to new information, I’ll remember today
that a fairly simple idea…. that I’m an alcoholic and can’t live with alcohol….
Is the main thing I need to know.
Harry
September 20
Daily Reflections
H.P. AS GUIDE
See to it that your relationship with Him is right,
and great events will come to pass for you and
countless others. This is the Great Fact for us.
ALCOHOLICS ANONYMOUS, p. 164
Having a right relationship with God seemed to be
an impossible order. My chaotic past had left me
filled with guilt and remorse and I wondered how
this “God business” could work. A.A. told me that
I must turn my will and my life life over to the
care of God, as I understand Him. With nowhere else
to turn, I went down on my knees and cried, “God, I
can’t do this. Please help me!” It was when I
admitted my powerlessness that a glimmer of light
began to touch my soul, and then a willingness
emerged to let God control my life. With Him as my
guide, great events began to happen, and I found the
beginning of sobriety.
Colin
September 10
Daily Reflections
RECOVERY BY PROXY?
They [the Promises] will always materialize if we work for them.
ALCOHOLICS ANONYMOUS p. 84
Sometimes I think: “Making these amends is going too far! No one
should have to humble himself like that!” However, it is this very
humbling of myself that brings me that much closer to the sunlight of
the spirit. A.A. is the only hope I have if I am to continue healing and
gain a life of happiness, friendship and harmony.
Sheila xxx
Twenty-Four Hours A Day
A.A. Thought For The Day
“No one is too discredited, nor has sunk too low, to be welcomed
cordially into A.A., if he or she means business. Social
distinctions, petty rivalries and jealousies are laughed out of
countenance. Being wrecked in the same vessel, being restored
and united under one God, with hearts and minds attuned to the
welfare of others, the things which matter so much to some people
no longer signify much to us. In A.A., we have true democracy and
true brotherhood.”
Meditation For The Day
When you call on God in prayer to help you overcome weakness,
sorrow, pain, discord, and conflict, God never fails in some way
to answer the appeal. When you are in need of strength for yourself
or for the help of some other person, call on God in prayer. The
power you need will come simply, naturally, and forcefully. Pray
to God not only when you need help, but also just to commune
with Him. The spirit of prayer can alter an atmosphere from one
of discord to one of reconciliation. It will raise the quality of
thought and word and bring order out of chaos.
Prayer For The Day
I pray that I may bring peace where these is discord.
I pray that I may bring conciliation where these is conflict.
Suzy :) Just For Today xx
NA Just For Today
Something Different
“We had to have something different, and we thought we had found it in drugs.”
Basic Text p.13
Many of us have always felt different from other people. We know we’re not unique in feeling that way; we hear many addicts share the same thing. We searched all our lives for something to make us all right, to fix that “different” place inside us, to make us whole and acceptable. Drugs seemed to fill that need.
When we were high, at least we no longer felt the emptiness or the need. There was one drawback: The drugs, which were our solution, quickly became our problem.
Once we gave up the drugs, the sense of emptiness returned. At first we felt despair because we didn’t have any solution of our own to that miserable longing. But we were willing to take direction and began to work the steps. As we did, we found what we’d been looking for, that “something different” Today, we believe that our lifelong yearning was primarily for knowledge of a Higher Power; the “something different” we needed was a relationship with a loving God. The steps tell us how to begin that relationship.
Just for today: My Higher Power is the “something different” that’s always been missing in my life I will use the steps to restore that missing ingredient to my spirit.
pg. 267