A friend calls out to us in anguish for help. Circumstances have brought him here in desperation.

We listen attentively to the litany, fragments of a puzzle. Each block of the Mosaic. Page after page, he pours out grief over injustices, some imagined, some real.

Finally, the exact nature of wrongs is acknowledged, and a glimmer of understanding returns to our friend.

When he closes the book, we ask: Now, where is your higher power in all of this?

No one is unique in their disease. Only in recovery do we find individual beauty. Disease is boring; it always blinds us to light, and we whither, get angry, lash out or nash in.

To paraphrase the book Alcoholics Anonymous, our debting is a merely symptom of a spiritual disease, and, in our recovery, “What we really have is a daily reprieve contingent on the maintenance of our spiritual condition.”(1)

Meditations, affirmations, and prayer – to MAP for short – is the answer. We grow along spiritual lines as we align ourselves with spiritual space.  We may not understand the origin of that loving space, but we can use its power nonetheless.

Once we recognize what’s happening, Steps 5, 6 and 7 direct us to healing space:

“5. Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.

6. Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character.

7. Humbly asked Him to remove our shortcomings.”(2)

It is a paradox that we see God when we show kindness to a person who is suffering.  Total reliance on a Higher Power is what will ultimately bring us all to the “table of plenty”.

Meditation for today:

We do a disservice to a person when we see self-abuse or self-neglect and say nothing. You may be the only person qualified to speak openly about such matters. Speak your truth quietly and kindly.

Affirmation for today:

When I sponsor, help others by sharing my program, I help myself most. And that is the idea. In a way this is selfish, in a way it is selfless. It is a paradox – God’s loving circuitry.

Prayer for today:

“My creator, I am now willing that you should have all of me, good and bad, to do with as you will.”(3)

“Take away my difficulties that victory over them may bear witness to those I would help of your power, your love, your way of life. May I do your will always!”(4)

For Further Reading:

DA Tool Eight encourages us to read AA literature.  A great place to start is with the AA Big Book “Alcoholics Anonymous”.  It explains the Twelve Steps like no other book, is filled with dozens of hopeful stories of recovery.

(By clicking the above link  you will be brought to Amazon.com, where you can buy this book.  Purchasing the book through this link in no way increases your costs.  Using the link helps us defray the costs of running this website.   Amazon gives us a commission.)

Footnotes:

(1) Alcoholics Anonymous, page 85
(2) ibid, page 59.
(3) ibid, page 76.
(4) ibis, page 63.