"It was the night of my weekly recovery group," a woman said to me. "I had to make myself attend the meeting. We had a guest speaker from out of town, and everyone had been buzzing about his speaker for weeks.

"Oh, Corky's coming. Have you heard about Corky? Don't miss the meeting; Corky will be there to talk that night. He's the best.' I was so sick of hearing about Corky. I didn't know who he was, and I didn't care. I just couldn't stomach all this gushing. By the time I got to the meeting, the only chair open was right next to Corky. I was so turned off and disgusted. I just couldn't stand all this naïve raving.

"I sat through the meeting. Barely heard a word this guy said. At the end of the meeting, when it came time to hold hands and say the prayer, I couldn't stand the thought of putting my hand in his. But I did.

"When I got home from attending the group that evening, my husband asked me how it went. So I told him the whole story, about Corky, about everyone being so excited this guy was coming to town, about my decision not to be involved with this idolization of some stupid guy named Corky.

"Don't you know who that is?" my husband said. I told him the only thing I knew was that he went by the nickname Corky. My husband pointed to the stack of books at my bedside - all written by the same author. My favorite author in the entire world.

"It's him,' my husband said. "It's the guy you read every night. Corky is just his nickname.' I felt this wave of horror go through me. I had wanted to meet this guy for years. I loved his mind. I loved his work. And here I had sat right next to him - even held his hand - and I hadn't even heard a word he said or appreciated the opportunity I had to meet him.

"I've seen him around a few times since that night," my friend added. "I haven't had the courage to tell him my story yet. Maybe someday I will. Until then, I'm working hard to remember the lesson of that night; keep an open mind or you might miss something or someone really valuable in your life."

Closing our mind and our heart can cause us to lose a lot more than a chance to meet someone we revere. We can miss the true beauty and wisdom in people who at first glance look ordinary. We can miss opportunities and ideas that could change our lives. We can overlook danger signs. And sometimes, we can embarrass ourselves.

Valve: We can call it dropping our assumptions or judgments, staying aware, or keeping an open mind. Whatever words we use to describe this state, that's the value this week.

Don't overlook the wonder of the ordinary.

The extraordinary, the amazing, the phenomenon are daily glorified in the movies, the news, and on television. Our senses become bombarded. We become addicted to drama. The only things that get our attention are the big, catastrophic, knee-jerking events.

Take a closer look at your life, your everyday world, and the people and activities in it. If it were all taken from you in one moment, what would you miss? What sights, what sounds, what smells? Would you miss the view from your kitchen window? If you were never to see that scene again, would you nostalgically reminisce about it, wishing you could see it one more time, remembering how beautiful it was, and how much that familiar sight comforted you in your daily life?

What about those toys strewn about or the baby crying because he's hungry or wet? What about the sounds of the city you live in as it comes to life each morning? Or how about how your child smells after her bath? Or when she comes in cold from playing in the snow?

What about the way your friend smiles, or that little thing he says all the time that's not funny but he thinks it is, so you laugh?

Look closely at the ordinary in your life. While you're being grateful, don't forget to express pure, sheer gratitude for how beautiful the ordinary really is. We can easily overlook the ordinary, take it for granted. The sun rises and sets, the seasons come and go, and we forget how beautiful and sensational the familiar really is.

God thank you for every detail of my ordinary, everyday world.

Life can only be understood backwards, but it must be lived forwards.
-- Soren Kierkegaard

One of Mark Twain's most interesting writings states we should live life backwards from the age of eighty to the time we were just a gleam in someone's eye. How much more we'd learn, he felt, if we already knew how to live before we had to.

We may fantasize sometimes about going back with the tools of the program we're using today to our families, our high schools, or our dating years. It may please us to think of how "together" we would be with such tools, knowing what we know now.

But we can't live backwards. Every year we move along in age, experience, maturity, and wisdom. Sometimes we only see such growth on birthdays, when we look back to a year ago at who we were then and who we are now. As our years advance, so do we. Sometimes we need to take a brief look backward in order to see this.

Today I'll remember that to see my growth all I have to do is look at where I was a year ago. I have advanced in age, but I've also advanced in wisdom and maturity.

"It's better to ask some of the questions than to know all the answers."
--James Thurber

"I believe the purpose of my life is to learn, grow, and be the best possible person I can be," said a group member. "In order to do that, I must ask big questions of myself and God. I ask questions like What's love? What's my life's work? What's the best way to deal with this problem? How can I best plan for the future? Who and What is God? What constitutes an ideal friendship or marriage? What is the purpose of life? and What's preventing me from reaching my goal?'

"To me, asking big questions makes life an exciting adventure. I look upon everyone and everything as a partial answer to a larger question. Life is never boring to me. Or lonely. I treasure every experience as a means of expanding my knowledge and understanding."

Today I will have more questions than answers. I will ask big questions of God and myself. I will search for, and be receptive to, the answers to my questions in my daily experiences and endeavors.

The 12 Step way of life is accepting, not necessarily passive.
--Anonymous

When we accept life on life's terms, we are acknowledging reality. We have all, on occasion, run from the truth. When we were in a situation that frightened us, we would turn tail and run. We would do our imitation of an ostrich and stick our heads in the sand, pretending the situation didn't exist and was not happening.

When we accept something, we are not passively taking it in. We are ready to work through and toward our new awareness. But we can't do anything at all unless we accept it as a reality.

We know what it's like to run from our disease. We tried to prove it was anything and everything but addiction. We tried to prove it was caused by something wrong in our lives, our jobs, our family, our childhood, our relationships, even the weather. After we ran out of excuses, we finally accepted our disease.

My acceptance of my addiction is not passive, but based in reality and truth.

When a person drowns himself in negative thinking he is committing an unspeakable crime against himself.
-- Maxwell Maltz

Negative thoughts can rule our lives as compulsively as an addiction. The feelings of power we get from holding a dismal and gloomy outlook deprive us of the positive and pleasant parts of life. Some of us have said, "If I expect the worst, I won't be disappointed. If I think the worst about myself, no one else can cut me down." It is like taking a driving trip and looking only for trash and garbage in the ditches, ignoring the beauty beyond. Indeed, what we see may be real, but it is a very limited piece of the picture.

When we have relied on negative thinking, it feels risky to give it up. We cannot do it in one day. We can begin by imagining ourselves with a more open attitude toward ourselves and the world. Then we can try it out as an experiment in little ways, with no commitment. Finally we reach the point where we can take a risk and entrust our Higher Power with the outcome.

Today, I will experiment with hopeful and positive thoughts about what happens.

Our hungers lead us to what will satisfy

Hunger serves us well. Physical hunger prompts us to eat the food we need to promote and maintain health. Emotional hunger sends us in search of companionship, intimacy, and love. Our hunger for achievement fuels our contribution to the work of the world. And our spiritual hunger leads us to a Power greater than ourselves. Peace, unity, goodwill all of these and more, we hunger for.

If we find ourselves trying to satisfy our hunger in ways that don't work, it's time to reassess and make changes. That's what we do when we come to the Twelve Step program, admitting that our false satisfactions have gotten out of hand and are threatening destruction.

The satisfaction of our various hungers is within reach. Much of what we crave we will find within ourselves as we develop a relationship with a Higher Power.

I will explore my hunger today, so that it may lead me to what satisfies.

A.A. Thought for the Day

Let us consider the term "spiritual experience" as given in Appendix II of the Big Book, Alcoholics Anonymous. A spiritual experience is something that brings about a personality change. By surrendering our lives to God as we understand Him, we are changed. The nature of this change is evident in recovered alcoholics. This personality change is not necessarily in the nature of a sudden and spectacular upheaval. We do not need to acquire an immediate and overwhelming "God-consciousness," followed at once by a vast change in feeling and outlook. In most cases, the change is gradual.

Do I see a gradual and continuing change in myself?

Meditation for the Day

"Come unto me all ye that labor and are heavy laden and I will give you rest." For rest from the care of life, you can turn to God each day in prayer and communion. Real relaxation and serenity come from a deep sense of the fundamental goodness of the universe. God's everlasting arms are underneath all and will support you. Commune with God, not so much for petitions to be granted as for the rest that comes from relying on His will and His purposes for your life. Be sure of God's strength available to you, be conscious of His support, and wait quietly until that true rest from God fills your being.

Prayer for the Day

I pray that I may be conscious of God's support today. I pray that I may rest safe and sure therein.

Everything that irritates us about others can lead us to an understanding of ourselves.
--Carl Jung

In our worst time, we have been irritable and difficult to live with. And when we feel most irritable, we are least likely to look at ourselves. Now in recovery, when someone irritates us, it is very useful to ask ourselves why we are so annoyed. We often find that the very thing that irritates us about someone else is the very quality in ourselves that we don't want to face.

When someone's whining bugs us, maybe it is our own capacity for whining that we reject. When someone's self-absorption gets under our skin, maybe we are sensitive about our own self-centeredness. Sometimes we find it easier to complain about a quality in others than to admit we are like that too.

Today I will use my feelings of irritation to guide me inward and know myself better.

Self-knowledge and self-improvement are very difficult for most people. It usually needs great courage and long struggle.
--Abraham Maslow

This is a simple program but it isn't easy. We cannot take the principles we learn and thereby possess them as if we were taking a class or reading a book. We need to live them. We can only get this program by participating with others who are also on the journey. Gradually we absorb it into every fiber of our being. This takes time and dedication.

The honesty required is sometimes frightening and painful. Anyone who remains faithful to this program has great courage and deserves deep respect. But we do not have to wait long to begin receiving the rewards. New freedoms, good feelings, and friendships quickly develop, and we are promised in this program to continue growing and to receive more benefits throughout our lives. What rewards have come from our courage and struggle?

I will give much to my spiritual growth because it gives much to me.

It doesn't happen all at once.... You become. It takes a long time.
--Margery Williams

Our spiritual awakening is partly a process of becoming real. We're moving from the external controls of image and others' opinions to the internal controls of honesty, listening to our inner voice, and having true relationships. We are shedding the games that maintained our old style of life - "macho" or "hero" or "poor me."

In place of the old phony surface, we are developing a real relationship with ourselves. We are becoming more aware - of emotions, of need for rest, of violations of our values. Sometimes change comes in a flash of insight or a moment of sudden, piercing awareness, but more often it comes a little bit at a time. As we work the Steps, as we are true to our inner voice, as we keep returning to conscious contact with our Higher Power, as we get closer to our friends, we become more real to ourselves.

As I grow, I see that I was always real. I was just looking at the outside.

Program friendships are special

Until we came into the program we may have thought that friendships were all alike. We counted on friends to socialize and gossip with, maybe to share a secret with. But when we were really scared about our lives and the future, we felt too vulnerable to let anyone else know our innermost thoughts.

What relief the program has brought us and what good friends! No problem seems as terrifying now that we are no longer shouldering it alone. Having to make a decision no longer overwhelms us when we have other people to discuss it with. Letting ourselves be deeply cared for, with all our faults, is a new experience too. All these gifts come automatically to us within the fellowship. All that is asked of us is that we be a friend too.

I will extend my heart in friendship today, and my concerns will be lightened.

Cheerfulness keeps up a kind of daylight in the mind, and fills it with a steady and perpetual serenity.
--Joseph Addison

Our Program allows us to stand back from day-to-day confusion and let serenity come into our lives. Our program doesnt take away all the struggles and problems from life, but it does let us learn a different outlook and attitude.

We dont have to get caught up in every storm that blows our way. We dont have to live the pain of every person who crosses our path. We dont have to right every wrong.

Our recovery is a gift to us from a power greater than we are. We become more and more aware of the meaning of the words in the Serenity Prayer: God grant me the Serenity to accept the things I cannot change, Courage to change the things I can, and Wisdom to know the difference.

Let me learn to see the world as it actually is, not as I want it to be. I trust that my Higher Power didnt make a mistake in designing this world or the plans for my life.

This is a simple program for complicated people.
--Saying heard at meetings

Newcomer

I heard a speaker with years in recovery share that she'd always done it her own way - that she met friends at bars if she felt like it, had never had a sponsor, and sometimes went for months without a meeting. I know newcomers who've done similar things. What's the big deal?

Sponsor

Some people in recovery cling to rebellion. While they don't want to return to the horrors of active addiction, they aren't willing to surrender what they think of as individualism. They "get away with" skipping Steps and ignoring suggestions. One helps out at meetings, but keeps booze in the house. One gives advice to newcomers, but goes un-sponsored.

The program doesn't ask that we give up what truly makes each of us an individual. It offers us clear guidelines, and promises that if we follow them, we won't have to risk a relapse. The program works for us, if we work it. Testing our recovery by trying to see what we can "get away with" is like playing a game of Russian roulette.

Today, I feel safety and strength as I follow the principles of this program. I know that true individuality comes from the self-knowledge that recovery affords me.

Humbly asked God to remove our shortcomings.
--Step Seven 

In the Sixth and Seventh Steps of the program, we become willing to let go of our defects of character - issues, behaviors, old feelings, unresolved grief, and beliefs that are blocking us from the joy that is ours. Then we ask God to take them from us.

Isn't that simple? We don't have to contort ourselves to make ourselves change. We don't have to force change. For once, we don't have to "do it ourselves." All we have to do is strive for an attitude of willingness and humility. All we have to do is ask God for what we want and need, and then trust God to do for us that which we cannot do and do not have to do for ourselves.

We do not have to watch with bated breath for how and when we shall change. This is not a self-help program. In this miraculous and effective program that has brought about recovery and change for millions, we become changed by working the Steps.

Today, God, help me surrender to recovery and to the process by which I become changed. Help me focus on the Step I need. Help me do my part, relax, and allow the rest to happen.