Hey there, my name is Bianka. Welcome back to Detox to Rehab’s Recovery Reflections. Corey, Connor and I will be sharing about how they are taking responsibility for their actions. Also, how they are thinking before they take action and how it is helping their recovery.
Please join us each Monday at noon on our Facebook page to listen to the experience, strength and hope shared by us!
We will live stream a reading from Alcoholics Anonymous: Daily Reflections and Narcotic Anonymous: Just for Today. We express how this reading has helped our recovery or how it has impacted us. Please join us, engage with the audience, post questions, and or leave feedback for us at noon. We thank you and hope we can inspire your recovery journey!
Alcoholics Anonymous
October 17, 2016: A Daily Tune-Up
Every day is a day when we must carry the vision of God’s will into all of our activities.
– Alcoholics Anonymous, pg. 85
How do I maintain my spiritual condition? For me it’s quite simple: on a daily basis, I ask my Higher Power to grant me the gift of sobriety for that day! I have talked to many alcoholics who have gone back to drinking and I always ask them: “Did you pray for sobriety the day you took your first drink?” Not one of them said yes. As I practice Step Ten and try to keep my house in order on a daily basis, I have the knowledge that if I ask for a daily reprieve, it will be granted.
Daily Reflections: http://www.aa.org/pages/en_US/daily-reflection?y=2016&m=10&d=17
We Didn’t Agree
Usually, Connor, Corey, and I can really relate to their readings. This one, not so much. We believe daily reprieve will not be granted with a simple prayer, you have to take action. If you work the steps, go to meetings, do something for someone else, and take your inventory a daily reprieve will come. It doesn’t just happen you must take action.
Take Action
“It is not all that you do is ask your Higher Power for the gift of sobriety, you have to actually do the work on a day to day basis,” I said.
Connor, Corey, and I agreed this reading wasn’t as informative as it should have been. Yes, you ask God to keep you sober throughout the day, but that isn’t all you do.
“I can’t just sit and pray to God and be like, ‘hey help me stay sober today,’ I need to go to meetings, I need to work with other people, I need to give back what was freely given to me and it is not just going to work if I ask for it,” I said.
It is simple, do the work and good things will happen. You will get trust back, build friendships and become a better version of yourself. But if you are lazy and just pray for the freedom from drug and alcohol abuse your future isn’t looking so hot. At least for me, not doing work, means relapse.
Corey agreed and was eager to tell us how he felt about this reading.
“If faith without works is dead then willingness without action is fantasy,” Corey said.
I agreed with Corey 100 percent. You can’t just sit there and expect things to change, think small. Instead of thinking, “Oh I have to change everything about myself right now,” why don’t you think, “What small step can I take today to become a better person?” It is small things that make a big difference.
If you are not willing to make changes in your life, then you are not ready for change. If you are not willing to do something different, then you will not achieve anything different. You must be willing to let go, it is that simple.
Corey proceeded to say, “It is easy to pray for sobriety, it is not that easy to work for it.”
This takes us back to what I was talking about. You can’t just sit and pray for something. You have to be willing to take action unless you want a relapse.
Connor agreed with the both of us.
“The slope is very slippery and as soon as I stop watching my behavior and doing these things it is just a matter of time and my defects pop up, it happens really quickly,” Connor said.
Connor proceeded to say, “Only praying for me in the morning doesn’t work for me there are a lot of other things I have to do.”
Just like me, Connor has to do more than pray to keep his sobriety. Although praying does help, there is still action that needs to take place.
A.A vs N.A
The AA: Daily Reflection focuses on praying to a Higher Power for sobriety while the NA: Just for Today puts attention how important living in honesty is. While each reading is very different, they share the same importance. They give me hope and guide me in the right direction. Also, it reminds me of how blessed I am to be living a life clean and sober.
Narcotics Anonymous
October 17, 2016: The Truth
“Everything we know is subject to revision, especially what we know about the truth.” – Basic Text, p. 94
Many of us thought we could recognize “The Truth.” We believed the truth was one thing, certain and unchanging, which we could grasp easily and without question. The real truth, however, was that we often couldn’t see the truth if it hit us square in the face. Our disease colored everything in our lives, especially our perception of the truth—in fact, what we “knew” about the truth nearly killed us. Before we could begin to recognize the truth, we had to switch our allegiance from our addiction to a Higher Power, the source of all that is good and true.
The truth has changed as our faith in a Higher Power has grown. As we’ve worked the steps, our entire lives have begun to change with the healing power of the principles of recovery. In order to open the door for that change, we have had to surrender our attachment to an unchanging and rigid truth.
The truth becomes purer and simpler each time we encounter it. And just as the steps work in our lives every day—if we allow them—our understanding of the truth may change each day as we grow.
Just for today: I will open my eyes and my heart to the changes brought about by the steps. With an open mind, I can understand the truth in my life today.
Just for Today: http://www.jftna.org/pages/10-17.htm
Recognizing the Truth
In active addiction, it was hard for me to recognize the truth. I believed I was doing what was best for my life even though what I was doing was killing me. Today, I can notice the truth about all aspects of my life thanks to the 12-steps.
Connor feels the same.
Be Grateful
“I am good, I am okay, I can get sober if I want to or if I tried to, I defiantly found out that wasn’t the truth,” Connor said.
In his addiction, Connor would tell himself lies he perceived as the truth. He told himself he could get clean and sober without help but shortly after he found out that wasn’t the truth and he had to rely on something greater than himself.
“I can’t take care of myself in a sense, I have to rely on something greater than myself,” Connor said.
Connor relies on a power greater than himself to keep him going and living in the truth.
Although I agree with Connor, I saw things differently.
“I need to open my eyes and be grateful for what the steps have done for my life or I am slowly going to lose what I have,” I said.
I proceeded to say, “I need to look at all the little things like having my family back, the ability to wake up in the morning and not be sick, and a shower, food, and all these little things the steps have given me.”
The 12-steps saved my life. I would be dead without them and if I have a bad day I need to take a step back and look at how far I have come in the past 14 months.
Corey agrees.
“Life is good whether I perceive it to be or not,” he said.
Even on the bad days, life is good. Living in recovery gives you a life where you can truly say the bad days are good.
