Winning the lottery ...

todAAy i AAm grAAteful & thAAnkful

we read from the Big Book yesterday in the Tuesday 6:30am meeting. Our reading was from the 4th edition, pages 268-276, entitled "The Keys of the Kingdom." One of my favorites.

"We watch the alcoholic performing in a position of responsibility, and we know that because he is drinking heavily and daily, he has cut his capacities by 50 percent, and still he seems able to do a satisfactory job."

This concept kept me from ever wanting to modify or moderate my drinking. I was the "functional" alkie who didn't need to stop. Thus, I was 49 years old before any change took place. (So was this guy, but he can tell you about that.)

"A.A. is not a plan for recovery that can be finished and done with. It is a way of life, and the challenge contained in its principles is great enough to keep any human being striving for as long as he lives. We do not, cannot, outgrow this plan. As arrested alcoholics, we must have a program for living that allows for limitless expansion. Keeping one foot in front of the other is essential for maintaining our arrestment."

I love this concept that A.A. is a design for living, custom-tailored just for me.

"A complete change takes place in our approach to life. Where we used to run from responsibility, we find ourselves accepting it with gratitude that we can successfully shoulder it. Instead of wanting to escape some perplexing problem, we experience the thrill of challenge in the opportunity it affords for another application of A.A. techniques, and we find ourselves tackling it with surprising vigor."

"In return for a bottle and a hangover, we have been given the Keys of the Kingdom."



When I despair, I remember that all through history the way of truth and love has always won. There have been tyrants, and murderers, and for a time they can seem invincible, but in the end they always fall, always.
- Mahatma Gandhi