A TWO-WAY STREET If we ask, God will certainly forgive our derelictions. But in no case does He render us white as snow and keep us that way without our cooperation. — TWELVE STEPS AND TWELVE TRADITIONS, p. 65 When I prayed, I used to omit a lot of things for which I needed to be forgiven. I thought that if I didn't mention these things to God, He would never know about them. I did not know that if I had just forgiven myself for some of my...
A SPIRITUAL KINDERGARTEN We are only operating a spiritual kindergarten in which people are enabled to get over drinking and find the grace to go on living to better effect. — AS BILL SEES IT, p. 95 When I came to A.A., I was run down by the bottle and wanted to lose the obsession to drink, but I didn't really know how to do that. I decided to stick around long enough to find out from the ones who went before me. All of a sudden I was thinking...
TRUSTING OTHERS But does trust require that we be blind to other people's motives or, indeed, to our own? Not at all; this would be folly. Most certainly, we should assess the capacity for harm as well as the capability for good in every person that we would trust. Such a private inventory can reveal the degree of confidence we should extend in any given situation. — AS BILL SEES IT, p. 144 I am not a victim of others, but rather a victim of...
TODAY, I'M FREE This brought me to the good healthy realization that there were plenty of situations left in the world over which I had no personal power – that if I was so ready to admit that to be the case with alcohol, so I must make the same admission with respect to much else. I would have to be still and know that He, not I, was God. — AS BILL SEES IT, p. 114 I am learning to practice acceptance in all circumstances of my life, so that...
FEAR AND FAITH The achievement of freedom from fear is a lifetime undertaking, one that can never be wholly completed. When under heavy attack, acute illness, or in other conditions of serious insecurity, we shall all react to this emotion — well or badly, as the case may be. Only the self-deceived will claim perfect freedom from fear. — AS BILL SEES IT, p. 263 Fear has caused suffering when I could have had more faith. There are times when...
