HAPPINESS IS NOT THE POINT I don't think happiness or unhappiness is the point. How do we meet the problems we face? How do we best learn from them and transmit what we have learned to others, if they would receive the knowledge? AS BILL SEES IT, p. 306 In my search "to be happy," I changed jobs, married and divorced, took geographical cures, and ran myself into debt—financially, emotionally and spiritually. In A.A., I'm learning to grow up....
ENTERING A NEW DIMENSION In the late stages of our drinking, the will to resist has fled. Yet when we admit complete defeat and when we become entirely ready to try A.A. principles, our obsession leaves us and we enter a new dimension—freedom under God as we understand Him. AS BILL SEES IT, p. 283 I am fortunate to be among the ones who have had this awesome transformation in my life. When I entered the doors of A.A., alone and desperate, I...
LEARNING TO LOVE OURSELVES Alcoholism was a lonely business, even though we were surrounded by people who loved us. . . . We were trying to find emotional security either by dominating or by being dependent upon others. . . . We still vainly tried to be secure by some unhealthy sort of domination or dependence. AS BILL SEES IT, p. 252 When I did my personal inventory I found that I had unhealthy relationships with most people in my life—my...
A.A. IS NOT A CURE-ALL It would be a product of false pride to claim that A.A. is a cure-all, even for alcoholism. AS BILL SEES IT, p. 285 In my early years of sobriety I was full of pride, thinking that A.A. was the only source of treatment for a good and happy life. It certainly was the basic ingredient for my sobriety and even today, with over twelve years in the program, I am very involved in meetings, sponsorship and service. During the...
NEW SOIL . . . NEW ROOTS Moments of perception can build into a lifetime of spiritual serenity, as I have excellent reason to know. Roots of reality, supplanting the neurotic underbrush, will hold fast despite the high winds of the forces which would destroy us, or which we would use to destroy ourselves. AS BILL SEES IT, p. 173 I came to A.A. green—a seedling quivering with exposed taproots. It was for survival but it was a beginning. I...
