Month: December 2009

I belong to a fellowship that is solely devoted to helping those having a spiritual malady that no human power has ever been able to aid. I had been asked to help an individual who appears to suffer from the same spiritual illness as I. I had laid out a plan I thought would help. I had not seen the person for many days. I picked up another fellowship member and we went to visit the person in question. It was obvious from onsite; though amiable and gracious, she had decided to turn to human power to correct her malady. This left me sad.
The following evening, I followed my regular routine of 2nd Friday of each month, of going to a place of lodging for those suffering from the same illness as I. I go there to share my experience. As I started I shared my sadness of my earlier days’ experience. As I began to speak a noticed the back row on men and women were engaging in other behavior and not paying attention to my talk. I continued on message without interrupting their actions. As I continued I noticed they began to listen even those who seemed to have lust on their minds.

I never really got into any conversation about the methodology of taming the beast of lust so that we could live with our God and others, because that is only a small part of the principles we must use. I stayed within the parameters of our devastating illness and that we cannot conquer it alone. I left feeling much better knowing that I am a messenger not the Message

Page 14, “As Bill Sees It”: “You can’t make a horse drink water if he still prefers beer or is too crazy to know what he does want. Set a pail of water beside him, tell him how good it is and why, and leave him alone.

“If people really want to get drunk, there is, so far as I know, no way of stopping this — so leave them alone and let them get drunk. But don’t exclude them from the water pail, either.”

This seems to a hard lesson for me to learn

Author: harold

After several years of surfing the internet, I have found many that bash 12 Step programs, that supply aid to those seeking some form of relief from a given spiritual malady. One of these fellowship have given aid to 10 million people over the past 74 years. Each of those 10 million have given testimony to some relief.

Now those that bash these fellowships fall into two groups. The first group are entrepreneurs that earn their wealth form the prejudices and fears of the insecure. The second group are the ones that enrich the first group. They all fall into one category that all the aforementioned 10 million can testify to: “They have not had their last drink yet”
Author: harold

1. You eat corn flakes with bourbon poured over them!

2. You drive to Eau Claire, WI to purchase 28 cases of “Bud Light” for 3% discount.

3. You try to hide 28 cases of “Bud Light” under a small bed!

4. Your favorite hiding place for “Haven Hill 6 Years Old” is in the tank of the window washer of your ‘73 Dodge Polaris!

5. You can drink one (1) fifth of “Haven Hill 6 Years Old” driving from Louisville to St. Louis without flashing a bottle or stopping.

6. You always cash your payroll check at the liquor store!

7. You have convinced your spouse the only place to purchase cigarettes is the liquor store!

8. You arrive at your son’s wedding with a half-pint of “Haven Hill 6 Years Old” in the breast pocket of your suit with bottle cap removed and straw inserted!

9. You have lost your car more than one dozen times in the parking lot of the local pub that accommodates 8 cars!

10. You have found the most comfortable and peaceful place to sleep was the bathtub on more than one dozen occasions!

11. You have been to a doctor about drinking at least 25 times but never confess to drinking more than a 6 pack per week!

12. You proudly proclaim you have never gone to bed with an ugly partner, but you have some recollections of awaking with one or two.

13. At least one time you have had the roof of your moth sunburned.
Author: harold

I was on the road in central Kentucky & attended a meeting, that had a defrocked priest in civilian clothes, a male distillery worker, a part time tobacco farmer & factory worker, school teacher, unemployed bricklayer, a female legal assistant, waitress, self-employed water treatment salesman, a black clergyman, bartender and harlot that had not been paid lately. I am sure we all wanted to stop drinking & help others to stop.
The above is my imagination of going through Nelson County KY, attending a fellowship meeting with a collection of 12 people that would not normally mix.

A Perfect Meeting is any group of people trying to stay sober & help others stay sober via sharing their experience, strength & hope.

Author: harold

The most dangerous psychoactive drug for an addict is the one he thinks he can use safely

Author: harold

1. You drink more coffee per day than Starbucks sells in one week.

2. Emails to your friends have “HALT” as the subject header.

3. You and your buddies get thrown out of expresso bars
and teahouses for being “too rowdy.”

4. Songs like “There’s a Tear In My Beer” make you
cry for reasons different than most people.

5. For parties with your friends, you buy a couple cases
of Mountain Dew and Pepsi-Cola.

6. Dining out, you wonder how someone at the next
table, can drink half a glass of wine and leave the rest.

7. There is at least one magnet on your refrigerator, plaque on your wall,or bumper-sticker on your car with an inspirational message printed on it.

8. You don’t know the last names of most of your best friends.

9. If you need advice on money, you ask the guy in your
meeting who used to be bankrupt.

10. When you empty your purse or pockets you find at least one of the
following: an anniversary chip, scraps of paper with phone numbers of people you met in meetings, pocket-sized Basic Text.

11. Your idea of a pick-up line is, “I really liked what you shared.”

12. No matter how bad a day you had, if you go to bed
clean, you consider yourself In recovery!

Author: harold

1 GOD: Good Oderly Direction

2. GOD: Group Of Drunks

3. HALT: Hungry Angery Loney Tired

4. SOBER: Son Of Bitch Everything’s Real

5. TIME: This I Must Earn

6. SLIP: Soberity Loses It’s Priority

7. ANTS: Automatic Negative ThougthS

8 EGO: Easing God Out

9. ISM: I Sponsor Myself

10. SSS: Sit Still and Suffer.

11.FEAR: F**k everybody and run

12.FEAR: Face everything and recover
Author: harold

~ It’s not old behavior if I’m still doing it.

~ If you’re looking to have an image in the fellowship, look around at the
meetings you go to and take a look at whom you’re trying to impress.

~ An alcoholic is a person who wants to be held while he’s
isolating.
~ Sobriety is the leading cause of relapse.

~A treatment center is where you go and pay $15,000 to find
out that fellowship meetings are free.

~ The idea that alcoholics, drug addicts, sex addicts, overeaters, smokers,
etc, etc, should all just go to fellowship Meetings because a disease, is a
disease, is a disease…was started by a treatment center that only had one van.

~ This is a ‘One Day at a Time’ program. If you are clean and sober
today, you are tied for first place in fellowship.

~ If drinking is interfering with your work, you’re probably a heavy
drinker. If work is interfering with your drinking, you’re probably an alcoholic.

~I often obsessively pursue feeling good, no matter how bad
it makes me feel.

~ When I was new, I didn’t think I had any obsessions until I
started thinking about it. Then it was all I could think about.

~ How come if alcohol kills millions of brain cells, it never
killed the ones that made me want to drink?

~ From a newcomer reading the ‘Promises’ for the first time:
We will comprehend the word cemetery and we will know peace.

~ If God were small enough to be understood, He wouldn’t be
big enough to be God!

~ If you want to quit drinking, you are going to have to
quit drinking.

~ Newcomer: How do I know how many meetings I should attend each week?
Old-timer: Gradually cut back until you drink. Then you’ll know.

~I would rather go through life sober, believing I am an alcoholic, than go
through life drunk, trying to convince myself that I am not an alcoholic.

~ Resentments are like stray cats: if you don’t feed them, they’ll go away.

~ The difference between a problem drinker and an Alcoholic is that:
A) When alcohol is taken away from the problem drinker, the problem goes
away.
B) When alcohol is taken away from the Alcoholic, the problem begins.

~ Before I came into the fellowship I was dead, but I did not know enough to lay down.

~ I drank when I was happy. I drank when I was unhappy.
Actually, I am a reason to drink.

~ You don’t have to be sick to want to get well. But if you
don’t want to get well, you ARE sick.

~ I can’t do His will my way.

~ In order to change the way we feel we need to change the way
we act. There is only one way to coast, and that is down hill.

~ The good news is you get your emotions back; the bad news
is you get your emotions back.

~ All we ask is that you completely change your attitude as
soon as possible.

~ I have held many things in my hands, and I have lost them
all; but whatever I have placed in God’s hands, that I still possess.

~ Without memory, there is no healing. Without forgiveness,
there is no future.

Yesterday is already a dream, and tomorrow is only a vision. But today,
well lived, makes every yesterday a dream of happiness and every
tomorrow a vision of hope……
Author: harold

1. There is a SLIP under every skirt.
2. We keep our pants zipped so we do not lose our brains.
3. Filling the hole does not fill the hole.

SLIP: Sobriety Loses Its Priority

There are many sayings in our fellowship that tell us to avoid serious boy/girl, girl/girl or boy/boy relationships. This involves one member considering the new friendship differently from what the other partner is thinking. This difference in perception of reality causes much emotional upheaval to all that consider these actions. We members of the fellowship must remember that these emotional attractions are natural and God given, but as surely as we seek our way in every issue we will, beyond a doubt, find conflict where we intended to find happiness.

When these relationships get past the hot season in Motel 6, then signs of trouble tend to appear. The fact that both parties get heated up when in each other’s presence will not insure a stable partnership. Being joined via a spiritual entity will not ensure we will look at each other in a spiritual light.

For these hookups to be lasting (if desirable), we must review our thoughts on a lasting relationship with the other and see if they can be concurrent. If not try plan B.

Remember the 13th Step is easy, – it could be back to the 1st Step.

Author: harold

• Alcoholism: High bottoms have trap doors.
 
• Alcoholism: If the cure works, chances are, you have the disease.
 
• Alcoholism: If you drank long enough to get to an A.A. meeting, you drank long enough.
 
• Alcoholism: Once you are a pickle, you can’t be a cucumber. But once you are a pickle, you can be a newcomer.
• Alcoholism: The three most dangerous words for an alcoholic-“I’ve been thinking”

• Alcoholism: We are not bad people becoming good, but sick people becoming well.

• Alcoholism: Your bottom just may be six feet under.

• Alcoholism: Your disease progresses even when you are not drinking.

• Alcoholism: Active alcoholism is like an elevator; you can get off at any floor.
 
• Alcoholism doesn’t come in bottles; it comes in people.
 
• Alcoholism is a self-diagnosed disease.
Author: harold