A Day at a Time Reflections

An entire philosophy of life is condensed in the slogan "Live and Let Live." First we're urged to live fully, richly, and happily - to fulfill our destiny with the joy that comes from doing well whatever we do. Then comes a more difficult challenge: let live. This means accepting the right of every other person to live as he or she wishes, without criticism or judgment from us. The slogan rules ou...

We can be surrounded by people and still feel lonely. We can be all by ourselves and still feel happy and content. What makes the difference? We feel lonely if we look to other people for something they really can't provide. No one else can give US peace of mind, an inner sense of acceptance, and serenity. And when we find ourselves alone, we needn't feel lonely. God is with us; God's presence is...

Soon after I came to Gamblers Anonymous, I found a Higher Power whom I choose to call God. I've come to believe that He has all power; if I stay close to Him and do His work well, He provides me not with what I think I want, but with what I need. Gradually, I'm becoming less interested in myself and my little schemes; at the same time, I'm becoming more interested in seeing what I can contribute t...

No matter what other people do or don't do, for ourselves we have to remain abstinent from gambling. When our program of recovery becomes contingent on the actions or inactions of another person-especially someone with whom we're emotionally involved the results are invariably disastrous. We also need to remember that intense dislike is as much an emotional involvement as new-found romantic love....

In our first weeks or months in Gamblers Anonymous, our shaky emotional condition sometimes affects our feelings toward old friends and family. For many of us, these relationships heal quickly in the initial stages of our recovery. For others, a time of "touchiness" seems to persist; now that we're no longer gambling compulsively, we have to sort out our feelings about spouses, children, relatives...

Now that we're free from our compulsion to gamble, and living life one day at a time, we can begin to stop making unreasonable demands upon those we love. We can show kindness where we had shown none; we can take the time and initiative to be thoughtful, considerate, and compassionate. Even with people we dislike, we can at least try to be courteous, at times literally going out of our way to unde...

In times past, even as adults, many of us childishly insisted that people protect, defend, and care for us. We acted as if the world owed US a living. And then, when the people we most loved became fed up, pushing us aside or perhaps abandoning us completely, we were bewildered. We couldn't see that our overdependence on people was unsuccessful because all human beings are fallible; even the best...

Is freedom from compulsive gambling all that we're to expect from a spiritual awakening? Not at all. Freedom from our addiction is only the bare beginning; it's only the first gift of our first awakening. Obviously, if more gifts are to come our way, our awakening has to continue. As it does continue, we find that slowly but surely we can scrap the old life - the one that didn't work - for a new l...

At the suggestion of a long-timer in Gamblers Anonymous, I began taking "recovery inventories" periodically. The results showed me - clearly and unmistakably - that the promises of the GA Program have been true for me. I am not the sick person I was in years past; I am no longer bankrupt in all areas; I have a new life and a path to follow, and I'm at peace with myself most of the time. And that's...

"Everybody wants to be somebody, nobody wants to grow," wrote Goethe. I ask myself sometimes, as we all do: Who am I? Where am I? Where am I going? What's it all about? The learning and growing process is usually slow. But eventually our seeking always brings a finding. What seem like great mysteries often turn out to be enshrined in complete simplicity. Have I accepted the fact that my willingnes...

On studying the Twelve Steps of Recovery, many of us as newcomers to Gamblers Anonymous exclaimed, "What an order! I can't go through with it." "Don't be discouraged," we're told at meeting after meeting. "No one among us has been able to maintain anything like perfect adherence to these principles. We are not saints. The point is that we are willing to grow along spiritual lines. The principles w...

For a considerable period of time after I reached Gamblers Anonymous, I let things I couldn't do keep me from doing the things I could. If I was bothered by what a speaker or other people said, I retreated, sulking, into my shell. Now, instead of being annoyed or defensive when someone strikes a raw nerve, I try to welcome it because it allows me to work on my attitudes and perceptions of God, sel...

I've heard it said that when God closes a door, He opens a window. Since I started working the Twelve Steps of Recovery, much of the fear and pain that haunted my life is gone. Some of my defects have been lifted from me, though I'm still wrestling with others. I believe that if I continue to work the Twelve Steps over and over again, my life will continue to improve - physically, mentally, and sp...

"When a man has reached a condition in which he believed that a thing must happen when he does not wish it, and that which he wishes to happen can never be, this is really the state called desperation," wrote Schopenhauer. The very real pain of emotional difficulties is sometimes very hard to take while we're trying to maintain abstinence. Yet we learn, in time, that overcoming such problems is th...

It's still not exactly a "piece of cake" for me to accept today's occasional pain and anxiety with any great degree of serenity, but I'm increasingly able to be thankful for a certain amount of pain. In the Gamblers Anonymous Program, we find the willingness to do this by going over the lessons learned from past sufferings - lessons which have led to the blessings we now enjoy. We can remember how...

In every story we hear from others in Gamblers Anonymous, pain has been the price of admission into a new life, But our admission price purchased far more than we expected. It led us to a degree of humility, which we soon discovered to be a healer of pain. And, in time, we began to fear pain less, and desire humility more than ever.  Am I learning to "sit loosely in the saddle," making the most of...

When I see new members come into Gamblers Anonymous, I am reminded first of the pain and the unmanageable mess I found myself in, and then the hope I felt once I became willing to accept the Gamblers Anonymous Program. When I see and hear the Old Timers, some with twenty years or more in GA, I am reminded that, if I am to continue to recover, I need to make this Program part of my daily life. Alth...

We learn from others in Gamblers Anonymous that the best way to deal with painful situations is to meet them head on, to deal with them honestly and realistically, and to try to learn from them and use them as springboards for growth. Through the GA Program and our contact with a Higher Power, we can find the courage to use pain for triumphant growth. Will I believe that whatever pain I experience...

No one welcomes pain with open arms, but it does have its uses. Just as physical pain serves as a warning that we may be suffering a bodily illness, so can emotional pain be a useful sign that something is wrong - as well as a warning that we need to make a change. When we can meet pain without panic, we can learn to deal with the cause of the hurt, rather than running away. Can I bear some emotio...

Until we came to the Gamblers Anonymous Program, our lives had been spent running from pain and problems. Escape by way of compulsive gambling was always our temporary solution. Then we started going to meetings. We looked and listened, often with amazement. Everywhere around us, we saw failure and misery transformed by humility into priceless assets. To those who've made progress in the GA Progra...

We hear often in our Gamblers Anonymous meetings that pain is the touchstone of spiritual progress. We eventually realize that, just as the pains of compulsive gambling had to come before our abstinence, emotional turmoil comes before serenity. We no longer commiserate with all people who suffer, but only with those who suffer in ignorance - those who don't understand the purpose and ultimate util...

"At certain moments," wrote Coleridge, "a single almost insignificant sorrow may, by association, bring together all the little relics of pain and discomfort, bodily and mental, that we have endured even from infancy." The Gamblers Anonymous Program doesn't teach us to pretend that hardships and sorrow are meaningless. Grief really hurts and so do other kinds of pain. But now that we're free of ou...

One thing, more than anything else, that can relieve my occasional feeling of depression is love. I have to keep myself "lovable" in the sense of being able to love others, rather than being concerned with whether others love me. In somehow losing myself in others, emotionally or spiritually, I usually find myself. Today I understand what they meant at my first blurry meetings of Gamblers Anonymou...

Years ago, Dr. Alfred Adler prescribed this remedy for depression to a patient: "You can be healed if every day you begin the first thing in the morning to consider how you can bring a real joy to someone else. If you can stick to this for two weeks, you will no longer need therapy." Adler's "prescription," of course, is not much different from the suggestion that we work more intensively the Twel...

The longer I'm in the Gamblers Anonymous Program and the longer I try to practice its principles in all my affairs, the less frequently I become morose and depressed. Perhaps, too, there's something to that cynical old saying, "Blessed is he that expecteth nothing, for he shall not be disappointed, but instead will be delighted daily by new and fresh evidence of the love of God and the friendlines...