A Day at a Time Reflections

When we're faced with some condition or situation not to our liking, how can we have faith that all things are working together for good? Perhaps we have to ask ourselves just what is faith. Faith has its foundation in truth and love. We can have faith, if we so choose, no matter what the situation. And, if we so choose, we can expect ultimate good to come forth. Have I made my choice? Today I Pra...

"It is the privilege of wisdom to listen," Oliver Wendell Holmes once wrote. If I try as hard as I can to culti vate the art of listening - uncritically and without making premature judgments - chances are great that I'll progress more rapidly in my recovery. If I try as hard as I can to listen to the feelings and thoughts expressed rather than to the "speaker" - I may be blessed with an unexpecte...

Many of us come to the Gamblers Anonymous Program professing that we're agnostic or atheistic. As someone once put it, our will to disbelieve is so strong that we prefer a date with the undertaker to an experimental and open-minded search for a Higher Power. Fortunately for those of us with closed minds, the constructive forces in the GA Program almost always overcome our obstinacy. Before long, w...

Very few of us know what we really want, and none of us knows what is best for us. That knowledge is in the hands of God. This is a fact I must ultimately accept, in spite of my rebelliousness and stubborn resistance. From this day forward, I'll limit my prayers to requests for guidance, an open mind to receive it, and the strength to act upon it. To the best of my capability, I'll defer all decis...

For my own good, I'll go to meetings and participate in discussions with an open mind that's ready to receive and accept new ideas. For my own peace of mind and comfort, I'll determinedly try to apply those new ideas to my own life. I'll remember that the Gamblers Anonymous Program offers me the instruction and support I can't find elsewhere. I'll seek out others who understand my problems, and I'...

Long experience has proved that the Gamblers Anonymous Program and Twelve Steps will work for any person who approaches them with an open mind. We have to remember that we can't expect miracles overnight; after all, it took years to create the situation in which we find ourselves today. I'll try to be less hasty in drawing judgmental conclusions. I'll hang on to the expectation that the GA Program...

Faced with almost certain destruction by our addiction to gambling, we eventually had no choice but to become open-minded on spiritual matters. In that sense, the multitude of ways we used to bet and wager were potent persuaders; they finally whipped us into a state of reasonableness. We came to learn that when we stubbornly close the doors on our minds, we're locking out far more than we're locki...

Conditioned as we are by our old ideas and old ways of living, it's understandable that we tend to resist certain suggestions made to us when we first come to the Gamblers Anonymous Program. If that's the case, there's no need to reject such suggestions permanently; it's better, we've found, just temporarily to set them aside. The point is, there's no hard-and-fast "right" way or "wrong" way. Each...

These days, I go to meetings to listen for the similarities between me and others in Gamblers Anonymous - not the differences. And when I look for the similarities, it's amazing how many I find, particularly in the area of feelings. Today I go to meetings thinking that I'm here not because of anyone else's addictions, but because of mine and, most importantly, what my addiction did to my spirit an...

In many respects, the Fellowship of Gamblers Anonymous is like a reasonably happy cruise ship or, in time of trouble, like a convoy. But in the long run, each of us must chart his or her own course through life. When the seas are smooth, we may become careless. By neglecting Step Ten, we may get out of the habit of checking our position. If we're mindful of Step Ten, however, then we rarely go so...

Someone once defined the ego as "the sum total of false ideas about myself." Persistent reworking of the Twelve Steps enables me gradually to strip away my false ideas about myself. This permits nearly imperceptible but steady growth in my understanding of the truth about myself. And this, in turn, leads to a growing understanding of God and other human beings. Do I strive for self-honesty, prompt...

The Gamblers Anonymous Program is a road, not a resting place. Before we came to this Program - and, for some living of us, many times afterward - most of us looked for answers to our problems in religion, philosophy, psychology, in theories of self-control and personal growth. Often these explorations of ours aimed at goals that were precisely what we wanted: freedom, calm, confidence, and joy. B...

Samuel Johnson wrote: "... he who hath so little knowledge of human nature as to seek happiness by changing anything other than his own disposition will waste his life in fruitless efforts and multiply the grief he proposes to remove." Today I understand that I am not the evil person I once thought I was, only that I have made mistakes in my lifetime that caused me and those I love much pain and g...

When we speak with a friend in the Gamblers Anonymous Program, we shouldn't hesitate to remind him or her of our need for privacy. Intimate communication is normally so free and easy among us that even a friend or sponsor may sometimes forget when we expect him to remain silent. Such "privileged communications" have important advantages. For one thing, we find in them the perfect opportunity to be...

What wonderful things could happen in my life if I could get rid of my natural impulse to justify my actions. Is honesty so deeply repressed under layers of guilt that I can't release it to understand my motives? Being honest with ourselves isn't easy. It's difficult to search out why I had this or that impulse and, more importantly, why I acted upon it. Nothing makes us feel so vulnerable as to g...

Some people in the Gamblers Anonymous Program feel that they can't do the things they want to do. They doubt their own ability. But actually, every person has untapped ability. We're children of God, which should give us a strong clue as to the infinite nature of our ability. As spiritual beings, we're unlimited. We may find it easier to accept this as true of some person who shines in a particula...

I am free to be, to do, to accept, to reject. I am free to be the wise, loving, kind, and patient person I want to be. I'm free to do that which I consider wise — that which will in no way harm or hinder another person. I'm free to do that which will lead me into paths of peace and satisfaction. I'm free to decide for or against, to say no and to say yes. I'm free to live life in a productive way...

STEP 7 Humbly asked God (of our understanding) to remove our shortcomings. Now you're being asked to seek, to remove, via your Higher Power, your character defects. Is this really necessary? It certainly is! Character defects were a major portion of the reason one gambled. Therefore, keeping these defects can lead one back to gambling. For example, let's take one defect - anger. Assume you get int...

It's time for me to become willing to do what it takes to recover my personal responsibility, even if that means giving over the financial reins to another. Just as there are paradoxes in the Steps admitting my life's unmanageability in order that it become manageable again, surrendering to a Higher Power in order to become liberated - there will be other paradoxes in my recovery. Allowing a trust...

Change is a part of the flow of life. Sometimes we're frustrated because change seems slow in coming. Sometimes, too, we're resistant to a change that seems to have been thrust upon us. We must remember that change, in and of itself, neither binds us nor frees us. Only our attitude toward change binds or frees. As we learn to flow with the stream of life, praying for guidance about any change that...

During our days of active addiction, many of us displayed almost dazzlingly fertile powers of imagination. In no time at all, we could dream up more reasons or excuses for pursuing our addiction than most people use for all other purposes in their entire lives. When we first come to Gamblers Anonymous, our once-imaginative minds seem to become lethargic and even numb. "Now what do I do?" many of u...

Fear may have originally brought some of us to Gamblers Anonymous. In the beginning, fear alone may help some of us stay away from the game and that insidious about-to-be-lucky feeling (even when we knew that gambling always turned against us in the end). But a fearful state is hardly conducive to comfort and happiness - not for long. We have to find alternatives to fear to get us through those fi...

I've learned in the Gamblers Anonymous Program that the trick, for me, is not stopping gambling, but staying stopped and learning how not to start again. God knows, I tried to stop plenty of times, by lecturing myself on how it was affecting not only my life, but all aspects of my behavior. Gambling was actually changing who I seemed to be. To stay stopped, I've had to develop a positive, ongoing...

Once we surrendered and came to the Gamblers Anonymous Program, many of us wondered what we would do with all that time on our hands. All the hours we'd previously spent planning, hiding, alibiing, losing our shirts, borrowing, juggling accounts and all the rest-threatened to turn into empty chunks of time that somehow had to be filled. We needed new ways to use the energy previously absorbed by o...

Almost daily, I hear of seemingly mysterious coincidences in the lives of my friends in Gamblers Anonymous. From time to time, I've experienced such "coincidences" myself: showing up at the right place at exactly the right time; phoning a friend who, unbeknownst to me, desperately needed that particular phone call at that precise moment; hearing "my story" at an unfamiliar meeting in a strange tow...