Alcoholics Anonymous Quotes

One day at a time.

If we still cling to something we will not let go, we ask God to help us be willing.

If, when you honestly want to, you find you cannot quit entirely, or if when drinking, you have little control over the amount you take, you are probably alcoholic.

...one of the primary differences between alcoholics and nonalcoholics is that nonalcoholics change their behavior to meet their goals and alcoholics change their goals to meet their behaviors.

How did people have conversations anyway? How did they meet and then begin to talk as if they had known each other for years?

The feeling of having shared in a common peril is one element in the powerful cement which binds us.

I've been benefited from a dictionary definition I found that reads: "Rationalization is giving a socially acceptable reason for socially unacceptable behavior, and socially unacceptable behavior is a form of insanity.

I gave alcohol everything I had

Avoid then, the deliberate manufacture of misery, but if trouble comes, cheerfully capitalize it as an opportunity to demonstrate His omnipotence.

I had sent her to four consecutive psychiatrists, and not one of them had gotten me sober.

I simply had to believe in a Spirit of the Universe, who knew neither time nor limitation.

When I stopped living in the problem and began living in the answer, the problem went away.

The program works, if you work it.

When we developed still more, we discovered the best possible source of emotional stability to be God Himself. We found that dependence upon His perfect justice, forgiveness, and love was healthy, and that it would work where nothing else would. If we really depended upon God, we couldn't very well play God to our fellows nor would we feel the urge wholly to rely on human protection and care.

A New Year: 12 months, 52 weeks, 365 days, 8,760 hours, 525,600 minutes - a

had we not been brought to where we stood by a certain kind of faith? For did we not believe in our own reasoning? Did we not have confidence in our ability to think? What was that but a sort of faith? Yes, we had been faithful, abjectly faithful to the God of Reason. So, in one way or another, we discovered that faith had been involved all the time! We found, too, that we had been worshippers. What a state of mental goose flesh that used to bring on! Had we not variously worshipped people, sentiment, things, money, and ourselves? And then, with a better motive, had we not worshipfully beheld the sunset, the sea, or a flower? Who of us had not loved something

RIGOROUS HONESTY Who wishes to be rigorously honest and tolerant? Who wants to confess his faults to another and make restitution for harm done? Who cares anything about a Higher Power, let alone meditation and prayer? Who wants to sacrifice time and energy in trying to carry A.A.'s message to the next sufferer? No, the average alcoholic, self-centered in the extreme, doesn't care for this prospect - unless he has to do these things in order to stay alive himself. TWELVE STEPS AND TWELVE TRADITIONS, p. 24 I am an alcoholic. If I drink I will die. My, what power, energy, and emotion this simple statement generates in me! But it's really all I need to know for today. Am I willing to stay alive today? Am I willing to stay sober today? Am I willing to ask for help and am I willing to be a help to another suffering alcoholic today? Have I discovered the fatal nature of my situation? What must I do, today, to stay sober?

As one of my early A.A. sponsors used to say, I didn't hang out with lower companions - I had become one.

It is a spiritual axiom that every time we are disturbed, no matter what the cause, there is something wrong with us.

Not being a man of means, I knew that if I did not stay sober enough to earn money, I would run out of liquor.

Through the years I had quit on everything that ever mattered: college, going for promotions, relationships - at least the relationships that demanded any work.

Almost none of us liked the self-searching, the leveling of our pride, the confession of shortcomings which the process requires for its successful consummation.

Not only had I been off guard,

We sometimes hurt those we love because they need to be "taught a lesson," when we really want to punish. We were depressed and complained we felt bad, when in fact we were mainly asking for sympathy and attention. This odd trait of mind and emotion, this perverse wish to hide a bad motive underneath a good one, permeates human affairs from top to bottom. This subtle and elusive kind of self-righteousness can underlie the smallest act or thought. Learning daily to spot, admit, and correct these flaws is the essence of character-building and good living. An honest regret for harms done, a genuine gratitude for blessings received, and a willingness to try for better things tomorrow will be the permanent assets we shall seek.

To be vital, faith must be accompanied by self sacrifice and unselfish, constructive action.

somebody? How much did these feelings, these loves, these worships, have to do with pure reason? Little or nothing, we saw at last. Were not these things the tissue out of which our lives were constructed? Did not these feelings, after all, determine the course of our existence? It was impossible to say we had no capacity for faith, or love, or worship. In one form or another we had been living by faith and little else.

The best gift of meditation, from my perspective, is that I've been introduced to the Spirit of the Universe by experiencing it in the very breath that I breathe. I love that God is available to all equally, that he's all about love, and that some of us experience that source of love by simply practicing the AA principles in all our affairs. Linda I.

No one waits to trap him in a lie. He is told what lies he is getting ready to tell.

This too shall pass" has become my mantra on the LOW days, havin one, but the day is half done and though my two year old does'nt want to give up the tantrum, I can begin my day again any time I should so choose.

Not my will, but my heart's will.

The first thing apparent was that this world and its people were often quite wrong. To conclude that others were wrong was as far as most of us ever got. The usual outcome was that people continued to wrong us and we stayed sore. Sometimes it was remorse and then we were sore at ourselves. But the more we fought and tried to have our own way, the worse matters got. As in war, the victor only seemed to win. Our moments of triumph were short-lived.