Alcoholics Anonymous Videos | DonInLondon

January 5 2013 | AA 12 Steps In Action | Step 1 "Powerless" | Alcoholics Anonymous How am I feeling today? I feel good and I feel frustrated by technology! I want my computer to be efficient and up-to-date, but it seems to have developed some bugs over the previous few weeks. Not to worry, I am working round the issue, and learning how to make videos and write dialogue to go with them. It is frustrating, and I need not worry about fixing everything at once. And my living space is in chaos as a result of a new printer and conflicting software…

Video For Today:

Around 7 o'clock last night, I felt a night in without any connections to the outside world was a bad idea. I trundled off to a meeting close by and just got there in time for the start. It's beautiful to see friends who are now years in recovery and also see good friends coming back after a bit of research out there in the land of alcohol. The news about life with alcohol for an alcoholic is most often horrible. And so often we never see people come back, some die quite quickly and others simply trudge an unhappy road , and only when the time is right, can they return under their own steam…

Listening intently to the main speaker, it covered everything about recovery, that it is normal life with good, bad and ugly bits. And when life gets ugly, dealing with this reality is as difficult as it need be. Usually we can cope with anything without a drink inside us and if we are not able to cope, we have plenty of friends in recovery and maybe sponsors as well who can be a listening post, and sometimes offer advice about how to process the issues. There is never a guarantee of an answer, an immediate answer to the problems we face. Or we would have found it already. The answer is to be open, honest and willing to ask for help when needed from the right people in the right place at the right time. Not always in fellowship…

I also shared how good it was to hear a true story of recovery, and everything shared, make complete sense to me. And one of the things on my mind at the moment when it comes to newcomers is the fellowship and its religious connotations. Some people, they are put off by any reference to God in the twelve steps of AA. Listening to a Buddhist share about their recovery recently, they picked a passage from as Bill sees it, which says one fellowship with many faiths. And that is the absolute truth of it, one fellowship all about sobriety and people of many faiths and beliefs who are able to live the twelve step principles in all their simplicity, one day at a time…

Meanwhile, back to the chaos I have created and gently sorting out where things will go. I don't have to make things perfect and cover-up to try and make things look perfect in my own space, I've learned that untidiness is as good as tidiness, it just depends on how I feel about it. If I feel comfortable in chaos, it is not an issue, if I feel discomfort and uneasy about anything, there is always somewhere to go to share and ask for help. Not necessarily about my immediate living space chaos, simply about the immediate chaos which might ensue in my head on any given day, there is always someone to ask the help these days…

January 5 | Daily Reflection|

Our daily reflections in AA, is all about acceptance and the jumping off point, where we have nowhere to go and no way to go back. How many times did I get to the jumping off point? I planned it, nearly did it, and if it hadn't been for the impact it would have on others I would have jumped…

Video For Today:

I needed professional help, and some direction. At first it seemed I could blame everything else, overwork, anxiety, impossible deadlines I had imposed myself. I admitted over indulging in alcohol but never accepted it had a part to play in my breakdown. A mountain of unresolved feelings kept at bay by drink. Total acceptance of my alcoholism was years away…

"It could not be happening to me" I would be stronger and tougher and I would overcome this problem. The idea of powerlessness never occurred to me until family asked for help on my behalf. And even then I rejected and raged at interference in my life, it was up to me to sort my own life out. It took another five years of trying to do the impossible, battle and beat addiction on my own...

When it was suggested I try to do 90 meetings in 90 days, and stop trying to go it alone, I accepted it was worth a go. And I went a lot more than 90 meetings in those 90 days, fearful of a drink and fearful of my own company. In the company of sober people for that length of time I saw it was possible to change…

DonInLondon 2005-2011

Sober Life in action ~ "Tennessee Williams "Success is blocked by concentrating on it and planning for it... Success is shy - it won't come out while you're watching." And gratitude is a reflection on what has happened and being alive so it may happen again...

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AA Official Online Site: Daily Reflections

http://www.aa.org/lang/en/aareflections.cfm

AA Official Online Site: Big Book And Twelve And Twelve

http://www.aa.org/lang/en/subpage.cfm?page=359

January 2013 | Step One Reading Video Link: