Wow! What a lesson I got today from a long time friend of mine. How full of myself I can be and not even have a clue.
What she reminded me of was the 7th Step in the 12&12. I thought about what she said and pulled out my book and read it once again. Read what? About the value and the need of humility in my life.
Easy to talk about, but hard in the doing. To once again to be reminded of the place my higher power, the God of my understanding, has in my life. Rather than being put on the bench, only to be called upon in an emergency, like a bush league pinch hitter, He should be ever present in my mind and in charge of my life.
Bill’s quote from the scriptures, “Of myself I am nothing, my father doeth the works” are words that are appropriate. I can remember early on using that as something I would repeat over and over during any given day. And then someplace along the line, satisfaction took over.
After all I was sober wasn’t I and that’s what it’s all about, isn’t it? Not after reading the 7th Step again. The idea that the humility we achieve in admitting and surrendering in the 1st Step is enough, is not enough for us to remain sober. Someplace along the line, especially in dealing with our egos, our faults, and our failures, we have to change. This is where we are asked to bring our higher power fully into the picture.
Like it was said, if God could remove alcohol from our lives, how much more he could do, when it came to defects, which are so harmful to us. How this could save us from having to drink again. But, like Bill said, it might take a series of humiliations, pain, to get us to look at humility by itself, as a saving grace in our lives.
Anyway, I was glad to be reminded of this today. It was like taking a refreshing plunge into a pool. At least that’s the way I saw it. I’m so grateful for friends, who help alcoholics like me