I was thinking about the power of prayer and meditation yesterday and then last night I opened that book Spiritual Awakenings and found something Bill W. wrote about this. He was really disturbed in this one. Sounded like me.
What he was saying in there was a lot different than what he wrote in the Eleventh Step in the 12&12. It was really a complaint about himself and his prayers and meditations. He even said he went back and read what he had written before in the 12&12. He said that there was no way he lived up to the standards he had proposed in that chapter.
What he really was saying was how hard it was for him to remember, or even concentrate on his prayers and meditations. That he somehow lacked the necessary discipline to live up to the spiritual standards he felt he should be living at that stage of his sobriety. He said he knew he was not alone, but that was no excuse. He definitely wanted to do better, but that it was a struggle.
That’s just a brief idea, there’s more in that little chapter in the Spiritual Awakenings, but just kind of a summary of what I got out of it. Like I was saying, I was thinking something along those lines before I read it. You’d think with what I have experienced in here that I would be way ahead of where I think I am.
I’ve seen some amazing results, as a result of my prayers and those of others. I mean that I should have been aware right from the start in this program, when I asked God to stop me from drinking, and He did. Right then and there! And I had been fighting and struggling on my own for years and couldn’t stop drinking no matter what I did. And then there was that group of people, some of whom I had no idea who they were, who prayed that I’d get sober and right about the time I quit and went in the program they ended their series of prayers for me. Their prayers and mine had been answered.
I thought about my problems in prayer. It’s something to do with my apparent inability to focus and concentrate. I start off with all good intentions and sometimes just before I start my mind will be somewhere else. It’s the same, when I sit down to meditate. I’ll have all these good intentions and that’s where it seems to stop. Ten minutes later I will become aware that I was in another place than when I started.
I always tell myself to be willing and just do it. And after my clumsy attempts I end up feeling frustrated and sometimes disgusted with myself. I know when I sit down and write, like I am now, my mind is more focused and in control of what I’m doing. This writing of mine at the moment is close to being some kind of meditation.
However, when it comes to prayer, I hesitate to write. Mainly because there are so many more spiritual prayers I’ve seen written, which far exceed anything I could say or do. The problem is, when I read them and try to recite them, there goes my mind, again.
I remember a priest one time talking about this. He told the story of a missionary, riding a mule into one of the towns he was assigned to. He dismounted from the mule to go into the church there for a service. A young boy was standing near where he had stopped. He asked the boy if he would watch his mule for him. The boy just stood there with a look of envy in his eyes at the mule. The priest smiled and asked him if he wanted the mule. The boy nodded enthusiastically. “I’ll tell you what I’m going to do. I’ll give you this mule, if you can say the Our Father, without distraction. Do you think you can do that?” The boy nodded his head vigorously. “All right, young man, begin.” The boy started, “Our Father, who art in heaven…do the saddle bags go with the mule?” That little boy could have been me. No, could be is more like it.
The reason I think about this from time to time is that I really want to live and practice a spiritual way of life, as I have learned it in this program. I know that the maintenance of my spiritual condition is what keeps me sober. So, like Bill did in what I was reading about him last night, I’m really doing here. Asking myself questions on how I can better discipline myself and improve my method of praying and meditating.
One thing for certain is that I’m not going to quit trying. This program saved my life. The God of my understanding was there for me, when I needed him. I’m not giving up. More to be revealed.