Several things today made me think about this program. Why this alcoholic is here and still sober. And that is about how we all have changed from the drunks we were to this sober person. And I know that it began with surrender.
All this began last night and this morning. Then in the meeting today. I know I talked for a long time last night, and again this morning with another alcoholic like myself. We talked about all the things which we need to change, and how to go about it. Then at the meeting today we talked about all the changes we went through in here, as a result of surrendering to this program. Then, after the meeting today, we went out and continued to talk about all of this. And what struck me was all we went through in surrendering.
I know how difficult it was for me. The surrender to that First Step was total. I knew nothing about alcoholism and this program, but I somehow knew that I had to totally give up or else I would kill myself. And that’s what I did. I turned this whole chronic disease over to my Higher Power. That and the way I had been living. And that stunned me the next day, when I woke up and discovered I didn’t want a drink of alcohol. I have never ever forgotten that.
However the rest of these changes in here have come about only after a long long time. That has been the next thing. My surrender to this program and working these Steps. But the most important part of all of this was my choosing to live a spiritual way of life and believing in a Higher Power and depending on that each and everyday. And part of all this has been my opening up and allowing alcoholics like myself to help me to begin to change. My old sponsor, those old timers, and then all the others, who have showed up over time.
The result of all of this is that I gave up most of my old drinking life, and adopted a new way of living. That’s what changed me a whole lot from the person I had been. Yet I have to remember that I’m still a human being. Not a saint. And alcoholic, whose past life can and does show up from time to time in here. Like my old sponsor told me, I was going to bumble and stumble and tumble over time. I was going to have to learn to pick myself up and dust myself off, and start my day over, with a positive attitude rather than negative. He and others told me this was going to happen over and over through time, all the way to the end of my life.
However he and others pointed out to me that I never had to drink again. I had to learn to live a spiritual way of life and commit myself to staying sober a day at a time. No more than that. Just for now and not the future, nor the past. Just right now. And I know I try to do this each and everyday in here. And it works. Makes me grateful. To be willing to live on hope, faith, and love in this way of life. To receive and to give away this way of life. I am so grateful to my Higher Power, the program, and all those who have helped me.