The Big Book of Alcoholics Anonymous

by Alcoholics Anonymous

have accepted the reasons and to have acted on them would have been too great a blow to my ego, which was as great, in reverse, as my body was small. In my

Easing God Out

There was the sense of being “misunderstood,” when as a matter of fact by my middle twenties I was quite popular, although I hadn’t grown much bigger physically.

But the feeling was a crutch, an excuse. It was my “secret garden” — bluntly, it was my retreat from life, and I didn

But as the years go by, the stretch becomes unbearable; and the man with the grown-up brain and the childish emotions — vanity, self-interest, false pride, jealousy, longing for social approval, to name a few — becomes a prime candidate for alcohol.

Just for today: Higher Power, help me live in accordance with spiritual principles. Only then can I approve of myself.

definition of alcoholism; a state of being in which the emotions have failed to grow to the stature of the intellect.

“compensation” for immaturity.

I wish I knew a short cut to maturity.

I had to be right all the time, and only God can be that. Okay, I wanted to be God.

“do you want to live or die?

binge.

Hope

humbly, “I suppose I want to live.

I chose to believe that the Power greater than ourselves we ask for help, wrapped my shivering body in loving warmth and strength which has never left me.

changed my mind about alcohol, and it stayed changed.

own power to happiness in life. I learned the true meaning of bread cast upon the waters.

my family and loved ones, all of my friends, are nearer and dearer to me than ever before; and I have literally dozens of new friends who say they cannot believe that a short eight years ago I was ready for the scrap heap.

For I am happy. I thought I could never be happy. A happy man is not likely to do harm to another human being. Harm is done by sick people, as I was sick, and doing dreadful harm to myself and to my loved ones.

the law of love,

loses his life does indeed find it. The more you give, the more you get. The less you think of yourself the more of a person you become.

And I am sure they would be right as far as they go, but A.A. has taught me I am the result of the way I reacted to what happened to me as a child.

I am responsible.

simple program

12&12

“match calamity with ...

restlessness, anxiety, fear and insecurity. The only kind of security

HAULT

The solution seemed very simple.

Sickness

futility, loneliness and lack of purpose, that had come with my deep sense of personal failure

Pointless

convinced me that my basic problem was a spiritual hunger, but A.A. has shown me this was the truth. And if I had been able to turn to the church at that time I’m sure they could not have convinced me my sickness was within myself, nor could they have shown me the need for self-analysis that A.A. has shown me is vital if I am to

Soul opposed to material

obsession with self, and my egocentricity

self-pity and resentment,

escape from myself, for my remorse and shame and humiliation when I was sober were almost unbearable. The

past master at kidding myself

my resentment and self-pity grew, so did my alcoholic problem.

Maybe I wouldn’t be able to hold any job, or maybe (and this was my greatest fear) I wouldn’t care whether I had a job or not. I knew it didn’t make any difference where I started, the inevitable end would be skid row. The

Jobs unstable

It seemed logical to me that if I married this man and took the responsibility for these children that they would keep me sober. So I married again. This caused the rather cryptic comment from one of my A.A. friends, when I told my story after coming into the program, “that I had always been a cinch for the program, for I had always been interested in mankind, but that I was just taking them one man at a time.

Conceal

drunk for sixty days around the clock and it was my intention, literally, to drink myself to death. I

My story before 101008

jail

Yet& with Gods help never.

sanitarium to be defogged so that I could make a sober decision about this for myself.

practicing alcoholic I had no rights. Society can do anything it chooses to do with me when I am drunk and I can’t lift a finger to stop it, for I forfeit my rights

Mentally ill have no rights in combination with alcohol

and that

I take no sedation or narcotics, for this program is to me one of complete sobriety and I no longer need to escape reality.

Mental health takes precedence to me I don't understand the social rules in comparison to my opinion.

the H is for honesty, the O is for open-mindedness and the W is for willingness;

HOW

try

Try

Twelve Steps

I believe this, and I believe too that it is equally impossible to practice these principles to the best of our ability, a day at a time, and still drink, for I don’t think the two things are compatible.

Not compatible

I had no problem admitting I was powerless over alcohol, and I certainly agreed that my life had become unmanageable.

Powerless unmanageable

I couldn’t manage my life drunk or sober. A.A. taught me that willingness to

believe

was enough for a b...

My desire to be honest with myself made it necessary for me to realize that my thinking was irrational.

“rationalization is giving a socially acceptable reason for socially unacceptable behavior, and socially unacceptable behavior is a form of insanity.

Social insanity

A.A. has taught me that I will have peace of mind in exact proportion to the peace of mind I bring into the lives of the other people, and it has taught me the true meaning of the admonition “happy are ye who know these things and do them.” For the only problems I have now are those I create when I break out in a rash of self-will. I’ve had many spiritual experiences since I’ve been in the program, many that I didn’t recognize right away, for I’m slow to learn and they take many

Warning