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“There are occasions for me when I am not thinking about myself and my own reactions to events or circumstances, but have my attention fully occupied by tasks, ideas, scenes, or another person. And when I recollect these occasions, I find that they have been my happiest.”

“Worry saps me of the energy that I need for today.”

“Acceptance doesn’t mean I have to condone a particular situation, it simply means I can better assess what is going on around me without the filters of my past and without comparison to what I would consider a more ideal circumstance.”

“Now that we no longer patronize bars and bordellos; now that we bring home the paychecks; now that we are so very active in AA; and now that people congratulate us on these signs of progress -- well, we naturally proceed to congratulate ourselves. Yet we may not be within hailing distance of humility. Meaning well, yet doing badly, how often have I said or thought, ‘I am right and you are wrong,’ ‘My plan is correct and yours is faulty,’ ‘Thank God your sins are not my sins,’ ‘You are hurting AA and I'm going to stop you cold,’ ‘I have God's guidance, so He is on my side.’ And so on, indefinitely.

The alarming thing about such pride-blindness is the ease with which it is justified.”

“Nothing is so bad that a drink won’t make worse.”

“As I carried the Fourth Step into the next directional action, the Fifth ... I began to gain by pain, to win by losing, to get control by letting go of control. And good feelings poured in from all sides. I discovered how many words that I had been fond of using were actually traps, setting off negative thinking -- ‘If only...,’ ‘You always...,’ ‘never,’ ‘forever,’ ‘If you would only...,’ and so on. I dug in and tried desperately to change word habits, to share time instead of spending it.”

“God didn’t give me this gift of sobriety to sit in a rocking chair...”

“Love is what the soul thrives on.”

“I feel close to the Great Spirit of my fathers. Words are not necessary. The Great Spirit speaks in all languages.”

“I’m not so quick to judge others. If I’m critical of you, it’s often because I’m trying to ignore that quality in myself.”

“The process of one alcoholic confiding in another has without a doubt saved my life. Nowhere else have I ever found such devotion and understanding as with AA sponsoring.”

“I inevitably find that when I’m able to stay focused on my primary purpose, my ‘secondary purposes’ (school, jobs, relationships) work themselves out quite satisfactorily.”

“When we meet and defeat the temptation to take large gifts, we are only being prudent. But when we are generous with the hat we give a token that we are grateful for our blessings and evidence that we are eager to share what we have found with all those who still suffer.”

“If we are to find spiritual growth and serenity, we must dress our minds each morning as carefully as we dress our bodies. Only then can today become the glorious tomorrow we looked forward to yesterday.”

“Work on Step Nine has freed me from fears about the past and given me more energy to devote to present-day living – this twenty-four hours.”