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“My daily life is conducted in a manner that is far different from my drinking days. The places I go, the things I do, and the people I am with are a reflection of my spiritual progress. My life is conducted with the knowledge that God is always at my side and guides me through the day. For that, at the end of each day, I say, ‘Thank You.’”

“From cradle to grave, the drunk and the potential alcoholic will have to be completely surrounded by true and deep understanding and by a continuous barrage of information: the facts about his illness, its symptoms, its grim seriousness. Why should an alcoholic have to wait until he is 55 and be horribly mangled to find out that he is a very sick man, when enough education of the right kind might have convinced him at 30 or 35?”

“The laughter in AA is what attracted me from the very beginning. The restorative power of laughter should never be underestimated ... I have come to believe that I’m being restored to sanity when my sense of humor is restored and I cease to take myself so seriously.”

“I am more a woman of action than a woman in reaction, and hope is more present in my life than insecurity ... As much as I was thirsty for alcohol, today I am thirsty for knowledge.”

“Like other men and women, we AAs look with deep apprehension upon the vast power struggle about us, a struggle in myriad forms that invades every level, tearing society apart. I think we AAs are fortunate to be acutely aware that such forces must never be ruling among us, lest we perish altogether.”

“AA is more than a set of principles; it is a Society of alcoholics in action. We must carry the message, else we ourselves can wither and those who haven’t been given the truth will die.”

“Because of what I learned in my home group -- to be on time, sit in the front row, thank the speaker, take commitments, pray and meditate -- I’m able to carry the message to the alcoholic who still suffers. It’s important for me to be connected to the love of giving back and the joy of helping others -- chips, cakes, Step work and lots of reaching out.”

“We have to keep looking for something better than dullness, better than average living, better than mediocre spirituality.”

“As I peel away the layers of day-to-day expediency, I realize that my zigzag, erratic, and inconsistent course was in the general direction of progress all the time.”

“The ability to laugh at ourselves is an intrinsic part of the healing process.”

“When we reach a maximum in understanding, we know how very much we shall never understand.”

‘Imperfection offers me the freedom of a million potentials.”

“Sound policy can only be made by rubbing the conservatives and the promoters together. Their discussions, if free from personal ambitions and resentment, can be depended upon to produce the right answers. For us, there is no other way.”

“I am still amazed at the aura around AA meetings ... No matter what our immediate problems, fears, or resentments, we come to a halt when the meeting begins and focus on our primary purpose.”

“Older AAs who know the record are unanimous in their feeling that an intelligence greater than ours has surely been at work, else we could never have avoided so many pitfalls, could never have been so happily related to our millions of friends in the outside world.”