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“Only the sharing of despair can bring us ... illumination.”

“No matter how truthful the words of my message, there could be no deep communication if what I said and did was colored by pride, arrogance, intolerance, resentment, imprudence, or desire for personal acclaim -- even though I was largely unconscious of these attitudes.”

“Certainly, we need leaders, but we must regard them as the human agent of the Higher Power and not with undue adulation as individuals.”

“Experience is what you get when you don’t get what you want.”

“Some of us take a long time to ‘come to’ before we can ‘come to believe’ that there is any hope for us.”

“Anonymity is a spiritual foundation not only of Tradition Twelve, but of sobriety itself.”

“Coincidences are merely a manner in which God protects his anonymity.”

“When I first started in AA, I began each day asking God to help keep me sober that day, and ended each night by thanking him for another day of sobriety. I still end each day that way, as I have done almost every night during the past forty-one years. It is a routine for me, but every once in a while I pause to reflect on what it truly means. I do it every night so that God won’t change his mind, as I truly believe he helped lead me from the pits of alcoholism to the AA way of life.”

“I have always carried a meeting list and quarter for a phone call because I don’t know when I am going to want another drink.”

“Our Serenity Prayer ... brings a new light to us that can dissipate our old-time and nearly fatal habit of fooling ourselves.”

“We now know that we do not have to run away, nor ought we again try to overcome adversity by still another bulldozing power drive that can only push up obstacles before us faster than they can be taken down.”

“Full consciousness ... implies not only the willingness to receive the love and benefits AA has to offer, but also to surrender to the equally painful experience of exposure to ourselves, and others, of ourselves.”

“We can’t grow without giving ourselves space for silence and the voice within.”

“We measure our progress in AA by two words, ‘humility’ and ‘responsibility.’ May I ever keep my eye on these yardsticks as I continue to seek only knowledge of his will for me.”

“Today’s disappointment, viewed six months hence, may turn out to be one of the best breaks we ever got.”