Daily Reflections reading December 28th
Suit Up And Show Up
In
A.A. we aim not only for sobriety – we try again to become citizens of the
world that we rejected, and of the world that once rejected us. This is the ultimate
demonstration toward which Twelfth Step work is the first but not the final
step. AS BILL SEES IT, p. 21
The
old line says, “Suit up and show up.” That action is so important that I like
to think of it as my motto. I can choose each day to suit up and show up, or
not. Showing up at meetings starts me toward feeling a part of that meeting, I
can talk with newcomers, and I can share my experience; that’s what
credibility, honesty, and courtesy really are. Suiting up and showing up are
the concrete actions I take in my ongoing return to normal living
© Alcoholics Anonymous World Services
My thoughts on December 28th Reading
Suit Up And Show Up
I could not offset the damage to my ex wife, caused by years
of alcoholism abuse, AA's do have sex and marital problems, and sometimes they
are distressingly acute, was not easy to suit up and show up, when your world
was falling apart on you
The severe emotional twists of my life just caught up with
me, I was not the great I am, I thought I was, with my alcoholism came situations
that work against my marriage, I still managed to provide for my family but not
in a manner they should have been provided for
My ignorance, compulsion, and self-will kept me misusing my
own free will, as matters got worse, I became sick and irresponsible, booze was
more important than anything else in my drunken life, something had to change
The Twelve Steps, showed me how to correct the mistakes of
my past, gave me the chance to reach out to others who were in the same position
I was in, with out the Ex wife in my life, I immersed myself in 12 step work, I
had to keep busy or go nuts
Thank God I did have a balance in my new family life, with
my two kids, my ex never did take me back, I had caused to much damage to
repair it all, so we did divorce but it was not a messy one, I had access to my
two kids any time I wanted
I started to show up in their lives more often, I had
reasonable visitations with my kids and this helped me to give them the father
they deserved, we had a fantastic relationship, did real family things, with
out my being to drunk to enjoy them
Today I do understanding how much damage I did, so again I
had to suit up and show up to take responsibility for the damage, I had the
willingness to repair any of the damage I could, but I also had to accept some
of this damage is not going to be repaired
Repairing the damage also meant I had to look at the damage
I did to myself, the steps helped me to do this, taken the action steps four thru
nine, showed me how to change the person I had brought into the halls, showing
me the right way to go, following Gods will not my own
having worked the steps into my life, I did after fourteen
months in the program the unthinkable I said I would never date or marry again,
but this AA angel came into my life, we dated for about six months and we both
saw we could make a marriage work following the steps of recovery
We did have a solid foundation to work from, we new each
other better than most folks, because we shared this common bond working the
program into our lives, we had compatibility at spiritual, mental, and
emotional levels and felt a deep understanding of each other
We were sure no deep-lying emotional handicaps in either of
us would rise up under pressures of life to cripple us and we had this solid
foundation and love for God as we both understood him, yes we had a clear
understanding and right, attitudes to make this work
With God's help, we accepted ourselves, we found we could
live at peace with ourselves and show others who still suffered the same fears,
they could get over them, we found freedom
from fear was more important than freedom from want
Today we are always there to reach out and help our brothers
and sisters in need, in or out of the program, we have been blessed with
recovery and we need to keep passing this God given program forwards, to
maintain our own sobriety
Please feel free to mail
suggestions or comments
