Daily Reflections reading February 16th

Commitment

Understanding is the key to right principles and attitudes, and right action is the key to good living. TWELVE STEPS AND TWELVE TRADITIONS, p. 125

There came a time in my program of recovery when the third stanza of the Serenity Prayer — “The wisdom to know the difference” –became indelibly imprinted in my mind. From that time on, I had to face the ever-present knowledge that my every action, word and thought was within, or outside, the principles of the program. I could no longer hide behind self-rationalization, nor behind the insanity of my disease. The only course open to me, if I was to attain a joyous life for myself (and subsequently for those I love), was one in which I imposed on myself an effort of commitment, discipline, and responsibility.

My thoughts on February 16th Reading

My first commitment was to myself to follow the twelve steps to insure I have sound recovery from our disease, this took a lot of action on my part, cleaning up the wreckage of my drunken past, knowing how many people I had hurt

I had to stay committed to following each step on my way to cleaning up that past, my next commitment was to family and friends repairing the damage I had caused by my drinking, trying to control every thing around me

I had to continue commit to making amends to family friend, an employers who I had hurt by not given 100% of myself to them, in my past I was a full time employee give only part time work because of all the time I lost because of the drinking

I committed more time to my two children given them a father they never had in the past, I was able to give them true unconditional love back as they had always given this to me, easy to see this being sober but sure was not the case when drunk

I have a fantastic relationship with my new wife and we have raised all our children her four and my two with the love and respect they deserved, we are also committed to our 16 grand children and two great grand daughters

Commitment to AA is a must for me I have served in almost every service positions in the fellowship last being DCM for a district I have the pleasure to serve, this was commitment to all those who served before me to continue their work

I prayed I could bring enthusiasm, give back some basic principles to the groups I was now serving along with new hope to the still sick and suffering, alcoholics who come to our meetings as members of alcoholics anonymous and members of a group in the district its up to us all

To see our group holds business meetings, gives the information as to how groups work what the financial status of our group is, what our groups conscience is, what our group hopes to accomplish and how they are going to accomplish these things we set out to do

I also committed to show where members can voice their opinions, and be heard, all member have a right to be heard even if they have minority opinions, it is vitally important to express those opinions, no group or individual member of AA should ever deny you the right to be heard.

As a trusted servant I wanted to hear everyone's views and how we should carry the message, to those who are still out there, when I declare myself a member of AA, I also have accepted, the very same responsibility of carrying the message to another alcoholic

As those who declared themselves members before me, this is a commitment only we as groups can decide what message we want our representatives to carry what commitments our district needs to fill and how we want these commitments filled

After serving that district I had some major health problems and it was at that time unable to carry on the duties of DCM with my on going health problem I had to give up face to face service work but being 35+ years sober I do continue to carry the message thru all the meetings on the internet

They insure me of my own sobriety, if your new or just starting out please conceder take one of the meeting on line to chair make the commitment to yourself to be of service one hour a week is not much to ask of anyone who wants to stay active and sober

God bless you Al M

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