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#18 |
Administrator
Join Date: Aug 2013
Posts: 75,455
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Big Book Study - Post #18
Good Morning, everyone! *Paragraph 2 on* *page 60* - original text in (parenthesis) and my editorial notes in [brackets]:* * "Our description of the alcoholic, [found in the Doctor's Opinion and Chapter 3 - More About Alcoholism] the chapter to the agnostic, [Chapter 4 - We Agnostics] and our personal adventures before and after" [Chapter 1 - Bill's Story] make clear (are designed to sell you) three pertinent ideas: (a) That we were alcoholic and could not manage our own lives. [This is Step 1.] (b) That probably no human power could have relieved our alcoholism. [This is the first half of Step 2.] (c) That God could and would (can and will) if He were sought. [Step 2, second half.]" At this point we have completed Steps 1 and 2. Notice how we go directly into Step 3 here in *paragraph 3*: "Being convinced, we were at Step Three, which is that we decided [remember that our decisions must be followed up with action in order to make them meaningful - Step 4 is the action] to turn our will [our thoughts] and our lives [our actions] over to God as we understood Him." *Paragraph 4 -* "The first requirement is that we be convinced that any life run on self-will can hardly be a success." In the preceding chapters we see that self-will has little effect regarding our drinking. Now we examine how that is true regarding our lives as a whole. Read through to *page 62 paragraph 1*: "Selfishness - Self-centeredness! That, we think, is the root of our troubles." This is an important point. Our troubles weren't the product of a poor upbringing, horrible parents, being the member of ____ (fill in the blank with any subset of society). We had a difficult time of it due to "Selfishness - Self-centeredness." "...we have made decisions based on self which later placed us in a position to be hurt." We have discovered that WE are usually the reason for the suffering we have had to experience. We were not the unwitting "victims" of life that we frequently portrayed ourselves to be. I was astonished when this was pointed out to me. *Next paragraph -* "So our troubles, we think, are basically of our own making. "...we alcoholics must be rid of this selfishness. We must, or it kills us!" So, it isn't always booze that kills us - selfishness will kill us indirectly. Throughout the book we will discover that bottles are only a symbol, that our problem runs deeper than the drinking itself. Tomorrow, we will pick up with the end of page 62 and touch upon that spiritual structure that we have been building. With love, Karen H.
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![]() "No matter what you have done up to this moment, you get 24 brand-new hours to spend every single day." --Brian Tracy
AA gives us an opportunity to recreate ourselves, with God's help, one day at a time. --Rufus K. When you get to the end of your rope, tie a knot and hang on. --Franklin D. Roosevelt We stay sober and clean together - one day at a time! God says that each of us is worth loving. |
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