Today, we learn how to not drink TODAY. It is really quite simple. Not always easy, but it is simple. Simple, because it is only one drink that will make or break us. That is the first drink. If you don’t take that first drink, you will never get to the second and others following. Also, we are only thinking of today. Or in other words, the now. Not the agonizing thing that is supposed to happen tomorrow. Or the awful thing that was done yesterday. When we successfully refrain from drinking or drugging AND work our program, we are SOBER. Not just DRY!
Let’s make it even simpler. I know that things can go bad in an instant. Maybe at 12:15PM something horrendous happens. This still leaves a lot of hours left in the day. What happens then? I start my day over again at any time that I choose. In this case, I would start it over at 12:16PM and so be successfully sober. Now I go back to not picking up that first drink TODAY. See, it is really simple. Now, let’s look at the question of how easy is it?
When you entered this human experience, your Creator made you Spiritually perfect and whole. When you left your mother’s womb, you had been having a heartbeat but were not breathing air as you do now. Your Higher Power had covered that fact by attaching you to your mother and you received all that you needed.
As soon as you left the comforts of your “home,” you let out a roar or cry. You may have been assisted in a reminder that you had to do some things by yourself with only God’s help. This reminder may have been successfully administered by a smack on the bottom. From that time on, you breathed without even thinking about or controlling it. Your mother let go and let God. You let go of your mother and let God. Neither you nor your mother thought about it. You both JUST DID IT and did it in the NOW!
Think of all of the things that you do without even consciously thinking about them. Things seem to happen instinctively. “I never thought about what to do when that baseball came toward my head. I just ducked.” Things “just happen” regularly that are not even thought about until they actually appear. We call our actions or reactions instincts. Our Higher Power does not talk to us in our language. It communicates with us with our feelings and instincts.
What does this have to do with not drinking today? If you are working your program 24/7/365 this means that if it feels right, it is right. If there is any apprehension at all, it may be time to reconsider.
OK, how do you work your program 24/7/365 if you are super busy? I believe that the best way to explain this is to realize just what to do 24/7/365 while being super busy at the same time. Just do the next right thing and continue doing just this, the next right thing. This way, if it feels right, IT IS RIGHT. If there is any apprehension at all, maybe it is time to RECONSIDER. Then if it FEELS right and there are no apprehensions, it IS right.
Do you think that you are an alcoholic? If you do, just keep right in the front of your mind to always do the next right thing. Then you are working your program. Then the craving will take a poof pill and disappear. To give it a real boost, just use the shortened version of the 3rd Step. Humbly say “God help me.” Then move on to the next right thing. It is so simple and the more that you practice it, the easier it becomes. That is a promise. God bless you!
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