Affirmations

What’s going on???

He that shuts love out, in turn, shall be shut out from love.
~Alfred Tennyson

Addiction caused us to turn away from love. We started to feel things weren't right; this feeling was a message of love from our Higher Power. We used denial or blame to turn away. Our family members told us they were worried; this was another message of love. We argued and blamed them. Our friends expressed concerns, still another message of love. We dumped them and got new friends. And then we wondered why we felt like love had turned its back on us.

Recovery pushes us back toward love. People treat us with care and kindness; these are messages of love. They ask that we turn to a Higher Power, a further message of love. We used to shut out love because our addiction demanded this of us. Now we must embrace love because our recovery requires this of us.

Prayer for the Day
Higher Power, help me to do what love asks of me, even when I'm scared.

Today's Action
I will list the ways I shut out love during my active addiction. Am I doing any of these today? I will use my Tenth Step to keep track of my relationship with love.

People-Pleasers
Have you ever been around people-pleasers? They tend to be displeasing. Being around someone who is turned inside out to please another is often irritating and anxiety producing.

People-pleasing is a behavior we may have adapted to survive in our family. We may not have been able to get the love and attention we deserved. We may not have been given permission to please ourselves, to trust ourselves, and to choose a course of action that demonstrated self-trust.

People-pleasing can be overt or covert. We may run around fussing over others, chattering a mile-a-minute when what we are really saying is, "I hope I'm pleasing you." Or, we may be more covert, quietly going through life making important decisions based on pleasing others.

Taking other people's wants and needs into consideration is an important part of our relationships. We have responsibilities to friends and family and employers. We have a strong inner responsibility to be loving and caring. But, people-pleasing backfires. Not only do others get annoyed with us, we often get annoyed when our efforts to please do not work as we planned. The most comfortable people to be around are those who are considerate of others but ultimately please themselves.

Help me, God, work through my fears and begin to please myself.

Walking the Path Together
When my sponsor died after a heart transplant, I found another guy I really liked. He was a military warrant officer with about four years' sobriety. I barely had a year. We started going to daily meetings and did a formal Step study together - the best thing I've ever done.

We were best friends for thirty-four years, until he died. When I retired from the military, I went to work for the government and was able to hire him. We'd ride to work and have a meeting on the way. What a man. I used to tell him, "You know, every man is my teacher. Some teach me what to do. You've taught me a lot about what not to do."

He used to tell me, "You know, the deal works, but not all the dealers do. Not all the people in the program work the program." He worked the program each and every day. We knew everything about each other, and the hardest thing I ever had to do was to bury that sponsor after thirty-four years. But I'm so thankful that his lessons live on.

Today I treasure those friends, past and present, I've met on the road to recovery.

~Mike F., U.S. Navy, 1959–1965/1972–1990