Sobriety Is The Launching Pad For Our Recovery

From the beginning of the book “Living Sober,” we’re told of practical methods for not drinking, starting with;

Keep an open mind.

It is suggested that, instead of dismissing thoughts which don’t appeal to you that you keep an open mind to be able to go back to something later on which you might not have liked initially. Then it says;

“Many of us found that the sooner we started work on the Twelve Steps offered as a program of recovery in the book ‘Alcoholics Anonymous,’ the better. Others of us felt the need to postpone this until we had been sober a little while.

The point is, there is no prescribed A.A. ‘right’ way or ‘wrong’ way. Each of us uses what is best for himself or herself – without closing the door on other kinds of help we may find valuable at another time. And each of us tries to respect others’ rights to do things differently.

Sometimes, an A.A. member will talk about taking the various parts of the program in cafeteria style – selecting what he likes and letting alone what he does not want. Maybe others will come along and pick up the unwanted parts – or maybe that member himself will go back later and take some of the ideas he previously rejected.

However, it is good to remember the temptation in a cafeteria to pick up nothing but a lot of desserts or starches or salads or some other food we particularly like. It serves as an important reminder to us to keep a balance in our lives.

In recovering from alcoholism, we found that we needed a balanced diet of ideas, even if some of them did not look, at first, as enjoyable as others. Like good food, good ideas did us no good unless we made intelligent use of them.”

Which, to me, offers a loud scream for a sponsor as there is a lot here that could be taken quite a few different ways and a sponsor would have the experience to give direction.