Tuesday, December 15, 2015
Today's Gift
****************************
Great symphonies begin with just one note. —Priscilla Young Pratt
Sometimes it's really hard to get going. We put off things we don't want to do, or are afraid to try. We occasionally feel overwhelmed by the size of a job to be done like cleaning out the cellar or reading a long book for a class.
But think a minute. If Beethoven had thought about how complicated it was to write his Ninth Symphony, with all those instruments and voices and notes to blend together, do we really think he would ever have started? But he didn't get overwhelmed. He sat down and wrote just one small note, and then another, and a third. It took him months, but writing one note led to a second, and, one note at a time, he completed it.
We begin the same way with whatever tasks we have ahead of us. Each tiny bit of progress helps us go on to the next part. We begin by reading one page of that book, or taking one box of junk from the cellar. That's all we have to do. The rest will follow almost on its own. The trick is to begin.
What needs to be done today, and how do I start?
From Today's Gift: Daily Meditations for Families ©
From: Hazelden Betty Ford Foundation - Thought for the Day http://www.hazeldenbettyford.org/recovery/thought-for-the-day
********************************
Twenty-Four Hours a Day
Keep It Simple
It isn't for the moment you are struck that you need courage, but for the long uphill climb back to sanity and faith and security. --Anne Morrow Lindbergh
Most of us are on a long uphill climb at this moment. It is a climb we are making together, and yet a climb we can't do for each other. I can reach out my hand to you, and you can grasp my hand in return. But my steps are my own, just as you, too, can only take one step at a time.
For brief periods we skip, even run, along the uphill path. The rocks and the occasional boulder momentarily trip us up. We need patience and trust that the summit is still achievable. We can help one another have patience. We can remind one another to trust.
We look back at the periods that devastated us so long ago. And now we are here. We have climbed this far. We are stronger, saner, and more secure. Each step makes easier the next step - each step puts us on more solid ground.
Action for the Day: I may run into some rocks or even a boulder today. I have stepped around them in the past. I will do so again.
From: Bluidkiti's Alcohol and Drug Addictions Recovery Help/Support Forums
One Day At A Time
Flexibility
During active alcoholism or addiction, many of us led pretty disorganized lives,
and the confusion often made us feel unsettled or even desperate.
Learning not to drink or drug is facilitated, we have discovered, by introducing some order into each day -- but being realistic and keeping our plan flexible.
The rhythm of our own special routine has a soothing effect, and an apt principle around which to organize some orderliness is
-- yes, "First Things First."
- Living Sober, p. 32
Thought to Ponder . . .
Flexible people do not get bent out of shape.
AA-related 'Alconym' . . .
O D A A T = One Day At A Time.
From: AA Thought for the Day (courtesy AA-Alive.net)
***************************
Daily Motivation
Excerpt of The Daily Motivator
Leaving limitations behind
by Ralph Marston
There is some way to get beyond every limiting factor that exists outside you. The limitations within you, however, are the ones that most stubbornly hold you back.
The challenges and obstacles outside you usually require time, effort and persistence to get beyond. Getting past the limitations within you requires nothing more than the simple act of letting go.
Yet all too often, those self-imposed limitations persist, day after day, year after year. But every one of them can be gone the moment you choose to let go.
Why do you cling so tightly to the limiting thoughts, the assumptions, and the feelings that hold you back? It doesn’t really matter why.
What matters is that you realize those self-imposed limitations are not a permanent part of you. You can choose, at any time, to leave them behind.
When you do, you’ll find that you can easily and naturally handle whatever challenges life may throw your way. When you leave your limitations behind, you’ll be moving quickly and solidly ahead.
From The Daily Motivator website at http://greatday.com/
No comments:
Post a Comment