Get the Support You Need

Learn from thousands of users who have made their way through our courses. Need help getting started? Watch this short video.

today's top discussions:

logo

Addiction

Lynn123

2024-03-27 3:02 PM

Managing Drinking Community

logo

New Year's Resolutions

Ashley -> Health Educator

2024-03-25 2:47 AM

Managing Drinking Community

logo

Water

Ashley -> Health Educator

2024-03-17 5:24 PM

Healthy Weight Community

logo

What motivates you?

Ashley -> Health Educator

2024-03-10 10:30 PM

Quit Smoking Community

This Month’s Leaders:

Most Supportive

DM555 3 3

Browse through 411.742 posts in 47.053 threads.

160,431 Members

Please welcome our newest members: Jgorilla, anna13, CCaballero, JJAY EVANGEL, VKATE DARLENE


13 years ago 0 1562 logo logo logo logo logo logo logo logo logo logo 0
Renewing my committment

Alcoholics have what is called obsession of the mind. after prolongs abstinence, their mind tricks them into taking a few drinks. Which may work for a while, but then the phenomenon of craving kicks in and they end up drink and into a vicious cycle. unfortunately the only solution is spiritual.
13 years ago 0 1562 logo logo logo logo logo logo logo logo logo logo 0
Renewing my committment

Tell me Foxman, how you define "spiritual".
 
The book called Alcoholics Anonymous is a guide to spirituality for Drunks. They knew people will have trouble with the GOD concept. That is why they have a chapter called we Agnostics for those who trouble with it. First though, you need to arrive at a point where only you decide whether you are powerless over alcohol or not. Then there are clear cut directions to reach a position of neutrality. Today people associate going to a meeting as "working the program or AA", that is where the trouble starts. Google for Alcoholics Anonymous, you can land on the online version. There are several work-shops on the big book freely available (search for xa-speakers). As we go through the steps with a competent person who understands the working of the steps can relieve you of the pain.
13 years ago 0 1562 logo logo logo logo logo logo logo logo logo logo 0
Renewing my committment

Nope, but, that chapter is for every one. Believers/Non Believers/Agnostics. But there is a great paragraph within this chapter:
 
Actually we were fooling ourselves, for deep down in every man, woman, and child, is the fundamental idea of God. It may be obscured by calamity, by pomp, by worship of other things, but in some form or other it is there. For faith in a Power greater than ourselves, and miraculous demonstrations of that power in human lives, are facts as old as man himself.
 
Also there is a great article at the end of the book on Spiritual Awakening/Experience:
 

The terms “spiritual experience” and “spiritual awakening” are used many times in this book which, upon careful reading, shows that the personality change sufficient to bring about recovery from alcoholism has manifested itself among us in many different forms.

Yet it is true that our first printing gave many readers the impression that these personality changes, or religious experiences, must be in the nature of sudden and spectacular upheavals. Happily for everyone, this conclusion is erroneous.

In the first few chapters a number of sudden revolutionary changes are described. Though it was not our intention to create such an impression, many alcoholics have nevertheless concluded that in order to recover they must acquire an immediate and overwhelming “God-consciousness” followed at once by a vast change in feeling and outlook.

Among our rapidly growing membership of thousands of alcoholics such transformations, though frequent, are by no means the rule. Most of our experiences are what the psychologist William James calls the “educational variety” because they develop slowly over a period of time. Quite often friends of the newcomer are aware of the difference long before he is himself. He finally realizes that he has undergone a profound alteration in his reaction to life; that such a change could hardly have been brought about by himself alone. What often takes place in a few months could seldom have been accomplished by years of self-discipline. With few exceptions our members find that they have tapped an unsuspected inner resource which they presently identify with their own conception of a Power greater than themselves.

Most of us think this awareness of a Power greater than ourselves is the essence of spiritual experience. Our more religious members call it “God-consciousness.”

Most emphatically we wish to say that any alcoholic capable of honestly facing his problems in the light of our experience can recover, provided he does not close his mind to all spiritual concepts. He can only be defeated by an attitude of intolerance or belligerent denial.

We find that no one need have difficulty with the spirituality of the program. Willingness, honesty and open mindedness are the essentials of recovery. But these are indispensable.

“There is a principle which is a bar against all information, which is proof against all arguments and which cannot fail to keep a man in everlasting ignorance?that principle is contempt prior to investigation.”

?Herbert Spencer
13 years ago 0 1562 logo logo logo logo logo logo logo logo logo logo 0
Went to bed angry

I am so sorry about your circumstances. But i want to point you to the main problem of an drunk: (this is from the book called AA):

Selfishness, self-centeredness! That, we think, is the root of our troubles. Driven by a hundred forms of fear, self-delusion, self-seeking, and self-pity, we step on the toes of our fellows and they retaliate. Sometimes they hurt us, seemingly without provocation, but we invariably find that at some time in the past we have made decisions based on self which later placed us in a position to be hurt.

So our troubles, we think, are basically of our own making. They arise out of ourselves, and the alcoholic is an extreme example of self-will run riot, though he usually doesn't think so. Above everything, we alcoholics must be rid of this selfishness. We must, or it kill us! God makes that possible. And there often seems no way of entirely getting rid of self without His aid. Many of us had moral and philosophical convictions galore, but we could not live up to them even though we would have liked to. Neither could we reduce our self-centeredness much by wishing or trying on our own power. We had to have God's help.

13 years ago 0 1562 logo logo logo logo logo logo logo logo logo logo 0
Went to bed angry

i used to be angry at stuff not going my way. today, most of the time i don't. the problem with us is we don't realize that. we are caught up with the emotions. the steps helped me to become spiritually fit. i let the events un fold and be alright with it. Another book that greatly helped me was Power of Now. if you have time please read it, hope you find it modern. Like the wine in new bottle, its the same spiritual teaching for modern age.
13 years ago 0 1562 logo logo logo logo logo logo logo logo logo logo 0
Went to bed angry

i have poor attention span too. but what helped me was the audio version of the book. its wonderful to download them on ipod/mp3 players and hear them.
13 years ago 0 1562 logo logo logo logo logo logo logo logo logo logo 0
Went to bed angry

I am glad you took time to read my old posts. Hope i was consistent . When i woke up one day from the un-conscious cycle of drinking, I realized I had to stop and went to a shrink. That kind doctor gave me medication to arrest the intake but looking at my history he recommended I take a spiritual approach and wanted me to try AA. He is one of the few doctors like Dr. Silkworth who understand only spirituality can help the drunks. Modern intellectuals think we can beat this age old disease but the drunks know we can't. So, we keep drinking and when we reach a point of hopelessness, we end up in AA, last house in the block. Entering AA i later learned is just a small piece of the puzzle. Then I was lucky to land on some free workshops freely available on the internet that walks us thru the book called alcoholics anonymous. Then I learned the monster we are fighting against. First thing i learned was about the obsession of the mind concept that always lead us a drink and then when we take that 1 drink, we trigger the phenomenon called craving. For example after prolonged absence, i will con my wife into having a Pint of Fosters and only that. I would start that, then get into that vicious cycle of putting another and another....The next day, i wouldn't con but come home drunk.
 
There are good and bad with every organization but but some just look at the negative aspects (they heard thru someone) and don't even try it. Like Eckhart Tolle talks about people being ticked off hearing the word GOD and totally denying that it points too. The book is available online and the workshops too. You don't even have to step into a AA meeting. But if you are interested about the program of recovery you can access that right from where you are. What do you have to lose?

 Working the program of AA, paved the way into other spiritual teachings, i could go thru life events with ease, create room and let the pain be there yet not go crazy.  
13 years ago 0 1562 logo logo logo logo logo logo logo logo logo logo 0
Went to bed angry

Good Morning Tallone,
   I am so glad that you found your path. There are many groups on the internet (just like you have in your town) but looks like there are people who went thru the wringer just like you and me and found the true message of AA.
====================================================================================
Here is a paragraph from Doctors Opinion:
 On the other hand-and strange as this may seem to those who do not understand-once a psychic change has occurred, the very same person who seemed doomed, who had so many problems he despaired of ever solving them, suddenly finds himself easily able to control his desire for alcohol, the only effort necessary being that required to follow a few simple rules.
====================================================================================
Good luck again and please keep us posted.
13 years ago 0 1562 logo logo logo logo logo logo logo logo logo logo 0
Went to bed angry

You are most welcome Keesu. We have to do this. It keeps us outside of us. The book talks about the powerlessness over alcohol, namely the obsession of the mind and the phenomenon of craving and the spiritual malady (restless, irritable and discontented) in forced sobriety. But then as we go to the later part of the book, it talks about selfishness and self-centered-ness being the issue. It talks about how our own behaviour makes others retaliate and we get upset and then get drunk. The whole process is to have different out look upon life, look and feel different even though the life situations remain the same. Daily discipline of prayer and meditation and constant thought of how we can be of service to others is the main purpose of our lifes today. There are several promises in the book but one which i like most is:
 
And we have ceased fighting anything or anyone, even alcohol. For by this time sanity will have returned. We will seldom be interested in liquor. If tempted, we recoil from it as from a hot flame. We react sanely and normally, and we will find that this has happened automatically. We will see that our new attitude toward liquor has been given us without any thought or effort on our part. It just comes! That is the miracle of it. We are not fighting it, neither are we avoiding temptation. We feel as though we had been placed in a position of neutrality safe and protected. We have not even sworn off. Instead, the problem has been removed. It does not exist for us. We are neither cocky nor are we afraid. That is how we react so long as we keep in fit spiritual condition.

13 years ago 0 1562 logo logo logo logo logo logo logo logo logo logo 0
Keeping Busy on the Weekend

I realized that alcoholism doesn't discriminate. Equal opportunity destroyer (LOL). But when i look closely, we all drink to have a great feeling. But some are allergic to alcohol and couldn't go continue with it.