Body, Mind & Spirit - Daily Meditations

<font color=red>Body, Mind & Spirit - Daily Meditations</font color=red>

<font color=blue>Joy in Recovery</font color=red>

Joy happens as we cease fighting everyone & everything & surrender to the good orderly direction of life.
Nancy Folsum

Living on the edge of depression & panic, we had little experience with joy. Our hearts were worn & battle-scarred, utterly unfamiliar with the peace that joy can bring.

Days & sometimes years into our recovery, we one day find ourselves sitting side by side with joy. What a new feeling. It’s solid, it’s peaceful. It has nothing to do with where we’re sitting or standing. It has nothing to do with what’s going on outside us, or with who said what to whom. It is a feeling too happy to be true & joy is the only word that pops into our head to describe it.

Joy is the gravy of recovery & it is beyond measure. Now that we are living in a healthy & life-filled way, there’s always a chance that joy will find its way into our day. In this knowledge we rejoice.

Today let me know that joy is the reward of persistently working my program of recovery.

<font color=blue>Patterns</font color=blue>

Courage is the price that life exacts for granting peace.
Amelia Earhart

When we feel angry, lonely, worried, or sad we can ask ourselves, “Is there a pattern here?” That simple question can help us take a giant step forward in recovery. When we feel these things, most of us feel like victims. We’re not used to taking responsibility for our part in our problems. If we find ourselves broke again, ending a romantic relationship again, having the same argument this year that we had last year, we may have established a self-destructive pattern. Not because we’re stupid but because we aren’t familiar with happiness & stir up what we know best: misery.

Looking for patterns in our behavior & accepting responsibility for them takes honesty & courage. But when we put aside our fears & really see what we’re doing, we’ve taken a huge step in changing. Happiness may feel downright strange at first, but we can get used to it.

Today help me see the patterns I create & grant me the courage to change.

<font color=blue>Friendship</font color=blue>

Friends are treasures.
Horace Bruns

Valuing our friends, we come to value ourselves. Accepting & enjoying the goodness of special people in our lives is an adventure in getting to know the depth of our own hearts. Friends teach us about our own capacity to care for & love other human beings.

We stretch our own goodness by listening to a troubled friend when we’re tired. We grow when we go out of our way to give our friend a ride when their car breaks down. We cherish another & ourselves when we find a card to send on an anniversary. We learn acceptance when we love others in spite of their failings & remind them of their special value when they feel guilty or down.

For many of us, being vulnerable & receiving friendship might be the best gift we can give. It can also be the most difficult. As with other problems in recovery, though, we find patience can be the solution. When we extend our patience & tolerance to others, we find a new inner calm & serenity. And we feel more worthy of love. Learning to be a friend is a two-way street that challenges us to love & to let others love & care for us.

Today let me enjoy the wonder of friendship.

<font color=blue>Real Love </font color=blue>

Real love is like holding an egg in your hand. The tighter you squeeze, the more you lose.
Ron P.

When we learn to love the beauty & gifts of others as separate from us, healthy relationships can flourish. Control is the enemy of love & at the heart of our painful relationships is usually one person trying to change another.

When we let it, love grows into a flower of unsurpassed beauty. When we trust enough to allow our loved ones to really be themselves & make their own decisions, we open the door to intimacy. Nothing is more loving than feeling free to live without criticism from our partner.

Learning to love someone better challenges us. It isn’t easy & we run up against our deepest fears of rejection, inadequacy & loss of control. But these are things we don't want to bring to a relationship anyway.

The work we do to improve our own health is the most important task in our lives. Part of this work is to let others do the same for themselves. When we can begin to do this, we are beginning to be ready to reap the rewards of real love.

Today help me let go of others, especially those I love.

<font color=blue>Change Within</font color=blue>

What man has made, man can change.
Fred M. Vinson

Sometimes we find ourselves wanting things to be different right away. When that doesn’t happen, we may feel angry & upset that our needs are not being met, our wishes not fulfilled.

Now we’re learning that change doesn’t come from outside us, but from within. When we’re looking for kindness & compassion, we must find it first in our own hearts. When we need order & discipline in our lives, we need to find them within ourselves.

In the beginning, taking such an active role may seem strange to us. But in time we come to relish changing our own lives for the better instead of waiting for change to happen. Our Higher Power is always waiting to grant us comfort & support. New things are there for us to learn. Our Twelve Step fellowship has advice, friendship & love for the asking. We have the time & the tools to rebuild our physical strength.

We are not alone. And we are not helpless. We’re learning to look forward to a new & exciting way of life — one day at a time.

Today help me remember to help myself.

<font color=blue>Letting Go of Resentment </font color=blue>

Only the brave know how to forgive.
Laurence Sterne

We hold onto resentment, old pain & grudges to hurt others. Instead, they hurt us, weighing us down & creating a barrier between us & the rest of the world. As long as our hands are full of old hurts we can’t reach for freedom, joy & love.

The key to ending resentment is forgiveness & surrender to a higher power. When we learn to accept others as they are without making judgments or taking their inventory, we can live & let live. We can come to understand that others acted as they did not to hurt us, but because it filled their needs.

As we come closer to uncritical acceptance of God’s will, we also find we’re able to forgive our own faults as easily as we do the faults of others. As we learn to accept others just as they are we begin to accept ourselves a little more. And soon we find resentments fading, replaced by a new acceptance of God’s will for ourselves & others. Now we can let go of old pain & make room for joy.

Today help me let go of resentment & accept myself & others.

<font color=blue>Unmasking Our Real Selves </font color=blue>

The first act of bad faith consists of evading what one cannot evade, of evading what one is.
Jean-Paul Sartre

When did we learn to pretend to be other than we were? When did we learn that what or who we were wasn’t good enough — that we could never do or say or be enough?

We learned in childhood, as did our parents & their parents as well. Wearing a mask was a habit that evolved into becoming that mask, while our real selves disappeared.

In many ways, our real selves are still untested. But unlike the old days when they’d emerge only under pressure, we now try our real selves on like new clothes — first in a locked room when no one’s looking; later, in the open air & finally, with other people.

Being who we are is scary & strange & awkward at first, but it is an act of faith, one that builds upon the next act. These acts of faith are the process that is our recovery.

Today help me show my real face, if only for a moment.

<font color=blue>Praise</font color=blue>

The sweetest of all sounds is praise.
Xenophon

When we were little & had just learned a new skill such as tumbling head-over-heels in the grass, the first thing we wanted was for Mom or Dad to watch us do it. “Look at me…look what I can do,” we said. If we were lucky, our parents praised us & we soaked it up & felt grand.

As small children, we knew we needed praise & we weren’t shy in seeking it. Sadly, as adults we often pretend we don’t need any praise, or else we feel we don’t deserve it. And even if we did deserve it, it wouldn’t be “proper” to ask.

But today we are learning that we do indeed deserve it & it’s okay to want & seek recognition. If we can’t yet ask for it anywhere else, we can always find it in our fellowship. Soon, as we learn to ask for & accept praise, we also learn to praise ourselves & to value our own opinion as much as we do others’.

Today help me believe I deserve praise & give me the courage to ask for it.

<A target="_blank" HREF=http://open-mind.org/Daily/Reading/58.htm>http://open-mind.org/Daily/Reading/58.htm</A>



















<font color=red>~Sundance~</font color=red>

<font color=blue>"Never react emotionally to criticism. Analyze yourself to determine whether it is justified. If it is, correct yourself. Otherwise, go on about your business."</font color=blue>

<font color=black>Norman Vincent Peale</font color=black>

{{{{{{{{{{{{{{{{{{{{Sundance}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}} Those are wonderful! Enough material here for the rest of the week, eh?

Thank you!! You sure are an asset to this site!




<font color=blue>"Our doubts are traitors and make us lose the good we oft might win by fearing to attempt" --Shakespeare</font color=blue>

aww thanks hon, hehe that was very sweet of you to say.

<font color=red>~Sundance~</font color=red>

<font color=blue>"Never react emotionally to criticism. Analyze yourself to determine whether it is justified. If it is, correct yourself. Otherwise, go on about your business."</font color=blue>

<font color=black>Norman Vincent Peale</font color=black>