10,958 Days

Sobriety is never owned, it's rented, and rent is due everyday.

— Unknown —

I remember August 9, 1987 (10,958 days ago) like it was yesterday. I came home from work and walked into my living room and there sat an intervention in the form of my wife, brother, boss and a recovering alcoholic and addict named Rusty. That moment was a major turning point in my life and forever changed my future course.

At the root of any type of addiction is a thinking problem and our thoughts come from our beliefs.

Since this is the day I celebrate 30 years of sobriety I thought I would share a list of 30 recovery sayings that helped me change my beliefs and in-turn my thinking, and most importantly the course of my life- journey for the better.

Sayings and Truths for Living Sober and In Peace:

  1. My sobriety (peacefulness) is contingent upon my spiritual condition and my spiritual condition is contingent upon my belief and trust in a power greater than myself (for me that power is Jesus).
  2. If I’m not the problem, when I’m not at peace with something in my life, there is no solution.
  3. Hope for sobriety and peace is proportionate to how much hope I surround myself with.
  4. My mind is like a bad neighborhood, I shouldn’t go there alone…especially when it’s angry.
  5. Courage is fear that’s been prayed for.
  6. You can’t keep what you have (sobriety and/or peace) unless you give it away. They say misery loves company; so does peace.
  7. At the center of my restlessness and discontent is me. When God is at my center, the world around me has a better chance at being at peace.
  8. On anger and resentment: Few people have been more victimized by resentment than have we alcoholics. A burst of temper could spoil a day, and a well-nursed grudge could make us horribly ineffective. Nor were we ever skillful in separating justified from unjustified anger. As we saw it, our wrath was always justified. Anger, that occasional luxury of more balanced people, could keep us on an emotional jag indefinitely. These ‘dry benders’ often led straight to the bottle.” (A.A. Twelve and Twelve, 90)
  9. Being a SNIOP indicates to the world how self-centered and insecure I am. SNIOP = Sensitive to the Negative Input of Other People.
  10. It’s OK to look back, but don’t stare.
  11. Serenity is not the absence of conflict but the ability to cope with it.
  12. Our minds are like parachutes, they only function effectively when they are open.
  13. We are only as sick as our secrets.
  14. This too shall pass.
  15. How important really is it?
  16. You can’t live one way and pray another.
  17. You can’t believe in God and play God at the same time.
  18. We’re all here, because we are not all there. (Talking about why we go to 12 Step meetings)
  19. Beware of HALT (Hungry, Angry, Lonely, Tired).
  20. Take the cotton out of your ears and put it in your mouth.
  21. You eat an elephant one bite at a time.
  22. Life can only be understood backwards, but it must be lived forwards. (Kiekegaard)
  23. This is a ‘One Day at a Time’ program. If you are clean and sober today, you are tied for first place in AA.
  24. If drinking or drugging is interfering with your work, you’re probably a heavy addict or drinker. If work is interfering with your drinking or drugging, you’re probably an alcoholic and/or addict.
  25. If God were small enough to be understood, He wouldn’t be big enough to be God.
  26. I would rather go through life sober, believing I am an alcoholic, than go through life drunk, trying to convince myself that I am not an alcoholic.
  27. Resentments are like stray cats: if you don’t feed them, they’ll go away.
  28. Step One: There’s a problem
    Step Two: There’s a solution
    Step Three: I get to Choose which I want…problem? or solution?
    ~Father Martin~
  29. If God seems far away, who moved?
  30. The road to sobriety is a simple journey for confused people with a complicated disease.

Thanks to all of my friends and family, especially my wife Lori for getting me to this day…Nothing great in life happens by doing it alone.

John 8:32, “And you will know the truth and the truth will set you free.”

John 10:10, “The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly.”…Amen and Thank You Jesus!

P.E.A.C.E.

Jay@EagleLaunch.com

 

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