I don't know what edition of the Big Book you all have...mine is the 3rd edition and it's taped together and such..old and yet none of the words have slipped off the pages. On page 439...story 17 begins, allowed there by our elder editors quietly urged by God so that this alcoholic (and many other also) would be spiritually, mentally and emotionally guided into sobriety and into keeping my chair in the rooms of AA.  Dr. Paul's story for me is a must read...over and over and over and when I still do it I laugh out loud and cry with pain and hope and gratitude for the gift of sobriety and the miracle of it which I could never ever imagine was available before the drinking stopped.  From page 448 he says, "To this day, I am amazed at how many of my problems-most of which had nothing to do with drinking, I believed-have  become manaea ble or hav e simply disappeared since I quit drinking".    Read onward and he says "It helped me a great deal to become convinced that alcoholism was a disease, not a moral issue; that I  had been drinking as a result of a compulsion, even though I had not been aware of the compulsion at the time;  and that sobriety was not a matter of willpower".

I read Paul's offering and revisit the pain and fear which was in me just before program...that time where I was deciding it would be better I had not lived than to live the way I was.  I wasn't scared...I was depressed and strongly oppositional and defiant to any suggestions which came from outside of myself; the fellowships of both program.  I did not accept and would not accept that there was help for me...I didn't even know what the problem was then...God knew, the fellowship knew and until I ran out of possible solutions to the problem I had I would never taste the miracle which was waiting for me that so many other alcoholics were living in.

I revisited suicide as again the solution to my problem...end my life; end the problem of my life and then I was strangely and miraculously led to the doors of recovery, certainly not by rational thinking of my own.  It was a second visit to the rooms because I simply wasn't ready the first time...not even close.  It took several more doses of that emotional, mental, physical and spiritual pain which alcohol cannot subdue before I could be led without resistance back to my seat and the promise "if you keep and open mind...you will find help".  Openmindedness gave me a newer definition of suicide, "It isn't about ending your life; it's about ending how you live your life" and this is part of my recovery awareness today.  On page 449 Paul, thru the guidance of my Higher Power makes the statement which has saved many lives in our program from that fatal decision.  "And acceptance - is the answer to all my problems today".  "When I am disturbed,...."  I'll let him say it best...go get your Big Book and turn to Doctor, Alcoholic, Addict and see what he says.

He explains the miracle in that paragraph also.  In his words "Nothing, absolutely nothing happens in God's world by mistake".

This morning I laughed out loud and cried again as I've always had because of that statement and how it sums up his whole share.

Mahalo Akua (God as I understand God)...Mahalo AA.    (((((hugs)))))