After many relapses and returns to AA meetings I got to a point where I was not sure of anything anymore.
The last time I came back to AA from a relapse, I saw familiar faces of people with many years of sobriety. They were getting better in AA.
It occurred to me that their physical appearances, wisdom and grace, where the only thing I could be sure of - that AA works.
I grasped that truth and have never let go of it. It is my first 'diamond in the rough' of life.
Without that example, I would have been lost forever.

I love this quote. I just heard about this concept earlier this year when I was reading a book about having children (not yet, but contemplating it at some point in the future). It speaks a lot to my own destructive and hypocritical behavior that manifested in my drinking. I was the guy who would tell people to live in the moment and then get totally blitzed. I was the guy who would tell people to be charitable and then spend copious amounts of money on booze and junk food instead of donating it to people who really needed it. I was the guy who would preach mindfulness and fearlessness, and yet was so terrified of life that anything was better than facing it sober. Point being, as someone early in my sobriety, nothing helps me more than seeing people who radiate the freedoms of sobriety and selflessness. Watching someone do, instead of listening to someone tell, has a million times the impact. I think it's the same no matter how old we are.

-Adam

True story, Pappy. If I followed all the sage advice I gave to people throughout my 20s and early 30s, I'd be a fully enlightened being with no problems whatsoever :P Instead, I'm mowing through chocolate bars and watching Frasier re-runs for comfort! Half joking, but seriously... One of the biggest symptoms of my alcoholism was telling people how to live their lives. Any time I feel the compulsion to do that, now, I know I need to check myself in a huge way.