Daily Reprieve

From Courage to Change of Oct 10:

The road to my hometown wound along a steep hillside. As a child, I was often afraid that our car would swerve too widely and go over the edge. I used to take hold of the rear door handle and try to prevent this. I was too young to understand that my actions could not influence the path of the car. Yet I often take a similar approach to my adult fears and persist in futile actions.

Al-Anon helps me to accept what I cannot change and change what I can. Although I can’t control the way alcoholism has affected my life, I can’t control another person, and I can’t make life unfold according to my plans, I can admit my powerlessness and turn to my Higher Power for help.

When I am the driver, the responsibility for steering clear of the road’s edge is mine. It is up to me to take my recovery seriously, to work on my attitudes, to take care of my mind, body, and spirit, to make amends when I have done harm — in short, to change the things I can.

Today’s Reminder

Sometimes the only way I can determine what to accept and what to change is by trial and error. Mistakes can be opportunities to gain the wisdom to know the difference.

“If a crisis arises, or any problem baffles me, I hold it up to the light of the Serenity Prayer and extract its sting before it can hurt me.” ~ One Day at a Time in Al-Anon

END OF QUOTE—————————————

There’s a moment in my life where innocence hardens into delusion — the child’s hand gripping becomes the adult’s will clenching at the illusion of control. This is the birthplace of self-betrayal: that instant when fear dresses up as virtue and we call it responsibility, loyalty, or love.

I was told to hold things together. Families, marriages, reputations, systems. “Good” people clench under the command of madness, denial, and collective cowardice. Recovery unteaches that lie. It teaches that letting go is not collapse; it is rebellion. The first act of spiritual independence is unclenching.

The Serenity Prayer becomes a battlefield order. “Accept what I cannot change” is not submission — it’s intelligence. “Change what I can” is not sentimental; it’s strategy. “Wisdom to know the difference” is reconnaissance. The clinging hand of the child now grips the sword of discernment. I can no longer afford to confuse martyrdom with mastery.

Mistakes are not sins. They are the bruises of apprenticeship. Each wrong turn exposes another illusion — that perfection is power, or that fear keeps the journey safer than trust. Wisdom grows out of wreckage; I salvage what burns and build again.

This entry was posted on October 11, 2025 at 9:38 pm and is filed under Uncategorized with tags Addiction, Alcoholism, Courage to Change, faith, Journal, Life, mental-health, Personal, Recovery, Spirituality. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.