Transcript

Vigilance · Sober Readings

Scott Hayes: Good morning, everyone. Welcome back to Sober Readings, where recovery happens one episode and one day at a time. My name is Scott. Thank you for joining me today. Today is Thursday, the twenty-fourth of September. Let's get started with the serenity prayer today. God, grant us the serenity to accept the things we cannot change, courage to change the things we can, and wisdom to know the difference. Today's reading from Daily Reflections, Vigilance. We have seen the truth demonstrated again and again. Once an alcoholic, always an alcoholic. Commencing to drink after a period of sobriety, we are in a short time as bad as ever. If we are planning to stop drinking, there must be no reservation of any kind, nor any lurking notion that someday we will be immune to alcohol. That's on page thirty three of Alcoholics Anonymous. Today I am an alcoholic. Tomorrow will be no different. My alcoholism lives within me now and forever. I must never forget what I am. Alcohol will surely kill me if I fail to recognize and acknowledge my disease on a daily basis. I am not playing a game in which a loss is a temporary setback. I am dealing with my disease, for which there is no cure, only daily acceptance and vigilance. Today's reading from twenty four hours a day, September twenty four, AA Thought for the Day. Let us continue with step twelve. We must practice these principles in all our affairs. This part of the twelfth step must not be overlooked. It is the carrying on of the whole program. We do not just practice these principles in regard to our drinking problem. We practice them in all our affairs. We do not give one compartment of our lives to God and keep the other compartments to ourselves. We give our whole lives to God and we try to do His will in every respect. Herein lies our growth. Herein lies all the promise of the future, an ever widening horizon. Do I carry the AA principles with me wherever I go? meditation for the day. Lord, to whom shall we go but to thee? Thou hast the words of eternal life. The words of eternal life are the words from God controlling your true being, controlling the real spiritual you. They are the words from God which are heard by you in your heart and mind when these are wide open to His Spirit. These are the words of eternal life which express the true way you are to live. They say to you in the stillness of your heart and mind and soul, do this and live. Prayer for the day. I pray that I may follow the dictates of my conscience. I pray that I may follow the inner urging of my soul. And for today's final reading, we're gonna read from the grapevine from August of 2026. And this is there's a special section called Sober Travel. And this story is titled God Took Me Down. Years ago in the Nevada Desert. He had a mysterious, life changing moment that opened a door to a new light. Like so many I have known in the program, I sat on step one for a long time. Okay, I was powerless over alcohol, and my life was unmanageable. Got it. I was drinking every day, and my relationships and career were nosediving. Though I somehow managed to maintain a marginal level of functionality, I felt entirely out of control. To be fair, I did start going to AA meetings, but my time there was spent sitting in the back with a huge granite chip on my shoulder. I had a knucklehead attitude of a WWE wrestler and a bulletproof shield, keeping anyone from coming within a mile of me. And not for nothing, I was still drinking. Meanwhile, as chaotic as things had become, I was still flying all over the country for work, particularly to Las Vegas. But since I didn't get to see much of anything other than hotels and conference rooms, I often rewarded myself. When I went to Vegas by taking a few days, getting in my car and shooting off into the Nevada desert, where I could be alone to go and do whatever I pleased. On one of those trips I went so far out I got stuck looking for a place, any place, to get a drink. Eventually I came to a tiny desert town with no more than a dozen buildings and one cinder block bar with a menacing hulk of a bartender intent on ignoring my presence. Nevertheless, I approached him and ordered a beer. He grabbed a cold one and slapped it down in front of me. After downing it in a single pole, I almost immediately began to feel something going wrong. Very wrong. I was losing my ability to move or even feel my arms, neck, and head. It was like I was on the verge of a systemic collapse. Tottering out to my car, I got in and drove down the dusty dirt road I had come in on. But less than a mile away, I had to pull to the side. After forcing myself out of the car, I crawled up on the hood and lay splayed out and immobile there for the next hour and a half. I couldn't move, couldn't talk, and could barely breathe. But as the sun slowly set and darkness set in, sense and sensibility returned, and I was able to slide myself down off the hood, get in my car, and drive back to Vegas. The next day, I got on a plane and flew home. I've never been able to fully understand why God took me down in the middle of the desert that way, but ever since then I've had no desire to put a drink or mind-altering substance into my body. Meanwhile, I rejoined AA for real this time, allowing me to forestall the demise of my marriage and to flourish in my career, achieving things beyond my most ambitious dreams. Over the next 27 years, I did just about everything the program had to offer. I cleaned ashtrays, made coffee, helped open meeting places, and shut them down. I've sponsored, been sponsored, and served AA in an amazing array of capacities. I've gotten to attend innumerable AA state and national conferences, highlighted by the 2005 International Convention in Toronto, where I was given the supreme gift of saying the Serenity Prayer in unison with more than 50,000 recovering alcoholics just like me. Throughout this incredible journey, what a long timer once said has always traveled with me. Go to meetings, ask for help, don't drink. If you do that, you have a chance at a life second to none. Most importantly, you won't have to do it alone. He was as right as the proverbial reign. Legions of AA members, friends, and family have been with me all along, and so has the God of my understanding who showed me. what he could do for me and what I couldn't do for myself. He has never left my side. As a matter of fact, he's standing here right now, looking over my shoulder, as I tap away on the keyboard, waiting for just the right moment to say, Nice work. But if you don't mind, there are a few edits I'd like to suggest. And that was submitted by Christopher in Gulfport, Florida. And that's gonna do it for today's readings. Before we close, let's go back to daily reflections and revisit this word vigilance and how it applies to sobriety. For me, vigilance in sobriety means remembering that this thing doesn't take a day off just because I've been sober for a while. I've learned that the hard way. After six years, I didn't suddenly wake up one morning and decide I wanted to throw my sobriety away. Looking back, I can see that I slowly stopped paying attention. Meetings became optional. Phone calls and texts became less frequent, prayer and meditation became inconsistent. None of those things seemed like a big deal by themselves, but together they created distance between me and the things that had kept me sober. By the time the drink was put in front of me, a lot of work leading up to that moment had already been done. That's why vigilance today isn't about living scared that I'm going to relapse. It's about paying attention. I have to notice when I'm isolating, when I'm overwhelmed. When I stop reaching out or when I start convincing myself that I don't need the program as much as I used to. I know how quietly complacency can creep in because I've experienced it myself. My sober time doesn't make me immune. If anything, it can make it easier to forget what brought me here. Vigilance means continuing to do the simple things that work, especially when I don't feel like I need them. I don't have to spend every day looking over my shoulder. But I do need to keep looking inward and asking myself whether I'm still doing the things that keep me connected, grounded, and sober just for today. Thank you for listening to Sober Readings today. If you'd like to be a guest on the show and share your experience, strength, and hope, or even join me for a reading, there's a link in the show notes to send me an email. I'd love to hear from you. And if you enjoy Sober Readings and you'd like to help support the podcast, you can drop a dollar in the donation basket by using the link. Also in the show notes. Another way is to visit soberreadings.com where you can fill out a form to leave me comments or request to be a guest. You can also click the support page to drop a dollar in the virtual donation basket. So again, thank you for listening today. And as always, just for today, don't drink, go to a meeting, and keep coming back. Have a great day, everyone, and as my friend Larry says, best day ever.