“One of the truly great gifts in this Fellowship of mutually concerned people is the gift of the art of listening ... But our need to listen goes beyond meetings and talks with friends ... We need Step Eleven and our greater conscious contact with the Divine Listener. Then will our serenity emerge; then will our help to others have quality.”
“The Twelve Steps ... are simple in language, plain in meaning. They are also workable by any person having a sincere desire to obtain and keep sobriety. The results are the proof. Their simplicity and workability are such that no special interpretations, and certainly no reservations, have ever been necessary. And it has become increasingly clear that the degree of harmonious living which we achieve is in direct ratio to our earnest attempt to follow them literally under divine guidance to the best of our ability.”
“Our Twelve Traditions ... represent the sum of our experience as individuals, as groups within AA, and similarly with our fellows and other organizations in the great fellowship of humanity under God throughout the world. They are all suggestions, yet the spirit in which they have been conceived merits their serious, prayerful consideration as the guideposts of AA policy for the individual, the group, and our various committees, local and national.”
“Spiritual progress isn’t what gets us sober, it’s what keeps us sober.”
“Full consciousness ... implies not only the willingness to receive the love and benefits AA has to offer, but also to surrender to the equally painful experience of exposure to ourselves, and others, of ourselves.”
“We measure our progress in AA by two words, ‘humility’ and ‘responsibility.’ May I ever keep my eye on these yardsticks as I continue to seek only knowledge of his will for me.”
“We can’t grow without giving ourselves space for silence and the voice within.”
“Our Serenity Prayer ... brings a new light to us that can dissipate our old-time and nearly fatal habit of fooling ourselves.”
“When I first started in AA, I began each day asking God to help keep me sober that day, and ended each night by thanking him for another day of sobriety. I still end each day that way, as I have done almost every night during the past forty-one years. It is a routine for me, but every once in a while I pause to reflect on what it truly means. I do it every night so that God won’t change his mind, as I truly believe he helped lead me from the pits of alcoholism to the AA way of life.”
“I have always carried a meeting list and quarter for a phone call because I don’t know when I am going to want another drink.”
“We now know that we do not have to run away, nor ought we again try to overcome adversity by still another bulldozing power drive that can only push up obstacles before us faster than they can be taken down.”
“Times change, alcoholism doesn’t.”
“Few of us will ever be famous, but we can all be great because we serve each other.”
“How wonderful to be sober, to be able to think clearly (at times, at least), and to become aware of some portion of the greater wisdom concealed so deeply within myself.”
“The best university for me -- the best school, the best teaching -- was in analyzing mistakes that I’d made and problems I created because of these mistakes. Not my successes.”
