Daily Reflection

JULY 17
SURRENDER AND SELF-EXAMINATION
My stability came out of trying to give, not out of
demanding that I receive.
Thus I think it can work out with emotional sobriety. If
we examine every disturbance we have, great or small, we
will find at the root of it some unhealthy dependency and its
consequent unhealthy demand. Let us, with God's help,
continually surrender these hobbling demands. Then we
can be set free to live and love; we may then be able to
Twelfth Step ourselves and others into emotional sobriety.
THE LANGUAGE OF THE HEART, p. 238
Years of dependency on alcohol as a chemical moodchanger
deprived me of the capability to interact
emotionally with my fellows. I thought I had to be selfsufficient,
self-reliant, and self-motivated in a world of
unreliable people. Finally I lost my self-respect and was left
with dependency, lacking any ability to trust myself or to
believe in anything. Surrender and self-examination while
sharing with newcomers helped me to ask humbly for help.