To Donate Go to
www.Transitionsdaily.org/Donate.htm
~A.A. Thoughts
For
The Day~
^*^*^*^*^
(\ ~~ /)
(
\(AA)/ )
(_ /AA\ _)
/AA\
^*^*^*^*^
Self-appraisal
"I used to be a champ at unrealistic
self-appraisal. I wanted to look only at the part of my life which
seemed good. Then I would greatly exaggerate whatever virtues I supposed
I had attained. Next I would congratulate myself on the grand job I was
doing. So my unconscious self-deception never failed to turn my few good
assets into serious liabilities. This astonishing process was always a
pleasant one. . . I was falling straight back into the pattern of my
drinking days. . . I shall forever regret the damage I did to people around
me. Indeed, I still tremble when I realize what I might have done to AA
and to its future."
Bill W., June 1961
1988AAGrapevine, The Language of
the Heart, pp.
256-7
Thought
to Consider . . .
When I
let go of what I am, I become what I might be.
Still another famous early itinerant was Irwin M., a Cleveland AA who had become a champion salesman of Venetian blinds to department stores in the deep South. He used to range a territory bounded by Atlanta and Jacksonville on one side and Indianapolis, Birmingham, and New Orleans on the other. Irwin weighed 250 pounds and was full of energy and gusto. The prospect of Irwin, as a missionary, scared us rather badly. At the New York Headquarters we had on file a long list of topers in many a Southern city and town, people who had not been personally visited. Irwin had long since broken all the rules of caution and discreet approach to newcomers, so it was with reluctance that we gave him the list. Then we waited - but not for long. Irwin ran them down, every single one, with his home-crashing tornado technique. Day and night, besides, he wrote letters to his prospects and got them to writing each other.
Stunned but happy Southerners began to send their thanks
to Headquarters. As Irwin himself reported, many a first family of the South had
been an easy pushover. He had cracked the territory wide open and had started or
stimulated many an original group.
1985 AAWS Inc.
Alcoholics Anonymous Comes of Age, page
25