I am sitting in the shade of a tree overlooking the water of the Niagara River as it rushes toward the American Falls. It’s the last day of my vacation, so I came back to this park to meditate for a few minutes, to connect with serenity, and capture my thoughts before I finish getting […]
Category Archives: Prayer and Meditation
Tradition 10: Why Not Talk about Outside Issues?
Sometimes it seems that the 12 Steps overshadow the Traditions. However, understanding the traditions and their influence on meeting guidelines helps keep our meetings safe. A saying in program quips that the steps keep us from killing ourselves and the traditions keep us from killing other people. I had a humbling experience several years ago […]
Achieving Fit Spiritual Condition
OA’s 12 step program of recovery from compulsive eating promises members “a life beyond our wildest dreams.” While that promise appears in various forms in our literature, the expression “fit spiritual condition,” comes at the end of the 10th step promises on pages 84 and 85 of the Big Book of Alcoholics Anonymous: “And we […]
Seventh Step Plea
Oh, God of my understanding, Higher Power of my fathers,Understand my cries tonight. Hear my call to you for help.This is the first and greatest of my defects. My characterSuffers so from independence. It was once a necessaryEvil, but today I must put away the shards of glass that myChrysalis has become. It is my […]
Serenity at the Beach
I came into OA in February 1989. I stayed for twenty-one years through periods of abstinence and relapse, my wedding, jobs, having children, and the death of my father. I shared my problems and my willingness to work on my program. Eventually, I’d realize that the problems I obsessed about were solved. I’d move forward […]
My O.A. Story – Love Notes to Myself
What was it like What happened And how it is today. My story starts straight forward But gets more complicated As I proceed. How do you explain the ins and outs From my first beginnings in the program To now, this very fruitful life. I’ve evolved and changed Through the course of years. At first […]