While I'm not going to tell you that AA is the only way to recovery, AA was an important factor in my early recovery. In particular, there is a passage in the Big Book that was extremely encouraging. The passage is known as "The Promises". As I progressed in my recovery, I saw that it was absolutely true. If you do the work of recovery--spiritual, emotional, and physical work--you too will see that these promises come true:
"If we are painstaking about this phase of our development, we will be amazed before we are half way through. We are going to know a new freedom and a new happiness. We will not regret the past nor wish to shut the door on it. We will comprehend the word serenity and we will know peace. No matter how far down the scale we have gone, we will see how our experience can benefit others. That feeling of uselessness and self-pity will disappear. We will lose interest in selfish things and gain interest in our fellows. Self-seeking will slip away. Our whole attitude and outlook upon life will change. Fear of people and of economic insecurity will leave us. We will intuitively know how to handle situations which used to baffle us. We will suddenly realize that God is doing for us what we could not do for ourselves. Are these extravagant promises? We think not. They are being fulfilled among us—sometimes quickly, sometimes slowly. They will always materialize if we work for them." (The Big Book, pages 83-84)
This spring, I heard a gentle reminder of these promises at Mass one Sunday morning. The second reading that morning was from Paul's Letter to the Romans. Its expression of the joy with which we can deal with our infirmities is breathtaking:
"...we even boast of our afflictions, knowing that affliction produces endurance, and endurance, proven character, and proven character, hope, and hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us."
Hope, forged by endurance, does not disappoint.
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