Newsletter for May 31st, 2024

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Miracles are everywhere if you can be open to them. 

I went to an AA meeting yesterday and it had been a while since I was at an actual in-person meeting. The last one I went to was in Bosnia so it had been 3 weeks, I would never recommend going this long but I did…Like everything I can fault the humans attending. 98% of the time I leave a meeting I feel amazing and one of those days was yesterday. 

Now this AA meeting wasn’t anything special on the outside, and the day wasn’t that out of the ordinary…it was sunny and warm. The building where I attended the meeting was a little beaten up, it needs a fresh coat of paint and the bathrooms really need to be cleaned but going to an AA meeting is not about aesthetics, it is all about the magic you feel when you are in a room of strangers talking about how transformed your life has been since putting down the drink/drug once and for all. 

This was the first time that I saw someone get a chip (what they give out to mark annual anniversaries, milestones in AA) for having 50 years of continuous sobriety!!! 50 years, I mean I was 5 when this person got sober. They were 21! Once the person decided that they were done that was it! No relapses, just everyday waking up saying “I’m not going to drink today”. 

But, I believe from the bottom of my soul that God has a huge part in someone’s sobriety! I know that the afternoon that I fell to my knees in the hot sand of the Jersey shore, and prayed like I have never prayed, begging God to help me ... .I was so desperate! All I wanted was to not hurt anymore from alcohol. I had asked many times before. When I woke up in the morning after a big night of partying and saying “God please…I can’t do this anymore” but that didn’t stick. It was when I actually got on my knees and said, “God help me” that he did. I had to get humble. 

What is humble? 


Webster’s Dictionary definitions of humble is:

For me personally I think that being humble is the ability to look at yourself and accept who you are, the bumps, lumps, lines, scars, sins and all. When you look in the mirror to accept who you are. I believe that God created us all and we need to embrace ourselves. Love ourselves. No one is perfect! 


Thinking that if you change this or that about yourself will then immediately give you self esteem and self acceptance is kind of ludacris in my mind. I believe that whoever we are we have to love ourselves the way God made us. I know if a plastic surgeon is reading this they think that I am wrong! Go under the knife and a doctor will make you perfect. What if you are already perfect? Plastic surgeons will go out of business?? LOL 


Getting to the place where we love ourselves takes a lot of work! A lot of praying! A lot of quiet! A lot of acceptance! 

One of my most favorite prayers in AA is the Acceptance Prayer: 

Acceptance is the answer to all my problems today. When I am disturbed, it is because I find some person, place, thing or situation- some fact of my life- unacceptable to me, and I can find no serenity until I accept that person, place, thing, or situation as being exactly the way it is supposed to be at this moment. Nothing, absolutely nothing, happens in God's world by mistake. Until I could accept my alcoholism, I could not stay sober; unless I accept my life completely on life's terms, I cannot be happy. I need to concentrate not so much on what needs to be changed in the world as on what needs to be changed in me and in my attitudes.


This Prayer helped me countless times on my journey. Whenever I was feeling fearful, lost, ashamed, powerless, I would pull out the book of Alcoholics Anonymous and go to page 417 (of the fourth edition) and read the Acceptance Prayer and right away I would feel better. Crazy that reading a prayer and praying can bring you so much peace. 

I believe that when I pray that God is listening and he loves me (and you for that matter) more than I could ever imagine. Humans are the ones that are sometimes scary and mean. God is not mean. 

Jordan Peterson was just on a Reel on Instagram and spoke about getting sober and he said that one must have a Spiritual connection “No treatment centers work, but people do quit. The most reliable cure is a religious transformation.” For me, I am not so sure about the transformation but when I entered AA, my relationship with God changed. I always have loved God and even given him credit for everything in my life, but did I see and feel him the way I have since getting sober, no. 

Today, I can see the magic of God everywhere I go and most especially when I am in the rooms of AA. In the rooms you can see people transform in front of your eyes. They come into a meeting looking lost and sad and give or take 90 days and in that time you see a sad person become happy, you see the person's eyes go from being shallow to bright and filled with hope and faith! It is an absolute miracle! 

You may have had a different experience personally. You may not have ever felt free or watch a loved one finally put down the drink for good but don’t ever lose hope or faith. 

I remember when I got sober in 2006 and my kids' dad was still drinking and he was drinking a lot. My anger towards him was over the top! Everytime I thought of him I got enraged! I would call my sponsor (my fellow traveler in the rooms of AA) and tell her everything that was going on about him. How he was doing this and that. She would listen patiently…I could have gone on for hours (she is a Saint). Finally when I would be finished ranting she would say, “now Elizabeth go and pray for him.” I thought this woman was MAD!!!! “Pray for my drunk ex-husband, it’s never going to happen.” She said, “you want to get better – go pray for him”....

When I asked a woman to sponsor me for some reason I listened to everything she said! I took my marching orders…stomping my feet but in the end I decided ok! “I’ll pray for him”!

I prayed and prayed for him! 


7 years of praying and one day my kids’ dad called me as he was about to be arrested for drinking and driving. Yes, he called me, his ex-sober wife! Crazy right! And, they say miracles don’t happen and prayer doesn’t work! 

Today he has over 10 years of continuous sobriety! 


So never give up hope!


While you are alive and breathing you can pray and it may not be on your time schedule but, I know God is listening! Don’t ever give up! 


Hope you have a stupendous weekend and week and until next time keep getting busy living sober. 


XO 

Elizabeth aka Bizzy