The Courage to Change for April 16 has a very important message. It points out that what we go through in life is not as important as how we interpret the experience, and respond to it.

 

To sum it up, we have powerful choices about our attitude in life. Al-Anon opening tells us that changed attitudes can aid recovery. I did not have the formula to change my attitude permanently, so I am grateful. Al-Anon gave me the tools.

The reading goes on to say that many of us expected our partners to provide us with happiness and that we spend much of our life waiting for them to show their love and approval in a way we can understand. When this did not happen we felt deprived and on lovable.

Al-Anon's principles help us to interpret our situations differently and by working the steps we will discover that we are lovable regardless of what a parent or anyone else thinks. It goes on to state that we can either feel sorry for what we have missed that we can appreciate the chance to learn to love and appreciate ourselves now.

The reminder for today is:". The only person who can love me the way I want to be loved is me."

The quote is from  Al-Anon faces alcoholism; "Gradually, I accepted the fact my" if only "wishes were not about to come true and I  also learned that I could be happy even if they did not".

 

When I think about this reading. I think about my expectations and how I lived my life prior to program. As a child I was taught that I was responsible for others feelings and that I would have to remember to always take care of others, and I was not important. Owning my talents or thoughts was unacceptable as I was bragging and proud and arrogant. If I did so. My job was to validate other people. These  tools  worked. theoretically. Subconsciously as a child , I guess I developed  the idea that if I was responsible for all of these feelings, then others must be responsible for mine. If I took care of their feelings by being supportive,validating blah blah blah, then they should do the same for me. The more I tried to take care of others, the more I noticed nobody was taking care of me.

 

Thank God for Al-Anon, I finally saw the mistake in my thought patterns and developed new constructive tools to live. I now have choices too. I can still be supportive, kind, generous, courteous, respectful to others, but I first must show those powerful respectful tools to myself. I validate myself without feeling guilty and that is a true gift