GRATITUDE MONTH: DAY 8: “Forget yesterday – it has already forgotten you. Don’t sweat tomorrow – you haven’t even met. Instead, open your eyes and your heart to a truly precious gift – today.” ― Steve Maraboli
Yeah, unless I am in the obituaries or on the front page, yesterday has forgotten me. I like that! And this is a great reminder to live HERE, live NOW, live THIS MOMENT.
We can only be grateful for the past and the NOW. It is not possible to be grateful for the future. The only way to live is in the day we are having.
When I am grateful for this day, it is a good day. That simple. I practice Step 11 every day. I pray with my gratitude letter. I say THANK YOU for everything that is going on in the day and at the end, I simply thank the Universe for “knowledge of His Will for me and the power to carry it out.” I just say thanks for it…no need to pray for it…I learned this from Chuck C. who said he lived in “expectation” of receiving what he needed every day by thanking God for it and getting on with the day.
I love that. I am not frozen in my fears, hoping I will recognize God’s Will for me. So many new members have this incredible battle with their will vs. God’s will. Yikes! What I know from the years of doing this is I am always given a U-turn when my day is not what was intended for me. I get a phone call or something that changes my plans and I do my best to move into the U-turn with gratitude and acceptance. That is my job as a recovering addict.
So many of my non-addict friends battle with acceptance in their lives. We are blessed to have a program that tells us how to do these things. I consider prayer to be saying “thank you” for everything that is in my life right now. I did little or nothing to bring about any of it. If I did, it was the opportunity that was a gift.
And then I meditate. I meditate to see what arises to stand in-between me and the Universe. It is most often my crazy, screaming purple monkeys. They want to tell me how bad things are, how screwed I am, how it has always been like this (whatever fear they are conjuring up) and always will be. They have the most interesting, but repetitive dialogue. And I sit with them until they run out of material.
THEN I can sit with myself and my love and my heart and my joy and my highest self. The monkeys are the same as the flying monkeys in Wizard of Oz. They guard my treasure and my castle, which is my heart and the love of the Universe that lives there.
They are like Coyote…trickster, no truth, just lots of flapping of arms and legs and crazy purple monkey songs. I don’t listen and I don’t sing with them. That is what we get when we consistently do these things, day after day. And the gifts are another day and another experience of a magnificent Universe where I get to play the role I am here to perform.
And I am grateful to the monkeys, for they remind me of a past life where I let them drive the bus and take me where they wanted. It was never a good thing for me…I have remembered all the evidence of that. And this recovery thing has never let me down. I have remembered all the evidence of that as well.
Dolphin Hug 