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Odd...
I was about to write my usual OA Journal entries, but suddenly was awash with exhaustion. Waking up at 5:30 am and then staying up while being productive is apparently hard work. ;)
( Ramblings this way! ) -
OA: Facing Our Defects for What They Are.
"The real fault is to have faults and not to amend them." -Confucius
Anger, resentment, jealousy, envy, as Bill W. states in the Big Book, "are dubious luxuries of normal men." For me, a compulsive overeater, they are poison. With defects unattended, the insanity of compulsive overeating returns and that is death, spiritually and emotionally if not ( Read more... ) -
OA: Nothing Worth Having Comes Easy
"Those things are dearest to us that have cost us most." - Michel de Montaigne
I paid a very high price to get to OA, and my life of abstinence and sanity are worth more to me than anything. But it is easy to forget. The lonely days of compulsive overeating can become hazy and I can get caught up in the cares of a day, running here, going there. It ( Read more... ) -
OA: The Only Thing to Fear is Fear Itself
From Where?
No one reaches love with fear beside him.
- A Course in Miracles
Qarla sat down with Brian, her newly hired business manager, and formulated a priority list of jobs that needed to be done. After the list was recorded, Brian handed the paper back to Carla and asked her to make one more distinction among the listed tasks: “Write an ‘F ( Read more... ) -
OA: Don't Judge a Book By Its Cover
"What is actual is actual for only one time.
And only for one place."
- T.S. Eliot
Do I think there is a certain way to be with people -- the set smile, the too firm handshake -- playing a part, well practiced and for a specific return? Why, then, is there a feeling of loneliness after a day with people? Because that is not a satisfying way to live. ( Read more... ) -
OA: Acceptance of the Less-Than-Perfect
"The wise man, the true friend, the finished character we seek everywhere and only find in fragments."
-Ralph Waldo Emerson
Where, oh where, is that perfect person? Surely, I will find someone who is everything I want. Maybe this one. Or that one. How noble the quest for perfection sounds. Why was there always something wrong with people? After all ( Read more... ) -
OA: Time, Love and Tenderness
"Love is above all, the gift of oneself." - Jean Anouilh
In order to give the gift of myself, I need to see how I have been avoiding it. There are two ways of doing this. One is to feel that I am worth nothing, that no one would want me. The other is to make clear that you ought to recognize how wise I am and follow my advice. Both are protective ( Read more... ) -
When You're Strange....
There are a million things whirling in this little mind of mine.
So many heartbreaks
So many joyful embraces.
Contradictions of what is friendship? and why would friends do this?
Who am I to question what a friend does, anyway?
I have unnamed tears that still need to be shed. I know cause I feel em prickling right under the eyelids, when I see ( Read more... ) -
OA: Don't Worry, Be Happy! Plus, Happy Rabbit Year!
"Most folks are as happy as they make up their minds to be." - Abraham Lincoln
What a novel idea! Did Honest Abe really mean to say I can WILL myself to be happy?
Yes, excatly. I have never tried it, so how could I know? I spent much of my life believing that my happiness depended on other people and what they did or did not do.
The fact that I am ( Read more... ) -
OA: Step 4
Step 4: Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.
A business which takes no regular inventory usually goes broke. Taking commercial inventory is a fact-finding and a fact-facing process. It is an effort to discover the truth about the stock-in-trade. One object is to disclose damaged or unsalable goods, to get rid of them promptly ( Read more... )