in my life, that dark, mysterious cloud of fear was gone. My first thought was to write to my wife about this experience, and I did. Imagine being able to write a letter after the condition I had been in the night before!
I am sure that some would classify this experience as an example of “letting go and letting God.” Not this self-willed character! I had held on to the thin strand of my will until it just snapped, and then I was caught up by the “everlasting arms.” I had to be rendered helpless, just like a drowning man who fights his rescuer.
I returned to A.A., but I was reluctant for a long time to tell of my experience. I was afraid that no one would believe me and that they would laugh. Later, I learned that others had had similar experiences.
A spiritual experience, I think, is what God does for a man when the man is completely helpless to do it for himself. A spiritual awakening is what a man does through his willingness to have his life transformed by following a proven program of spiritual growth, and this is a never-ending venture.
Raleigh, North Carolina
| PRAYER | 3 |
| In A.A. we have found that the actual good results of prayer are beyond question. They are matters of knowledge and experience. All those who have persisted have found strength not ordinarily their own. They have found wisdom beyond their usual capability. And they have increasingly found a peace of mind which can stand firm in the face of difficult circumstances. | |
| Bill W. | |
| “Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions,” page 104 | |
INFINITE NEED
In practice, I have always found it rather difficult to let Allah’s superior and flawless will prevail in my life and govern my will. However, when I make humble efforts, serenely accepting His will for me at some moment in my life, I feel absolutely relieved of the load I have carried on my shoulders. The mind does not wander any more, and the heart is full of happiness at every breath I take.
The most wonderful thing I have discovered is that prayer does work. I am beginning to think of Allah as a most loving Creator who is specially interested in me—otherwise, He would not have led me to A.A. nor given me so many chances to come out of slips. He is patient and merciful.
Although a moral inventory and a daily inventory reveal myriads of flaws in our makeups, still we, as human beings, cannot unravel all our liabilities in the personality. So at night, when I offer thanks to Him for the day’s sobriety, I add a prayer: I ask Him to forgive my failings during the day, to help me to improve, and to grant me the wisdom to discover those faults in myself which I cannot lay my finger on.
In short, the need for prayer is infinite!
Karachi, Pakistan
MORE THAN A SYMBOL
In the not-too-distant days of my drunken past, when locomotion was failing and consciousness was fading, I would always manage to get at least one knee on the floor before I fell into bed. This gesture was accompanied by a mumbled “God, I’m checking in. I’m drunk.” I tell this, not to elicit praise for having kept an outward vestige of the faith I knew as a child, but because I want to show the deep entrenchment of a symbol after the meaning was gone.
When my life was mercifully turned around and I threw in my lot with A.A.—because I could not do otherwise and live—a new prayer took the place of the old one. Monotonously, almost every moment when I was alone, I repeated, “God, please restore me to sanity.”
And finally the answer began to come. A sane me was a startling revelation. Being able to look at the “what I was” part of my life with unclouded insight made me feel like a clairvoyant. I was looking into the life of someone I really had never known, though I knew everything that had taken place in her life. My perception is not keen enough to understand the how or why, but now at least I can see the pattern of that life.
Since my quiet miracle happened, when I happily found I did not need or want to drink, I have continued to pray. Now I say funny, private prayers, like one that is a line from a song, asking that there be peace on earth and that it begin with me. Most of my prayers are just short thank-yous for a favor or for making me stop to think before I act or react. My relationship with God has matured as any child’s might normally do with his earthly father—I appreciate His kindness and wisdom more.
Nashville, Tennessee
“HOW DO YOU PRAY?”
Many times while I was drinking, I asked God to help me—and ended up calling Him all the curse names I could think of and saying, “If You’re so almighty, why did You let me end up drunk and in all this trouble again?”
One day, I was sitting on the side of my bed, feeling all alone, with a shotgun shell in my hand, ready to load. “If there is a God,” I cried out, “give me the courage to pull the trigger.”
A voice, soft and very clear, spoke: “Get rid of that shell.” I threw the shell out the door.
In a moment of calm, I dropped to my knees, and that voice spoke again: “Call Alcoholics Anonymous.”
It startled me. I looked around, wondering where the voice came from, and I said out loud, “Oh God!” I jumped up and ran to the phone. As I grabbed for it, I knocked it to the floor. I sat down beside it and, with a shaking hand, dialed the operator and yelled for her to call A.A.
“I will connect you with information,” she said.
“I’m shaking too damned bad to dial any numbers. You go to hell!”
I can’t explain why I didn’t hang up. I just sat there on the floor, with the receiver to my ear. The next thing I heard was “Good afternoon. Alcoholics Anonymous. May we help you?”
After I had been sober in A.A. four months, my wife and I got back together. I had always said it was her fault that I drank so much—all those crying kids and her complaining would cause anyone to drink. But after we had been back together for three months, I realized how wonderful a wife and mother she was. For the first time, I knew what real love was, instead of just using her.
Then it happened. I had always been afraid to love. For me, to love meant to lose. I believed that was God’s way of punishing me for all the sins I had committed. My wife became very ill and was rushed to the hospital. She had cancer, a doctor finally told me. She might not pull through the operation, he said, and if she did, it would be only a matter of hours before she passed away.
I turned and ran down the hall. All I could think of was to get a bottle. I knew that if I got out the door, that’s just what I would do. But a Power greater than myself caused me to stop and cry out, “My God, nurse! Call A.A.!”
I ran into the men’s room and stayed there, crying, begging God to take me instead of her. Again the fear took over, and in self-pity I said, “Is this what I get for trying to work those damned Steps?”
I looked up, and the room was full of men, standing there looking at me. It seemed to me that they all
