Reflection for the Day

April 1
If we don't want to slip, we'll avoid slippery places. For the gambler that means shunning poker parties and race tracks and anywhere that gambling is taking place. For me, certain emotional situations can also be slippery places; so can indulgence in old ideas, such as a well-nourished resentment that is allowed to build to explosive proportions.

Do I carry the principles of the Gamblers Anonymous Program with me wherever I go?

TODAY I PRAY
May I learn not to test myself too harshly by "asking for it," by stopping in at the casino, the Bingo hall, or the track. Such "testing" can be dangerous, especially if I am egged on, not only by a craving for the old object of my addictions, but by others still caught in addiction whose moral responsibility has been reduced to
zero.

TODAY I WILL REMEMBER
Avoid slippery places.

April 2
What causes slips? What happens to a person who apparently seems to
understand and live the Twelve Step way, yet decides to go out gambling again? What can I do to keep this from happening to me? Is there any consistency among those who slip, any common denominators that seem to apply? We can each draw our own conclusions, but we learn in the Gamblers Anonymous Program that certain inactions will all but guarantee an eventual slip.

When a person who has slipped is fortunate enough to return to the Program, do I listen carefully to what he or she says about the slip?

TODAY I PRAY
May my Higher Power show me if I am setting myself up to gamble again. May I glean from the experiences of others that the reasons for such a lapse of resolve or such an accident of will most often stem from what I have not done rather than from what I have done. May I "keep coming back" to meetings.

TODAY I WILL REMEMBER
Keep coming back.


April 3
In almost every instance, the returned slipper says, "I stopped going to meetings," or "I got fed up with the same old stories and the same old faces," or "My outside commitments were such that I had to cut down on meetings," or "I felt I'd received the optimum benefits from the meetings, so I sought further help from more meaningful activities." In short, they simply stopped going to meetings. A saying I've heard at Gambers Anonymous hits the nail on the head: "Them that stops going to meetings are not present at meetings to hear about what happens to them that stops going to meetings."

Am I going to enough meetings for me?

TODAY I PRAY
God keep me on the path of the GA Program. May I never be too tired, too busy, too complacent, too bored to go to meetings. Almost always those complaints are reversed at a meeting if I will just get myself there. My weariness dissapates in serenity. My busyness is reduced to it's rightful proportion. My complacency gives way to vigilance again. Any how can I be bored in a place where there is so much fellowship and joy?

TODAY I WILL REMEMBER
Attend the meetings.


April 4
Another common denominator among those who slip is failure to use the tools of the Gamblers Anonymous Program--the Twelve Steps. The comments heard most often are, "I never did work the Steps," "I never got past the First Step," "I worked the Steps too slow," or "too fast" or "too soon". What it boils down to is that these people considered the Steps, but didn't conscientiously and sincerely apply the Steps to their lives.

Am I learning how to protect myself and help others?

TODAY I PRAY
May I be a doer of the Steps and not a hearer only. May I see some of the common mis-Steps that lead to a fall: being too proud to admit Step one; being to tied to everyday earth to feel the presence of a Higher Power; being over- whelmed by the thought of preparing Step Four, a complete moral and financial inventory; being to reticent to share that inventory. Please God, guide me as I work the Twelve Steps.

TODAY I WILL REMEMBER
To watch my steps.


April 5
Still another common thread we invariable see among slippers is that many of them felt dissatisfaction with today. "I forgot we live one day at a time," or "I begain to anticipate the future," or "I began to plan results, not just plan." They seemed to forget that all we have is NOW. Life continued to get better for them and, as many of us do, they forgot how bad it had been. They began to think, instead, of how dissatisfying it was compared to what it could be.

Do I compare today with yesterday, realizing, that by contrast, what great benefits and blessings I have today?

TODAY I PRAY
If I am discourged with today, may I remember the sorrows and hassles of yesterday. If I am impatient for the future, let me appreciate today and how much better it is than the life I left behind. May I never forget the principle of "one day at a time."

TODAY I WILL REMEMBER
The craziness of yesterday