More Language of Letting Go: 366 New Daily Meditations by Melody Beattie (classic books for 10 year olds TXT) 📕

enough about me to allow these times of discipline and learningin my life. Help me know that as a result of discipline and learning, something important will have been worked out in me.

November 12

Timing

Wait until the time is right. It is selfdefeating to postpone or procrastinate; it is also selfdefeating to act too soon, before the time is right.

Sometimes, we panic and take action out of fear. Sometimes, we take untimely action for revenge or because we want to punish someone. We act or speak too soon as a way to control or force someone to action. Sometimes, we take action too soon to relieve feelings of discomfort or anxiety about how a situation will turn out.

An action taken too soon can be as ineffective as one taken too late. It can backfire and cause more problems than it solves. Usually, when we wait until the time is right sometimes only a matter of minutes or hours—the discomfort dissolves, and we're empowered to accomplish what we need to do.

In recovery, we are learning to be effective.

Our answers will come. Our guidance will come. Pray. Trust. Wait. Let go. We are being led. We are being guided.

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Today, I will let go of my need to control by waiting until the time is right. When the time is right, I will take action.

November 13

Taking Care of Ourselves

We do not have to wait for others to come to our aid. We are not victims. We are not helpless.

Letting go of faulty thinking means we realize there are no knights on white horses, no magical grandmothers in the sky watching, waiting to rescue us.

Teachers may come our way, but they will not rescue. They will teach. People who care will come, but they will not rescue. They will care. Help will come, but help is not rescuing.

We are our own rescuers.

Our relationships will improve dramatically when we stop rescuing others and stop expecting them to rescue us.

Today, I will let go of the fears and selfdoubt that block me from taking assertive action in my best interest. I can take care of myself and let others do thesame for themselves.

November 14

Letting Our Anger Out

It's okay to be angry, but it isn't healthy to be resentful. Regardless of what we learned as children, no matter what we saw rolemodeled, we can learn to deal with our anger in ways that are healthy for us and for those around us. We can have our angry feelings. We can connect with them, own them, feel them, express them, release them, and be done with them.

We can learn to listen to what anger is telling us about what we want and need in order to take care of ourselves.

Sometimes we can even indulge in angry feelings that aren't justified. Feelings are just feelings; there is no morality in the feeling, only in our behavior. We can feel angry

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without hurting or abusing others or ourselves. We can learn to deal with anger in ways that benefit our relationships instead of ways that harm them.

If we don't feel our angry feelings today, we will need to face them tomorrow.

Today, I will let myself feel my anger. I will express my anger appropriately, without guilt. Then I will be done with it.

November 15

Benefits of Recovery

There are two benefits from recovery: we have shortterm gains and longterm gains.

The shortterm gains are the things we can do today that help us feel better immediately.

We can wake up in the morning, read for a few minutes in our meditation book, and feel lifted. We can work a Step and often notice an immediate difference in the way we feel and function. We can go to a meeting and feel refreshed, talk to a friend and feel comforted, or practice a new recovery behavior, such as dealing with our feelings or doing something good for ourselves, and feel relieved.

There are other benefits from recovery, though, that we don't see immediately on a daily or even a monthly basis. These are the longterm gains, the larger progress we make in our life.

Over the years, we can see tremendous rewards. We can watch ourselves grow strong in faith, until we have a daily personal relationship with a Higher Power that is as real to us as a relationship with a best friend.

We can watch ourselves grow beautiful as we shed shame, guilt, resentments, selfhatred, and other negative buildups from our past.

We can watch the quality of our relationships improve with family, friends, and spouses. We find ourselves growing Page 331

steadily and gradually in our capacity to be intimate and close, to give and receive.

We can watch ourselves grow in our careers, in our ability to be creative, powerful, productive people, using our gifts and talents in a way that feels good and benefits others.

We discover the joy and beauty in ourselves, others, and life.

The longterm progress is steady, but sometimes slow, happening in increments and often with much forward and backward movement. Enough days at a time of practicing recovery behaviors and piling up shortterm gains leads to longterm rewards.

Today, I will be grateful for the immediate and longterm rewards of recovery. If I am new to recovery, I will have faith that I can achieve the longtermbenefits. If I've been recovering for a while, I will pause to reflect, and be grateful for my overall progress.

November 16

The Victim Trap

The belief that life has to be hard and difficult is the belief that makes a martyr.

We can change our negative beliefs about life, and whether we have the power to stop our pain and take care of ourselves.

We aren't helpless. We can solve our problems. We do have power—not to change or control others, but to solve the problems that are ours to solve.

Using each problem that comes our way to ''prove'' that life is hard and we are helpless—this is codependency. It's the victim trap.

Life does not have to be difficult. In fact,