Weekly Topic for Sept.01-07,2008 - Commitment, Has it change you?

[Rich75]

First of all let me start with thanking my Higher Power for another day in sobriety and thank you Tammy for asking me.
Commitment, how this has change me? Well the only thing I committed to was the drink. I wasn't willing to devote myself to any tpye of respondsibilities. I just did not care. Not my problem I used to say. I couldn't be entrusted with my kids because I would pass out somewhere from being so drunk. I couldn't pledge myself to my wife because that would mean I promise myself to her. So I entrusted my friend the bottle. Then AA came into my life and my sponsor suggested that I should take on a committment, Whether greeting or coffee or speaking and I was Like What's that? No way!!!! Not me.... So I committed to just come to meetings and that was good enough for me. Untill one day something came over me and I found myself at a meeting standing next to the greeter by the door and everyone was shaking my hand saying hello. It wasn't just the people I knew but everyone. I found myself liking that. Another time I got to the meeting early and help the coffee guy set the room and make coffee. It wasn't bad. I continue to do this for a while and then actually ask for these commitments. As a result of having them it started to change my life. They started to teach me things I knew nothing about. I learned about caring, and doing things without getting anything in return, and a williness to be respondsible for my action or even others. For example my computer went down and I spent these last couple of days trying to get it back up so that I could follow through with my commitment. Why, because I agreed to, I made a promise to another person that I would be there and that means the world to me now!! Thanks for letting me share.

[annalittlebit]

This is a good question--Thank You!!!!!! For me, from day 1, I have never been so committed in my life---To staying sober--To helping others do the same--To give back what was soooooo freely given to me!!!!! I am truly amazed every day by the focus this program has put in my life----To the life this program has given me----When I make a commitment now, no matter what it is, I can be counted on to follow through--To be there when I say I will be--Not like the old me who was always distracted by my drinking----I live and breath this sobriety!!!!! Life Is Good!!!!!!!!!!

[admin]

Use to be I was committed to doing my will. Today I am committed to doing God's will. Has it changed me? Actions speak louder than words.

[csmith48850]

What I said to my last boyfriend before I got sober was, "As long as I am drinking, I can never be faithful." My commitment was to my drinking, to my blackouts, not to myself and definitely not to anybody else. I find it hard to be continuously committed to things like 'spirituality,' 'daily meditations,' 'daily meetings.' Sometimes my commitment to the program is not evident in my daily actions. But what is true for me is that my thinking has changed due to my commitment to do whatever it takes to not drink or drug. My commitment to being true to myself, found through living the principals of AA, has proved to be a guide to self-awareness. When life seems to go askew, I will always be able to regain the proper direction so as long as I refer back to these principals .

[sioux]

My recovery is the only committment I have ever followed through on prior to getting sober.

I am going to say it people...the "J" word....I make judgments today. I hear it all the time in meetings how we are not to do this judging thing, etc. I try to stay out of the sentencing gig, but.....

When I drank and used I had no judgment skills to speak of. Everything was a-okay with me. The big whatever. Freebird, you can't cage me and all that nonsense. Just another out.

My committment to getting sober and staying that way has been the only obligation I ever undertook and follows through with for these many years now.


I have evolved into the person I always wanted to be but had no clue how to achieve.

Through abandoning myself as I was to this simple Program, I have re-learned a lot of things some for the very first time. Like how to be a loyal friend to others and to myself, a trustworthy employee, a faithful spouse, a devoted mother, a member of something.

Today I am who I say I am not only by my words, but by my actions too; no I am not close even to becoming a saint, but a lot of miles between me today and that poor sad lonely creature that I was. I have morals!

[Craig A.]

Good topic and very good comments. Before I was commited to staying high all the time as long as I could, my sponsor told me if I put half that energy into my sobriety I would be able to stay sober and he was right. Todat I show up where and when I am suppose to, when I give my word I follow through. But the most important committment I made was to myself, and sometimes it is a struggle to keep; what I mean by that is I am going to school to better myself ( considering I never payed much attention in school or cared cause I wasn't going to live that long( I thought I would be dead by the time I was 30)), not be so hard on myself ( my sponsor would tell me I know better than anyone else where exactly to hit myself so I would feel down)), I feed myself negative messages and I try to follow up with something good about myself. A couple things I learned it is easier to get lost helping other people and I can't love you till I love myself! I get lost in helping other people and forget to take care of myself, not as a bad defect as being unhelpful but there is a cost to spreading yourself to thin. I am learning all this cause I listen to people in meetings and by trial and error, before I would not even made an attempt to help you unless there was something in it for me. Thank you for letting me share and listening!!!!!

[snugsnug]

Well now, for me commitment came very early. At about 90 days clean my sponsor had to go work out of town and he asked me to chair the meetings he had signed up for. We had a small home group and we only had one meeting a week then. Reluctantly I did, and I was off to the races. The format then was chairpersons choice, so being the self-centered addict I was, I chose topics I was dealing with, or not. Those three or four meetings turned into about a year and a half of chairing a bunch of meetings. We have grown four times since then. We now have four meetings and a bunch of members.

The commitments I have made during my recovery have helped me to stay clean, become responsible. Those commitments early on helped me in my marriage and as a father as well. They are still helping me in school and on my job. Thanks for the topic and thanks for letting me share.
sterling

[CD BUCKBERRY]

Well when I first came around the rooms,after my 90-90 I had suggested that I do.One of the men I met early in recovery said I should do service,I have .I started setting up chairs,making coffee,putting out the literature.I have been secretary of the meeting when they are absent.I have been chairperson of my homegroup and other groups also.I am GSR right now and have just been elected as a regional committee member of my reigion.I guess all of those are commitment.It makes me Keep Coming Back.