Gambling Addiction & Recovery Support Group
Compulsive gambling is an urge or addiction to gamble despite harmful negative consequences or a desire to stop. A preferred term among many professionals is problem gambling, as few people described by the term experience true compulsions in the clinical sense of the word. Problem gambling often is defined by whether harm is experienced by the gambler or others rather...
Good Afternoon Folks
Took me awhile to figure out how to get back into the site.
I am not computer wise.But am back and I am going to start
posting the GA Reflection for the Day again and hope to catch
up with my old recovery friends and to meet some new people.
If you are interested I visit a new site called Gamtalk that is run
out of Montreal Canada and it has 24/7 chat room and on Friday
at 3pm est we have a group Topic Session.Today's topic is Step 9.
God Bless
Ken L GRCG
March 22 Reflection for the Day
Once in a great while, I find myself thinking perhaps things werent quite so bad as they seemed to be. At such moments, I force myself to realize that my illness is talking to me, trying to tempt me into denying that I am, in fact, afflicted with an illness. One of the key action steps of the Gamblers Anonymous Program is that we give our illness to God, as we understand Him, accepting our powerlessness in the face of His greater Power.
Do I believe that the grace of God can do for me what I could never do for myself?
Today I Pray
May I know that much of our lives depends on faith. For we cannot know the limits of space and time or explain the mysteries of life and death. But when we see God working through us and through others who have found new life in the GA Program it is all the evidence we need to know that God exists.
Today I will Remember
The Big Wheel runs by faith.
Took me awhile to figure out how to get back into the site.
I am not computer wise.But am back and I am going to start
posting the GA Reflection for the Day again and hope to catch
up with my old recovery friends and to meet some new people.
If you are interested I visit a new site called Gamtalk that is run
out of Montreal Canada and it has 24/7 chat room and on Friday
at 3pm est we have a group Topic Session.Today's topic is Step 9.
God Bless
Ken L GRCG
March 22 Reflection for the Day
Once in a great while, I find myself thinking perhaps things werent quite so bad as they seemed to be. At such moments, I force myself to realize that my illness is talking to me, trying to tempt me into denying that I am, in fact, afflicted with an illness. One of the key action steps of the Gamblers Anonymous Program is that we give our illness to God, as we understand Him, accepting our powerlessness in the face of His greater Power.
Do I believe that the grace of God can do for me what I could never do for myself?
Today I Pray
May I know that much of our lives depends on faith. For we cannot know the limits of space and time or explain the mysteries of life and death. But when we see God working through us and through others who have found new life in the GA Program it is all the evidence we need to know that God exists.
Today I will Remember
The Big Wheel runs by faith.
Those whom I most respect in the Gamblers Anonymous Program and, in turn, those from whom Ive learned the most seem convinced that pride is, as one person put it, the root-sin. In moral theology, pride is the first of the seven deadly sins. It is also considered the most serious, standing apart from the rest by virtue of its unique quality. Pride gets right into our spiritual victories. It insinuates itself into all our successes and accomplishments, even when we attribute them to God.
Do I struggle against pride by working the Tenth Step regularly, facing myself freshly and making things right where theyve gone wrong?
Today I Pray
May I be on guard constantly against the sneakiness of pride, which can creep into every achievement, every triumph, every reciprocated affection. May I know that whenever things are going well for me, my pride will be on the spot ready to take credit. May I watch for it.
Today I will Remember
Put pride in its place.
The more self-searching we do, the more we realize how often we react negatively because our pride has been hurt. Pride is at the root of most of my personal problems. When my pride is hurt, for example, I almost invariably experience resentment and anger sometimes to the point where Im unable to talk or think rationally. When Im in that sort of emotional swamp, I must remind myself that my pride and nothing but my pride has been injured. I have to pause and try to cool off until such time as I can evaluate the problem realistically.
When my pride is injured or threatened, will I pray for humility so that I can rise above myself?
Today I Pray
May I know that if my pride is hurt, the rest of me may not be injured at all. May I know that my pride can take a battering and still come back for more, stronger than ever. May I know that every time my pride takes a blow, it is liable to get more defensive, nastier, more unreasonable, more feisty. May I learn to keep my upstart pride in another place, where it will not be so easily hurt or so willing to take credit.
Today I will Remember
Humility is the only authority over pride.
NOVEMBER 3 Reflection for the Day
The Gamblers Anonymous Red Book says: The word spiritual can be said to describe those characteristics of the human mind that represent the highest and finest qualities, such as kindness, generosity, honesty, and humility. Inasmuch as the Gamblers Anonymous Fellowship advocates consideration of these principles as a way of life, it is said that ours is a spiritual fellowship." I have begun to understand that my spirituality has to do with my wholeness the healthy congruency of truths, as I now perceive them, and my inner self.
Do I continue to strive for qualities that will bring me the greatest long-term happiness?
Today I Pray
May I work toward taking into myself those highest and finest qualities that define my spiritual being. May I know the joys that come through living the GA way, until all life becomes a celebration shared especially with others who, like me, are trying to live up to these God-inspired principles.
Today I will Remember
From spiritual holes to spiritually whole.
In the words of Teilhard de Chardin, We are not human beings having a spiritual experience. We are spiritual beings having a human experience. Even though we acknowledge in theory that we are spiritual beings, most compulsive gamblers had to experience some sort of spiritual awakening before we were willing to turn our lives over to a Higher Power. It was then that we could finally say we were spiritual beings. For some of us, it was as though we had experienced spirituality for the first time in our lives. But, no matter what our spiritual base had been previously, once we discovered this new sense of spirituality, it became an experience and a feeling we would not soon be willing to leave behind.
Am I grateful for the awakening that has put me in touch with my Higher Power and with my own spiritual essence?
Today I Pray
May I not forget how my outlook towards life, myself, friends, loved ones, and God had deteriorated prior to coming to Gamblers Anonymous. May I do whatever it takes to keep my spiritual life from hitting bottom again. May I keep growing spiritually a day at a time.
Today I will Remember.
Let my spirituality guide my humility.
For many months after I came to gamblers Anonymous, I paid little attention to the Eleventh Step, to the practice of serious meditation and prayer. I felt that it might help me meet an emergency such as sudden craving to return to gambling but it remained among the lowest level on my list of priorities. In those early days, I equate prayer and medication with mystery and even hypocrisy. Ive since found that the results of prayer and medication are more rewarding than I could have ever imagined. For me today, the harvest is increasingly bountiful, and I continue to gain peace of mind and strength far beyond my human limitations.
Is my former pain being replaced by tranquility?
Today I Pray
May I find my own best way to God, my own best technique of meditation whether I use an oriental mantra or the name of Jesus Christ, or just allow the spirit of God, as I understand Him, to settle into me and give me peace. By whatever means I reach my God, may I learn to know Him well and feel His presence not only in these quiet times, but in everything I do.
Today I will Remember.
Meditation is opening myself to the spirit of God.
There are no boundaries to meditation. It has neither width, depth, nor height, which means that it can always be further developed without limitation of any sort. Meditation is an individual matter: few of us meditate in the same way, and in that sense, it is truly a personal adventure. For all of us who practice meditation seriously, however the purpose is the same: to improve our conscious contact with God. despite its lack of specific dimensions and despite its intangibility, meditation is, in reality, the most intensely practical thing that we can do. One of its first rewards, for example, its emotional balance. What could be more practical than that?
Am I broadening and deepening the channel between me and God?
Today I Pray
As I seek God through daily prayer and meditation, may I find the peace that passes understanding, that balance that gives perspective to the whole of life. May I center myself in God.
Today I will Remember
My balance comes from God.
There are those in the Gamblers Anonymous Program who, at the beginning, shun meditation and prayer as they would avoid a pit full of rattlesnakes. When they do finally take the first tentative and experimental step, however, and unexpected things begin to take place, they begin to feel different. Invariably, such tentative beginnings lead to true belief, to the extent that those who one belittled prayer and meditation often become walking advertisements for its rewards. We hear in the GA Programme that almost the only scoffers at prayer are those who never really tried it.
Is there an obstinate part of me that still scoffs?
Today I Pray
May I learn, however irreverent I have been, that prayer is not to be mocked; I see the power of prayer effecting miracles around me, and I wonder. If I have refused to pray, may I look to see if pride is in my way that old pride that insists on doing things on it own. Now that I have found a place for prayer in my life, may I reserve that place religiously.
Today I will Remember
Whoever learns to pray keeps on praying.
My conscious contact with God depends entirely on me and on my desire for it. Gods power is available for me to use at all times; whether I decide to use it or not is my choice. It has been said that God is present in all His creatures, but all are not equally aware of His presence. Ill try to remind myself every day of how much depends on my awareness of Gods influence in my life. And Ill try to accept His help in everything I do.
Will I remember that God knows how to help me, that He can help me, and that He wants to help me?
Today I Pray
May I be aware always that Gods power and peace are a bottomless well within me. I can draw bucket after bucket from it to refresh and purify my life. All I need to supply are the buckets and the rope. The water is mine free, fresh, healing, and unpolluted.
Today I will Remember
The well is Gods; I bring the buckets.
As time passes, daily communion with God is becoming as essential to me as breathing in and out. I dont need a special place to pray, because God always hears my call. I dont need special words with which to pray, because God already knows my thoughts and needs. I have only to turn my attention to God, aware that His attention is always turned to me.
Do I know that only good can come to me if I trust God completely?
Today I Pray
May my communion with God become a regular part of my life, as natural as a heartbeat. May I find, as I grow accustomed to th attitude of prayer, that it becomes less important to find a corner of a room, a bedside, a church pew, or even a special time of day, for prayer. May my thoughts turn to God automatically and often, whenever there is a lull in my day or a need for direction.
Today I will Remember.
Let prayer become a habit.
When I first came to Gamblers Anonymous, I thought humility was just another word for weakness, but gradually I learned that theres nothing incompatible between humility and intellect, just as long as I place humility first. As soon as I begin to do that, I was told, I would receive the gift of faith a faith that would work for me as it has worked and continues to work for countless others who have been freed of their gambling addiction and have found a new way of life in the GA program.
Have I come to believe, in the words of Heine, that the actions of men are like the index of a book, they point out what is most remarkable in them?
Today I Pray
May I never let my intelligence be an excuse for lack of humility. It is so easy, if I consider myself reasonably bright and capable of making decisions and handling my own affairs, to look down upon humility as a property of those less intelligence and humility are both God given.
Today I will Remember
If I have no humility, I have no intelligence.
What, exactly, is humility? Does it mean that we are to be submissive, accepting everything that comes our way, no matter how humiliating? Does it mean surrender to ugliness and a destructive way of life? On the contrary. The basic ingredient of all humility is simply a desire to seek and do Gods will.
Am I coming to understand that an attitude of true humility confers dignity and grace on me, strengthening me to take intelligent spiritual action to solving my problems?
Today I Pray
May I discover that humility is not bowing and scraping, kowtowing, or letting people walk all over me all of which have built-in expectations of some sort of personal reward, like approval or sympathy. Real humility is awareness of the vast love and unending might of God. It is the perspective that tells me how I, as a human being, relate to that Divine Power.
Today I will Remember
Humility is awareness of God.
There are few absolutes in the Gamblers Anonymous Twelve Steps of Recovery. We're free to start at any point we can, or will. God, as we understand Him, may be defined as simply a Power greater; for many of us in the Program, the group itself was the first Power greater. And this acknowledgment is relatively easy to make if a newcomer knows that most of the members are free of compulsive gambling and he or she isn't. This admission is the beginning of humility. Perhaps for the first time, the newcomer is at least willing to disclaim that he himself or she herself is God.
Is my behavior more convincing to newcomers than my words?
Today I Pray
May I define and discover my own Higher Power. As that definition becomes clearer and closer to me, may I remember not to insist that my interpretation is right. For each must find his or her own Higher Power. If a newcomer is feeling godless and alone, the power of the group may be enough for now. May I never discredit the power of the group.
Today I will Remember
Group power can be a Higher Power.
All progress can be boiled down and measured by just two words: humility and responsibility. It is said that our entire spiritual development can be precisely measured by our degree of adherence to those standards. Only by abandoning my self-centeredness and maintaining contact with a Higher Power can I achieve true humility. Only by regaining contact with reality can I develop responsibility.
Am I trying my honest best to live by standards of humility and responsibility?
Today I Pray
I pray that of all the good words and catch phrases and wisps of inspiration that come to me, I will remember these two above all: humility and responsibility. These may be the hardest to come by humility because it means shooing away my pride, responsibility because I am in the habit of using my gambling addiction as a thin excuse for getting out of obligations. I pray that I may break these old patterns.
Today I will Remember
First humility, then responsibility.
First search for a little humility, my sponsor urged me. If you don't, he said, you're greatly increasing the risk of going out there again. After a while, in spite of my lifelong rebelliousness, I took his advice; I began to try to practice humility, simply because I believed it was the right thing to do, I hope sincerely that the day will come when most of my rebelliousness will be just a memory, that then I'll practice humility because I deeply want it as a way of life.
Am I willing to try humility today, if only for a moment? Will I learn to hunger for the feeling I get from it?
Today I PraySince I - like so many compulsive gamblers - am a rebel, may I know that I will need to practice humility. May I recognize that humility does not come easily to a rebellious nature, whether I am out-and-out defiant, dug-in negative, or, more subtly, determined in a roundabout way to change everything else but myself. I pray that by practicing humility it will become instinctive for me.
Today I will Remember
Get the humble habit.
As a newcomer to Gamblers Anonymous, I was told that my admission of my powerlessness over gambling was my first step toward freedom from its deadly grip; I soon came to realize the truth of that fact. In that regard, surrender was a dire necessity. But for me that was only a small beginning toward acquiring humility. I've learned in Gamblers Anonymous that to be willing to work for humility as something to be desired for itself takes most of us a long, long time.
Do I realize that a whole lifetime of self-centeredness can't be shifted into reverse in a split second?
Today I Pray
May I search for my own humility as a quality that I must cultivate to survive, not just an admission that I am powerless over my compulsive gambling. Step one is just that step one in the direction of acquiring an attitude of humility. May I be realistic enough to know that this may take half a lifetime.
Today I will Remember
Pride blew it; let humility have a chance.
We sometimes hear humility defined as the state of being teachable. In that sense, most of us in the Gamblers Anonymous Fellowship who are able to stay free of gambling have acquired at least a smattering of humility, or we never would have learned to stay away from that first bet. Humility, I have come to know, is being open to listening to others, continuously open to learning.
Do I see humility as a pathway to continuing improvement?
Today I Pray
Now that I have made a start at developing humility, may I keep it up. May I open myself to the will of God and the suggestions of my friends in the group. May I remain teachable, confrontable, receptive, and conscious that I must stay that way in order to be healthy.
Today I Will Remember
To remain confrontable.