Narcotics Anonymous

Just For Today - Daily Email Service

   October 23                                                       Surrender

           "By surrendering control, we gain a far greater power."

                                                            Basic Text, p. 44

                           ----=----

   When we were using, we did everything we could to run things our way.   We
   used every scheme imaginable to bring our world under control.  When we
   got what we wanted, we felt powerful, invincible; when we didn't, we
   felt vulnerable, defeated.   But that didn't stop us-it only led to
   more efforts to control and manipulate our lives into a manageable state.

   Scheming was our way of denying our powerlessness.   As long as we could
   distract ourselves with our plans, we could put off accepting that we were
   out of control.  Only gradually did we realize that our lives had become
   unmanageable and that all the conning and manipulating in the world was
   not going to put our lives back in order.

   When we admit our powerlessness, we stop trying to control and manage our
   way to a better life-we surrender.  Lacking sufficient power of our own,
   we seek a Power greater than ourselves; needing support and guidance, we
   ask that Power to care for our will and our lives.  We ask others in
   recovery to share their experience with living the NA program instead of
   trying to program our own lives.   The power and direction we seek is all
   around us; we need only turn away from self to find it.

                           ----=----

   Just for today: I  will not try to scheme and manipulate my way to a
   manageable life.  Through the NA program, I  will surrender myself to my
   Higher Power's care.