April 21

April 21 – AM          Page 159, A Vision For You, Chapter 11

All this time our friend of the hotel lobby incident remained in that town.  He was there three months.  He now returned home, leaving behind his first acquaintance, the lawyer and the devil-may-care chap.  These men had found something brand new in life. Though they knew they must help other alcoholics if they would remain sober, that motive became secondary.  It was transcended by the happiness they found in giving themselves for others.  They shared their homes, their slender resources, and gladly devoted their spare hours to fellow-sufferers.  They were willing, by day or night, to place a new man in the hospital and visit him afterward.  They grew in numbers.  They experienced a few distressing failures, but in those cases they made an effort to bring the man’s family into a spiritual way of living, thus relieving much worry and suffering.

April 21 – PM          Page 24, There Is A Solution, Chapter 2

The almost certain consequences that follow taking even a glass of beer do not crowd into the mind to deter us.  If these thoughts occur, they are hazy and readily supplanted with the old threadbare idea that this time we shall handle ourselves like other people.  There is a complete failure of the kind of defense that keeps one from putting his hand on a hot stove.