Standing for something
“… we could feel time, touch reality, and recognize spiritual values long lost to many
of us.”
Basic Text, p.85
In our active addiction, we were prepared to compromise everything we believed in
just to get our hands on more drugs. Whether we stole from our families and friends,
sold ourselves, or lied to our employers, we were ignoring the values that mattered
most to us. Each time we compromised another dearly held belief, another chunk of
the mortar holding our characters together fell away. By the time many of us came
to our first meeting, nothing was left but the ruin of our former selves.
We will locate our lost values as we carry out our first honest self-examination. But
in order to rebuild our characters, we’ll find it necessary to maintain those values, no
matter how great the temptation to shove them aside. We will need to be honest,
even when we think we could fool everyone by lying. If we ignore our values, we’ll
discover that the biggest fibs we’ve told have been the ones we’ve told ourselves.
We don’t want to start the demolition of our spirits again after all the work we’ve put
into their restoration. It’s essential that we stand for something, or we risk falling for
anything. Whatever we find important to us, we honor.
Just for today: I stand for something. My strength is the result of living my values.