I’m always grateful for Saturday mornings. I’m grateful for the beautiful pink sky last night. I’m grateful for patience—mine and others. I’m grateful for leaving what might have been behind. I’m grateful for encouragement and kindness. I’m grateful to be able to spot my own tells. I’m grateful I can make myself laugh. I’m grateful to be sober today.
First things first. As is often the case with absolute proclamations, particularly those followed by hyperbolic things like “it’s coming like an avalanche down the mountain,” they require follow-up and not with pithy things like, “told ya.” We ran into some insurmountable production problems yesterday and the bad news is that there won’t be a new episode of Breakfast with an Alcoholic until next weekend. I know, I’m sorry. But the next episode is going to be awesome. Just wait!
Before we launch into things, if it’s easier, you can also read this post here: Daily Gratitude List.1 we’ve been doing a lot of tinkering over here at Sober HQ. Our goal, and it actually took us a fair amount of discussion to figure this out, is basically set forth in the Long Form of the Fifth Tradition:
Each Alcoholics Anonymous group ought to be a spiritual entity having but one primary purpose—that of carrying its message to the alcoholic who still suffers.
Big Book, p. 563
In the Big Book, the phrase “having but one primary purpose” is italicized, so that always means something. Jane, Your Sponsor and I are all pretty big fans of AA, in case you hadn’t noticed. I may say some critical things from time to time, but it’s mostly because I feel like a kid in class who knows the answer and can’t wait to say it out loud.2 We’re just looking to find some new ways to carry the message and, this alcoholic stays sober by writing this stuff—so, hopefully it works out for everyone. We’re even doing TikTok videos:3
Our schedule going forward is going to be something like this:
Friday: New Episodes of Breakfast with an Alcoholic
Sunday: Liner Notes
Monday: Now a Word From Your Sponsor4
Wednesday: Growing Pains: Sober Girls Edition
And then we’re back to Friday, lather, rinse, repeat.5 Of course, the Daily Gratitude List will continue on, I guess, a daily basis. I am going to try and keep some of them shorter so that I can devote some of my writing time to longer, more well-thought out things. We’ll see. But as part of that effort, the Saturday Daily Gratitude List is going to become kind of a weekly round-up of interesting and cool things that we’d like to pass along and share with you: Our highly valued subscribers. Without further ado, you should start here—with good friend, super talented writer and stem cell donor Holly Rabalais:
When you’re finished there, I would definitely check out Jamee Sailor Rowe over at Macrodosing. I thought this was really great!6
Paulina Pinsky writes pretty compelling stuff about addiction and recovery, too and I thought this was just fantastic:
Last, but certainly not least, is Tatiana Gallardo at Brazenface. Tatiana writes about the intersection of creativity, recovery and self-discovery and I think her stuff is inspiring, even exhilarating! Do you need more of recommendation than that?
Thanks for Letting Me Share
This just looks way, way better on the website or the app!
And, if you know me, over and over and over.
Long term goal: Making “Your Sponsor” a fixture on TikTok.
For now, this is every other week, but talk to “Your Sponsor” about it.
I feel like I maybe responsible for having popularized this phrase. I used it in an essay about Old Yeller in my 10th Grade Humanities Class. That’s like 1978 and I still have the paper. If you’re aware of any earlier use (outside of shampoo bottles) I’m all ears.
I’m sorry it took me so long to get to this!!
Wow! Paulina's post had me feeling all kinds of things--things from my 20-year-old self and my present-day self. Good fodder for some Saturday journaling. Thanks!