Promises from recovery in A.A.

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The BIG BOOK BUNCH

We are the Big Book Bunch group of Alcoholics Anonymous. Our origins are the Students of the Big Book group, which has met in Woodland Hills, California since December of 1985. Our goals are to live the spiritual process through which sobriety is obtained and enhanced, and to publish (at no charge) our experience for other recovering alcoholics. We have absolutely no affiliation with any organization or cause other than our membership as individuals in A.A..

Our written materials are not official AA literature. They usually do, nevertheless, contain information from the Big Book (Alcoholics Anonymous) and other conference approved literature owned and published by Alcoholics Anonymous. All A.A. material used identifies the source from which it is quoted. References in our documents to Big Book content exclude its stories. Included is all material from inside the front cover through page 164, plus Appendices I (Traditions) and II (Spiritual Experience).

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How many promises await us as we trudge this road of happy destiny? Some folks think they are limited to those following Step 9 on page 83. There are 20 there (not the 12 often mentioned). But, you will find promises for each step and in many other places as well. We are sure you want to know what they are.

Thanks to Buddy T. at About.com we were referred to the Big Book Comes Alive website, which lists their version of 147 Big Book promises. We have not yet added from their list to ours the missing promises that meet our promise criteria. You may wish to make a very worthwhile visit to them at:

However, there is a price to pay for reading on. You must contact us with additional promises from inside the front cover through page 164. Here are well over 100 presented as of today:

1) There is a solution. Almost none of us likes the self-searching, the leveling of our pride, the confession of shortcomings which the process requires for its successful consummation. But we saw that it really worked in others, and we had come to believe in the hopelessness and futility of life as we had been living it. When, therefore, we were approached by those in whom the problem had been solved, there was nothing left for us but to pick up the simple kit of spiritual tools laid at our feet.
2) We have found much of heaven and
3) we have been rocketed into a fourth dimension of existence of which we had not even dreamed.
4) The great fact is just this, and nothing less: That we have had deep and effective spiritual experiences which have revolutionized our whole attitude toward life, toward our fellows and toward God's universe.
5) The central fact of our lives today is the absolute certainty that our Creator has entered into our hearts and lives in a way which is indeed miraculous.
6) He has commenced to accomplish those things for us which we could never do by ourselves.

7) Here and there, once in a while, alcoholics have had what are called vital spiritual experiences. To me these occurrences are phenomena. They appear to be in the nature of huge emotional displacements and rearrangements.
8) Ideas, emotions, and attitudes which were once the guiding forces of the lives of these men are suddenly cast to one side,
9) and a completely new set of conceptions and motives begin to dominate them.

10) We, in our turn, sought the same escape with all the desperation of drowning men. What seemed at first a flimsy reed, has proved to be the loving and powerful hand of God.
11) A new life has been given us or, if you prefer, "a design for living" that really works.

Much to our relief, we discovered we did not need to consider another's conception of God.
12) Our own conception, however inadequate, was sufficient to make the approach
13) and to effect a contact with Him.
14) As soon as we admitted the possible existence of a Creative Intelligence, a Spirit of the Universe underlying the totality of things, we began to be possessed of a new sense of power and direction, provided we took other simple steps.
15) We found that God does not make too hard terms with those who seek Him.
16) To us, the Realm of Spirit is broad, roomy, all inclusive; never exclusive or forbidding to those who earnestly seek.
17) It is open, we believe, to all men.

18) Do not let any prejudice you may have against spiritual terms deter you from honestly asking yourself what they mean to you. At the start, this was all we needed to commence spiritual growth, to effect our first conscious relation with God as we understood Him.
19) Afterward, we found ourselves accepting many things which then seemed entirely out of reach.

20) That was growth, but if we wished to grow we had to begin somewhere. So we used our own conception, however limited it was. We needed to ask ourselves but one short question. "Do I now believe, or am I even willing to believe, that there is a Power greater than myself?" As soon as a man can say that he does believe, or is willing to believe, we emphatically assure him that he is on his way.
21) It has been repeatedly proven among us that upon this simple cornerstone a wonderfully effective spiritual structure can be built.

Big Book page #48:
22) Faced with alcoholic destruction, we soon became as open minded on spiritual matters as we had tried to be on other questions. In this respect alcohol was a great persuader.
23) It finally beat us into a state of reasonableness. Sometimes this was a tedious process; we hope no one else will be prejudiced for as long as some of us were.

Big Book page #50:
24) Here are thousands of men and women, worldly indeed. They flatly declare that since they have come to believe in a Power greater than themselves, to take a certain attitude toward the Power, and to do certain simple things, there has been a revolutionary change in their way of living and thinking.
25) In the face of collapse and despair, in the face of the total failure of their human resources, they found that a new power, peace, happiness, and sense of direction flowed into them.
26) This happened soon after they whole-heartedly met a few simple requirements. Once confused and baffled by the seeming futility of existence, they show the underlying reasons why they were making heavy going of life. Leaving aside the drink question, they tell why living was so unsatisfactory. They show how the change came over them. When many hundreds of people are able to say that the consciousness of the Presence of God is today the most important fact of their lives, they present a powerful reason why one should have faith.

27) We finally saw that faith in some kind of God was a part of our make-up, just as much as the feeling we have for a friend. Sometimes we had to search fearlessly, but He was there. He was as much a fact as we were. We found the Great Reality deep down within us. In the last analysis it is only there that He may be found. It was so with us.

28) Even so has God restored us all to our right minds. To this man, the revelation was sudden. Some of us grow into it more slowly.
29) But He has come to all who have honestly sought Him.
30) When we drew near to Him He disclosed Himself to us! [contributed by Joe Mc.]

[PROMISES OF STEP THREE]
31) When we sincerely took such a position, all sort of remarkable things followed.
32) We had a new Employer.
33) He provided what we needed, if we kept close to Him and performed His work well.
34) Established on such a footing we became less and less interested in ourselves, our little plans and designs.
35) More and more we became interested in seeing what we could contribute to life.
36) As we felt new power flow in,
37) as we enjoyed peace of mind,
38) as we discovered we could face life successfully,
39) as we became conscious of His presence,
40) we began to lose our fear of today, tomorrow or the hereafter.
41) We were reborn.
42) an effect, sometimes a very great one, was felt at once.

43a) We have begun to learn tolerance, patience and good will toward all men, even our enemies, for we look on the them as sick people.

[PROMISES OF STEP FIVE]
Once we have taken this step, withholding nothing,
44) we are delighted.
45) We can look the world in the eye.
46) We can be alone at perfect peace and ease.
47) Our fears fall from us.
48) We begin to feel the nearness of our Creator.
49) We may have had certain spiritual beliefs, but now we begin to have a spiritual experience.
50) The feeling that the drink problem has disappeared will often come strongly.
51) We feel we are on the Broad Highway, walking hand in hand with the Spirit of the Universe.

[PROMISES OF STEP EIGHT]
52) If our manner is calm, frank, and open, we will be gratified with the result.
53) In nine cases out of ten the unexpected happens. Sometimes the man we are calling upon admits his own faults,
54) so feuds of years' standing melt away in an hour.
55) Rarely do we fail to make satisfactory progress. Our
56) former enemies sometimes praise what we are doing and wish us well.
57) Occasionally, they will offer assistance.

Big Book page #83:
[ PROMISES OF STEP NINE]
If we are painstaking about this phase of our development,
58) we will be amazed before we are half way through.
59) We are going to know a new freedom
60) and a new happiness.
61) We will not regret the past
62) nor wish to shut the door on it.
63) We will comprehend the word serenity and
64) we will know peace.
65) No matter how far down the scale we have gone, we will see how our experience can benefit others.
66) That feeling of uselessness (will disappear)
67) and self-pity will disappear.
68) We will lose interest in selfish things and
69) (We will) gain interest in our fellows.
70) Self-seeking will slip away.
71) Our whole attitude and outlook upon life will change.
72) Fear of people (will leave us) and
73) (fear) of economic insecurity will leave us.
74) We will intuitively know how to handle situations which used to baffle us.
75) We will suddenly realize that God is doing for us what we could not do for ourselves.
76) Are these extravagant promises? We think not. They are being fulfilled among us—sometimes quickly, sometimes slowly.
77) They will always materialize if we work for them.

[PROMISES OF STEP TEN]
64) And we have ceased fighting anything or anyone —even alcohol.

70 We will see that our new attitude toward liquor has been given us without any thought or effort on our part. It just comes! That is the miracle of it.

73) We feel as though we had been places in a position of neutrality—safe and protected.

74) We have not even sworn off. Instead, the problem has been removed. It does not exist for us.

76) That is our experience. That is how we react so long as we keep in fit spiritual condition.

On awakening let us think about the twenty-four hours ahead. We consider our plans for the day. Before we begin, we ask God to direct our thinking, especially asking that it be divorced from self-pity, dishonest or self-seeking motives. Under these conditions
77) we can employ our mental faculties with assurance, for after all God gave us brains to use.
78) Our thought-life will be placed on a much higher plane when our thinking is cleared of wrong motives.
79) In thinking about our day we may face indecision. We may not be able to determine which course to take. Here we ask God for inspiration, an intuitive thought or a decision. We relax and take it easy. We don't struggle. We are often surprised how the right answers come after we have tried this for a while.

80) What used to be the hunch or the occasional inspiration gradually becomes a working part of the mind.

81) Being still inexperienced and having just made conscious contact with God, it is not probable that we are going to be inspired at all times. We might pay for this presumption in all sorts of absurd actions and ideas. Nevertheless, we find that our thinking will, as time passes, be more and more on the plane of inspiration.
82) We come to rely upon it.
83) We are careful never to pray for our own selfish ends. Many of us have wasted a lot of time doing that and it doesn't work. You can easily see why.

As we go through the day we pause, when agitated or doubtful, and ask for the right thought or action. We constantly remind ourselves we are no longer running the show, humbly saying to ourselves many times each day "Thy will be done."
84) We are then in much less danger of excitement,
85) fear,
86) anger,
87) worry,
88) self-pity,
89) or foolish decisions.
90) We become much more efficient.
91 We do not tire so easily, for we are not burning up energy foolishly as we did when we were trying to arrange life to suit ourselves.
92) It works—it really does.

93) PRACTICAL EXPERIENCE shows that nothing will so much insure immunity from drinking as intensive work with other alcoholics. It works when other activities fail.
94) You can help when no one else can.
95) You can secure their confidence when others fail.
96) Life will take on new meaning.
97) To watch people recover, to see them help others, to watch loneliness vanish, to see a fellowship grow up about you, to have a host of friends—this is an experience you must not miss. We know you will not want to miss it. Frequent contact with newcomers and with each other is the bright spot of our lives.

98) Both you and the new man must walk day by day in the path of spiritual progress. If you persist, remarkable things will happen. [contributed by Kate O.]
99) When we look back, we realize that the things which came to us when we put ourselves in God's hands were better than anything we could have planned. [contributed by Kate O.]
100) Follow the dictates of a Higher Power and you will presently live in a new and wonderful world, no matter what your present circumstances! [contributed by Beth]
101) Assuming we are spiritually fit, we can do all sorts of things alcoholics are not supposed to do. [contributed by Kate O.]

102) Your job now is to be at the place where you may be of maximum helpfulness to others, so never hesitate to go anywhere if you can be helpful. You should not hesitate to visit the most sordid spot on earth on such an errand. Keep on the firing line of life with these motives and God will keep you unharmed. (contributed by Beth)
103) The power of God goes deep! [contributed by Kate O.]

104) But sometimes you must start life anew. We know women who have done it. If such women adopt a spiritual way of life their road will be smoother. [contributed by Kate O.]

105) how much better life is when lived on a spiritual plane. [contributed by Kate O.]

106) These work-outs should be regarded as part of your education, for thus you will be learning to live. [contributed by Kate O.]
107) You will make mistakes, but if you are in earnest they will not drag you down. [contributed by Kate O.]
108) Instead, you will capitalize them. [contributed by Kate O.]
109) A better way of life will emerge when they are overcome. [contributed by Kate O.]

the BIG BOOK BUNCH

Promises for YOU!