Step 2 Spiritual Guidance

[maureen]

I guess I never REALLY trusted the concept of the Higher Power that I had. So, now I am trying to be real and honest in my search. But I guess a part of me worries...what if I am given guidance and miss it?

So, how do YOU know when your Higher Power is "nudging you"?

All I can offer is my own experience -- I fought the concept of giving myself fully to a higher power for years. It was only recently that I finally submitted and took the step. Since doing so, I look back and since they say "hindsight is 20/20" my best I see just how many "nudgings" my higher power gave me (and still gives me!). I always knew my higher power, and I prayed to her and asked her for guidance and wisdom so many times over the years. But I hadn't realized she was the driving force I needed to submit myself to specifically for my sobriety. She showed me so many things along the way, but I equated them with other factors in my life. When I realized that I wasn't devoting myself to her in the one area I perhaps needed her most in -- attaining and maintaining sobriety -- well, that was the moment when I gave all of myself to her. Not just the parts of me and my life that I picked and chose from. All of me. And my powerlessness over alcohol. I gave all of myself to my Triple Goddess, as she is the higher power for me, and when I finally gave her literally all of me, I sobbed like a child -- I just felt so relieved. It was as though she was there always but had been waiting for me to give myself fully.

I hope my experience is of at least some help to you.

My best advice is to pay attention to the little things. Your higher power is there, but might be sort of flying under your radar if you aren't truly paying attention. Pray as well. Even if to no one specific. you can pray and ask that your higher power come to you and that only those with genuine love and good intention reach out to you. Imagine a ball of white light starting from within you and expanding to protect your entire body. This will always keep you safe, no matter what religion or who your higher power. The white shield of protection will keep you safe. This is not medical or religious advice. It is only my personal experience and my desire to help you connect with your HP, if I can even help at all. Maybe try a journal as well, just writing whatever comes into your mind without thinking about it -- just write as it comes. Some people have a lot of success in doing that.

Keep posting and pm me any time if you'd like.

It leaves me feeling better and more refreshed. Anyone else do this?
When I say meditate I mean lie on my bed listening to guided meditation tapes that relax you and help clear your thoughts.

[Roberth]

Hello Zara, My Name is Robert and I am a Los Angeles Area Alcoholic.
I wish I can tell you would see the clouds part or you will have a room light but none of that happened to me. I actually didn’t even know I did my second and third steps.
I had stopped drinking on January 1st 1992 and started going to AA and January 15th of that year. At about 80 days I ended up with a sponsor but I still wasn’t sure this AA thing was going to work for me. On March 27th the urge to drink hit me harder than ever before in my life. I told my then wife to take me to a meeting or I am going to the liquor store. She took me you a speaker/Q&A meeting that we knew about and then it happened. I heard my story coming out of someone else’s mouth. This guy lived my life a year before me down to the same village in Viet Nam. Right when and there I knew this AA would work for me and made a decision to keep coming back to AA drunk, sober or crazy. The obsession disappeared at the moment. I went and told my sponsor what happen he kindly point out that now that I did my 2nd and 3rd steps it was time to start on my 4th step. That was 25 years ago ant that obsession has not return. Sometime you just feel that spiritual awakening .

[sandertristan]

I am in the process of re-working Step 2 and one of the questions I want to ask is how do YOU sense spiritual guidance? In the past, I often avoided actually asking for spiritual guidance in certain important situations like employment. https://minotaurfightstore.co.uk/ | https://minotaurfightstore.co.uk/lp/tatami-bjj-gi/ | Why? Out of fear I guess....fear that God's will wouldn't be the same as MY will. Sounds weird maybe, but that is one reason I am re-working the steps, and re-meeting my Higher Power after all these years. I guess I never REALLY trusted the concept of the Higher Power that I had. So, now I am trying to be real and honest in my search. But I guess a part of me worries...what if I am given guidance and miss it?
So, how do YOU know when your Higher Power is "nudging you"?

When I have a problem and I will be in a state of depression, I turn to God to supplicate and pray to him.

I am usually in a state of dilemma sometimes..I have believed that there is a High Power in the works all my life and like you said above, whenever am having troubled thoughts i ask God for guidance and sure enough i get an answer in one way or another..But am always left wondering how it works and why it works for some..maybe its just luck or something? i do not know.. do not want to believe so.

[PaigeB]

So, how do YOU know when your Higher Power is "nudging you"?

and

But am always left wondering how it works and why it works for some..maybe its just luck or something? i do not know.. do not want to believe so.

I like to think that my HP is Anonymous. We do Service work and have no expectations. To be Loving & Tolerant is our "Code" and though it does not further specify "anonymously" on page 84 - I think that can be assumed. I am never going to be perfectly altruistic, loving and tolerant 100% of the time - but my understanding of my HP is that She is. So, when I think of what my HP would have for me as a "nudge" or a message, it would have to be one or all of those 3 things. If I must act and have no idea what God's will is (and let's be honest ~ we never Really Know) I think it is safe to say that if I act in accordance with Love, I am going the right Direction... a Good Orderly Direction.

I like this Prayer by Author: Thomas Merton
My Lord God,
I have no idea where I am going.
I do not see the road ahead of me.
I cannot know for certain where it will end.
nor do I really know myself,
and the fact that I think I am following your will
does not mean that I am actually doing so.
But I believe that the desire to please you
does in fact please you.
And I hope I have that desire in all that I am doing.
I hope that I will never do anything apart from that desire.
And I know that if I do this you will lead me by the right road,
though I may know nothing about it.
Therefore will I trust you always though
I may seem to be lost and in the shadow of death.
I will not fear, for you are ever with me,
and you will never leave me to face my perils alone.

[Tosh]

I am in the process of re-working Step 2 and one of the questions I want to ask is how do YOU sense spiritual guidance?

How is spiritual guidance related to Step 2?

For me Step 2 is a process; something that happens along the way; not something for me to control or work on (like my character defects have nothing to do with me other than asking and becoming willing; the rest is up to God).

Things happen, like 'coming to believe' - without any effort - when we take the actions outlined in the BB.