Category Archives: Step 02

Step 02, The 12 Steps

Came To Believe That A Power Greater Than Ourselves Could Restore Us To Sanity

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This quote is Step Two of Depressed Anonymous.

CLARIFICATION OF THOUGHT

  1. What or who is the Power greater than you who is able to restore you  to sanity?
  2. Do you HAVE a Power greater than yourself?
  3. Do you actually feel powerless and helpless over your feelings of depression?
  4. Can you think of a time from your past when a Power really was allowed to restore a sense of equilibrium to your life?
  5. Have you made use of this 12 Step program of recovery and have you discovered it to be THAT Power that restored your life to sanity?
Belief, Fellowship, Hope, Purpose, Spirituality, Step 02, The 12 Steps

Does Mid-life = Half-life?

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I accepted that God, as the God of my understanding is loving and forgiving. The 12 Step group and our God is the pillar of our strength and healing. The #2 STATEMENT OF BELIEF  of Depressed Anonymous.

In  depression the first thing that we must do is to take charge of our lives and incorporate a planned pleasant activity in our daily lives.  If  I don’t, I will continue to linger on alone and live a half-life. Nothing beyond my reach can absorb my pain of isolation and feeling worthless. This is especially true for many of us in mid-life where the dreams we once thought possible  remain stillborn. We seem to have lost the time to do something positive with our lives. We feel stuck. I want to get involved with  a  fellowship of persons who are learning new ways of living with a sense of purpose. We want to live our lives  with hope.  Step  Two of Depressed Anonymous states that “we came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity. We will “let go and let God.”

Comment: I am thinking this  morning and attempting to clarify some of my thinking about having a purpose for my life. I remember that it was at the  mid-life point of my life (45 years) where my life  gradually screeched to a   halt.  That is when my life, plummeted down to the   half-life point. My life’s meaning, instead of providing hope and purpose drew my resources down until the only purpose that I could envision was to try and get out of bed in the morning.  My concentration was focused–but only on my pain. Another way of looking at it is using  the   metaphor of looking at the gas gauge on your car’s dash and seeing that it reads empty.

When I discovered a group of people, just like myself, in the 12 Step recovery program  did my life began to happen. My experience with depression and living daily  the recovery process has provided me with a wealth of purposeful living and meaning. My half-life became a very full  life. Everyday I am blessed to be able to communicate with person depressed, be it locally or from the far corners of  the world. Whether it is with emails, SKYPE or to meet  face to face with fellow members sharing their  experiences and who are  desiring a  way out of their depression.

I know from personal experience that mid-life or really any part of one’s life  there may be a need for a reexamination of what our life is about and possibly for it to take a more purposeful direction. And no matter where our life stands today we are always poised on making it purposeful and filled with meaning. A full life is one filled with hope, service to others while embedded in a fellowship of persons like ourselves. For myself today, I know it is my fellowship group, Depressed Anonymous.

Take the plunge if you like and find out how you too can have a life filled with purpose, service to others like yourself, and part of a dynamic Depressed Anonymous 12 Step group.

SOURCES:  (c) Believing is seeing: 15 ways to leave the prison of depression (2015) Depressed Anonymous Publications. Louisville.

(c) Depressed Anonymous, 3rd edition. (2011) Depressed Anonymous Publications. Louisville.

Depressed Anonymous, Focus, Hope, Step 02, Step 03, The 12 Steps

Overcome our need to be compulsive about everything…

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Affirmation

I will be fearless as I take my personal inventory and uncover those thoughts that I sad myself with on an ongoing basis.

“The most common symptoms of emotional insecurity are worry, anger, self-pity, and depression. These stem from causes which sometimes seem to be within us, and at other times to come from without. To take inventory in this respect we ought to consider carefully all personal relationships which bring continuous or recurring trouble.”

Clarification of thought

I am seeing how my attitudes of worry, anger, self-pity and depression can keep me imprisoned. Working with my program has been and is part and parcel of my every waking minute.  The Steps that I put so much faith in are the road signs that keep me on this shining path which I call God’s will for me. I am reminded of not sticking my nose always into other people’s business so that my serenity is lost.

I am mindful that this program is mine for the used.  I believe that this program deals with the way we respond to our attachments and compulsions.  The Second  and the Third Step help me realize that there is a God larger than me. Once I am in his will, I can move on and be changed for the better. It is a simple reality to realize that to work on my program is to let God work through me.

Depression sometimes is a symptom of something inside me that I have lost. It is a sadness over something gone out of my life.  This loss could be the reality of never being good enough, never doing enough or being les than perfect. The symptoms disappear when I can learn to live with the belief that I will find hope and begin to feel better.

Meditation

God will help us today to overcome our need to be compulsive about everything negative that we say to ourselves. God will help us say Stop to all those compulsive and self-defeating thoughts.”

Sources:

Copyright(c) Higher Thoughts for Down days: 365 daily thoughts and meditations for members of 12 step fellowship groups. Depressed Anonymous Publications. Louisville. Page 168.

Depressed Anonymous, 3rd edition. Depressed Anonymous Publications. Louisville.

             Hope to hope. Depressed Anonymous Publications. (2000) Louisville.

DA Literature, Focus, Higher Power, Journaling, Spirituality, Step 02, The 12 Steps

God Is The Rudder Of My Boat. I Am Going To Put My Oars In The Water!

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 AFFIRMATION

I will have the peace I desire as I continue to pray to do God’s will.

“Being in God’s will is the beginning of peace and the beginning of the end of your depression with its hollowness and jitters.” (8)

 CLARIFICATION OF THOUGHT

Most people don’t understand this who have not been in the program very long. What it means is that I must attempt to work and live this spiritual program. I need to let myself be guided by God’s hand in my life and so become open and ready to fiollow his guidance.

The beginning of wisdom is to hear the voice of God. It is imperative that I take an active role in getting better. I often say that God is the rudder of my boat and I have to put my oars in the water if I am going to get to the shore. I believe that one of the best ways for me to start to feel better is to take each step (Depressed Anonymous, Third Edition (2011) Depressed Anonymous Publications) and try to do what it suggests.  Keeping a journal lets me know what I am feeling for each day. I have come to believe that a power greater than myself can restore me to sanity.   I wonder sometimes if this hollow feeling inside myself isn’t more of a longing and hunger for a spiritual food that nothing in my life now can and ever will provide.

MEDITATION

We pray that God will show us the way out of our depression by living and following the program that  has healed other people who have been addicted to a behavior or a substance and which  continued to bring them down instead of up.

SOUIRCE: Higher Thoughts for Down Days: 365 daily thoughts and meditations for Twelve Step Fellowship Groups. Depressed Anonymous Publications. Louisville. Page 71.

Belief, Step 02, The 12 Steps

Came To Believe That A Power Greater Than Myself Could Restore Me To Sanity!

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This is the Second Step of the Twelve Steps of Depressed Anonymous.

A negative way to say this is what power in your life is making you feel completely hopeless and helpless?  For your own review, please list the people, places, situations, things that have exerted the greatest power over you and your life in the past.  The places, persons, and situations can have a positive or negative power over you and your life.

DA Literature, Depressed Anonymous, Serenity, Step 02, The 12 Steps

Insanity Is Doing The Same Thing Over And Over Again And Expecting Different Results

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How true. It’s like being around persons who are continually toxic (negative) and for us to try and make them happy. Or someone in the family smokes and we  tell them they need to quit smoking. And how has that worked for you?   Or someone who continues to pig out on junk food day after day and who is obese and you try to have them change their eating habits. How  has that worked out for you?  But you say, we have our own problems.

Today I tell myself, like all the days past, I am going to make a change in the way I  talk to myself. You know, all those thoughts which keep circling in our minds, like the proverbial  merry-go-round, riding  our horse, bobbing up and down,  going nowhere, and telling ourselves we must get off before we fall off.   And….what do we do? Yep, we  keep riding this bobbing up and down horse. Again, we tell ourselves, I’ll do it when I feel better;  When I have the time, the money for counseling, the friend who will listen to me forever and not run away like all the rest of those who said  they were my friends. Where do you go after the continual self speak which pounds in to our heads thoughts voicing how  I am unacceptable to myself and everyone else. Another horse (thought)  that I ride that bobs me up and down is the one that tells me how bad and unacceptable that I am.

How do I keep from riding a dead horse? Get off!

In Step Two, and the commentary which tells us all about this Step Two in our DEPRESSED ANONYMOUS BOOK — “Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity,” we learn some things about the compulsivity of sadness that has gripped our minds and our whole physical self. The insanity of our thinking continues to make us feel helpless and hopeless. I got off the merry-go-round years ago. At times I almost bought a ticket and got back on but then I remembered I had a “toolbox” which continues to provide me with a spiritual and Step by Step  program  to NOT get trapped into the maddening, insane way that caused so much pain in the past.  DO YOU WANT TO GET OFF THE MERRY-GO-ROUND OF INSANITY?

_____________________________________

Books from Depressed Anonymous  Publications which can help: Depressed Anonymous, Third edition, 2011. Also, I’ll do it when I feel better.”

Choice, Higher Power, Step 01, Step 02, The 12 Steps

Made A Decision To Turn My Life And My Will Over To The Care Of God As I Understand Him

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AFFIRMATION

I admitted that I was powerless over depression -that my life had become unmanageable. I now choose freedom instead of security and place my trust and hope in God’s guidance and direction. Help me trust in you, O God.

REFLECTION

I know as I immerse myself in the program, the more I seek the security of not having to feel pain -not having to forgive and never getting angry, I will indeed have security, the security of the high walls of a prison. I will always be able to predict how I feel. It will never change. I was always told that by being good and trying to be as perfect as I could, I would be happy.  Somehow this doesn’t work. I have worked at being good, always doing my best, but I still ended up in the prison of depression. What went wrong?  For today I will choose to be someone different. I will call a friend and/or I will take a walk. I will begin to  work on myself, trusting that my God or Higher Power will begin to help me find a path out of this prison that I have constructed. Today. I will trust myself to trust the God of my understanding.

MEDITATION

We need today, to allow ourselves the opportunity to take responsibility for the way we think and feel. It is our responsibility to finally yield to God, to trust the God as we understand him and let him enter into our life. (Personal comments). Steps 1, 3.

Acceptance, Choice, Depressed Anonymous, Mutual Aid, Negativity, Purpose, Step 01, Step 02, The 12 Steps

Listen To How You Talk To Yourself – Do You Like What You Hear?

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AFFIRMATION

I will let go of the negative thoughts about myself as soon as I am conscious that I am experiencing them.

“…try to live one day at a time.. We know from experience that our sobriety , our disappearance from sadness is due to letting go, admitting our powerlessness  (Step 1) and coming to believe that a power greater than ourselves can restore us to sanity (Step 2).

REFLECTION

I know that I have to continue to work on myself and the way that I speak to myself on an ongoing and daily basis. My letting go and letting  God take over my life doesn’t mean that  I’ll just sit back and let it do all the work, no, it means that I will work on myself and leave the outcome up to my Higher Power. I know that my life can be lived differently if I just make an effort to choose to be conscious of the thoughts  that I let myself ruminate and think  about during the day. The more I monitor my thoughts, the more I am able to filter out the negative thoughts and have them replaced with positive and constructive thoughts. We call them SUNSPOTS (Depressed Anonymous).

So often when I am depressed I continue a thinking style that was learned as a small child. I am not even conscious as to how I would  always select the negative attributes about myself to reflect upon instead of attempting to think positive and hopeful thoughts about myself and relationships. The more I believe that I have a choice as to how I am to feel, the more I become conscious of the thoughts that influence the way I feel.

Going to a mutual aid group, which focuses on depression, enables us to share with others how we talk to ourselves and what we tell ourselves, day after day. Do we like what we hear when we share with others our continued negative thinking? I would think not.

MEDITATION FOR TODAY

God, let us just for today, dwell on your mercy and kindness. Your are not the harsh judge of my childhood. You are the God who loves us just the way we are. God is like the Mother who continues to love the child of her womb.

SOURCE: HIGHER THOUGHTS FOR DOWN DAYS(C) December 14.

Serenity, Step 02, The 12 Steps

Came To Believe That A Power Greater Than Ourselves Could Restore Us To Sanity – Step 2

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What do you give your power to in your own  life today? What can help you to greater sanity?

Various powers  have played a critical role in our lives in the past. If you wish, please name and list the people, places, situations, and  things  that have exerted the greatest power over you and your life in the past. These places, persons, situations and things can have a positive or negative power over you and your life. Please list below.

Persons

Places

Situations

Things

Depressed anonymous Workbook/ Depressed Anonymous Publications/Page 11/ Step Two.

In tomorrow’s post we will list some of the thoughts about Step 2 and how our beliefs can produce sanity in our lives.

12 Step Meeting, Acceptance, Depressed Anonymous, Depressed Anonymous Workbook, Higher Power, Step 02, The 12 Steps

Test Drive This Idea

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The car I drive is a manual shift (stick) and has 5 gears. I like the stick shift better than automatic–it seems that I can feel the power of the engine when I go from one gear to the next.
When I bought an older Honda this last month, I made sure it was a shift. I gave it a test drive and the gears shifted smoothly from one gear to the next. I bought the vehicle.
How does this Test drive idea apply to depression? I’m glad you asked. Many times people when they come to a Depressed Anonymous meeting for the first time–it’s similar to test driving a car. They want to check out how many miles the car gets to a liter/gal of gas. Like, they want to know if this group will give them all that it promises . Is there a warranty with the group? Well, as a matter of fact there are. On page 109 in the Depressed Anonymous book the warranty itemizes everything that is yours. You will see them as the Promises of what can happen if you work the recovery program as outlined in our manual. I guess you would call the Depressed Anonymous book our manual. In fact, it has been written by persons who test drove the program and found it helped propel them into a life of healing and a fellowship of those many others who found it did what it promised. It always put them on the road.
When I was setting up Depressed Anonymous, a spiritual program of recovery in a State Prison a number of years back, one of the members of the group told us that he didn’t believe in God. He had been test driving the program and discovered that Step Two, (Gear 2?) “came to believe that a power greater than myself could restore me to sanity.” “Well,” he said his “Higher Power was his Prison DA group.” This is the engine that gave him the most mileage. In fact, after test driving it for weeks it was just what he was looking for–a trust worthy vehicle that would take him to the end of his journey–one day at a time. This group was the only engine with a warranty that was good all day, every day, and was good for the life of the engine. Since everyone in the group were all affected by depression, or the same engine problems they could speak to each other in the same language. No one was alone and isolated. The toolbox was there for each of the group and all of them had engines that were humming because they were all familiar with each of the gears and knew how to keep learning more about how all the gears (steps) were to work together.
Sign up today if you would like to test drive our vehicle of tested quality. We have everything you would like to know about our vehicle. Keep in touch. There is always a “pit crew” standing by to offer help.