"It is our actions that are important. We leave the results to our Higher Power."
Basic Text p. 88
There's an old saying we sometimes hear in our meetings: "If you want to make God laugh, make plans." When we hear this we usually laugh, too, but there's a nervous edge to our laughter. We wonder if all of our carefully laid plans are doomed to fail. If we're planning a big event-a wedding, a return to school, or perhaps a career change-we begin to wonder if our plans are the same as our Higher Power's plans. We are capable of working ourselves into such a frenzy of worry over this question that we refuse to make any plans at all.
But the simple fact is that we really don't know whether our Higher Power's plans for our lives are carved in stone or not. Most of us have opinions about fate and destiny but, whether we believe in such theories or not, we still have a responsibility to live our lives and make plans for the future. If we refuse to accept responsibility for our lives, we're still making plans-plans for a shallow, boring existence.
What we make in recovery are plans, not results. We'll never know whether the marriage, the education, or the new job is going to work out until we try it. We simply exercise our best judgment, check with our sponsor, pray, use all the information at hand, and make the most reasonable plans we can. For the rest, we trust in the loving care of the God of our understanding, knowing that we've acted responsibly.
Just for Today: I will make plans, but I will not plan the result & I will trust in my Higher Power's loving care.
On the one hand I need to make plans. I just turned 60 so I have to make plans to get the medical tests needed for a man my age etc.
Yet in my life plans have been used like a drug. I would feel anxious, nervous about something. And because I'm an addict I can't tolerate discomfort so I would take a drug, and very often along with the drug I would make a plan.
I'm gonna do this or that or the other thing. I'll go here, there, or the other place, I'll get this, that, ..............etc. till some frantic plan would strike me as "THE ANSWER" and I would get through that moment. Of course this would merely set the stage for the next moment and so on......till i got sick and tired of being sick and tired.
