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Al-Anon Meeting Topic: One Day at a Time
I Am Powerless Over Yesterday

By , About.com Guide

Created October 27, 2009

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I remember the effect it had on me the first time I heard someone say I was powerless over yesterday and tomorrow. This seems like a simple enough statement alright, but the truth is that it had just never occurred to me before.

I spent so much time worrying about stuff that was already past --wishing that I could undo it, or make up for it somehow. Al-Anon made it simple for me to understand that was just impossible.

Powerless Over Yesterday and Tomorrow

One of the best lessons that I "got" when I came into these rooms was there were two things that I was surely powerless over - yesterday and tomorrow.

I may not like what happened yesterday, but I am powerless to change it. I may not like what will happen tomorrow, but it hasn't happened yet!

All I Have is Today

If I accept yesterday's mistakes and troubles and refrain from worrying about what might happen tomorrow, then I am living right in the middle of today, which is all I really have anyway!

I had heard that same principle expressed many times before in the words, "take therefore no thought for tomorrow..." but I never learned what that really meant until I came into the rooms of Al-Anon Family Groups.

-- BuddyT

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