Statistically, 80% or more of New Year’s resolutions die on the vine during January. We pick out a goal that seems right, and make a plan to achieve it, but end up quitting before the race is done – sometimes before it really started. Why is that? What is wrong with us as a species that keeps us from the change we desire? Plenty. But it mostly boils down to ego and self will…

The key to allowing God to relieve you from your self-imposed prison, is to fully surrender yourself to God. Anything less than 100% is not surrender, but submission. Some people use these words in different ways, but for our purposes, submission is anything less than a 100% admission of powerlessness. If we reserve even 1% of our ability to repair the mess that our lives have become, we are only submitting to get out of trouble, and risk relapse into reactivation of our disease…

Abuse of alcohol, other drugs, or a compulsive behavior takes over and controls every aspect of one’s life. Addiction ruins the addict physically, spiritually, and emotionally. Unfortunately, there is collateral damage. Virtually everyone associated with the addict is affected in one way or another. The closer the relationship, the greater the impact. The immediate family suffers greatly in a myriad of ways. Parents, spouses and kids can all trace long term issues back to a dysfunctional relationship with an addict in their active disease…

An elderly woman takes baby steps behind a walker with wheels on the front and a couple of tennis balls on the back legs. Even though it is afternoon, she’s still wearing a housecoat and slippers, because changing clothes requires too much effort, and her lungs just cannot support it. Every few steps, she pauses to catch her breath, until she finally makes it to the chair. Her children and grandchildren love her and wish they could help her more than just shopping and cleaning, but the doctors have told them she doesn’t have long to live…