I’ve been in and around OA for twenty-four years. In my mid-twenties, I weighed about 250 pounds (113 kg). When I was 30, I weighed 173 pounds (78 kg). My denial weight in OA was 225 pounds (102 kg), and seven years ago, I weighed 185 pounds (84 kg). I’m 70 years old now, and in the last two years, I’ve had two stents and two strokes, and I’m now taking two blood thinners.

I gained some weight after my second stroke because I developed a habit of going into the kitchen at 9:30 p.m. and eating about three hundred calories. I knew that getting down to 190 pounds (86 kg) would maximize my ability to enjoy exercising again, and so instead of eating, I began asking God to be with me while I drank water. I haven’t done it regularly, but I have come to realize that water is HP in tangible form.

Then I found a secret . . . a spiritual device, you could say. I recognized that all of my life I have wanted to be better—to be good, but HP has shown me that this desire to behave so I can feel better about myself is illusory. It’s a desire that can never be satisfied. My “self” is actually an illusion as well; when I am connected to HP, my self is gone. So, I don’t need to be a “good boy,” and I don’t have to be motivated or rewarded with desserts, sweets, or any food off my plan of eating to affirm that I am a good boy. Because my self is an illusion, I do not have to try to be anything. Because I cannot be good (or bad), I do not need to get better. This realization has kept me out of the kitchen and given me physical recovery that I haven’t known in eight years.

HP has also shown me one other thing: Twenty years ago, I learned that resentment causes of all forms of spiritual disease and that I can pray for those I resent, but I have only occasionally prayed for people and about things I have resented. Recently, though, HP showed me that I resent everyone, every thing, and every situation. I resent all the people who have harmed me or could harm me and people with whom I can compare myself, so that’s everyone. I also resent traffic, taking the recycling to the street, the fact that people watch mindless TV, rain, the mailman, the editors of Lifeline, and more.

So that means I could spend all day praying for everyone and everything. How do I do that? I simply say or think “Thy will be done,” which to me means “May your will and God’s will align with one another.” After all, that’s all I ask for myself.

— Russell B., Decatur, Georgia USA

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