Today's Reading from Just For Today © NA World Services
September 26 Seeing ourselves in others
"It will not make us better people to judge the faults of another."
Basic Text, p. 37
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How easy it is to point out the faults of others! There's a reason for
this: The defects we identify most easily in others are often the defects
we are most familiar with in our own characters. We may notice our best
friend's tendency to spend too much money, but if we examine our own
spending habits we'll probably find the same compulsiveness. We may
decide our sponsor is much too involved in service, but find that we
haven't spent a single weekend with our families in the past three
months because of one service commitment or another.
What we dislike in our fellows are often those things we dislike most in
ourselves. We can turn this observation to our spiritual advantage. When
we are stricken with the impulse to judge someone else, we can redirect
the impulse in such a way as to recognize our own defects more clearly.
What we see will guide our actions toward recovery and help us become
emotionally healthy and happy individuals.
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Just for today: I will look beyond the character defects of others and
recognize my own.
