This Friday I got off to a decent albeit late start. My prayers were the abbreviated version but I made my daily spiritual connection, made the commitment to do God's will, and planned my conduct.

After breakfast I heard my wife playing with the kids in bed. After a bit I heard them getting out of hand and her griping at them. This quickly descended into yelling. I intervened by critically griping at her briefly. I allowed her the last comment as I realized that I was treating her the same way as I was criticizing her for. Nevertheless, some correction was needed and I thought about what I should have said.

I should have just calmly reminded her to follow our parenting plan. But it occurred to me that we don't really have an agreed upon parenting plan. I thought about how to approach her about this. I expect resistance and wondered what I could do to foster cooperation.

I spent most of the morning raking leaves. As I prepared to do the job it occurred to me that I should get my son involved in the job. I expected resistance. I wondered how I could foster cooperation. I thought about allowing for a transition. I informed him about the project but didn't dump it on him and expect him to stop what he was doing. I also planned the job in small increments, with a reasonable scope of completion. When my son joined me I utilized some flexibility to alter my plan and have us work together instead of on separate sections. We spent all morning talking and bonding in our work.

I spent the rest of the afternoon acquiring more bargain sports training equipment from a sale and then playing outside with the kids. They wore me out but it was a great deal of fun.

I thought quite a bit today about the reason most people need God to get sober and for that matter everyone  needs him to live life. I know that I need God to set the limits of the moral rationale that leads to my behavior and to my state of mind. But I have found the expression of this idea in simple words to be ineffable. Perhaps the best expression is that I need God to be the supreme arbiter of my conduct.

In the evening I got to go to a meeting. It was speaker night at my 12 step group. Our guest was a friend who works at a treatment center. He told his story in the format of his experience with each step. When he got to the part about step 10-11 he mentioned that we should do this every day. He mentioned recent relapses after long term sobriety. He talked about logging meeting attendance and service work in our evening reviews. I thought about whether or not I have been taking effective inventory as I have not been writing lately. I have been praying and taking verbal inventory with my sons every night and have not seen an accumulation of resentment, fear, or dishonesty. I have been meditating on my conduct at various times throughout each day. I believe that my personal inventory has been effective but I still have the resolve to write and believe that it is the most effective method.

Thus I do this journal.

Thanks be to God for this day.