Life-Changing Tips from AA: Principles Before Personalities

AA Medallion, NA Pamphlet, and ACA Basic Text Blur
Daily writing prompt
If you had to give one life-changing tip, what would it be?
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This title is the last phrase in the Twelfth Tradition of Alcoholics Anonymous: “Principles before Personalities.” The last step in Twelve step recovery also rings true with; “Practice these Principles in all our Affairs.” These are coined with another oft-used phrase, “moral compass.” These phrases, are my embodiment of being given a tip to a new life to live by. Not unlike Captain Jack Sparrow, this compass always points to where you want to go.

We all have our quirks, our personalities, our blind spots, and inevitably, they lead us to resentment. It is so clear to US alcoholics that what the other person, place or thing needs to change–in order to become more mo’ bettah–is that they can see through their apparent ignorance or denial–ringing clear as a dinner bell! Unfortunately, I am, with increasing frequency–one sandwich shy of a picnic! Which is why I go to meetings and hang out in the fellowship of AA, so I can get feedback from another alcoholic in the solution. Thankfully, we’re all not crazy at the same time!

Let’s take a look at a current situation where honest feedback from say, a group of people whom you lead, (not those who make money hand over fist for themselves and could care less about citizen’s well being) could help you understand lessons learned from history, and to not repeat the same mistake again, which we define as insanity.

Let’s say there’s an Empire, oh, call it Persia, where they still remember the lessons of their older brothers in Turkey, and like the current leader of the country of Turkey, know better, than to dictate and tell them what they must do or have, such as, oh perhaps, a nuclear bomb. And that this peace, shall we say, means to respect and honor the past. Than unlike every army that tried to defeat the Persian Nation, got defeated as they wasted all their military resources to nothing. You know, just like the USA did during WW1 and WW2; not get involved with a nation-state trying to dictate to all it’s neighbors. And what happened when the US did not burn through all it’s munitions and armaments (minding its own business) during these wars? It became the next world leader.

Hmmm. Who, pray tell is in that position now? Could it be maybe . . . Satan? No. That’s for a Church Chat with Enid Strict on SNL. What if the ‘Great Satan’ was indeed not the leader or Commander-in-Chief of say a country like the US, but the billionaires backing the Military Industrial Complex* fair-squared and warned by Dwight D. Eisenhower on January 17, 1961?

*The Term: He coined the phrase “military-industrial complex” to describe the deep link between the U.S. Armed Forces and private defense companies.
The Risk: He stated that this partnership could gain too much power, whether people wanted it to or not, and put democracy or peace at risk. (Gemini Google AI.)

Has bombing ever brought a population to it’s knees to surrender? Did our bombing in Viet Nam lead to victory? The answer seems pretty clear to me. It just unites and hardens the will of those being pushed. Methinks it is time take a deep breath and reflect on what we can meditate and pray about before we do something dumb. Oops. I mean dumber. Oh wait, wasn’t that a movie with Steve Martin in it?

The iPod Shuffle

My Walks on Waikiki Uniform
Daily writing prompt
What is the best purchase you have ever made?
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I’d have to say it was the iPod Shuffle. No heavy armband or having to hold a phone and buy expensive earbuds that easily get misplaced: Songs you can upload or replace when you click onto Music, and carry with you in a miniature device–With simple controls you can use by touch without having to slide or select and remain hands free.

I was so upset in 2009 when Apple discontinued this device–which at the time I didn’t realize as a precursor to making the iPhone the single juggernaut*–

In slang, a *juggernaut describes an unstoppable, overwhelming force or entity that crushes all obstacles in its path. It can refer to anything massive and immensely powerful—such as a dominant sports team, a highly successful corporation, or a powerful character in a video game, or in my case, an otter case, the all-in-one slipcover for my iPhone, which has changed a whole generation towards an attention deficit disorder causing increasing difficulty in reading, writing, and who can only guess, arithmetic. (Save for the new calculator app which works wonders for doing turbo tax itemization lists!)

–The device that miraculously replaced the camera, the desktop, the flashlight, and how we connect to the internet–starting with it’s introduction around the same time the iPod shuffle went away. Alas, everything was going to streaming, and the software loaded permanently to your device would forever be converted to a monthly subscription service and no longer held in sovereignty as our own with a 16 digit serial code for as long as we held or used the laptop, pc, or desktop computer.

Mini is really Maxxy!
Portability is great for getting around.

So yeah, the iPod Shuffle, along with the smooth egg-shaped inexpensive clamshell smartphones, were great durable devices that kept things simple. I’ve frequently said that ‘smartphones’ kinda destroyed the telephone call. (We all know what killed the radio star.)

So while I don’t dislike the iPhone and Android phones, for they are incredibly powerful in their own right, I love changing songs and volume with the ingenious bezel control, in it’s simple design–as the best purchase I ever made. And the replacement earbuds are still under twenty dollars!

Space-X or Space-Q?

Daily writing prompt
What’s a common misconception people have about happiness?
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Would we like an IPO that pays dividends and has a long-term outlook on earning per share that will never enter bubble territory or collapse earning per share? Wouldn’t this make us happy?

Welcome to Space Q. Our quantum creative reality that isn’t on the Nasdaq or ever become listed on the S&P. Just like an eruptive volcano which starts with ‘the last straw’ of frustration and despair—and ends with a fantastic never ending milkshake! With the flavor of your choice!

First off, let me help you know who I am. I have an incredibly short memory and get stuck comparing my internal struggles to your Tik-Tok only-fans curated public success on the outsides: your fabulous meal on Facebook, your incredible trip, your party with all the gang with smiles, and with me looking at all your joy—without me being there. And there’s the rub. I’m not happy. Too many choices with not enough time.

Gnarly trunks and dead roots command the start of a new you!

Well, I don’t need to launch a Space-X style public offering! And neither do you! No monthly subscription fees, no Training Vault .pdfs or audiobooks, no charges on your credit card!

We can take a night deep dive into the abyss of the sea and hollow out our identity by reconstruction of a new version of myself. Indeed, as Neale Donald Walsh describes with God, In ‘Conversations with God,’ the phrase most apt about where I’m headed with this Space-Q of Quantum Reality, is: To create, “The Grandest Version of the Greatest Vision of myself!

All those times when wrestling with anger about being fed up—is the time before we rise to a new level that required all previous experiences to be accessible. I believe this is where happiness begins. It’s where we know we are being the self we’ve always tried to be.

The Good News – The God News – just in. We won’t need IPO’s or Wall Street Derivatives where we’re heading. All we’ll need is Silver 107, and press the dent in the console to take our craft wherever we tell it to go with our telepathy!

Any questions? Take a view here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-ADx8X2w7x4 and get ready to blast off with Clif High! Silver is going to be more valuable than Gold!

Growing into Your True Self: A Year of Change

The Final Dance off Competition begins now!
Daily writing prompt
What is one way you have grown this year?
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We are not returning to a previous version of ourselves; we are arriving at a new level that requires all previous experiences to be accessed. The masks we wear in public, by our ego or exterior surface–is finally breaking. Our dream state or creative self–not a part of our daily do list–what our executive function decides is important; is not in the internal depths which have reached the necessary level to sustain our rise. This is how our inner garden grows. To bloom as our true self!

There is no external reward coming. Nothing is growing here. Beneath the of frustration and despair in silence; this emptiness–is where we really change and grow.

You are not returning to a previous version of yourself; you are arriving at a new level that required all your previous experiences to be accessible. The surface is finally breaking—your internal depth has reached the necessary level to sustain your rise.

Carl Jung talks about the Bamboo Metaphor: Once you plant bamboo, you’ll never be able to get rid of it–at least here in Hawaii. Just like the aloe vera plants, they resemble Audrey 2 in “The Little Shop of Horrors.” But here’s the thing. Bamboo species can spend five years appearing to do nothing on the surface. They are building a massive root system before rising to (in some varieties), up to ninety feet tall! Any Deadpool-like stale watery thoughts that keep getting resent to our brain over and over, are like the massive root system underground in a bamboo shoot planted. Truth is, we’re building a foundation.

And the foundation, once in place, can skyrocket tall like a bamboo tree into your new self. Alongside our descent into darkness, we bury our true gold–our most potent gifts–which we usually gloss over because we take our artistic or poetic self for granted, especially if we let our ego compare ourself to famous actors (or infamous ones if you’re like me) – and celebrity painters, writers and singers.

The point psychologist Carl Jung is trying to make: that once an absolute limit is reached, a reversion or breakthrough pushes forward–like the pile of sand or dirt or rock that gets too big or steep and reaches avalanche stage and the pile slides down–like Highway 1 on the California coast!

So whether you rise:

A line in the street pointing to Daly City and the San Bruno Mountain Ridge to the south. The faint ridge in the background was where Sergeant Ortega of the Spanish Army scaled where current Sharp Park Road goes over to Skyline College, and was the first European discovery to realize there was a huge inland bay that could connect to the Golden Gate by the Presidio.

Or whether you fall:

The old bus line number 6 Parnassus terminal on Golden Gate Heights, is now the trolleybus 7 or 21 line and offers incredible sunsets and water-play light dances.

Be it known it’s because you are growing into the person you truly are–and have always been!

Like my flowers? Here are more in my collection:

Not Just Roses on Doug’s Fineartamerica website (tap this button)

The Proverbial Proverbs – Part Two

I asked AI to respond to the recent WordPress writing prompt asking, What Proverb do you disagree with? I didn’t ask about any contradictions, but just asked Chrome Gemini AI to name the top three sayings: It came up with, “Don’t judge a book by it’s cover,” “Actions speak louder than words,” and “Better late than never.” Hmmm. These top three AI proverbs seem, at first blush, to be difficult to disagree with. They’re used so often, I figured I should move on to something else. But what fun is that? Let’s see how I can convolute this simple task and go off on tangents that can create a centripetal acceleration force that brings up, “If you can’t impress them with your Knowledge, baffle them with your Bullshit!” Or, just now, in the middle of a zoom meeting–I heard a first timer; “Two crumbs don’t make a cookie!”

The intent behind this truism is the oft used, ‘That’s the way the cookie crumbles,’ was spoken in the context of two broken emotionally unavailable people whom cannot a relationship, make. Certainly, the cookie monster doesn’t show any discretion or pace in the way he eats cookies!

Now on to proverb one, ‘Don’t judge a book by it’s cover.”

Meaning: You should not form an opinion about the value, character, or quality of someone or something based purely on their outward appearance. In taking this photo above literally, I can’t help but see that the title of said book–to be of more weight than the hardcover binding or jacket cover of the actual book itself. ‘First impressions count,’ I guess. I must say, I am much more judgmental about the cover, before I really actually read the ‘dust cover jacket,’ so to speak, of someone I’m intrigued about getting to know better. What with attention deficit disorder scaling to new levels since the advent of scrolling on an iPhone, true meaningful conversation, at least in passing, seems to be going the way of the Dodo bird.

Truth be told, I do judge a book by it’s cover, and may God help the soul that actually penetrates my thick skull of first look impressions, before any meaningful coffee date occurs.

On to ‘Actions Speak Louder.’ This seems to be true of protests around the US these days. But, to be honest,

I think the actions of protest are largely meaningless. Payola to hold up a manufactured sign. Definitions lost on being able to describe the definition of a King. Causing property damage and theft in the name of peace. It seems bizarre. So my for my take against ‘Actions speak Louder,’ I’ll go with words or names being much more important than sticks and stones.

Indeed, if I can ask a simple question which could be answered with a simple ‘yes’ or ‘no,’ and the person responds clearly and offers a good reasoning behind their answer, I am immediately drawn to them and they get entered into my attractive list waiting room. No long testing between going through my quiet hoops they must go through to be trusted. Oh, I’ll never let you know the laundry list of tests you must pass before I come up with a verdict of friend or foe–which can be crushingly unfair! I’ll just see if you have no angry reaction, and that you . . .

PS: If you’d like to see more of my sign collection, tap this following link: https://fineartamerica.com/profiles/douglas-griggs?tab=artworkgalleries&artworkgalleryid=1026659&page=1

Finally, the Proverb: ‘Better Late than Never.’

I do bring this up in my Chapter, “We’ve Been Waiting an Hour” in my Dao of Doug Series, The Art of Driving a Bus (nom de plume Douglas Meriwether) found in this link: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07FBPK4NB, very tongue in cheek and with some very cheeky dialogue, as with most of my anecdotal non-fiction esaay style humorous autobiographies–shall we say.

But this phrase does not apply at all to a bus that is late, because my experience definitely has showed me that people are not in the mood of better late than never when it comes to being out in the rain without a shelter and when I’m missing my leader.

Here’s another quick-shot list of Proverbs that have loopholes bigger than our US tax code, with 2026 changes going over 700 pages!

  • Practice makes Perfect – bullshit. Failure is the best of all learning curves. My conversion I’ve found to be true is:
  • Practice makes Progress
  • Honesty is the Best Policy – for who? The insurance company? The cop issuing the ticket? The boss smelling alcohol on your breath? The reason for being late (and failing) a test? Once again, this is really about the opportunity in using the creative juices! Go for it!
  • A Really good White Lie is the Best Policy
  • Time is Money – I don’t know about you, but the hell with a cheap dime store watch! Rolex aside, we know that
  • Money Talks – and what Walks? Put up or Shut up! ‘Nuff said.
  • Don’t put all your eggs in one basket – No, open up the egg container at Safeway before you take them to the checkout, and make sure there aren’t any broken ones inside! The Captain and Tennille’s number one album had the best rendition of this song–and let’s not forget David Archuleta’s, Mama Told Me, American Idol 2008:
  • You better shop around

PS: My Mama Told Me Not to Come – Three Dog Night – Oh yeah!

Well attention spans must be hitting the limit, so ‘bye for now.

The Proverbial Proverb

Daily writing prompt
Share a proverb you think is completely wrong and make your case.
View all responses

Here’s the phrase, “Hear, my son, your father’s instruction, and do not forsake your mother’s teaching.” written in Biblical Hebrew. I had asked JetPack AI for the phrase, “The enemy of my enemy is my friend.” and it gave me this. By many accounts of my youth and with my family, the AI response was definitely more telling as a credo I wish I had taken to heart in my teens and twenties! It would have saved me much of grief of drinking till I puked on the porcelain bus, aka. the toilet! Every hour on the hour (actually, every 55 minutes) like a trip to Daly City from Ferry Plaza.

Indeed, AI knows me better than I know myself! Oh yeah, like the message above the door of the Oracle’s kitchen in the Matrix Trilogy; Know Thyself! Thanks Neo.

In my Dao of Doug series, I close my humorous chapter, “The Complaint Department” about pulling in after a day of driving a bus with minor defects, such as a horn that would intermittently go off randomly when it’s loud blare was totally inappropriate–much like my youthful indiscretions*

*Indiscretion refers to a lack of good judgment, caution, or tact. It describes behavior, speech, or actions that are careless, risky, or fail to respect privacy. The term applies to both the general quality of being imprudent and the specific foolish mistakes or missteps themselves. Hmm. Ouch, this exercise is pointing a finger right back at me.

Having failed to create the image I wanted for ‘Enemy of my Enemy,’ I wanted to go modern:

I thought I’d be cute with this truism I’ve unfortunately learned from buying high and selling low on my Bitcoin proxy, MSTR:

And low and behold, here’s the next adjustment Jetpack AI gave me when I tried to change the format of the picture: OMG!

Lord knows this has been true for me in 2025 to now in 2026. My Schwab brokerage account reminds me my ‘unrealized losses’ from MSTR are $144,000. Dammit, I want my money back! And I’m still waiting six weeks for the IRS to finish ‘investigating’ my refund I filed on Turbo Tax on March 1st! Oh, it’s only going to be another six weeks, like say, July 23rd!

Fortunately, I have a Wheel-of-Fortune, Ten Pentacles card type promissory note following my YouTube Jungian and Buddihst channel to repeat the phrase, “I am wealthy, I am wealthy, I am wealthy” in three groups of three resetting my mind body and soul to the quantum frequency which generates our desire. Whew. So at least I got that going for me.

Finally, I tried to go for Little Miss Red Riding Hood, and the You Know Who in the cute cottage in the forest–with the age old, “Don’t Put All Your Eggs in One Basket” and got this image:

Here I was thinking about money, stocks, and more specifically, banks. And Jetpack AI rerouted me to the Spiritual side of Abundance. Darn. But again, another wake up call.

Finally, the full first proverb actually reads: Listen, my son, to your Father’s instruction, and do not forsake your Mother’s teaching. They will be a Garland to Grace you head and a chain to adorn your neck.” Not as contemporary as I anticipated, but a wonderful message with a very clear God shot.

Manage Ad Campaign

Daily writing prompt
If you had an unlimited budget for 24 hours, what would you do?
View all responses
Coin labeled AEGEAN PROTOCOL AETHEREUM embedded in cracked black block with glowing blue binary code
A detailed coin labeled ‘AEGEAN PROTOCOL AETHEREUM’ sits embedded in a cracked block inscribed with glowing binary code in a tech workshop.

The obvious answer to this question is to advertise on Google slash Alphabet–on my YouTube channel!

The number of views you can get on YouTube in just three days is so huge, such that even if the cost per view is very reasonable, the numbers grow so fast, the cost is thousands of dollars in as little as just one day.

A YouTube manager called me and another emailed me with a free one-thousand dollar ad campaign boost because I had intervened on a critical thread about how awful YouTube is.

I gave my short take about how freeing YouTube is because any one of us no longer has to be employed by a network affiliate of big media to create what we like and are knowledgable about! The structured vertically integrated institutional media magnate no longer forces us to conform to their outright censorship resulting from where their revenue source comes from–even if opaque to us on air. We truly become our own creator!

They couldn’t understand why I refused their one thousand dollar credit. It’s because the ability to guess the threshold for going over a thousand dollars can be near impossible due to the number of views.

So if I had an unlimited amount of money to advertise, I could stretch my sandbox for weeks on end and become eligible to get my most coveted award of all–the ten thousand subscriber plaque I see successful YouTube creators display behind them on their podcast!

I know I have the talent to get paychecks from Google, but I can’t seem to get it together. All I can do is blog and post on WordPress and see if the light eventually goes off.

Maybe someday I’ll see my ship come in!
Best of the Dao of Doug!

Reading Writing and Arithmetic

Not only can I read, but I know the truth behind the difference between similar signs.

What are you good at?

I’m good at reading the signs I see coming. Knowledge with experience becomes wisdom. Such that the following sign becomes wisdom immediately after reading it before arriving at the construction lane closure! Most of our resentments with others on the road is that we don’t create a large enough space cushion between us and them, and we run out of room to maneuver to go around and leave ourself an out.

A knowingness comes faster than whatever lies ahead!

https://audiobooks/daoofdoug/amazon.com

Not only can I read, but I can read aloud to anyone who enjoys listening to audiobooks while driving or working on other tasks at home or office.

I’m also good at writing. I was able to take notes from my shirt pocket and write down the notes into outline form on terminal breaks and then into paragraphs on weekends on days off. This was in the mid-oughts and teens of the early-to-mid-2000’s. Now, with Chat GPT, Microsoft CoPilot, and iPhones with more computing power than desktops, writing your story and publishing a book has never been easier!

Mind the gap.

Here’s my favorite book.

http://www.daoofdoug.com

Finally, I’m good at arithmetic. I do my own taxes.

Screenshotting is crucial for scanning receipts for quickbooks!

PS: I love photography!

A PICTURE IS WORTH A THOUSAND WORDS!

Doing the Worksheet arithmetic for QuickBooks is fun when you can drag and drop a .jpeg and let Intuit keep you in the green for filing year-end tax returns.

Boy Howdy

Do you have any collections?

Do I have collections? Yes. Here’s my first one:

The top collection? Ball caps!

Ball caps are great for morning and evening sun rays because the visor is a portable adjustable flapper that allows you to rotate and block the glare. During the midday the visor shields the face’s surface from being burned.

Umbrellas are usually useless when there’s wind and are a hazard as well as a hassle to carry around. The ball cap is always in use and hands free. There’s no issue with blurry glass and annoying splashing around on the eyes and face.

My next collection are glasses.

The quickest makeover is
changing your glasses, especially sunglasses.

Whether you’re a recognized musician, artist, writer or all three, you need to be able to stay anonymous in public. Especially as a public bus driver with a captive audience sitting in rows along a single aisle!

Changing the run numbers.

We can move down the body in future blogs!

Hidden Obstacles Killing Indie Authors

HIDDEN OBSTACLES KILLING INDIE AUTHORS TRYING TO UPLOAD MANUSCRIPTSHidden Obstacles.pdf

I’ve included download buttons to access these important .pdf files I copied and exported to .pdf yesterday as I finally broke down in frustration after spending hours trying to upload an updated doc.x file on my expiring Word application. I typed in a query to Google on my Chrome url field, and got AI answers to my frustration with Word. First up: HOW COME WORD DOESN’T HAVE AN EXPORT TO EPUB? Who do you think your biggest customers are? Don’t you think having the Heading1 command buried in an export to EPub to create at TOC (Table of Contents) is a no brainer?

Why do you cheat a Mac Screen of the top view of the ribbon tray and the title page document you’re working on like a full display will show on a pc? And what’s with the microscopic microsoftish tiny icon field in our custom toolbox? Are you really pressed for time and money to create meaningful icons such as the various ‘accept all’ ‘accept last change’ et. al. as the same faint green dot?

Go from thinking you have a dumbed down Word version to Winning an Award for your submitted manuscript!
VERIFY TOCDownload

The Quick Access Toolbar – God’s Gift to using Word. Let’s face it. Microsoft is dominate on all publishing websites throughout the world. If you’re a mac lover like me, you may use pages. And oh, gee, there’s an export function to word. Ha, ha, ha. How bad could it be?

So I concluded long ago that a mac user must have Word if they’re a writer. And I copied and pasted these pdf’s for you to give you a guide to make Word be the next Wonder of the Word for self-published authors. Below are three more downloads that should be an immense help:

THE SIMPLIFIED VIEW IN WORD AND HOW TO GET QUICK ACESS TOOLBARDownload
ITS THE REFERENCE TAB, SILLYDownload

Its okay to scroll down and ignore all the screenshots for links which are inactive when converted to a pdf file as the example above. I don’t want you guys to fear bad urls or links. I am hoping you agree pdfs are harmless. The point is, you can see my questions and use ChatGPT or Claude or Google in your Chrome browser to get the answers you need to make Word author friendly.

FREE DOWNLOAD for getting rid of the barnacles – I spent over four hours yesterday at D2D trying to get The Table…Download

Having these pdfs two days ago would have saved me about five hours of frustration. This last pdf is the big one with the most information. Instead of my six hours query on chat, you can simply click and download these files and have the information if a few seconds! Yessss!

Plus I am curious as to how many brave souls download these pdfs in my analytics statistics chart. My last set of five did pretty good.