Daily Sonnets For 12 Steppers

DAILY SONNETS FOR 12-STEPPERS is an exploration of the principles embodied in the 12-Step program of recovery. The calendar sets the pace for this adventure. Each month concentrates on one of the steps, and each day of the month contemplates an aspect of that step. Wellness is our natural state, and the Twelve Steps provide a perfect means to restore wellness that has been pushed aside by learned habits. Daily Sonnets for 12-Steppers has no parallel. Dean Lovejoy has combined his knowledge of the 12 steps with his unique assortment of talents to produce a remarkable volume of daily reminders of specific 12-step work and of the principles that underlie each step. __Storm A King, PhD. Redding, CA What a wonderful meditation on the 12 Steps! What a wonderful undertaking. It definitely should be published. __Gretchen Goff, Psychologist, Tesuque, NM Whether you’re just starting on your road to recovery, have been on the path for years or supporting a person in recovery, Dean Lovejoy’s sonnets offer insight into the mind, internal dialogue and habits that are a part of recovering wellness. A gift given from his heart, his essence in apparent in each verse . __Roy Woolfstead, Retired Attorney, Mt. Shasta, CA Dean has written a powerful book to touch the hearts and minds of those in recovery. It’s simplicity makes the 12-step process available to all who seek to mature in their life. I’ve taken to reading this book daily and it assists me, in a safe way, to look at and gently confront unexamined areas of my life. As a licensed therapist, I find this book can be a useful tool. I highly recommend it. __Brad Seiser, Palo Cedro, CA Dean Lovejoy has found a way to add poetry as a tool for those of us seeking to improve our lives. In this thought provoking and fun read, I have found it possible to explore delightful additions to my daily self-care routines. __Thom Spring, MS, LCLS, Mesa, AZ

This one-of-kind book started with my very first poem I wrote, the "My Alcoholism" poem. I awoke one morning in March, 2009, at about 5:00am, with this poem in my head. So as not to forget, I went to the computer room and wrote it down on paper in about 15 minutes. I was not fully awake and proceeded back to bed. After morning breakfast and coffee, I took my daughter, Hannah, to school for the day. I came back home and put this poem into the computer, 99% pure from the first format. I proceeded in the months that followed to have many more inspirations from my "Higher Power". This book is the result of me following direction and using "His Will". In spite of my lack of talent and no experience, this book was completed, and I do believe it is a miracle. "He" provided me with 24 poems, to equal the 12 steps and 12 traditions of our program. I don't believe this to be a coincidence, and in reading this book I hope you will agree. As in our pre-amble primary purpose, I am staying sober today while doing this project, and I hope to help another member to achieve their sobriety. I wish all of you to enjoy this gift from our "Higher Power".

Now I find myself in late August, with the nights cool and the crickets thick in the fields. Already the first blighted leaves glow scarlet on the red maples. It’s a season of fullness and sweet longings made sweeter now by the fact that I can’t be sure I’ll see this time of the year again.... — from Learning to Fall Philip Simmons was just thirty-five years old in 1993 when he learned that he had ALS, or Lou Gehrig’s disease, and was told he had less than five years to live. As a young husband and father, and at the start of a promising literary career, he suddenly had to learn the art of dying. Nine years later, he has succeeded, against the odds, in learning the art of living. Now, in this surprisingly joyous and spirit-renewing book, he chronicles his search for peace and his deepening relationship with the mystery of everyday life. Set amid the rugged New Hampshire mountains he once climbed, and filled with the bustle of family life against the quiet progression of illness, Learning to Fall illuminates the journey we all must take — “the work of learning to live richly in the face of loss.” From our first faltering steps, Simmons says, we may fall into disappointment or grief, fall into or out of love, fall from youth or health. And though we have little choice as to the timing or means of our descent, we may, as he affirms, “fall with grace, to grace.” With humor, hard-earned wisdom and a keen eye for life’s lessons — whether drawn from great poetry or visits to the town dump — Simmons shares his discovery that even at times of great sorrow we may find profound freedom. And by sharing the wonder of his daily life, he offers us the gift of connecting more deeply and joyously with our own.

Historical and contemporary papers on the philosophical issues raised by the Turing Test as a criterion for intelligence. The Turing Test is part of the vocabulary of popular culture—it has appeared in works ranging from the Broadway play "Breaking the Code" to the comic strip "Robotman." The writings collected by Stuart Shieber for this book examine the profound philosophical issues surrounding the Turing Test as a criterion for intelligence. Alan Turing's idea, originally expressed in a 1950 paper titled "Computing Machinery and Intelligence" and published in the journal Mind, proposed an "indistinguishability test" that compared artifact and person. Following Descartes's dictum that it is the ability to speak that distinguishes human from beast, Turing proposed to test whether machine and person were indistinguishable in regard to verbal ability. He was not, as is often assumed, answering the question "Can machines think?" but proposing a more concrete way to ask it. Turing's proposed thought experiment encapsulates the issues that the writings in The Turing Test define and discuss. The first section of the book contains writings by philosophical precursors, including Descartes, who first proposed the idea of indistinguishablity tests. The second section contains all of Turing's writings on the Turing Test, including not only the Mind paper but also less familiar ephemeral material. The final section opens with responses to Turing's paper published in Mind soon after it first appeared. The bulk of this section, however, consists of papers from a broad spectrum of scholars in the field that directly address the issue of the Turing Test as a test for intelligence. Contributors John R. Searle, Ned Block, Daniel C. Dennett, and Noam Chomsky (in a previously unpublished paper). Each chapter is introduced by background material that can also be read as a self-contained essay on the Turing Test

Walt Whitman's poem was first published in the 1856 collection Leaves of Grass.