Member: Bob S.
Location: Salt Lake City
Date: 1/27/2002
Time: 4:26:29 PM
Without A.A. I am a dead duck...but with my luck, I would be LIVING a long, drunk and miserable life. So, what that means is that the GROUP is more important than me. Being sure the group and A.A. continue to prosper ensures my sobriety and very existence. I win by working to ensure you win. It is totally opposite from the attitude and practices I had prior to recovery. Me coming second ensures my happiness and prosperity. Thanks for helping me come in second...and winning. ;>) Bob
Member: Adam H.
Location: Nagano, JAPAN
Date: 1/27/2002
Time: 5:24:51 PM
Hi folks! Adam, alcoholic.
Where I live in rural Japan, there are 2 meetings a week, they are not much bigger than 8 people at the most and not one is conducted in English. Sounds like a pretty daunting situation, right? Do I still go to those two meetings a week? Yep. Why? Because I still need the experience, strength and hope (and fellowship) of other alcoholics as much as I did when I first came to AA five years ago...AND also because I have learned what little I can contribute to AA in this area--be it in service to my meeting or in sharing my own experience strength and hope--may be of use to the other seven members who, like me, come to AA to for the experience, strength, hope and fellowship of another alcoholic. Although the language and cultural barrier has often been a really hard thing for me to overcome, I have been increasingly grateful for these two meetings in rural Japan for being there for me so that I can stay sober and also so that contribute to and keep AA alive out here.
Grateful to be sober, to be working this Tradition in my life, and to be having the experience I am having now. God bless.
Member: Bob P
Location: Midwest
Date: 1/28/2002
Time: 7:43:24 PM
I always too this tradition to mean that we must always take great care to not let dissension and petty disagreements weasel their way into our fellowship and destroy individual groups and cause meetings to falter. We must keep our eye on our sole and singular purpose, to remain sober and carry the message to the alcoholic who still suffers.
Because if we lose our link to the collective spirit of the program, our individual gooses are cooked and many of us will drink. So, without group cohesion, we are in big, big individual trouble.
Unless of course, any of you know another way to stay sober that works as well as the one we have now...:)
Member: tina
Location:
Date: 1/28/2002
Time: 8:55:06 PM
im trisexual,ill try anything
Member: Les AM
Location: San Diego
Date: 1/29/2002
Time: 12:31:49 AM
Prior to AA I would probably be sitting in an institution wearing a dipper and drooling on my bib. That would have been my fate as a dipsomaniac with a pretty good body: wet brain instead of cirrhosis and early death. I pray that AA can be preserved for future alcoholics, that they may have the same chance that I've been given to live happy, joyous, and free.
The problem for me is how to decide what constitutes the common welfare. What is good for our common welfare and what is harmful? How do we know what effect our present actions will have on the future survival of AA? Is the continuing growth in both finances and organization of Alcoholics Anonymous World Services, Inc. good or bad? What effect will the incorporation of Central Service Offices have on the future of AA? There seem to be more groups forming to serve minorities within AA, separating us by race, language, sex, sexual preference, and age: is this fragmenting or stabilizing the unity of AA?
Many AA's love the organizational part of AA and become very active as GSRs, CSRs, etc., others find that sort of service not their cup of tea. So, like the rest of the world, most of the day to day affairs of AA are kept going be a very small percentage of AA members. We, as individual members of AA have intrusted the future of AA to the very few willing to take the responsibility. Politics happen, special interest activity happens, a great deal of money is moving around, and AA gets bigger and more complicated, and we hire more professionals to deal with it all.
I've listened to people, who've been sober members of AA much longer than I, talk about the changes in AA and what it means. Some say it'll be OK, others say we're going to hell in a hand basket. One man, who has been sober a long time, told me not to worry about AA falling apart, because if it did he and I (me) could stay sober by talking to each other and everybody else could join us or fend for themselves. Another guy, who had his last drink in the early sixties, told me AA was already down the tube because the addicts have taken charge in New York and its too late to save anything. Most AAs say that AA is fine and will remain so as long as we trust God and follow the traditions. I am one of the many who find organizational custody of AA very tedious. My service runs more to simple custodial stuff, coffee making, literature minding, secretarial commitments,shooting my mouth off, and such while viewing with some skepticism the present trend toward more organization and the increasing size, wealth, and complexity of World Services and the many Central Service organizations. I just really don't know what serves our common welfare and promotes unity, but I certainly believe our common welfare should come first and pray that those minding the store know what serves our common welfare and think, as well, that it should come first and that our unity is, therefore, maintained.
Member: Jack B
Location: Palo Alto, Pa
Date: 1/29/2002
Time: 2:55:59 AM
Hi, I am Jack, a real alcoholic. Pamphlet, called 12 traditions illustrated says it best for me: Our individual sobriety depends upon the group.The group depends upon us. We soon learn that unless we curb our individual desires and ambitions, we can damage the group. I am a firm believer that the hope is seeing another alcoholic staying sober, and the HELP is in the home group. Thanks for allowing me to share and God Bless.
Member: Lessa E
Location: Chicago
Date: 1/29/2002
Time: 5:13:35 PM
Hi, Lessa E here, grateful recovering alcoholics. The 12 & 12 says this tradition is based on the program. That spiritual principles must be lived and that we HAVE to give it away in order to keep it. This forms the basis for the GROUP. Our preamble says that "our primary purpose is to stay sober and help other alcoholics to achieve sobriety". This is the foundation for our meetings. And the reason that the group needs must come before individual ones.
I had firsthand experience of seeing this tradition working - or rather the need for it -my first year back to the tables. I was going to a women's meeting that someone suggested to me. Truthfully, I couldn't tell that it WAS an AA meeting except that How It Works was read and we read from the 24 hour book. Then, we 'shared'. To be honest, we bitched. About our jobs, the men in our lives, our kids. Whatever we felt like griping about. Once in awhile, something good would happen to someone, she would share it and we would 'ooh' and 'aah' and congratulate her. But, it was more of a coffee clatch, not an AA meeting. Many members bitched about the same thing, meeting after meeting after meeting after meeting. There was no talk of recovery and I saw little individual progress being made. I was going to 4 other meetings a week. And was getting nothing out of this one. I stayed there for several months. And it seemed that a) nobody got better and b) the few times a newcomer ventured to the tables, she never came back.
I related this to my counselor in outpatient treatment and she told me to find another meeting to go to instead of this one- one where the AA program was at least brought into the discussion. She pointed out that this meeting was frustrating me more than it was helping. She told me this group of people was failing to bring the program or recovery principles into the meeting room with them. With a heavy heart (I've always hated change, even if I was in a miserable place!) I went to my last meeting there to say 'goodbye'.
To my astonishment, a longtime member asked for a group conscience meeting. She said that the group had gotten away from what Bill W and Dr Bob had wanted. That we were proud of our individuality - and were, for the most part, ignoring the fact it was an AA meeting, with a suggested program of recovery. She pointed out that we rarely mentioned the program at all. And that we hadn't had any newcomers in several years with the exception of me. And that we should be either getting back to the meat of AA or call it a social club and move on. What a gutsy thing to say!! Well, there was alot of arguing. And a couple of diehards that badly wanted the social club left intact finally looked to me and used me as an example of a newcomer coming around and being satisfied. I was asked my opinion. So, I was honest. I told them I respected them all. And had appreciated being there. But I needed help in getting and staying sober. And I wasn't hearing anything at all at this meeting that was helping me work a program.
After more discussion and alot of emotional histrionics, it was decided we'd get back to basics and truly become an AA meeting. With the intention of staying sober and reaching out to others. Our meetings now are definitely AA meetings, with program material adhered to in most every share.
I'm happy to say that the meeting not only has survived, it's thriving. More than a few of the 'social club' members have left us. However, among those that stayed are some who were chronic gripers over the same issue. In less than a year, they've made TREMENDOUS progress on their own programs. What an inspiration that has been to me - to know that the program really does work miracles, if we just let it. I've learned alot and have been fortunate to grow using alot of the ES&H I now hear at this meeting. And, we've had a number of newcomers - and folks THEY'VE told about us come back - and keep coming back. It's a strong meeting now, filled with some very good recovery.
The program works - but we need to make sure that we don't forget it's a "WE" program. That the collective group's needs are more important than the individual ones. And that we all prosper and grow when this tradition is adhered to.
Thanks for letting me share.
lessa_e@hotmail.com
Member: Ashley L
Location: Pasadena CA
Date: 1/30/2002
Time: 1:52:20 PM
Greetings, Ashley Alcoholic. I just kinda wanted to vent a bit, cause my chicken butt doesnt have the gutts to go out to a meeting. See, I've become quite the hurmit. 22, disiulioned ego, a strange paranoia creps over me when i try to face the real world. I had 6months once. Been to Rehab 3 times. Im at the pont now where I think I have it under control, (who am I kidin) everyother day another forty ounce down the hatch, and then once a week, ill go on a bindger once i get that whisky in me and drive 300 miles to see old high school buddies, that prolly dont care about me. And it continues to be a horible circle. I want to just stop... I want to have the serinity and the life I had when I was in AA. Felling refreshed when waking up, going to bed with nice thoughts in my head, BEING SOCIAL--geeze what happened to me. Anyway thanks for having this web site, I feel better now ).. Ashley needs to go to a meeting. Take care all.
Member: ANONYMOUS26
Location: New Hampshire
Date: 1/31/2002
Time: 11:05:52 AM
First I'd like to say,it was good to here about the turnaround of LESSA"S group. Got a little misty-eyed reading that one. Wish I had something good,positive,optimistic to post about unity within the fellowship or groups .After 26 yrs of sobriety I seem to have aquired more of a pessimistic view on the subject of unity.Unity seems to be more of a misnomer for what actually exist within the groups,fellowship.In the book, THE HOME GROUP:THE HEARTBEAT OF AA, are articles about problems stemming from the individual,the group, or AA as a whole. pg 64 Bill W. said that the force that will destroy AA will come very slowly from inside the fellowship. pg 60 GG wrote; Alcoholics may be getting sober, not because of us, but in spite of us. pg 59 Is the AA group dying because of individual apathy? AS BILL SEES IT pg 207-titled THE FELLOWSHIPS FUTURE--- Never should we be lulled into complacent self-satisfaction by the wide acclaim and success that are eveywhere ours. This is the subtle temptation which could render us stagnate today, perchance disintergrate us tomorrow. Although I consider myself a member of AA as a whole I haven't belonged to a group for over 20 yrs for some of the same reasons I've just posted. Not that I haven't tried. Once in a while I'll participate in the forming a new group or in a group that has been already established,usually BB or 12&12 meetings, usually for several months or more. Usually came to the conclusion that they were not the best group that I could join or felt that they would not continue for much longer. In the past 3 or 4 yrs I've seen 4 out of 5 of those meetings I've participated in die and the 5th seems precarious at best.In contemplating or speculating as to who, what, where ,when,why, or how the problem with unity begins it seems to me to be one of a lack of consciousness of the presence of GOD, which in the BB pg 51 says it was the most important fact of their lives. Their seems to me to be a lot of people uniting on things that undermine the main purpose of the BB,the 12 traditions, and the 12 concepts. Just my concerned opinions.
Member: bert gari
Location:
Date: 1/31/2002
Time: 12:08:06 PM
hey there,i am looking to chat with anyone that either has studied the big book or is interestedin learning about it. if you are interested go to www.unhooked.com at 1:00pm and hit chat
Member: Five Years
Location: N.H.
Date: 1/31/2002
Time: 11:46:49 PM
Ashley, "Quite as important was the fact that spiritual principles would solve all my problems".Pg.42 Big Book.More sobriety brought about by the admission of alcoholism and by the attendance at a few meetings is very good indeed,but it is bound to be a far cry from permanent soberity and a contented,usefull life.That is just where the remaining Steps of the A.A. program come in.Nothing short of continuous action upon these as a way of life can bring the much desired result.Pg 40 Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions.
Member: Ray C
Location: Haines ,Alaska
Date: 2/1/2002
Time: 1:34:23 AM
I really don't think theres much I can add to whats already been posted here...The first trad always reminds me of some of the others that follow,mainly principals before personalities.All I know for sure is AA is the only place where I've actually felt understood and like I belonged and one of the few places where people did ask me to keep coming back when I first got here.I'm grateful for that and hope I can help others to know that same peace and spirit of oneness I've found here.No doubt we got plenty of faults but it sure beats the life of lonliness and misery I was living before I got here.
Member: Michael B.
Location: AZ
Date: 2/1/2002
Time: 3:33:24 AM
Hi! My name is Michael, and I am an recovering alcoholic and addict sober today only by the Grace of God and the Fellowship. Thanks for the sincere shares. Welcome newcomers!
One thing I know for certain is that I need AA. No matter how hard I tried, I could not stay sober on my own. Without AA, I don't stay sober for long.
Member: helloo
Location:
Date: 2/1/2002
Time: 9:32:10 AM
Hey Adam from Nagano....here's a great place where there are nightly online chat AA meetings and people hang there for lots of the day to just share or joke around. There are people here from all over the world too. I'll look for you there...in the room my name is "helloo" Keep coming back.
http://www.geocities.com/HotSprings/2609/aachat.htm
Member: AnilG
Location: Mt Vernon,IL
Date: 2/1/2002
Time: 10:27:28 AM
i am an alcoholic and an addict sober since past 4 years If it were not because of AA its traditions I would be dead somewehere. I am so Glad and thankful to God to have given me hope.tradition has helped me and thousands of people like me which I plan to remember what is our sole purpose of coming here to stay united and dont forget why we all are here. God bless you all.
Member: AnilG
Location: Mt Vernon,IL
Date: 2/1/2002
Time: 10:35:54 AM
i am an alcoholic and an addict sober since past 4 years If it were not because of AA its traditions I would be dead somewehere. I am so Glad and thankful to God to have given me hope.tradition has helped me and thousands of people like me which I plan to remember what is our sole purpose of coming here to stay united and dont forget why we all are here. God bless you all.
Member: UNITED
Location: UNITED ON WHAT ?
Date: 2/1/2002
Time: 11:00:50 AM
At a BB meeting not to long ago after reading some of THERE IS A SOLUTION, I asked the question,"what is a recovered alcoholic?" One of the first to respond was some one well off ,15 to 20 yrs sober.His comment was,"well you know what,I don't give a shit!" then most maybe all,applauded & cheered. The meeting continued with the same kind of comments and copouts. I don't know ,I don't care ,alI I know is that I'm sober today,it's just semantics, or even I don't want to get recovered. One person with 20 + yrs started their comment with "I think they use that word in the book".ONE newer person made an attempt to answer the question by the book. Well At the end of the meeting I got called on again an identified myself as a recovered alcoholic then read from the FOREWORD TO THE FIRST EDITION. To SHOW other alcoholics PRECISELY how we have RECOVERED is the MAIN purpose of this book. Anyway this "I don't give a shit" attitude is the kind I find "members" uniting on when it comes to discussing seemingly sensitive subjects, a form of unity I've encountered quite often on different subjects. I guess it's no wonder that I didn't find out what a recovered alcoholic was with the help of the "unity" of the fellowship,group,or any one individual. I found out by reading,studying the BB,12+12, any approved AA literture,other outside documented AA history,spiritual material and asked GOD to help me to see hear,and understand the material so that I might get recovered and help the next person to get recovered.12+12 step 7 Refusing to place GOD,we had deprived ourselves of HIS help. BB pg 63 HE provided what we needed ((IF)) we kept close to HIM and performed HIS work well.pg 164 GOD will constantly disclose more to you and to us.Feel united with very few on very little concerning the principals,traditions, concepts. May GOD"S grace keep you all sober until you get recovered,if you want to get get recovered.
Member: admirer
Location:
Date: 2/1/2002
Time: 9:21:52 PM
LES, it will be people like yourself that change AA. AA is going to bits, or is not, depending on who you talk to. My personal opinion is that if you leave it as it is, it is going to flounder, but this will take a lot of years. There will be subtle changes along the way, but as nobody is heeding them the eventual outcome is the non-exsistence of AA as we now know it today. Just take a look at AA from when it began to the present day and you should see how it has changed and what the pattern is.
Member: ann M
Location: Aussie
Date: 2/2/2002
Time: 3:02:43 AM
My whole life (including childhood)indoctrinated in me the belief that I was only as good as the service I provided to others. This was my only value. Left a big hole in my stomach when I did not contribute to others health and healing. love...
Member: M.F.C
Location: A.Z
Date: 2/2/2002
Time: 4:49:19 AM
thhe common unity is that we cannot do this by ourselves. we should hold together and help each other.
Member: M.F.C
Location: A.Z
Date: 2/2/2002
Time: 4:49:47 AM
thhe common unity is that we cannot do this by ourselves. we should hold together and help each other.
Member: AAYAH
Location: Granite State
Date: 2/2/2002
Time: 10:06:08 AM
BB FOREWORD TO THE SECOND EDITION---As we discovered principals"steps" by which the individual alcoholic could live, so we had to evolve principals"traditions" by which the AA groups and AA as a whole could survive and function effectively. 12+12 contents-trad 1 Without unity,AA dies. Individual liberty,yet great unity. Each AA's life depends on obedience to spiritual principals. Seems like a lot of people got some the of the individual liberty part down,some of the spiritual principals down. Like LESSA E's group realized,that they were more of a social club,that they were proud of their indivduality,and were,for the most part,ignoring the fact that it was an AA meeting---that rarely mentioned the program. I stopped going to open speaker,closed speaker,speaker discussion meetings mostly because of the lack of hearing the steps being discussed,put into practice or lack of seeing the traditions being utilized. Seems like most of those groups are functioning like LESSA's, a social club. Some groups seem to held together by a few "member's" that have "some" understanding the of the principals of the steps But have no one familar with the traditions,even though someone may have claimed the title of being a GSR, or might not even have one. I've gone to meetings where,when it came time to start,seeing that no one was going to open,chair,I asked if there were any members of the group present. Guess what? No members! seemed the only reason it continued was because it was at a halfway house an someone there would make the coffee and as long as there was coffee people kept showing up. BB THE MEDICAL VIEW ON AA --"This organization of AA calls on two of the greatest resevoirs of power known to man, religion and that instinct for association with ones fellows...the herd instinct. Reminds me of a way the american indian used to kill buffalo. They would get the leader of the herd running in a direction that would result in the leader an all who followed going off a clift. What direction is your "leader" taking you?
Member: LEADERS
Location: AA SERVICE MANUAL
Date: 2/2/2002
Time: 12:02:40 PM
---CONCEPT 1X pg 42 While this article was first thought of in connection with our world service LEADERship,it is possible that some of it's suggestions can be useful to anyone who takes an active part in our society. This is true particulary in the area of twelve step work,in which nearly all of us are actively engaged. Every sponsor is a LEADER. The stakes are about as big as they could be.A human life and usually the happiness of a whole family hang in the balance.What the sponsor does and says,how well he estimates the reactions of his prospects how well he times and makes his presentation,how well he handles criticisms,how well he LEADS his prospect on by personal spiritual example--these qualities of LEADERship can make all the difference,often the difference between life and death.......Chapter 6 pg S47 LEADERSHIP IN AA:EVER A VITAL NEED ---" Our LEADERS do not drive by mandate:they LEAD by example." In effect, we are saying to them, "act for us, but don't boss us"--- Therefore, a LEADER in AA service---- 12+12 step twelve--We had refused to learn the very hard lesson that over-dependence upon people is unsuccessful because all people are fallible,and even the best of them will sometimes let us down.----FALLIBLE;(see fallacy)capable of making mistakes or being in error.--FALLACY; [decieve] aptness to mislead. a mistaken idea;eror. an error in reasoning. FALLACIOUS; [see fallacy]erroneous. misleading or deceptive.BB pg 23 If you draw this fallacious reasoning to the attention of the alcoholic,he will laugh it off, or become irritated and refuse to talk about it. Where will following your LEADER take you? where will our LEADERS take the AA program? Over a cliff to it's death? Evil,bad"leadership" can only prevail when good people do nothing.
Member: ruthiew
Location: alaska
Date: 2/2/2002
Time: 4:14:28 PM
Well, after a few years of being too afraid to attend a f2f meeting, I was at a point where I had no choice. It was time to get serious about getting sober or wallow in my ______. So I went to the only meeting in town. There were two other people there and one was my husband. I was skeptical and cynical at first. But I'm happy to say that the group has grown to 7 people and I have never been more sober in my life! AA unity is important to us. Without those 7 people I CANNOT stay sober. We've had to cancel meetings occasionally for various reasons, and the weeks without a meeting are waaayyy too long. Thank you AA for helping me stay sober and keeping me sane!--
Member: Anne M.
Location:
Date: 2/3/2002
Time: 12:36:27 AM
My name is Anne, and I'm an alcoholic.
Tradition 1. Re: "United; United on What".
I've had the same similar experience. The group here, I found, was the same. As a newcomer, I was already dazed/confused, but somehow, I got caught up in the "smokescreen". It seemed that the "program" was more of a 'soap-opera' program. With members having 10+ years, there seemed to be little rememberance of the 'unity'. I had to be careful, as I realized that maybe it was just the disease playing tricks on me...until I discovered that what got said in that room did not stay in that room--and the 'insanity' of it all was disheartening. Our personal recovery depends on AA unity, from what I witnessed..let's just say something was missing, only I was to much of a newcomer to say anything, who am I to say? When phones don't ring, and one doesn't go cuz someone else is there, and when one does go, they don't share, cuz it may not stay within the walls, the primary purpose gets lost. How can a newcomer get&stay sober? I'm now starting all over again. February 1, is my first complete day sober. I can't drink, to drink is to die..I'm addicted,and allergic to the stuff, still the old body wants more. I stayed sober for 13 months, didn't even get a medallion for it, so I thought, what's the point? The POINT is--how bad do you want to be sober, and stay sober. Also, how badly do we want the program to continue..there are those who have cultivated arrogance the longer they've been sober, but they are still of "self". Some newcomers are there because the have to be, but some are there b/c they want to be...are you extended the hand to the newcomer, or are you pulling your hand back, because you are so afraid of the disease itself, that you turn your back to the newcomer? Remember, honesty, humility, and UNITY. It has to go farther than a simple "I understand". People have told the alcoholic they understand before, just to get them out of their hair. Ask yourselves, how would Bill or Bob treat this person?