When I was still pretty new, I went to a meeting where a guy said he had slip after slip and just didn't seem able to get this. Then he said something that hit me as the obvious reason for this problem. He said, "I go to meetings when I can, but I don't make it my life." To me, it is about making it my life, not my whole life but its core or skeleton. Living like I did when drinking and just hanging a meeting or to on the outside of it, like a Christmas tree ornament just doesn't work. I can recall arguments and friction between those who say that AA is their life and those who suggest that they get one. I substituted addiction to meetings for addiction to alcohol, averaging about ten a week, for my first three years of recovery. That may have been a good thing as I had trouble getting onto the Steps and a steps sponsor was something I had never heard of, although I did say the Serenity Prayer a lot and got into reading the big book and Came to Believe. This did me no harm, kept me dry if not all that sane and at least kept me out of trouble. There was a bit of ego in it as thought people who only went to five meetings a week were slackers. Some years later I got up at a meeting and said I thought I probably went to too many meetings in my early days. An old timer came up to me after the meeting, pointed out the fact that I had stayed sane and sober for a number of years and asked it I was sure I would be if I hadn't gone to all those meetings. I had to admit that I wasn't. He used to talk about building a firm foundation for sobriety, and those meetings were part of that foundation. Meetings are not AA's program of recovery, the Steps are, but I still feel that the Steps are essential, at least for me. They do a lot to help me live this way of life, and I'm a bit unclear on where those who think they are working the Steps without meeting find the alcoholics they carry the message to. In my experience the number in AA who stop going to meetings because they drank are greatly outnumbered by those who drank because they stopped going to meetings. For me doing AA online is also important, and helps me get away from the sort of recycled stale thinking I could get into just going to meetings in one area, but I just don't feel the sort of fellowship here that I feel meeting face to face with people I know well each week. It seems essential to do at least a bit more than I think I need to, going for real sanity and not just sobriety, as doing 95% of what it takes to keep me sober would get me drunk. When I got into my professional phase, working for a rehab, I no longer had time for so many meetings and felt that my work was a sort of substitute. One day I went with some residents to speak at a Catholic girls' high school. At the back of the room, there was a poster with a picture of an old sailing ship on it. At the bottom, it said, "Ships are safe in harbours, but that's not what ships are built for." I then began to understand that it can be a good thing to just concentrate on getting to meetings and work for a while, but I eventually I needed to get out and dosomething with my life, remembering that a ship still needs regular maintainance after spending some time in the harbour for repairs. I lot of things have happened since then, including spending twenty years teaching English in Japan, where I was a couple hours from the closest English meeting, even using a bullet train. I got to a Japanese meeting each weekend and English ones in other places on my summer and winter vacations. But I also needed to work the Steps on my own and live in harmony with them, maintain contact with my higher power and develop some healthy interests. This got a lot easier when the internet came along and I was able to get into an email group I am still a member of. I moved here to Tasmania to retire six years ago, and one of the nicest things about that is that I have plenty of time to get to meetings, and participate in email groups as well as participate in other interests. I am in clubs that play lawn bowls and Scrabble. I am active in my religion and particularly enjoy taking a fairly long walk each day which includes a stop for a sensible lunch. It is a life of contentment and I don't want to be anyplace else or doing anything else. There is nothing I wish I had or wish I didn't have, and I can enjoy each day as it comes along. I try to life a life in harmony with the Steps and doing whatever seems to be the right thing to do. There is a fair bit of routine, a help in maintaining good habits, but I don't find it at all boring or stale. Maintaining my sobriety and sanity is still not easy or effortless, but I enjoy doing it more and more. |