I had been a pub and club drinker, and I found that meetings were the only place I felt at all comfortable and safe going to after I stopped drinking. I averaged about 10 a week for my first three years. Some years later, I was at a meeting and said that perhaps I went to too many meetings back then. An older member who was at a lot of those meetings came up to me afterwards and pointed out that I was still sane and sober, then asked if I was sure I would be if I hadn't gone to all those meetings, and I couldn't say I was. I think meetings were a substitute addiction for some time after I got here. But it still seems to me that it was a harmless addiction with no unpleasant side effects. I was on my own and not robbing anyone of my time. After those three years, I became a full-time student for a while and it was no longer obvious that going to so many meetings was the best way to spent my time, as I had to spend quite a bit of time studying. Then I went to work for a rehab, my professonal phase and something of an addiction in itself, and went with some residents to talk at a Catholic Girls' school. On the back wall of the hall we were in was a poster with a picture of an old sailing ship with the words, "Ships are safe in harbours, but that's not what ships are built for." I think many of us need to stay on port for refitting for a while, but that's not what life and recovery are about. I am now living in a place where we have one weekly AA, and one NA, meeting, with the closest other meetings being fifteen and thirty-five minutes drive away, and all others over an hour. I sometimes feel a bit handicapped in advising newcomers in that what I did in my early days just isn't possible here. Still it seems to me that everyone has a Higher Power, whether they recognise it or not, and It seems to help those who are really doing what they can. I recall situations in which groups I've been in seemed divided between those who say, "AA is my life!" and those who say, "Get a life!" AA is not my whole life, but it is at the center of it and the rest is in accord with it. |