AA's Singleness of Purpose

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AA's Singleness of Purpose

An excerpt:

“I am an alcoholic. I have a drug history as long as my alcoholism, but I am not an addict. The stories I have heard of addicts, gamblers, and so on elicit sympathy from me, but do not reach that place in me of identification that I find in the story of another alcoholic- that place where I actually begin to feel the pain experienced by the speaker and relate his experience to my own. Thank God you had alcoholics speak to me of alcoholism when I came into AA. Because identification is so vital to the recovery of alcoholics like myself, I do not wish to risk weakening my effectiveness by speaking of my drug use in an AA meeting.

“We alcoholics come with many “related disorders” of drugs, gambling, overeating, sex, depression, anxiety, and so on, but by choosing to join AA we have chosen a common ground on which to relate to one another- alcoholism and recovery from alcoholism. Given the diversity of people and problems in AA, the unity necessary to function as a group would be impossible and our effectiveness with newcomers diminished if we did not keep our focus on our common problem. I have to relate myself to the group as a whole for my own recovery and the recovery of those I would help. I would hate to see the day in AA where an alcoholic’s chance to recover was dependent upon whether we had the “right” person with the “right” set of problems for him that day on the answering service, Twelve Step call, and so on. I would hate to see the day when any real alcoholic finds himself unable to relate to a speaker or discussion due to too much talk of problems other than alcoholism that he does not possess. I want every alcoholic to have the chance I had to enter an AA meeting and come to realize, as I did,  that “those people are like me and maybe if I do what they did it will work for me too.” ”

over to the care of god - as I understand him

I was at a conference recently and attended a panel discussion of steps one through six. The three presenters did an incredible job of all 6 steps, but what I keep thinking about is step three: "Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him."

What I liked about the presenter's perspective is this: He compared putting one's will and life into the care of a higher power to putting one's finances into the care of a broker. The broker takes your money and works on your behalf to make your money grow.

The presenter asked, "Now that the broker has the money, is it HIS money? Or is it still your money?"

The audience hummed with, "My money!"

The presenter continued, "So if you take that same idea, but instead of money, make it your will and your life and instead of a broker, make it your higher power, it's the same thing: Whose life is it? Whose will?"

Again the audience agreed, "My life! My will!"

He said, "Exactly! God isn't TAKING your life and will, he's just taking care of it; he's investing, saving, making sure it's well cared-for."

And that was just the best twist on that step. As someone who has sponsored a baker's dozen of women over the years, I've had to respond to newcomers who are afraid of this step.

"What if God decides to make me a scientist? I'm awful at science!" they'd cry.

But God (or the higher power, your higher power, or whatever it is you call it) isn't interested, I don't think, in using us as circus acts; I think God is more interested in using us to help each other.

And if it's only that I feel better thinking that and in the end there's absolutely nothing "out there," so be it. My life will have been better spent -and my heart will have felt more content- believing that.