For me, when I first came around, AA simply gave me something to do with my time. Even if I was going to certain meetings because I knew there would be women there that I thought attractive or there was a softball team out of that meeting i wanted to play on or the food was great, I was going. Eventually all the superfluous stuff became ... superfluous. I started to hear the message and began to clear up. Made a lot of good friends, too.
Mike