Originally Posted by
REZ 
I agree that meetings, sponsors, etc. are not enough.
You need to work the steps too.
For me, I need all the tools: meetings, sponsor, home group, stepwork, service, prayer and meditation.
And by Not Drinking and Going to Meetings and Getting a Sponsor you will find the way to all those tools.
"Don't drink and go to meetings" means that if you wish to stay sober you must:
1: not drink (obviously!)
2: go to meetings (where you learn about AA principles and build and rebuild fellowships)
3: Get a sponsor (who helps you build the tool box you need!)
Of course its MORE than just "going to meetings," etc. It's what HAPPENS at those meetings. It's what you ACCESS at a regularly attended home group. It's what ASSISTANCE and GUIDANCE you get from a sponsor!
Going backwards up the list, if one:
Has a sponsor and is working with that sponsor (implied by "get a sponsor"), then CHANCES ARE BETTER THAN NOT THAT one will be working the steps and developing a relationship with a Higher Power and learning first-hand from a mentor how to make that transformation from active alcoholic to service-giving partner of the human race. Sponsors help with other important lessons such as:
Participating in meetings, (sharing experience, strength and hope about your journey along the path of sobriety, and listening to others do the same; being present in the moment during those shares and readings; coming out of isolation, and perhaps most importantly, being there for newcomers as they arrive with their hand out expecting you to take it! NOTHING, I promise you all this, NOTHING transforms me like service! Working with a struggling alcoholic is the doorway to salvation!
Of course then there is:
Building a network of AA's from your home-group! Even physics teaches us that any system closed to outside resources will eventually entropy. We must build and continually rebuild our network of AA's (who is in my contact list today is a bit different than who was in it several years ago. Some from the beginning are still there but no list in my life is as dynamic and ever changing as my contact list. For obvious reasons.) and its in our home groups (as well as other meetings) that I have found the best places to build it and continue to build it.
IT's all there in those three simple suggestions. You just need to see them for what they REPRESENT.
To reduce them to the words written or said, like the "forest lost for the trees," is to lose the MESSAGE for the WORDS!
Much love to you!
Bob H