Being a Sponsor ?
Member
Thread Starter
Join Date: Feb 2010
Location: Ontario
Posts: 806
Originally Posted by RobbyRobot 
There is no need to clear anything up, really. Your opinion is very clear, but let's be honest, its your stated opinion about what length of time is required for being deep into fellowship, sponsoring, and service work. Some others, including me, think differently. No problemo, Steve.
As for a moral obligation, time is not required to bring moral resources into focus. Humility and gratitude, spiritual living, and quality of life suffices to enable a consistent practice of decent morality experienced within AA.
Dosen't take years to learn to be decent and give back what we have received, you know?
As for a moral obligation, time is not required to bring moral resources into focus. Humility and gratitude, spiritual living, and quality of life suffices to enable a consistent practice of decent morality experienced within AA.
Dosen't take years to learn to be decent and give back what we have received, you know?
But is that person understanding the responsibility?
If something goes really wrong will it have repercussions......and jeopardize their recovery?
Saying and knowing the big book is definitely required but what about sober life experience? Being able to cope in a normal healthy manner with disappointments and tragedies.
There seems to be a high rate of relapse with people when life isn't easy....yet they're willing to fight for the right to sponsor.
Adventures In SpaceTime
Join Date: Jun 2008
Location: Ottawa, Canada
Posts: 5,827
Originally Posted by Spawn
No?
But is that person understanding the responsibility?
If something goes really wrong will it have repercussions......and jeopardize their recovery?
Saying and knowing the big book is definitely required but what about sober life experience? Being able to cope in a normal healthy manner with disappointments and tragedies.
There seems to be a high rate of relapse with people when life isn't easy....yet they're willing to fight for the right to sponsor.
But is that person understanding the responsibility?
If something goes really wrong will it have repercussions......and jeopardize their recovery?
Saying and knowing the big book is definitely required but what about sober life experience? Being able to cope in a normal healthy manner with disappointments and tragedies.
There seems to be a high rate of relapse with people when life isn't easy....yet they're willing to fight for the right to sponsor.
When we generalize, we risk having a conversation which remains inconclusive by any reasonable measure. I don't want to do that, and of course neither do you, I'm sure.
My experience with alcoholism and sobriety within AA is something always goes wrong, on so many levels, and consequences of course play out respectively. There is nothing remarkable is this knowledge. Operation normal for alcoholics, yeah?
It is of course vitally important a sponsor and sponsee can honestly and authentically relate. Hoping for the best outcomes without being responsible to the personal histories and life experiences of both participants is just plain foolish, and can be easily avoided with some simple exploratory questions answered honestly.
How wrong can things get? Well, things can get so wrong that people completely destroy their lives, and even die from things going wrong.
What are you asking and suggesting? That years of time mitigates the chances of things going wrong? Ideally, I would agree that more time spent doing the right thing has more value then a shortness of time doing the right thing.
However, if the right thing is being done already, then that is in itself sufficient for the sponsor-sponsee task at hand. If things are not being done correctly, then 50 years of wrongness won't be enough to get things done safely and properly.
Once again we have arrived at the question of quality of life issues. It really is this central issue which is paramount and overwhelmingly trumps all other concerns.
AA Twelve Step Program Quality speaks for itself. Quality is universally the best measure of appreciating the safeguards required to ensure the sponsor is responsible to his or her duties to their sponsee.
Experience in time is secondary to experience in quality. Secondary does not mean not important, it merely means secondary, and not the primary indicator of what defines a resonable sponsor-sponsee relationship.
Nothing is more important then the successive quality of a sponsors total life experience with the program when sponsoring. At the end of the day, sobriety is what the sponsee wants and needs, and without effective sobriety, all is nothing, and worse then nothing.
Member
Join Date: Jan 2012
Location: Richmond,Va.
Posts: 183
I didn't listen to my sponsor about thr 2 year suggestion.I was so on fire for the program that I was sponsoring at the 6 month period.I made some mistakes in retrospect,not pushing people that needed a push,not understanding the traditions and not speaking up when they were flaunted.Bailing sponsees out of jail,loaning small amounts of money.Not understanding how to handle a wet drunk when I was chairing a meeting,letting someone share too long off topic and not knowing how to cut them off gracefully.Not reviewing a mans 5th step before we got into it and finding out he had written an autobiography which was useless.And on and on.....
So this was my apprenticeship so to speak.I also attended several Joe and Charlie Big Book studies,State Conventions,workshops, and listened to hundreds of speaker tapes of people speaking at conventions and workshops.I wanted to learn all I could about our program.
Nothing equals experience,I know who I sponsor that needs tough love and I know who just needs an atta'boy.I know not to trust everyone in the program just as I didn't trust everyone in the bar.I know that I must lay down conditions about the relationship we are to enter. I know what is the message we carry and I try to do it right while I'm still around.This is me,not everyone does it that way but get them sober for God's sake and don't let them go away when their lives get good if you can.Keep them committed.
Cheers,Steve
So this was my apprenticeship so to speak.I also attended several Joe and Charlie Big Book studies,State Conventions,workshops, and listened to hundreds of speaker tapes of people speaking at conventions and workshops.I wanted to learn all I could about our program.
Nothing equals experience,I know who I sponsor that needs tough love and I know who just needs an atta'boy.I know not to trust everyone in the program just as I didn't trust everyone in the bar.I know that I must lay down conditions about the relationship we are to enter. I know what is the message we carry and I try to do it right while I'm still around.This is me,not everyone does it that way but get them sober for God's sake and don't let them go away when their lives get good if you can.Keep them committed.
Cheers,Steve
Laozi Old Man
Join Date: May 2008
Location: Detroit, MI
Posts: 6,665
Originally Posted by Spawn
No?
But is that person understanding the responsibility?
If something goes really wrong will it have repercussions......and jeopardize their recovery?
Saying and knowing the big book is definitely required but what about sober life experience? Being able to cope in a normal healthy manner with disappointments and tragedies.
There seems to be a high rate of relapse with people when life isn't easy....yet they're willing to fight for the right to sponsor.
But is that person understanding the responsibility?
If something goes really wrong will it have repercussions......and jeopardize their recovery?
Saying and knowing the big book is definitely required but what about sober life experience? Being able to cope in a normal healthy manner with disappointments and tragedies.
There seems to be a high rate of relapse with people when life isn't easy....yet they're willing to fight for the right to sponsor.
The idea that we must wait till we are perfectly prepared, takes the "God-factor" completely out of the equation and assumes all sponcees are not beyond human-aid.
IMO the sponcees level of willingness, is way more important then the sponsors level of experience anyway.
Adventures In SpaceTime
Join Date: Jun 2008
Location: Ottawa, Canada
Posts: 5,827
Originally Posted by Boleo
Of course something could go wrong with a rookie sponsor. But then again, something could go wrong with a veteran sponsor. Something is even more likely to go wrong with no sponsor at all.
The idea that we must wait till we are perfectly prepared, takes the "God-factor" completely out of the equation and assumes all sponcees are not beyond human-aid.
IMO the sponcees level of willingness, is way more important then the sponsors level of experience anyway.
The idea that we must wait till we are perfectly prepared, takes the "God-factor" completely out of the equation and assumes all sponcees are not beyond human-aid.
IMO the sponcees level of willingness, is way more important then the sponsors level of experience anyway.
I'm not sure willingness is way more important then the quality of the sponsors experience, but I certainly see what your saying -- without a sponsees willingness initially, nothing is going to work well going forward of course no matter the sponsor.
Member
Join Date: Apr 2009
Posts: 3,095
The answer that is supported by the BB is one should wait to sponsor until they have experienced a spiritual awakening as the result of the Steps. Clear and precise directions are given in Chapter 7 on how to proceed.
I encourage guys to start seeking out others as soon as they have completed the Steps and have experienced that spiritual awakening. Really, they can't complete the Steps until they start sponsoring, right? If the guy is uncertain, we sit down together with the new guy, and go through the Steps side by side.
I think we've made a big mistake in the 'culture' of AA to reserve sponsorship for some elite class of recovered alcoholics, instead of presenting it as the necessary part of our Steps that it is.
I encourage guys to start seeking out others as soon as they have completed the Steps and have experienced that spiritual awakening. Really, they can't complete the Steps until they start sponsoring, right? If the guy is uncertain, we sit down together with the new guy, and go through the Steps side by side.
I think we've made a big mistake in the 'culture' of AA to reserve sponsorship for some elite class of recovered alcoholics, instead of presenting it as the necessary part of our Steps that it is.
Member
Thread Starter
Join Date: Feb 2010
Location: Ontario
Posts: 806
Originally Posted by RobbyRobot
Well, who exactly, is or is not, meant by the expression "that person?" Who are we really talking about?
So I have to speak in general terms.
Member
Thread Starter
Join Date: Feb 2010
Location: Ontario
Posts: 806
Originally Posted by winslynn
I didn't listen to my sponsor about thr 2 year suggestion.I was so on fire for the program that I was sponsoring at the 6 month period.I made some mistakes in retrospect,not pushing people that needed a push,not understanding the traditions and not speaking up when they were flaunted.Bailing sponsees out of jail,loaning small amounts of money.Not understanding how to handle a wet drunk when I was chairing a meeting,letting someone share too long off topic and not knowing how to cut them off gracefully.Not reviewing a mans 5th step before we got into it and finding out he had written an autobiography which was useless.And on and on.....
So this was my apprenticeship so to speak.I also attended several Joe and Charlie Big Book studies,State Conventions,workshops, and listened to hundreds of speaker tapes of people speaking at conventions and workshops.I wanted to learn all I could about our program.
Nothing equals experience,I know who I sponsor that needs tough love and I know who just needs an atta'boy.I know not to trust everyone in the program just as I didn't trust everyone in the bar.I know that I must lay down conditions about the relationship we are to enter. I know what is the message we carry and I try to do it right while I'm still around.This is me,not everyone does it that way but get them sober for God's sake and don't let them go away when their lives get good if you can.Keep them committed.
Cheers,Steve
So this was my apprenticeship so to speak.I also attended several Joe and Charlie Big Book studies,State Conventions,workshops, and listened to hundreds of speaker tapes of people speaking at conventions and workshops.I wanted to learn all I could about our program.
Nothing equals experience,I know who I sponsor that needs tough love and I know who just needs an atta'boy.I know not to trust everyone in the program just as I didn't trust everyone in the bar.I know that I must lay down conditions about the relationship we are to enter. I know what is the message we carry and I try to do it right while I'm still around.This is me,not everyone does it that way but get them sober for God's sake and don't let them go away when their lives get good if you can.Keep them committed.
Cheers,Steve
The point of the 2 year suggestion is better than say 3 or 6 months?
Member
Thread Starter
Join Date: Feb 2010
Location: Ontario
Posts: 806
Originally Posted by RobbyRobot
Well, you can always speak about your own experience, no problemo.
When I see people who have less than a year or so who are still on that AA pink cloud go out and sponsor. I just worry about the newcomer sometimes.
The youngest person I saw in a pine box was only 20.....it was a while ago so I'm not harboring any unresolved emotions about him....I still think it was sad and all. I just think some need to put the brakes on when they start sounding like they know it all about the program. Maybe there needs to be tougher guide lines about sponsoring. I know there's no guarantees as to whether or not a sponsor will relapse but maybe we could minimize the number of sponsee's they take down with them.
The 2 year guide line seems to come up a lot?
Member
Join Date: Jan 2009
Location: scotland
Posts: 1,493
first line...page 89 of the big book,chapter 7 "working with others"
"Practical experience shows that nothing will so much insure immunity from drinking as intensive work with other alcoholics"
the book tells me that indeed it is selfishness and self-centredness that are the root of ALL my troubles....this is the beginning of what will take me back to drinking...this is what will set off the irritibility,restlessness and discontentedness that would then lead to the idea that maybe a drink would be a good idea.....there is no better way to get out of self than of giving of myself freely....sponsorship....giving away what has been given to me.its my best insurance...for an alki of my type and the girls i work with it is not a good idea to hang about on the sidelines...immediate action is what is called for...and step 12 is to carry the message...you got the 12 or indeed an awakening then why do people presume that it is optional....its not an 11 step program...its 12.
example for you....i told you about a young lady i sponsor in an earlier post...i have another girl who got through the steps back in october..is yet to sponsor....guess whos quality of sobriety is more content...more free...more happy and joyous......more useful...cos thats what the steps tell me...that once i get mine...i have to be of maximum service to God and my fellows.
thats where my experience comes from...and thats where my quality of sobriety comes from.
then lo and behold ive strung some time together.........
"Practical experience shows that nothing will so much insure immunity from drinking as intensive work with other alcoholics"
the book tells me that indeed it is selfishness and self-centredness that are the root of ALL my troubles....this is the beginning of what will take me back to drinking...this is what will set off the irritibility,restlessness and discontentedness that would then lead to the idea that maybe a drink would be a good idea.....there is no better way to get out of self than of giving of myself freely....sponsorship....giving away what has been given to me.its my best insurance...for an alki of my type and the girls i work with it is not a good idea to hang about on the sidelines...immediate action is what is called for...and step 12 is to carry the message...you got the 12 or indeed an awakening then why do people presume that it is optional....its not an 11 step program...its 12.
example for you....i told you about a young lady i sponsor in an earlier post...i have another girl who got through the steps back in october..is yet to sponsor....guess whos quality of sobriety is more content...more free...more happy and joyous......more useful...cos thats what the steps tell me...that once i get mine...i have to be of maximum service to God and my fellows.
thats where my experience comes from...and thats where my quality of sobriety comes from.
then lo and behold ive strung some time together.........
Member
Thread Starter
Join Date: Feb 2010
Location: Ontario
Posts: 806
Originally Posted by Charmie
first line...page 89 of the big book,chapter 7 "working with others"
"Practical experience shows that nothing will so much insure immunity from drinking as intensive work with other alcoholics "
"Practical experience shows that nothing will so much insure immunity from drinking as intensive work with other alcoholics "
Member
Join Date: Dec 2008
Location: uk
Posts: 2,548
Maybe i need to hear your definition of a sponsor spawn, so i can kinda get where your coming from.
Cos it may be very different from mine,......im not sure what the term pink cloud means either,.. ive seen guys recover very quickly with the right sponsorship, if they are on fire and smiling, does that mean they are sitting on a pink cloud, or just experiencing some of the promises ?...and have recovered.
Cos it may be very different from mine,......im not sure what the term pink cloud means either,.. ive seen guys recover very quickly with the right sponsorship, if they are on fire and smiling, does that mean they are sitting on a pink cloud, or just experiencing some of the promises ?...and have recovered.
12-Step Recovered Alkie
Join Date: May 2010
Location: West Bloomfield, MI
Posts: 5,797
I'm with ya spawn ^^^^^^^ I worried about them a lot too. Part of that "worry" was jealousy on my part..... why didn't that new guy ask ME to sponsor him? (I still catch myself in that one sometimes). Part was legit concern.....but then I remember, if the sponsor is able to keep the guy sober, the guy wasn't really an alcoholic anyway.
My first sponsor had 3.....maybe 4 yrs when he picked me up - I had about 3 or 4 months I think (I was a slooooow mover....lol).
He wasn't a BB guy, we didn't read the book together, we talked about the steps as he understood them (which wasn't BB perfect), he took me to a lot of different meetings all over Metro Detroit, and we talked a lot about God, praying, fear, and so forth (I'd known this guy for about 12 yrs.....we used to party together).
He absolutely did NOT have answers to all my questions (I had TONS.......and I can't imagine new ppl here aren't asking questions like craaaazy.....I sure would have) and I was "concerned" I'd end up going back out if I didn't get the real AA deal.......and I suspected I was getting his version, not THE version. This prompted me to go "seeking" - like 11 suggests. I discovered there was a LOT about AA I didn't know, my sponsor didn't know and neither of us were working.
Had he been a super-stud sponsor....I wouldn't have had to do that seeking. Maybe I would have just leaned on him and made him my higher power. That feeling of being alone and somewhat adrift in AA led me to REALLY work on my relationship with God. No human power could relieve our alcoholism right? On the flip side, I've got a sponsee now who HAD a great sponsor and it was wonderful.....till the sponsor had a heart-attack and died. His sponsees had always gone to him for advice, for direction, for what to do next.....they ran everything by him. When he was gone...they had no experience going to God......not REALLY going to God.....like when you ass is on fire, yanno? The guy I'm working with now, he made it a year then relapsed in year 6 and stayed out for 5yrs. Another one of that guys sponsees made it a couple years and now is in the hospital, critical life support for a car accident he got into drunk/high 2 weeks ago. I'm not saying it was the sponsor's fault....but these two guys may have been better off with someone they KNEW wasn't their HP. So, in a way, I was "blessed" with learning how to do that in my first year (even though that learning came as the result of haaaaving to - having to or else).
I thought about your earlier posts last night and didn't reply because I wanted to think about it for a while first. I recall being scared about my sobriety early on......and being mad that I had to do so much of the work of figuring things out on my own. Where was my guru to teach me? Why did I have to do so much on my own in this "we" program? Now, I'm GLAD things went the way they did. That experience led ME to digging into AA. I wasn't pushed, I wasn't told, I wasn't directed........I went looking. For a guy like me at that time, anyone who TOLD me much of anything went on my $hit-list. I didn't really trust anyone but me...and maybe one or two other ppl but they weren't sponsor options for me.
Now, when I see a 6 month guy/gal sponsoring someone brand new......I smile.
1. the sponsor won't keep the new person sober anyway
2. the sponsee will prolly have to do some extra seeking like me....which worked just fine
3. the sponsee will learn the value of "you're responsible for your recovery" quickly...lol
4. the young sponsor will likely get a better relationship with his/her sponsor cuz they're gonna have a lot of questions for them
5. I don't think it's just up to me, or you, or any of US as to who sponsors whom. If there really IS an all-powerful God, who the FCK am I to say "he shouldn't sponsor him yet?" ......I'm historically fond of thinking I can run things (like AA's sponsor/sponsee relationships) better than God.
6. As for a new sponsor going out and taking sponsees with them.....I see more of the "I'm your HP" old/long-term-sobriety sponsor's going out (or dying) and taking sponsees with them than young sponsors taking sponsees with them.
7. This one's hit me lately: maybe it's not that new person's time yet anyway.....maybe they're not ready no matter who their sponsor is......and the lessons learned are for the new/young sponsor - maybe they need to learn that they can't keep someone sober and/or maybe they need an ego adjustment...and the sponsee who wasn't gonna get it needs to learn to find someone who's had an awakening as the result of the program rather than someone they think is cool.
bottom line.....I think (ie.....MY OPINION) that a lot / most / all of this stuff is in God's hands anyway and we're just fooling the $hit out of ourselves thinking we have ANYthing to do with it.
My first sponsor had 3.....maybe 4 yrs when he picked me up - I had about 3 or 4 months I think (I was a slooooow mover....lol).
He wasn't a BB guy, we didn't read the book together, we talked about the steps as he understood them (which wasn't BB perfect), he took me to a lot of different meetings all over Metro Detroit, and we talked a lot about God, praying, fear, and so forth (I'd known this guy for about 12 yrs.....we used to party together).
He absolutely did NOT have answers to all my questions (I had TONS.......and I can't imagine new ppl here aren't asking questions like craaaazy.....I sure would have) and I was "concerned" I'd end up going back out if I didn't get the real AA deal.......and I suspected I was getting his version, not THE version. This prompted me to go "seeking" - like 11 suggests. I discovered there was a LOT about AA I didn't know, my sponsor didn't know and neither of us were working.
Had he been a super-stud sponsor....I wouldn't have had to do that seeking. Maybe I would have just leaned on him and made him my higher power. That feeling of being alone and somewhat adrift in AA led me to REALLY work on my relationship with God. No human power could relieve our alcoholism right? On the flip side, I've got a sponsee now who HAD a great sponsor and it was wonderful.....till the sponsor had a heart-attack and died. His sponsees had always gone to him for advice, for direction, for what to do next.....they ran everything by him. When he was gone...they had no experience going to God......not REALLY going to God.....like when you ass is on fire, yanno? The guy I'm working with now, he made it a year then relapsed in year 6 and stayed out for 5yrs. Another one of that guys sponsees made it a couple years and now is in the hospital, critical life support for a car accident he got into drunk/high 2 weeks ago. I'm not saying it was the sponsor's fault....but these two guys may have been better off with someone they KNEW wasn't their HP. So, in a way, I was "blessed" with learning how to do that in my first year (even though that learning came as the result of haaaaving to - having to or else).
I thought about your earlier posts last night and didn't reply because I wanted to think about it for a while first. I recall being scared about my sobriety early on......and being mad that I had to do so much of the work of figuring things out on my own. Where was my guru to teach me? Why did I have to do so much on my own in this "we" program? Now, I'm GLAD things went the way they did. That experience led ME to digging into AA. I wasn't pushed, I wasn't told, I wasn't directed........I went looking. For a guy like me at that time, anyone who TOLD me much of anything went on my $hit-list. I didn't really trust anyone but me...and maybe one or two other ppl but they weren't sponsor options for me.
Now, when I see a 6 month guy/gal sponsoring someone brand new......I smile.
1. the sponsor won't keep the new person sober anyway
2. the sponsee will prolly have to do some extra seeking like me....which worked just fine
3. the sponsee will learn the value of "you're responsible for your recovery" quickly...lol
4. the young sponsor will likely get a better relationship with his/her sponsor cuz they're gonna have a lot of questions for them
5. I don't think it's just up to me, or you, or any of US as to who sponsors whom. If there really IS an all-powerful God, who the FCK am I to say "he shouldn't sponsor him yet?" ......I'm historically fond of thinking I can run things (like AA's sponsor/sponsee relationships) better than God.
6. As for a new sponsor going out and taking sponsees with them.....I see more of the "I'm your HP" old/long-term-sobriety sponsor's going out (or dying) and taking sponsees with them than young sponsors taking sponsees with them.
7. This one's hit me lately: maybe it's not that new person's time yet anyway.....maybe they're not ready no matter who their sponsor is......and the lessons learned are for the new/young sponsor - maybe they need to learn that they can't keep someone sober and/or maybe they need an ego adjustment...and the sponsee who wasn't gonna get it needs to learn to find someone who's had an awakening as the result of the program rather than someone they think is cool.
bottom line.....I think (ie.....MY OPINION) that a lot / most / all of this stuff is in God's hands anyway and we're just fooling the $hit out of ourselves thinking we have ANYthing to do with it.
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