AAnoob

this forum is not the home of AA

ScottFromWI

It's not the home of any particular sobriety method. It is the home of people who want to get and stay sober though. Is that your goal as well?

matt4x4

Didnt MIT or some other iconic institution do an extensive study on the way AA works. The study came to a conclusion that by theory, AA should not have survived. But to keep on topic, dont take yourselves too seriously. Isnt that Rule 62, I wonder what the first 61 rules are. I guess the next meeting I go to that is a topic meeting and someone brings up Honesty, I will throw a topic such as What are the first 61 rules and how do they relate to you. Ask the chair to write it out completely on the whiteboard.

suki44883

I honestly cannot understand why people have to argue about recovery programs. If you find one you like, and it works for you, then go for it! If you find one that doesn't work for you, then move on until you find one that does. It's almost like arguing about religion. The goal is the same, but people take different paths to attain it.

Take what works for you and run with it. Don't criticize or try to belittle what may work for someone else. That's just rude and there is no excuse for it.

matt4x4

There must have been a Divine Inspiration for AA to have survived, that is the conclusion at hand. Wars are fought over religion suki, religion, oil and money. Dont have to look far. But I agree man, there are so many ways people get and stay sober and progress in life. Sure sometimes we can get on our soap-boxes and preach, but its attraction right. We might get carried away, but we are just human, we are not perfect, we are just humans trying to scratch out a living and be happy. I got that from Kevin Oleary, from The Dragons Den and his Oleary Exchange Financial News show.

Carlotta

AAnoob

Kevin O'leary?
really?
that's ur inspiration?

AAnoob

Legal pot like 'alcohol after Prohibition': O'Leary

matt4x4

Just the saying "scratch out a living"

polaris

Have you managed to overcome addiction with that approach?

GracieLou

I was driving to work yesterday and there was some MAJOR fog, I mean HOLY FOG Batman sort of fog. I don't think I could see 20 feet in front of me.

So I am driving along and I think of the song "Lover" and the line that goes "Thank God for the man who put the white lines on the highway".

And it dawns on me that AA, like many other recovery programs, were laid out before I got there. There were men and woman that laid down those first white lines and a whole lot of people have come along and re-painted those lines again and again. They have not changed. The line does not suddenly jerk to the left or right, it stays the path.

It sort of reminded me of my journey in AA. It was as simple as following the lines that were laid out before me by hundreds of people. I can choose to follow it, as I have, or I could just dart to the left into the darkness and take my chances.

It just amazes me how while I am driving along I would never choose to dart to the left or right. I mean who would make that choice? I could crash and kill myself because I have no idea what is out there so common sense tells me to stay between the lines yet when we make the decision to get sober or any choice to change ourselves really we go out of the way to prove that there is some reason not to stay in the lines and the most common one is that we think, in our sick minds, that we are different or unique in some way. These lines will not work for us so lets just jump to the right and off into the darkness they go.

While some do not crash, they find the road to be rough and on the way it dawns on them they should have stayed on the path and they turn around. Some stay on the bumpy course for years until the decide to turn back and then there are the sad few that die in the crash. Some die right a way while others linger for decades until the drive off the cliff they could not see in the dark.

I wonder why while driving a car that we stay in the lines so easily. We flow through the day and read, comprehend and make the choice to follow the path and the signs laid out before us. Red light says stop and we do. Green light says go and we do. No left turn and we don't. Must turn right and we do. We never think twice, we just do it because we know that we want to get some place and the path and these signs are telling us how to get there so we do them. I don't know about you but I have yet to jump out of my car and analyse a sign. Does that really say go? Does that really say turn left?

There are 1000 different roads leading to the same place but all of them have some sort of path laid out telling you how to get where you want to go. Some take the highway while others prefer the back roads, some want to fly while others want to walk, it doesn't really matter which one you choose as long as you get there but you need to say in the lines to do so.

The important thing is to find the path and stick with it. If you start driving and then decide to fly and then decide to walk you may get there but you have to start at the beginning again each time. You will find the rough road you are trying to prove was there by jumping from path to path.

I don't care, as I think most people here do not care what path you take. Just pick one and stay on it. Stop jerking to the left and right hoping to find the easier softer way, it is not there. Stay in the lines and follow the path.

It really is just that simple.

ru12

Why do people like to debate recovery programs? Well, probably for lots of reasons. Some want to share what worked for them. They want to lead others to the path they followed. Others perhaps have seen many people fail and sometimes die desperately trying to follow a path . . . and want to warn people to that possibility as they think it is dangerous to go a certain way. Some people just like to argue. Some enjoy the intellectual stimulation matching wits with others.

I've seen may people fail at sobriety. I personally know people that have failed most of the popular recovery methods: AA, RR, SMART, LifeRing, Moderation Management... I don't think per se that the problem is something wrong with the program, I think that the problem is that the program is wrong for THEM. And if someone comes here after failing at the popular recovery methods, I think it is helpful to let them know that others too have failed at the same program, perhaps many programs, but some eventually find something that works to keep them sober.

I kind of want to try to nudge people back from the cliff when they feel that nothing works to stop addiction. I want to remind them that there are many paths to find sobriety and they are not failures because they cannot do what some others seem to do.

WritingFromLife

I was referring to our SR home....You are correct, Scott :-)

Since I don't know how to repost Memphis Blues eloquent post from earlier, I, too, will am done with this thread.

I respect all of you--new, experienced, AA, AVRT, stack of books on your desk, cosmos, spider monkeys, or just trying to figure out why the hell your knuckles are so white.

RobbyRobot

Yeah, there'll likely yet be more threads of the same likely having the same results. It is becoming less important to respond to such soap-box-on-the-cheap threads. Its all about choices for any of us, and as for me like others here I'm done too. Later, AAnoob.

Leshar

GracieLou,

Thank you for that awesome post!

Dee74

I removed a couple of posts under rule 4.
Looks like everyone, including the OP, is done with this thread & the original article.

let all go help someone else

closed.

D