EightyThree

Day 1 was sharing and my BB sponsor wanted to make sure I was serious which is understandable. We basically got to know each other as we only met the night before.

Day 2: read pg. 567 "Spiritual Experience"

It basically says that in the first edition many readers expected a sudden immediate change and that they would all of a sudden be full on spiritual. Spirituality occurs over time and there is a good chance that the people surrounding me will notice a change in my personality before I do . Without another alcoholic working with me this spiritual change could take years with self discipline.

"With few exceptions our members find that they have tapped an unsuspected inner resource which they presently identify with their own conception of a power greater than themselves"

"Most emphatically we wish to say that any alcoholic capable of honesty facing his problems in the light of our experience can recover provided that he does not close his mind to spiritual concepts. (Open mindedness)

So by going through pages 1-88 the only thing that can stop me is of I have a know it all attitude.

"Willingness, honesty and open mindedness are the essentials of recovery. But these are indespensable"

When I know, I don't know, then I am ready to know

We then went to the bottom of page 18 and top of 19 and made a contract. The contract means that the sponsor has been through it. He's an alcoholic p. He doesn't want praise or money. He just wants to help guide ,e through the book and steps.

Not sure anybody will find this useful but if you're thinking of going through the steps the old fashioned way then here's an idea. Looking forward to tomorrow!

awuh1

Interesting. I like how it begins (day 2 that is) with discussion of different sorts of spiritual experiences. Yours could be of any sort. It's not predictable. Mine was sudden, profound and and life changing. If you had told me that before it happened, I would have told you that you were nuts. I was an agnostic with a very strong bias towards atheism in the beginning.

The idea of starting with the Spiritual Experience appendix appeals to me. By the way, the Herbert Spenser quote is not by Herbert Spenser. If you want to get a feel for open mindedness of the person guiding you through the steps, pay close attention to his reaction when you tell him this. If he asks what caused you to say this, refer him to this link. Survival of a Fitting Quotation

AA central office is having a difficult time admitting they got it wrong (when attributing the quote to Spenser. and even more so in regard to promptly admitting it). But that's just an aside.

What's important is working the steps. So far it sounds like the person who is guiding you has integrity. I'm looking forward to hearing how it goes.

EightyThree

That is very interesting Awuh. I'm going to have to bring that up lol. Might catch him off guard and teach hi, something. He is actually a famous musician. Like seriously famous. Toured with David Bowie for many years. I feel good about him. I've talked to people who he has booked and people that have been booked by his sponsees. I will keep this post updated. Might be useless to some but some might take interest

tomsteve

keep posting! 11 years in and i find it interesting and learned an awesome phrase today:
When I know, I don't know, then I am ready to know.

yoga stuff there!
or yogi berra.

Mountainmanbob

I think that we need to remember that AA is not the only way in which to get and stay sober (although I often attend meetings).

Many have experienced a spiritual change while in church, in the woods or sitting at home in their easy chair.

God has been helping ones with a means of escape since the beginning of time.

M-Bob

EightyThree

You are absolutely right Mountainmanbob. For me personally, my drinking was so bad that I could not wait for that spiritual change to come to me. I had to take action. What I did two Saturday's ago was get a bag of Mushrooms and I went on a 4 day mushroom bender to find myself and get into the physiological mindset of putting down the drink and getting into recovery. with the help of this site I got back to a meeting. Then by chance (or my higher power as it was storming and I couldn't get to the meeting I intended on going to) I ended up at a Big Book discussion group. There I met a member who is experienced at Booking

By no means do I recommend the route that I took involving drugs. That was just the route I took being in the hopeless state of mind having consumed alcohol for a long time

EightyThree

Day 3:

We began on the page after the Table of contents. We drew out the AA triangle. Unity (12 Traditions/Group), Services (1 on 1), Recovery (11 steps)

Then The Wheel of Misfortune:

A circle of 1 drink, Binge, sober...the steps block the cycle from continuing over and over etc.

Then To the Preface (Cake Recipe Step 1) a disease of Body and Mind <---RECOVERED

Then through the Foreward to First Edition and on to Foreward to the Second Edition. Basically just going through the AA history of how Dr. Bob and Bill W. Met and how the book was written with the first 100.

EightyThree

Just an example

sg1970

I think that's pretty awesome to read that on day 2. I didn't even know it was in the book for such a long time.