JerseyGirl

...as it pertains to Alanon?

I have a list of "The Steps"

I hear it over and over - work the steps.

But...what does that MEAN?

tommyk

Start with Step 1 and find out.

(P.S. - I had the same question once.)

bookwyrm

I'm reading Melody Beattie's co-dependants guide to the 12 steps. If you can lay your hands on a copy it ought to help answer your questions!

JerseyGirl

tommyk....I can read a step....I can "get what it means" , I can "agree"...but what I don't *understand* what it means to "work the step"

bookwyrm...I will see if my library has that - thanks!

laurie6781

(((((JerseyGirl))))))

The 12 steps as pertains to AlAnon are really no different than the ones for AA or NA. Hopefully you can find some AlAnon meetings near you and start attending. An AlAnon sponsor, one who has WORKED the steps would be an excellent guide.

Step 1, for example is a process of Acceptance. Accepting to the very core of your being that you are powerless over the alcohol or drug, the loved one using the alcohol or drug and in trying to 'fix' the situation your life has and is becoming unmanageable. Now that acceptance sounds easy, but a lot of 'yeah but's' will crop up 'yeah but if he/she/it/they would just do this,' 'yeah but if they just went to meetings' 'yeah but why don't they just moderate' etc etc

The actual action for this step will probably include writing starting maybe with a time line of your own frustrations with the particular behaviors that have brought you here. "The Progression." When seen in black and white on paper, it somehow helps us get to the "acceptance" that this step is.

Anyway, please keep posting, let us know how YOU are doing and how we can help, we do care very much.

AlAnon was a great help for me in dealing with my sober but gambling husband and I was already 3 years sober in AA.

Please keep posting and let us know how you are doing, we do care very much.

Love and hugs,

sodetermined

On the Family/Friends of Substance Abusers Forum, there is a Step Study listed at the top. I am "working" step one right now, there is a series of thought provoking questions. I am acutally copying and pasting the questions into a word document, and doing this on the computer.

Chrysalis123

To me working the steps means to spend time on each step. I attend Alanon, and my home meeting is a "step" meeting. This means that each month we study a step. So January is step 1, Feb. is step 2 and so on. We read from Alanon literature and then have time for personal sharing on what was read. It is always thought provoking for me. I also spend time at home thinking about each step, reading other Alanon books on the steps (some of which have handy thought provoking questions perfect for journaling) and talking with my sponsor about the step. The steps, at first glance, seem easy and simple...it is a simple program. But the application is another story.

CatsPajamas

Hi. There's a sticky at the top of the Friends and Family of Substance Abusers forum called What it All Means. http://www.soberrecovery.com/forums/...all-means.html

Working a program: If you go to a Face to Face Al Anon meeting, you will hear people talk about working a program of recovery. Just like the alcoholics who attend AA or the addicts who attend NA, members of Al Anon have their own program. In Al Anon, you learn about the 12 steps (taken from Alcoholics Anonymous), the slogans, the serenity prayer, getting a sponsor. All of these things are highly recommended if you want to find the recovery and serenity that other members of Al Anon have found. The fundamental issue is that WE work our OWN program, and the Addict or Alcoholic works theirs.

In Al Anon, we work the steps just like they do in AA. It's recommended that you get a sponsor, and you work thru the steps with that person. The step study that's posted online is helpful too. It is based on the book Paths to Recovery and has the step questions. The important thing - REALLY REALLY important - is that you work them in order, and you don't go on to the next step until you really, truly complete the step you're on. It's not something you can rush thru... and many people find that they work the steps more than once as they grow in their recovery.

The Steps are a wonderful way to learn more about yourself, your history, and all the wonderful things that make you who you are... the good, the bad, the ugly, the quirky, the funny and the heartwarming.

Here's a link to the online step study. It doesn't matter at ALL that you normally post on Friends and Family of Alcoholics instead of Friends and Family of Substance Abusers. We're all in this together, sharing our experience strength and hope as we learn to understand and live with the disease of alcholism/addiction and how it affects us and our families.

http://www.soberrecovery.com/forums/...ependents.html

Barbara52

Since I do not go to AlAnon, for working the steps has meant reading, reading, and more reading and then serious, honest self examination. I've also had a few very helpful session with a therapist. It means I look at what each step means on a gut level for me and my issues. It can be done without goig to meeting of any sort. The meeting seem to be very helpful for many but it is not a requirement if you truly want to look inside your own head and "fix" what you see as not what you want it to be.

CatsPajamas

B52, I agree. I have friends who have done all of their step work without meetings. The 12 steps are a guideline for growth, and a method that has worked for a large number of people seeking recovery. There are those who can do all of that introspection without help, without an organized program, and I admire them. Meetings helped me, hence I tend to recommend that as a possible solution for others.

Jersey Girl: "working the step" means to read about it, study it, talk about it with others, and take an action if the step has an action associated with it. For example, Step 8 says made a list of persons we have harmed and became willing to make amends to them all. So, in order to "work" this step, you would be doing 2 things... (1) actually making a list and (2) becoming willing to make amends.

I am going to start a step study for us on this forum. I think it will be interesting and helpful for us to do it together.

tommyk

Work mentally to understand how an individual step relates to YOUR life.

Work consciously on a daily basis to apply each individual step into YOUR lifestyle.

Work continually in remaining conscious of how the steps belong YOUR life.

Works for me...!

(The real 'work' for me is in continually applying a concept that really works, on a daily basis. I get it at first and it helps, but then I tend to drift back into my own ways. It takes work for me to pursue recovery on a daily basis - as versus learning something and then forgetting about it.)

Neagrm

All that is said above expresses my thoughts, too. I can only add that finding a sponsor and making the commitment to meet and work together each week (varies according to our schedules) one-on-one, and also doing a focused step study group, have made the steps come alive for me.

It is sooo helpful to bounce things off another person, to have someone to do reality checks with you, to brainstorm together as equals even though we're in different phases of our journey, doing it together brings great clarity and helps me remember to apply it in my everyday life.

I discovered, for example, that I was misinterpreting a step, but my sponsor and the group helped me quickly see that I didn't have to do it all at once. I was making it much bigger than it was.

Doing the steps with another in focused study provides wonderful practice in applying the step to other aspects of life. The interactive process slows me down and I can really look closely at the meaning and find the significance in the steps.

It's been a fascinating process to observe. For me, one little example of how powerful step work can be even though the steps sound simple -- I was working on Step 8 mentioned above, Made a list of all those I'd harmed and became willing to make amends to them --

I couldn't seem to find many to put on the list and thought there should be more; suddenly it dawned on me that it was myself that needed the most amends and I needed to focus on amends to me and what that involved. Part of that means learning to love myself, accept myself, etc. My sponsor told me from the outset to put myself at the top of the list, but I didn't GET IT until time went on.

Also there is a big difference between _becoming willing_ and actually doing it. It takes time to "become." We need the time to become, and to make life lasting changes. Each step is very specific to a certain task that's very important foundation for the next.

Enough from me! Thanks for bringing this up. It would be wonderful to have a step study focused on Al-Anon perspective.

CatsPajamas

There's a new online step study for Friends and Families of Alcoholics. Come check it out:

Online Step Study Click HERE http://www.soberrecovery.com/forums/...-step-1-a.html

tommyk

Jersey - keep asking any questions you like.

I feel that I learn alot about the steps when I try to relate what I think I know to others.

(In short - I never really know how much I know about a subject until I try and explain it to someone else. PS - I am a 12 Step 'zealot'... lol... I have them all memorized and I recite them at least once per day.)

freya

I think a lot of people have said a lot of good things already, but if you want a really thorough look at what "working the steps" means in an Al Anon context, I highly recommend the books Al Anon's 12 Steps and 12 Traditions and Paths to Recovery. You will find here, not only extensive information on working each step, but also detailed stories of several different people's experience working that step. I would also highly recommend that, at some point, you take a good look at the the AA Big Book and AA's 12 Steps and 12 Traditions, because these are, after all, the "primary texts" from which all 12 Step programs have arisen and also because I often find that AA literature has an edge and a sense of urgency (in the sense of "vital importance," not in the sense of "speed"!) that I personally have found to be very helpful to my own program and that I really do not see as much in a lot of Al Anon literature.

Of course, one of the best possible sources of extensive help and experience from a lot of different people is to attend Step meetings -- either Al Anon or AA.

Finally, I need to say that there is no short-hand, accelerated way to work the steps, and, in my own experience, once you start there is really no end (and, BTW way this is actually a good thing!). Al Anon is a spiritual program, and spiritual work is a life-long commitment. It is also work and commitment that one does not and cannot do in vacuum -- which means you need help and support and connection of some kind. Exactly what that help and support and connection looks like and exactly how it manifests can vary widely from person to person, but there is very good reason that the first word of the first step is "We..."

freya