Threshold

Backstory:

Me- multiple substance and process addictions.
Read Big Book four years ago, felt the 12 steps were an excellent, concise, format for growth that would bring freedom from addiction. Totally turned off by the language.
Began attending NA meetings, read the Basic Text, much more comfortable.
Moved to an area with no NA meetings. Read the basic texts of many other 12 step programs, and their variations of the steps. Worked the steps (long distance NA sponsor) found sobriety and a saner life.

So, now I have a sponsee, like me a VERY long history of substance abuse and process addictions. He's read the NA basic text. His most recent and glaring addiction was booze, he has been sober for 6 months and I am leading him through the steps.

I was in a thrift store the other day and saw a copy of the Big Book, could have bought it for him for 50 cents. Was afraid that it might actually turn him off the steps and the program. He's about to do step 4, and I plan to have him do it in the manner described in the BB because I think keeping it that simple will work best for him.

I know him pretty well. He's talked with me about his resentments, fears, philosophies about life, etc. The only 12 step meeting anywhere near by is 30 miles away and due to his work schedule he can't attend it. I've been to that meeting and it is very BB based.

So, am I projecting my own issues with the BB on him? I haven't prevented him from reading the BB, but I certainly haven't encouraged him and I didn't pick it up for him when it would have been so easy to do so.

I re read the BB a few weeks ago, and even this far into recovery found the language extremely off putting.

This isn't a huge moral dilemma. He's working the steps, he has the basic text, we've read How it Works and Why and the NA step working guide. So I am not throwing together my own version of things for him.

But I know I am consciously "protecting" him from the BB and there is something that feels wrong about that. He's a grown man and obviously if he cares to he can get his hands on a copy. But I am sure that my issues with it have come across during our work together.

Anyway, just wanted some input from folks here.

Db1105

I started In both AA and NA in the last 1970's. In NA at that time there were some pamphlets and that was about it. There was no Basic Text. We used The 12 Steps and 12 Traditions. We just substituted drug for alcohol. While being the literature chair for the Philly area back then I had a few discussions with Jimmy K and that was suggestion also. It worked and kept NA rolling until they began to write The Basic Text. It can't hurt to
Have a sponsee read The Big Book with the understanding of how 12
Step recovery started.

awuh1

I think it might be best to just be honest. It’s your bias so just own it. Tell him that you feel this way about the original book but that you don’t expect him to. Suggest that he might find it useful and let him decide for himself.

If this does not sit well with you (or even if it does) it might be productive to look at why you are put off by the language. The book was written 75 years ago by a very bright guy, so that needs to be put in context. The language is a bit archaic as well, but it’s the content that’s really important isn’t it?

Coldfusion

I read the Big Book with the idea that it is intentionally written that way. Things sound trite, we don't want to do anything somebody else's way. We will do things our way, invent our own God. And it works! That's all you have to do, is find God.

DylanS

I think I understand the desire to protect someone from something that wasn't good for me. I recently heard a tape where a guy said that we're also powerless over someone else's drinking/addiction and recovery.

I agree with Awuh:

DylanS

Nice.

Threshold

Lol. Thing is I am pretty sure how he'd feel about it (talk about projecting!) but I wouldn't suggest he doesn't read it...but I hope he does his step 4 first. I honestly fear it would set him back, because it would sidetrack from step work to other issues.

I have asked myself why I am put off by the language. And that is why I picked it up yet again a few weeks ago. Even knowing the cultural backround etc, I find myself bristling through much of the first 163 pages. No problem with the steps or a spiritual program. I guess it's like anything, sometimes the way a message is presented DOES make a difference.

If the steps are the program, and I don't take issue with the words of the steps...guess I can't be too far off base.

I really appreciate the input here. I want to do right by my sponsee. I've had two sponsors with very different styles and approaches, including on this issue.

Boleo

I read the BB 3 or 4 times on my own- decided it was nice but filled with archaic language - made a place for it on my book-shelf. Then I started going to meetings where they had a separate table set aside for about a dozen people who took turns reading from it.

We would take turns reading about 2 -4 paragraphs each, then passed to the next person. When all 12 people were done reading, we shared our interpretation of what was just read. That is when the meaning of the book really started jumping out at me. There is something about reading the book with others that brings out the hidden treasures contained within it.

Even though I have read the first 164 pages about a thousand times at this point, there are still sentences that jump out at me when read in a group dynamic. Kind of like what Carl Jung alluded to when he coined the term "Collective Unconscious".

Threshold

We did that at NA meetings, so I know what you mean. The word "we" is always used and that is a direct reference to the group consciousness as you say. The book is a collection of the experience of people recovering, helping one another, sharing the message and the way it manifest in our lives. Powerful stuff.

fini

Threshold,
let me say up front that i haven't done the steps, but have read the book and bristle more than a little bit at the language. AND at some of the content. BUT, i put it in context, where it came from, the time it was written, all that jazz.
i just wanted to address this from the other side, so to speak.
if i were to finally make the big decision to do the step-thing and found a sponsor, i'd WANT that person to share their concern with me. i wouldn't want to be "protected" from his or her opinion. it would, to me, smack of an unequal relationship. yes, i know, the sponsor is a guide through the steps, and that sounds like what you and your sponsee are clear on and are doing. and yes, so there is the assumption that the sponsor, as guide, has more experience.
but to take that farther, for me, would go into territory of "i know what's good for you better than you do".
Threshold, if you were my sponsor, this is the kind of stuff i'd want to talk with you about.
and yeah, quite possibly/probably your own stuff would come across, and this would so easily hinder honest communication instead of encouraging it.

i recognize that this opinion i'm expressing here comes almost solely from my own "stuff"; i hate finding out that i was being "protected" from something, the implication i read into it.

Threshold

I get you. I don't like the implication of me feeling like I SHOULD protect him.

A couple years ago he bought himself a copy of the NA Basic Text. So it's not disingenuous to be working out of that.

He doesn't own a Big Book far as I know, so I think most of this is in MY head.

I haven't kept him from it, but I saw it at the thrift store and first thought "hmmm, maybe I should get this for him." then thought "I don't want to deal with the fall out, questions etc etc. that I anticipate would turn up."

I really do think if he read it now, it would stall his step progress. So...am I protecting him from too much information at the present time, or protecting me from dealing with whatever fall out might occur?

I will be honest with him. And part of that is that I think it's best for us to stick with the program and literature we have right now and get him through the steps.

I remind him I too am a work in progress. Lately that is something that has been made very clear to me. I am who I am and where I am in my recovery. I can be honest, but I can't necessarily change everything in an instant. I would have a hard time leading him through the steps using the Big Book as our guide. That's my limitation, but there it is.

Of course if he needs to he is free to choose another sponsor that can take him in the way he feels he needs to go.

fini

I remind him I too am a work in progress.

yeah, that was part of what i was thinking when i responded, too.
i'd want to know that, and see some of it. not all. not even maybe most. but enough to really know it's so.

and i expect a lot of this depends on where he's at/where someone's at.

at six months, he's in a different place than a person a couple of days away from their last drink.

or protecting me from dealing with whatever fall out might occur?

ach, Threshold, don't know about you, but that would be my first guess if it mere me

sugarbear1

What does your sponsor say about this?

Joe Nerv

There are no rules stating that one must follow the directions in the book, nor even read the BB, to successfully work the 12 steps. I don't see any reason why you can't lead him through the 4th step without it. But after (or during) that, I agree with awuh...

Iffin I were you, I'd come clean with my feelings. You have a hangup with the language in the book, and you're concerned it will be offputting to the guy. I'm sure he could understand that. Then he could make up his mind on his own. IMHO I think you might be overthinking it a bit. He's going to eventaully hear/see/read the BB regardless of how you well you protect him , might as well just share your thoughts and concerns now.

GracieLou

I have had and am having this same experience.


I understand what you are trying to accomplish. I do, but it also makes me think of a section of the BB that reminds us that even when we feel that controlling a situation was for the greater good, it was still in fact control.

Whether you go with the BB or not, there are some parts that ring true.

Page 60-61 of the Big Book.

Most people try to live by self-propulsion. Each person is like an actor who wants to run the whole show; is forever trying to arrange the lights, the ballet, the scenery and the rest of the players in his own way. If his arrangements would only stay put, if only people would do as he wished, the show would be great. Everybody, including himself, would be pleased. Life would be wonderful. In trying to make these arrangements our actor may sometimes be quite virtuous. He may be kind, considerate, patient, generous; even modest and self-sacrificing.........Is he not, even in his best moments, a producer of confusion rather than harmony?

The BB is available online. He does not need to buy one or you to buy one for him, although for .50 cents I would have bought the book anyway. I guess I would worry that you are not giving him all the information possible even though you feel in your heart that you are doing the right thing.

Would you hold back the bible or any other literature or book because you are choosing what is best.

You are making a choice for someone else and that is not fair. There are times I have seen other literature or mentioned things to my sponsor and after a good talk I have come to my own conclusion that what I thought may be an option was in fact not one for me.

I think, and you can take it with a grain of salt, that my recovery cannot be my own if I can't own it.

fini

one more thing jumped out at me finally: chances are more than good the guy knows there's a BB. pretty much everyone knows. if he hsn't picked it up when doing 12-step for alcoholism, then he's making his own choice.

he may well have partly picked you to be his sponsor because you haven't added that and because he likes/wants pretty much to be guided just the way you're doing it.


regardless, honesty is paramount in that relationship, i'd think, so i'd want to know if my sponsor were this unsettled about it.

Threshold

The post that followed yours addressed this, but because I've been thinking about this since yesterday as well, I will use your quote as a jumping off point.

He IS a grown man. Has known AA and the BB exist, probably for a few decades.

On his own he chose to purchase and read the NA Basic text and said he identified with it.

His alcohol addiction was the latest and most obvious issue, but by his own admission he has abused drugs, if a compulsive over eater, and shares a number of other "addictive" characteristics.

He knows that my first foray into recovery was in NA, my sponsor is in NA, and that I have the NA literature. I myself don't own a copy of the BB.

So he DID choose me as a sponsor knowing this and obviously knows the literature is NA literature.

My own issue with whether or not to buy the BB is actually a reflection of my own experiences on this forum lately. The substance abuse 12 step forum gets very little traffic, as does the secular 12 step forum. So I began to hang out and post in the alcohol 12 step forum. And there have been many spirited threads that stress the BB, using it word for word, heck, even going back to the manuscript of the BB for guidance so as to be truly doing it the right way. And I did get paranoid. Some of the things posted led to me wondering if I was bound to relapse because I hadn't said the right words using the right prayer position. That is my OWN paranoia and insecurity speaking, there is no fault in people sharing their own experiences and interpretations. But I know I have reacted strongly to those things.

This morning, an audio book I was listening to, and some recovery things I read coalesced into some thoughts on this issue. AA has a primary purpose and that is alcoholism.

The BB addresses that. There are things in the BB that I don't relate to. My primary issue isn't alcoholism, it is the "disease" of addiction.

There is a reason that NA wrote it's own basic text, which addresses the disease of addiction. It makes sense that I identify with that text more, because that is the disease I am addressing.

If it was just me and my issues, then there never would have been a reason for NA at all, or it's literature. It exists because the value of the 12 steps is recognized and respected, but that it makes sense for groups that are addressing issues other than alcoholism to maintain the steps as they are, but share their experiences for their people to identify with. There are millions of people who use the 12 steps to address substance abuse, behavioral issues and process addictions successfully. But the BB wasn't written for them. It was written for alcoholics.

I would not hold back the use of other resources. I have passed on several things that have helped me in my own recovery. I haven't passed on the BB because I have found it a wrench in the works at points in my recovery and my sponsor did tell me that I should stick to my own literature and quit worrying over whether or not I can identify with the literature of another program. Duh....I was getting distracted by talking to people for whom the BB was written and their genuine experience of it, rather than working my recovery in a straightforward manner.

It's been really amazing lately how resources and situations in several areas of my life have come into play and led to a lot of things falling into place in my mind and heart lately. It may well be a case of me finally being ready to "see" it, or "hear" it.

So, yes. Sponsor came to me seeking to be led through the steps of the NA literature. That's what I need to focus on, and not let my own side interests or issues muddy that.

This upset, and this thread are really about my own issues and questions and discomfort lately. And I need not project that on my sponsee.

The other day I told him that if he feels he needs an AA sponsor I can direct him to an online group that will connect him to someone. But I know I am not the person to guide anyone through the BB.

Thanks for helping me "see" this and sort this out.