Helpful for anyone whose life has been affected by substance abuse. ( )

sober

The twelve steps are important for all twelve step groups, but here I just want to touch on a misconception about alcoholism that this book (and another book like it) dispelled for me.

It’s easy to think that alcoholics lack a desire for the higher life. You think that they just want to drink, and the hell with the rest. It’s an illusion. Most alcoholics are much more trustworthy than they seem when they’re bottomed out, they are disproportionately high functioning, and really it is usually an idealism, a botched, frustrated idealism that that man or woman did not know how to carry, and in the final analysis on pain that they could not abide, pain that was beyond natural strength and magnified by an unusual sensitivity…. Being stupid or average doesn’t make you an alcoholic. I think that as far as we can identify people as limited and average, those people are likely simply not to understand people with unusual problems, not to have them themselves.

One other thought. AA is the product of the 20th century, in the immediate aftermath of the blowup of the Great War and the consequent reevaluation of all things; it is not, however, any longer the newest trend. New adaptions (like Racists Anonymous) are still forthcoming, but the most ruthlessly trendy today are either non-traditional American or ruthlessly individualistic (or, often in a contradictory way, both). Other traditions can indeed take you to wholeness; the trap is follow them only for the sake of chasing after exotic bling—only as much of the Orient as you can get without leaving LA, or the mall, probably without caring too much about immigrants and foreigners and brown people, or their languages or even their written literature. But I digress. The point is that life is not about me me me really, I find, and not wanting homespun garments and a community is not really a good reason for throwing shade on AA.

…. ~All the songs that we used to sing, have gone out the window, as the duckling sang, you know.

I think it would be misleading and unnecessary, not helpful, to actually /delete/ what will (with Melody’s book) end up being six 12-Step books I read completely; I did learn things from them, so why not own that, right. And sometimes people who don’t like AA emote negatively, right. They make noise.

But I’ve decided that after I’m done with the ACA Red Book, I’m going to stop buying (and delete the samples, notes-to-maybe-buy-later or whatever) all 12-Step books. I’m even going to delete the Al-Anon book I’m 25% of the way through, instead of investing another nine hours. Networking through the Steps taught me things about not being isolated, which is good, but like a lot of social interaction left something to be desired; the teaching was sometimes good—I learned about codependence, for example—but also sometimes there can ironically be a huge caretaking and toxic normality thing: the children are hurting themselves! Be good, children! Children, we’re having a meeting! Let’s talk about how we hurt ourselves! Let’s pool our energies and strategize new ways to abuse ourselves! (Focus on the negative, you know.) —And, you know, there’s just so much caretaking and normality in the real world; I don’t need to do it on my own time for semi non-practical reasons for free, when I don’t have to.

But when I first learned about, in a serious way, and learned for the first time, the Steps, it was a big ‘step’ forward for me; it’s just that needs can change like the seasons of our lives.

Addiction

I remember when I first encountered the twelve steps, (e.g. ‘became willing to make amends’), I thought that it didn’t apply to me because I didn’t use alcohol.

*insert pithy saying here, then transition* Recommended.

.........................

The Twelve Steps are great, and are obviously the foundation of much derivative literature. The Twelve Traditions I was expecting to be less useful since I’m not actually an A.A., but I was wrong. They’re really great. We could all use some more humility and step-work in group affairs.