| The relative success of the A.A.
program seems to be due to the fact that an alcoholic who no longer
drinks has an exceptional faculty for "reaching" and helping an
uncontrolled drinker. In
simplest form, the A.A. program operates when a recovered alcoholic
passes along the story of his or her own problem drinking, describes
the sobriety he or she has found in A.A., and invites the newcomer
to join the informal Fellowship.
The heart of the suggested program
of personal recovery is contained in Twelve Steps describing the
experience of the earliest members of the Society:
- We admitted we were powerless
over alcohol - that our lives had become unmanageable.
- Came to believe that a Power
greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.
- Made a decision to turn our will
and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him.
- Made a searching and fearless
moral inventory of ourselves.
- Admitted to God, to ourselves
and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.
- Were entirely ready to have God
remove all these defects of character.
- Humbly asked Him to remove our
shortcomings.
- Made a list of all persons we
had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all.
- Made direct amends to such
people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them
or others.
- Continued to take personal
inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it.
- Sought through prayer and
meditation to improve our conscious contact with God as we
understood Him, praying only for knowledge of His will for us and
the power to carry that out.
- Having had a spiritual awakening
as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to
alcoholics and to practice these principles in all our affairs.
Newcomers are not asked to accept
or follow these Twelve Steps in their entirety if they feel
unwilling or unable to do so.
They will usually be asked to keep
an open mind, to attend meetings at which recovered alcoholics
describe their personal experiences in achieving sobriety, and to
read A.A. literature describing and interpreting the A.A. program.
A.A. members will usually emphasize
to newcomers that only
problem drinkers themselves,
individually, can determine whether or not they are in fact
alcoholics.
At the same time, it will be
pointed out that all available medical testimony indicates that
alcoholism is a progressive illness, that it cannot be cured in the
ordinary sense of the term, but that it can be arrested through
total abstinence from alcohol in any form.
Recommended Reading: The
Heart of Addiction: A New Approach to Understanding and
Managing Alcoholism and Other Addictive Behaviors by Lance Dodes.
A Complete At-home Addiction
Recovery Program That Permanently And Naturally Cures An Alcohol Or
Drug Addiction.
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