Reach Out To Others
We come into recovery feeling worthless, unloved and unlovable. We go to our first recovery meetings and, if things are as they should be at these meetings, someone will say hello to us and take an interest in who we are and say they are pleased we have come to ‘the right place’. Although we are feeling bad about ourselves, they genuinely mean it and that should come across to us. Reach out to these people when you are in recovery.
Recovery Progresses
As our recovery progresses, we will begin to feel better about ourselves and be able to extend the same welcome to other people. This is an important aspect of how the fellowship of Alcoholics Anonymous (and other such 12 Step fellowships such as Cocaine Anonymous, Narcotics Anonymous, Gamblers Anonymous, Overeaters anonymous etc) work. We reach out to others and share our experiences, strength and hope with them (if appropriate at the time). We ‘keep what we have by giving it away’ to use another recovery cliché.
Help Others
However bad we might be feeling on any particular day, the chances are there is someone feeling worse who can benefit from our support – and by supporting them we will feel better about ourselves. I am a firm believer in us all having a particular journey to do and us all having valuable lessons that we can learn from each stage of our journey.
My early journey was very up and down. I knew I had an alcohol problem for many years but for many of these years what I got from drinking seemed to be more than was taken away. I had certain rules about the times of day and how much I would drink. Nonetheless things got progressively worse, my marriage broke down and I began to break my own rules – which was the beginning of the end for me. In 2005 I went to a lovely place for a detox. I got sober, recognised I was happier sober and clung on to my sobriety for a few months. However, as I had no programme to follow and had not dealt with why I drank nor learned about my illness, I relapsed – inevitably. There then followed 3 years of me stopping and starting drinking during which I found AA.
Reach Out and Keep Coming Back
I became somewhat infamous as I took on board the advice from the meeting ‘keep coming back’ but kept stopping drinking and starting again. The fact I only attended one meeting a week probably did not give me much of a chance but personally I also needed more than this (proper rehab) to finally kick start my ‘proper’ recovery. Whenever I went to a meeting, I knew that what I heard made sense and people were always welcoming. They even invited me out on a few occasions. I probably just wasn’t ready to finally give up.
When I was and finally put the drink down, I had been through a particular experience – a 3 year association with AA but I finally got it. So now I can particularly reach out to serial relapsers and tell them to keep trying because it is still possible to get recovery in the end.
We can all use our individual experiences to identify with others, help them and so help ourselves – Step 12 in action, carrying the message to other alcoholics and addicts.
