Resting On Laurels Is Hardly Enough

Look at Step Ten. If you think I mean read the summary of Step Ten off the Twelve Steps shades hanging on the wall or what can be gleaned off of page 59 — I do not.

I mean read the directions for taking Step Ten. They are on page 84 followed by some unbelievably wonderful promises to be had as the result.

Now, here’s where some life changing challenges comes in. We begin to see that practicing these principles in all of our affairs is much more than a week or month long spurt of 4th step inventory writing and an afternoon of fifth step talking.

It means changing the way we approach our daily lives – moment by moment and day by day. It takes commitment – a commitment that is not so hard for those of us who have by now felt a miracle and are experiencing a new flow of power into our lives. We have come to believe and making drastic changes is now possible where before it was not. But it can be impossibly difficult for anyone who has not taken the previous steps and consequently begun to have the spiritual experience promised.

People who “take the steps” through AWOL programs or by reading the 12 & 12 may not get the powerful new flow of Gods grace. If they do, it seems short-lived.

There is no continued growth in effectiveness They “wait”. And they “wait”. And they “wait”. And they read. And they read. And they read. And they discuss. And they discuss. And then they argue over what a spiritual awakening is. Attempting to living off of a spiritual experience had years or months ago is not growth. It’s resting on laurels. And for real alcoholics it is deadly.

There are thousands of us out there going to Big Book meetings, and Twelve and Twelve meetings – reading Twelve and Twelve essays, the stories in the back of the Big Book – who are so self centered that we have resorted to turning Dr. O. into a demigod and page 449/417 into a mantra for feeling good. Many of us would rather savor some of the fine insights of someone like Emmet Fox than perform daily Step Ten exercises throughout the day and engage in nightly inventories as prescribed in the Twelve Steps.

We think that we have the AA Program in our lives. And we don’t. And we lie about it to others.

We rubber-stamp our half-assed actions with “to the best of our abilities” and it isn’t. And we are still crazy – still suffering from the slings and arrows that life shoots at us, still have financial fears and worries and are telling newcomers that, “This Program Works” when it is apparently that for many of us it isn’t.

But we have an inspection sticker on the car and a job and so we brag – as if these have been fruit that matters of sobriety. To the newcomer without a sticker, or a car for that matter, this seems an improvement over his own lot – and for a spell we are attractive – until the next first drink hits that newcomer like a freight train hits a stalled car on the track.

Then we tell him, “You must not have really wanted sobriety” or to “Double up on your meetings.”

We are full of shit!

And so we figure it must be some lifelong, never quite get there, hardly noticeable but it must be so experience. Let’s go with spiritual experiences of the educational variety – yeah, that’s the ticket. And then we continue to struggle and fight through life. If we are real alcoholics we will probably relapse and come back – and relapse and come back over and over. If we are not real alcoholics we might stay dry and crazy and figure we must be recoverING because we have been attending all these dammed meetings and haven’t had a drink – even though it has been on our own willpower that this is so.

We are nuts. We are dishonest. And we are killing people.

It is no wonder that some people leave AA feeling like it has been a CULT experience. IT HAS BEEN! We have allowed what probably began as a small clutch of non-alcoholic, hard drinking, problem drinkers evolve into a glut of alternative solutions masquerading as AA and it is now so top heavy that it has weighed down the entire fellowship to the point were interlopers and generations of non-AA thought has dragged the Fellowship into a throw-back of its former self. We are made out to be a laughing stock.

If only we would do what real alcoholics have to do in order to recover- if we wouldn’t change the words of the Big Book and call it “semantics” as if “semantics” is an excuse to re-write the directions to fit middle-of-the-road solutions more agreeable to addictions counselors and treatment center “for profit” philosophies – their apodictic tone in direct conflict with AA’s Big Book experience. Then we might see some of the Step Ten promises come true.

They have come true and for that I am truly grateful that these 12 promises and of course the 9th step amends promises have become operative in my life.

• And we have ceased fighting anything or anyone – even alcohol.
• For by this time sanity will have returned.
• We will seldom be interested in liquor.
• If tempted, we recoil from it as from a hot flame.
• We react sanely and normally, and we will find that this has happened automatically.
• We will see that our new attitude toward liquor has been given us without any thought or effort on our part. It just comes! That is the miracle of it.
• We are not fighting it, neither are we avoiding temptation.
• We feel as though we had been placed in a position of neutrality – safe and protected.
• We have not even sworn off.
• Instead, the problem has been removed.
• It does not exist for us.
• We are neither cocky nor are we afraid.

Not too shabby, huh? This is my experience and these are all delivered every single day, when I maintain my spiritual fitness through the daily 10th step practices prescribed by the first one hundred alcoholics.

So what do you want to do? Do you want and read and quote Emmett Fox – or do you want to recover from alcoholism and show others how to do the same?

Peace,

Danny S

Resting On Laurels Is Hardly Enough

Look at Step Ten. If you think I mean read the summary of Step Ten off the Twelve Steps shades hanging on the wall or what can be gleaned off of page 59 — I do not.

I mean read the directions for taking Step Ten. They are on page 84 followed by some unbelievably wonderful promises to be had as the result.

Now, here’s where some life changing challenges comes in. We begin to see that practicing these principles in all of our affairs is much more than a week or month long spurt of 4th step inventory writing and an afternoon of fifth step talking.

It means changing the way we approach our daily lives – moment by moment and day by day. It takes commitment – a commitment that is not so hard for those of us who have by now felt a miracle and are experiencing a new flow of power into our lives. We have come to believe and making drastic changes is now possible where before it was not. But it can be impossibly difficult for anyone who has not taken the previous steps and consequently begun to have the spiritual experience promised.

People who “take the steps” through AWOL programs or by reading the 12 & 12 may not get the powerful new flow of Gods grace. If they do, it seems short-lived.

There is no continued growth in effectiveness They “wait”. And they “wait”. And they “wait”. And they read. And they read. And they read. And they discuss. And they discuss. And then they argue over what a spiritual awakening is. Attempting to living off of a spiritual experience had years or months ago is not growth. It’s resting on laurels. And for real alcoholics it is deadly.

There are thousands of us out there going to Big Book meetings, and Twelve and Twelve meetings – reading Twelve and Twelve essays, the stories in the back of the Big Book – who are so self centered that we have resorted to turning Dr. O. into a demigod and page 449/417 into a mantra for feeling good. Many of us would rather savor some of the fine insights of someone like Emmet Fox than perform daily Step Ten exercises throughout the day and engage in nightly inventories as prescribed in the Twelve Steps.

We think that we have the AA Program in our lives. And we don’t. And we lie about it to others.

We rubber-stamp our half-assed actions with “to the best of our abilities” and it isn’t. And we are still crazy – still suffering from the slings and arrows that life shoots at us, still have financial fears and worries and are telling newcomers that, “This Program Works” when it is apparently that for many of us it isn’t.

But we have an inspection sticker on the car and a job and so we brag – as if these have been fruit that matters of sobriety. To the newcomer without a sticker, or a car for that matter, this seems an improvement over his own lot – and for a spell we are attractive – until the next first drink hits that newcomer like a freight train hits a stalled car on the track.

Then we tell him, “You must not have really wanted sobriety” or to “Double up on your meetings.”

We are full of shit!

And so we figure it must be some lifelong, never quite get there, hardly noticeable but it must be so experience. Let’s go with spiritual experiences of the educational variety – yeah, that’s the ticket. And then we continue to struggle and fight through life. If we are real alcoholics we will probably relapse and come back – and relapse and come back over and over. If we are not real alcoholics we might stay dry and crazy and figure we must be recoverING because we have been attending all these dammed meetings and haven’t had a drink – even though it has been on our own willpower that this is so.

We are nuts. We are dishonest. And we are killing people.

It is no wonder that some people leave AA feeling like it has been a CULT experience. IT HAS BEEN! We have allowed what probably began as a small clutch of non-alcoholic, hard drinking, problem drinkers evolve into a glut of alternative solutions masquerading as AA and it is now so top heavy that it has weighed down the entire fellowship to the point were interlopers and generations of non-AA thought has dragged the Fellowship into a throw-back of its former self. We are made out to be a laughing stock.

If only we would do what real alcoholics have to do in order to recover- if we wouldn’t change the words of the Big Book and call it “semantics” as if “semantics” is an excuse to re-write the directions to fit middle-of-the-road solutions more agreeable to addictions counselors and treatment center “for profit” philosophies – their apodictic tone in direct conflict with AA’s Big Book experience. Then we might see some of the Step Ten promises come true.

They have come true and for that I am truly grateful that these 12 promises and of course the 9th step amends promises have become operative in my life.

• And we have ceased fighting anything or anyone – even alcohol.
• For by this time sanity will have returned.
• We will seldom be interested in liquor.
• If tempted, we recoil from it as from a hot flame.
• We react sanely and normally, and we will find that this has happened automatically.
• We will see that our new attitude toward liquor has been given us without any thought or effort on our part. It just comes! That is the miracle of it.
• We are not fighting it, neither are we avoiding temptation.
• We feel as though we had been placed in a position of neutrality – safe and protected.
• We have not even sworn off.
• Instead, the problem has been removed.
• It does not exist for us.
• We are neither cocky nor are we afraid.

Not too shabby, huh? This is my experience and these are all delivered every single day, when I maintain my spiritual fitness through the daily 10th step practices prescribed by the first one hundred alcoholics.

So what do you want to do? Do you want and read and quote Emmett Fox – or do you want to recover from alcoholism and show others how to do the same?

Peace,

Danny S

Click on "START"

What do you do after clicking the “Start” button?

You begin clicking through some more – going through your Programs – getting work done. Right? You wouldn’t pay $1,000 for a Start Button that didn’t take you further than that – would you?

But if you don’t click beyond “Start” – nothing more happens – except that you’ve STARTED. All you get is an expanded menu of possibilities (Suggestions?)

When this whole business about “Higher Power” and “Power greater than ourselves” is discussed by the co-authors of “Alcoholics Anonymous” – does anyone find it as interesting and as pertinent as I do that these concepts are prefaced and qualified with other expressions like “In the beginning” and “To make a start”?

Once we go beyond Step Two – these concepts are completely dropped and the power always comes from God. It’s a God of our own understanding – that makes sense to us – but God all the same.

Many of us who chose NOT to participate in the full Program portion – the Twelve Steps – never get beyond the “Start” or the “Beginning” – and we all know what happens to real alcoholics who fail to get beyond the beginning – they drink.

To WIT: Jim the salesman, Fred the Accountant, me, (I did) maybe you too, and don’t forget those with whom we work with daily who balk – perhaps on amends, meditation, prayer, inventories and sponsoring.

It is common for example to hear folks say “I’ve taken the steps” – but what they do not say is that they HAVE NOT completed their amends and/or don’t take others through them. (I know. . . I know . . . we have ALL been told that it’s OK to take YEARS to finish amends. Tell that to the guy who just called me last week after a three month tear – who just took that advice he heard in “the rooms”)

Many I’ve seen and with whom I’ve worked – drink eventually on unfinished amends. Even worse – until till they complete amends, present conflicting pictures of recovery with their own life as an example. They are often still experiencing the emotional and spiritual difficulties associated with untreated alcoholism. All the while telling the newcomer “I’ve done it” flashing sobriety dates as the proof!

I notice this to be particularly the case with folks who seek out alternative heavily “Buffered” methods of “Step taking” like AWOL. The AA Program, unadulterated, is just too tall an order and they cannot go through with it.

You’ll see this when people qualify their “program” by mentioning their sober time – usually under the guise of giving hope to the newcomer. I know that when I want to give hope the newcomer it’s telling him how I recovered and I bring him to my home to see how I live – NOT try to impress them with how much time I’ve got. There are WAY too many non-alcoholic hard drinkers with whom the real alcoholic newcomer DOES NOT IDENTIFY – playing THAT card, diluting any positive effect that may have.

The old “If I can do it – so can you” idea is just plain ineffective. It’s like, “SO WHAT?” “My sister hasn’t had a drink in that long either — and she’s a freakin‘ mess! But if that’s all you know, I suppose that’s all you have to offer – a “Good word” is a hell of a lot easier than “Good work”.

Does anyone REALLY THINK that some poor slob about to pull that steering wheel and shoot into the parking lot of the liquor store is going to suddenly get stricken sober and get a boost of sudden WILLPOWER with the thought, “Wait a minute, old Pete has 30 years – I can do it too,” -and then steer straight past that store?

If they do – then they DON’T understand alcoholism.

Yeah, I guess they do think that. PHULEEZE! Hard drinkers might be capable of such a thing – but I don’t identify with them at ALL!

I am sure most of us remember the from Paul Simon album title, “Still Crazy After All These Years.”

It ain’t pretty. (Down-right ugly!)

Peace,

Danny S

AWOL IS NOT AA – The Truth

If you love “POP-AA” – then you will ADORE AWOL.

If you live in the New England area this article may be of particular interest to you. Over the last decade alcoholics in the New England area have begun to resort to an OVEREATING Program of Twelve Step Recovery. Why has AA failed these people? Why have they had to go outside of the AA Fellowship to “take the steps”? And how come many of them don’t even know that AWOL is not designed for alcoholics? Oh and if you are an AWOL “grad” and go around AA telling folks in AA meetings that AWOL is AA and that you’ve “done the steps” – be prepared for an intense inventory tonight. You will need it. You are about to get your ass spanked.

If I told you that there was another Fellowship – a non-alcoholic Fellowship – which had adopted The Twelve Steps for their own purposes (A problem other than alcoholism – but a serious problem – deserving of a treatment non-the-less) and that this fine, non-alcoholic Fellowship had designed a new method of taking the steps for their own “Members” – what would you say?

I know what I would say.

I would say, “Bully for them!” That is what I DO say! If our Twelve Step wholesale method of getting to God and recovering can help others overcome their problems too – then it’s a beautiful thing! ” . . . we are sure that our way of living has its advantages for all.” (Forward to the First Edition)

There are, in fact, very many such Fellowships out there – modeling their recovery methods straight from our Twelve Steps. The best known I suppose would be Al-Anon, NA, CA, OA, GA – there are oodles more of them. Some are listed here: 12

Are you with me so far? Good.

Now . . . . what if I told you that one of those “Non-alcoholic” fellowships – say one which dealt with people with food addictions (not alcoholism) – had developed a schematic for their own use, straight out of the Big Book – The Twelve Steps – and additionally provided diet regimes etc – renamed their Twelve Step method to say, G.O.D. (Good Orderly Direction?) and that thousands if not millions had been helped with their food addictions and become healthier and more prolific – perhaps even happy joyous and free? Still good, no? Of course!

Now here comes the punch line. I call it a punch line because it so closely resembles a joke it isn’t funny – albeit a cruel one:

Now what if I told you that folks who call themselves alcoholics and “Members” of AA, the originating Fellowship of all this – the Fellowship which named itself after the book “Alcoholics Anonymous, which contains the pure, unadulterated version of the Twelve Step instructions designed specifically for alcoholics – would rather follow the G.O.D. method than the Big Book method of taking the steps?

It has happened. And it’s not funny. It has become a virtual sub-cult right within the AA Fellowship itself!

. . . it is an adaptation of The Twelve Steps that has gone from from alcoholics to food addicts and now back to alcoholics again! Do you really we want to put your life or death that kind of dilution and third degree of separation from the AA Program?

There is a fine Fellowship know as Greysheeters which have a system of step taking – they call AWOL (A WAY OF LIFE) which AA’s in this area (New England) use to take the Steps INSTEAD of the Big Book! These AA’s do not necessarily join Greysheeters. They just get together and take the Greysheeters facsimile version (AWOL) of the Twelve Step instructions.

Few if any of these AA’s know that AWOL is TWICE REMOVED from AA’s 12 step procedure and actually THINK that they are using the AA method of recovery in taking the steps the AWOL way.

Let me repeat that: They think AWOL is AA!

What is wrong with this picture?

I know many people who just WILL NOT follow the Steps out of the Big Book – so they will eschew their own Big Book and instead gravitate toward sponsors and Groups that have managed to re-invent watered down version of the steps – perhaps using a 12 & 12 – which ARE NOT the instructions so there is total freestyle 12 step-ability available.

OR they will enroll in an alternate facsimile with an adaptation like AWOL which is just about the SICKEST most watered down and most sinister versions of the Twelve Steps that I have ever seen – for alcoholics anyway. I could NEVER stay sober and recovered using AWOL! All of the key ingredients that help maintain recovery have been filtered out! And so it probably should – it’s for people with FOOD PROBLEMS! Not ALKIES!

AWOL purports to be “THE STEPS” out of the Big Book – and it isn’t. All you need do is get a copy of it and read it for yourself. IF you are familiar with the Big Book’s directions you will not believe how middle-of-the-road AWOL is. Unfortunately many folks do not have the experience with the Big Books Twelve Steps to make that evaluation, so they believe it. It is a LIE!

I can hear it now, “Well, AWOL gave me the support I needed”

SUPPORT? YOUR needs? Sorry but “your” needs and “support” is not what the Twelves Steps are about. They are about Finding God, serving Him, HEALING – MIRACLES and helping other to do the same. But AWOL is prefect for self-centered folks wishing to remain that way – the Big Book is the tool that takes all of that selfishness away – and what self-serving drunk wants to do that? Only a few.

AWOL may be very suitable and successful for food addicts but it is horribly deficient for the real alcoholic. It is an attractive facsimile though – and since it’s easier folks gravitate toward it to claim their “I TOOK THE STEPS” credentials. And they have done no such thing

It’s not Greysheeters fault. They GOT what THEY need! God bless ‘em and Bravo!

But for an alcoholic, AWOL is an absolute half/measure – just about the most awful thing I have ever seen tossed into an already MOTR* fellowship.

So all these still-crazies stand up in meetings – still suffering from untreated alcoholism OR not suffering from it at all because they never had it to begin with saying “I’VE taken the steps” – still un-recovered – still crazy as loons and horrible examples of what the steps really do for real alcoholics who adopt and practice it’s principles.

I am waiting for someone to break out in tears of gratitude from a podium one day saying “AWOL SAVED MY LIFE”. I am waiting to hear from an AWOL alumni, those ever important words, “I have recovered”. But so far I have never heard it. And I doubt I ever will.

Yet folks up here in the Boston and Cape Cod area will promote another Fellowship’s twelve Step method like AWOL from podiums absolutely unchallenged. Do they realize the harm they do to our Fellowship and to newcomers when they do this? I doubt it. I don’t know if they even care.

Please . . . the next time someone says “Wanna do an AWOL?” (“Again” in many cases) remember that it is an adaptation of The Twelve Steps that has gone from from alcoholics to food addicts and now back to alcoholics again! Do you really we want to put your life or death that kind of dilution and third degree of separation from the AA Program?

What happened to keep it simple? Good Grief!

It is no wonder the AWOL sub-cult folks – in AA – still sound and act like newcomers – middle-of-the-road AA hobbyists.

Folks if you seek a solution to your alcoholism – stick with with the genuine article! If you have a problem with food – maybe try Greysheeters AWOL. Apparently they have a great diet system (Distributed on Grey “sheets” I understand) and “A Way Of Life” – A.W.O.L.

But if you want to recover from alcoholism and be apart of AA – we in have a “Design For Living” and a “way of life that is incredibly more wonderful as time passes” that results when we follow and live it – on, that doesn’t end when the AWOL sessions complete and then leaves you to your own devices and to the sloganeering and lip-service crap doled out by shitty-assed sponsorship.

If you are an alcoholic and live in New England and want to take the Twelve Steps – PLEASE stay away from AWOL or any alcoholic who embraces it. That person will kill you. Get a hold of me and I personally will either take you through the Steps of I will find you someone who will. That is a promise.

SEE: “AWOL and Other Ways”

Peace,

Danny S

* Middle-of-the-road

AWOL IS NOT AA – The Truth

If you love “POP-AA” – then you will ADORE AWOL.

If you live in the New England area this article may be of particular interest to you. Over the last decade alcoholics in the New England area have begun to resort to an OVEREATING Program of Twelve Step Recovery. Why has AA failed these people? Why have they had to go outside of the AA Fellowship to “take the steps”? And how come many of them don’t even know that AWOL is not designed for alcoholics? Oh and if you are an AWOL “grad” and go around AA telling folks in AA meetings that AWOL is AA and that you’ve “done the steps” – be prepared for an intense inventory tonight. You will need it. You are about to get your ass spanked.

If I told you that there was another Fellowship – a non-alcoholic Fellowship – which had adopted The Twelve Steps for their own purposes (A problem other than alcoholism – but a serious problem – deserving of a treatment non-the-less) and that this fine, non-alcoholic Fellowship had designed a new method of taking the steps for their own “Members” – what would you say?

I know what I would say.

I would say, “Bully for them!” That is what I DO say! If our Twelve Step wholesale method of getting to God and recovering can help others overcome their problems too – then it’s a beautiful thing! ” . . . we are sure that our way of living has its advantages for all.” (Forward to the First Edition)

There are, in fact, very many such Fellowships out there – modeling their recovery methods straight from our Twelve Steps. The best known I suppose would be Al-Anon, NA, CA, OA, GA – there are oodles more of them. Some are listed here: 12

Are you with me so far? Good.

Now . . . . what if I told you that one of those “Non-alcoholic” fellowships – say one which dealt with people with food addictions (not alcoholism) – had developed a schematic for their own use, straight out of the Big Book – The Twelve Steps – and additionally provided diet regimes etc – renamed their Twelve Step method to say, G.O.D. (Good Orderly Direction?) and that thousands if not millions had been helped with their food addictions and become healthier and more prolific – perhaps even happy joyous and free? Still good, no? Of course!

Now here comes the punch line. I call it a punch line because it so closely resembles a joke it isn’t funny – albeit a cruel one:

Now what if I told you that folks who call themselves alcoholics and “Members” of AA, the originating Fellowship of all this – the Fellowship which named itself after the book “Alcoholics Anonymous, which contains the pure, unadulterated version of the Twelve Step instructions designed specifically for alcoholics – would rather follow the G.O.D. method than the Big Book method of taking the steps?

It has happened. And it’s not funny. It has become a virtual sub-cult right within the AA Fellowship itself!

. . . it is an adaptation of The Twelve Steps that has gone from from alcoholics to food addicts and now back to alcoholics again! Do you really we want to put your life or death that kind of dilution and third degree of separation from the AA Program?

There is a fine Fellowship know as Greysheeters which have a system of step taking – they call AWOL (A WAY OF LIFE) which AA’s in this area (New England) use to take the Steps INSTEAD of the Big Book! These AA’s do not necessarily join Greysheeters. They just get together and take the Greysheeters facsimile version (AWOL) of the Twelve Step instructions.

Few if any of these AA’s know that AWOL is TWICE REMOVED from AA’s 12 step procedure and actually THINK that they are using the AA method of recovery in taking the steps the AWOL way.

Let me repeat that: They think AWOL is AA!

What is wrong with this picture?

I know many people who just WILL NOT follow the Steps out of the Big Book – so they will eschew their own Big Book and instead gravitate toward sponsors and Groups that have managed to re-invent watered down version of the steps – perhaps using a 12 & 12 – which ARE NOT the instructions so there is total freestyle 12 step-ability available.

OR they will enroll in an alternate facsimile with an adaptation like AWOL which is just about the SICKEST most watered down and most sinister versions of the Twelve Steps that I have ever seen – for alcoholics anyway. I could NEVER stay sober and recovered using AWOL! All of the key ingredients that help maintain recovery have been filtered out! And so it probably should – it’s for people with FOOD PROBLEMS! Not ALKIES!

AWOL purports to be “THE STEPS” out of the Big Book – and it isn’t. All you need do is get a copy of it and read it for yourself. IF you are familiar with the Big Book’s directions you will not believe how middle-of-the-road AWOL is. Unfortunately many folks do not have the experience with the Big Books Twelve Steps to make that evaluation, so they believe it. It is a LIE!

I can hear it now, “Well, AWOL gave me the support I needed”

SUPPORT? YOUR needs? Sorry but “your” needs and “support” is not what the Twelves Steps are about. They are about Finding God, serving Him, HEALING – MIRACLES and helping other to do the same. But AWOL is prefect for self-centered folks wishing to remain that way – the Big Book is the tool that takes all of that selfishness away – and what self-serving drunk wants to do that? Only a few.

AWOL may be very suitable and successful for food addicts but it is horribly deficient for the real alcoholic. It is an attractive facsimile though – and since it’s easier folks gravitate toward it to claim their “I TOOK THE STEPS” credentials. And they have done no such thing

It’s not Greysheeters fault. They GOT what THEY need! God bless ‘em and Bravo!

But for an alcoholic, AWOL is an absolute half/measure – just about the most awful thing I have ever seen tossed into an already MOTR* fellowship.

So all these still-crazies stand up in meetings – still suffering from untreated alcoholism OR not suffering from it at all because they never had it to begin with saying “I’VE taken the steps” – still un-recovered – still crazy as loons and horrible examples of what the steps really do for real alcoholics who adopt and practice it’s principles.

I am waiting for someone to break out in tears of gratitude from a podium one day saying “AWOL SAVED MY LIFE”. I am waiting to hear from an AWOL alumni, those ever important words, “I have recovered”. But so far I have never heard it. And I doubt I ever will.

Yet folks up here in the Boston and Cape Cod area will promote another Fellowship’s twelve Step method like AWOL from podiums absolutely unchallenged. Do they realize the harm they do to our Fellowship and to newcomers when they do this? I doubt it. I don’t know if they even care.

Please . . . the next time someone says “Wanna do an AWOL?” (“Again” in many cases) remember that it is an adaptation of The Twelve Steps that has gone from from alcoholics to food addicts and now back to alcoholics again! Do you really we want to put your life or death that kind of dilution and third degree of separation from the AA Program?

What happened to keep it simple? Good Grief!

It is no wonder the AWOL sub-cult folks – in AA – still sound and act like newcomers – middle-of-the-road AA hobbyists.

Folks if you seek a solution to your alcoholism – stick with with the genuine article! If you have a problem with food – maybe try Greysheeters AWOL. Apparently they have a great diet system (Distributed on Grey “sheets” I understand) and “A Way Of Life” – A.W.O.L.

But if you want to recover from alcoholism and be apart of AA – we in have a “Design For Living” and a “way of life that is incredibly more wonderful as time passes” that results when we follow and live it – on, that doesn’t end when the AWOL sessions complete and then leaves you to your own devices and to the sloganeering and lip-service crap doled out by shitty-assed sponsorship.

If you are an alcoholic and live in New England and want to take the Twelve Steps – PLEASE stay away from AWOL or any alcoholic who embraces it. That person will kill you. Get a hold of me and I personally will either take you through the Steps of I will find you someone who will. That is a promise.

SEE: “AWOL and Other Ways”

Peace,

Danny S

* Middle-of-the-road