juliaoceania
Posts: 21383
Joined: 4/19/2006
From: Somewhere Over the Rainbow
Status: offline
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quote:
My observation consists of supporting friends at a several NA/GA/AA meetings, less than a dozen in total. In discussions after the meetings closed, I asked a few basic questions. The reception I received was frosty on every occasion. It was made perfectly clear to me that one doesn't question the basic concepts of the program - one follows them unquestioningly. My experience was that questioning (however innocently or otherwise) the basic principles was a strict no-no. Outside of meetings, this frosty response to any analysis has been repeated in many (but not all) casual discussions with AA/NA adherents. I see some of that defensiveness in some of the posts here. When I see this defensiveness I always wonder why it's present.
I have had the same experiences....with the exception of my one friend who has been doing AA for 5 years... she is a Jewish agnostic, btw. I think part of why she was not defensive was because she is an anthropologist too, and she is used to being around people like herself, who question things. She is even aware of the statistics, but she feels the program has helped her, and she stays sober by helping others. I am soooo good with that, and she knows I respect her path.
quote:
And while in theory it's "take it or leave it" in practice every time I asked I was told that to make a full recovery one had to follow the steps diligently. So it's the same for everyone, one size fits all. There's no allowance for human diversity.
And that was at the crux of my issues with NA when I went with my ex hubby, because what I saw in the meetings told me that in practice people followed those steps pretty darn closely, and if they weren't following them "correctly" the group had norming impact on the individual of calling them out on it... "getting real".
quote:
It is said: "If it isn't broken, don't fix it". But a 5% success rate is hardly anything to crow about, and to my mind at least, doesn't qualify as "not broken" overall. A 5% success rate is a 95% failure rate.
I think that is why I have posted so much on this thread. I WANT there to be questioning about this topic because of the people I have lost to addiction. The fact that so many people that were unsuccessful with AA, and feel possibly like they failed the most "successful way" to get sober, when most others fail with it too, isn't right. I think that people should be encouraged to seek out multiple modalities of recovery to see which could help them in their life, but they are not encourage, suggested to, or recommended to find these other paths by adherents of AA...At least I never heard the message that there were multiple paths to sobriety at any NA meeting or AA meeting or literature that I ever came into contact with. Maybe I am wrong about that....
As far as not being an expert on AA, nope, I am not an expert. I would hope that those who are could correct any misunderstandings I have about AA, because I am more than willing to admit I may have had a few misunderstandings. And if I misunderstand, I am sure there are plenty of other people who do too, and by setting me straight, maybe other people can learn something new. I have no ego about being "wrong"....
_____________________________
Once you label me, you negate me ~ Soren Kierkegaard
Reality has a well known Liberal Bias ~ Stephen Colbert
Great minds discuss ideas; Average minds discuss events; Small minds discuss people. Eleanor Roosevelt
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RE: Does religion belong at AA? Fight over God splits T... - 
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