To All Friends of Bill W. (Especially Those in CA)

I just got back home from a meeting, one that is generally small. In fact, the only people that show up to this particular meeting are me and two other people. Some sundays, we show, and stay thirty minutes just to make sure we'll be there for a newcomer and we'll talk recovery and all. Here's the deal, today, we had two people show up that never have been to this meeting before, so we actually had it. After the meeting was done, me and one of my friends talked about why this meeting never doesn't have people come to it, and he said that at first, it did have a lot of people come to it. And, he was right. It did, at first, have a lot of people come to it. But, people got turned off to the meeting because it was disorganized primarily due to the person who ran it, who ironically enough doesn't go to it anymore.

I will tell you this now, I primarily go to CA meetings- it's just me. While I am an alcoholic, I did more drugs than alcohol in my life time (even though the end of my using career could debate that issue). The sad thing is, in CA, most people do not amass much time, so me, with my 13+ months has reached an echelon that puts me as one of those people in the room that have a responsibility to make sure that that 11th tradition applies to all meetings.

So, when my friend said that that meeting does not attract people, I said the same thing to him, that me and him had that obligation to make it attract to the newcomer. Even more importantly, us as people that have completely the 12 steps, having a spiritual awakening, it is almost our duty to carry God's will out, and be ready to make sure we can reach the most important person in a meeting- the newcomer. It is imperative that we do so, or recovery dies.

The ninth tradition supports this. In our group conscious meetings, we have to prepare ourselves to organize, but not control, the meetings so that when necessary, God's will, and his message, and the solution carried in the Big Book will be openly available to the those ready to receive it.

This was poignantly pointed out to me today at this meeting as one of the two people that showed up for the meeting was a newcomer, as in this was her very first CA meeting. Imagine the implications of no one being there at all. What would she think of CA? What could of possibly happened to her that night? Even if you don't like a meeting, I must remind any addict or alcoholic, after a while, it's not what you get out of a meeting, it's what you bring to it.

In the hearts and minds of every person recovery should be the pain and suffering of the time before their first meeting, or before their first step (their first honest one at least). Upon remembering that, ask yourself, how much are you doing for your AA/CA/CMA/NA etc. community? How many people do you sponsor, how many H&I's do you do, how many meetings do you chair? Yes- I understand that their are families and jobs and so on, and it's important now, more than ever that we are sober, not to neglect them, but I urge you to read page 143, where it reminds us that we must place recovery before all else, for without that, we have no homes and families, no nothing. By placing recovery above all else, we place God above everything. Remember you third and seventh step prayers. Page 77- fit yourself to maximum service to him and your fellows. God. Recovery. Life. If there's no God, there's no recovery. If there's no recovery, there's no life. Don't plan your recovery around your life.

I get frustrated with people who say that they don't have that much time for recovery after they get sober for a while. I hate to remind them that when they were shoving rigs in their arm, sucking on that glass cock, putting lines up their nose, I'm sure they didn't really have much time for anything else. I know for me, in my addiction, my life revolved on how can I plan work, friends, school, all that around my drugs. Now, I find ways so to fit school, friends, family, so I can do a meeting every day, a couple H&I's a week, and sponsor 4 people right now- and for two reasons. One, because I want to. This program saved my life and I genuinely want to pass it along. I had that spiritual awakening and it's an amazing thing. The Sketch of the past is very different than who I am now. Two- I know I have to do this for the rest of my life or this disease will catch up with me. I will die with this disease, I don't have to die from it. I'm sure, all these people with "no time" came find some time that they used to give to drugs, to find at least one hour for a meeting, or an H&I or to talk to a newcomer. Just something to give back, to honor that oath they gave to God in the third and seventh step.

I know, I probably sound like pretentious 23 year old that amounted some sobriety, and you might be right. I might need to pray and drop some of my ego. I just got really frustrated today. I saw that woman, who by the way, to make it even more tragic, brought her kids to the meeting because she had nowhere else to leave them, come to the meeting, and I got scared. I got scared thinking about the meetings out there that are scheduled and no one goes to. And the newcomer shows up, and he's fucked. Fucked. I remember how hard it was for me. I didn't get this program the first time around. I didn't get it the second time around. It took years and pain and suffering and hurt and trauma just like it did for many others in this program. So, maybe my ego is getting into this, but if I can just maybe make one person in this program just a little bit more aware of the newcomer, than I feel... better.

But, it's not about words. It's about action. This is a program of action. It's about doing something. Like Martin Luther King, Jr. said, "In the end, we will not remember the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends." So suit up and show up, and act. Sometimes just being there is all it takes. That's all it took for this woman for her to at least not use for one hour.

And one more quote by MLK I like, I'm going to put here because I find it somewhat apropos: "Faith is about taking the first step, even if you don't see the whole staircase."