All Addictions
12-Step Study
Workshop
12-Step Study
Workshop
4/24/2014 0 Comments Recording For April 24, 2014(week 121) 24 April 2014
Big Book Chapter 5 How It Works Page 59: Half measures availed us nothing. We stood at the turning point. We asked HIs protection and care with complete abandon. Every couple of months Stephanie will announce that she will stay on until 9.30am (EST) to allow more time for any questions. Soul work Look up: availed, nothing, abandon, protection, care, complete abandon, scrupulosity. Half measures availed us nothing. We stood at the turning point. We asked HIs protection and care with complete abandon. Q1a) Half fill a glass with water. What is your instinct when you look at it? Do you see it as half-empty or half-full? b) Taking this experience, put it into your life script and ask whether as a philosophy, you have always looked at life as half full or half empty? Half measures availed us nothing. We stood at the turning point. We asked His protection and care with complete abandon. Q2 Write on this sentence. What does half measures mean in this context?
Draw: the triangle of the spiritual ‘we’ over the word. (You in one corner and your fellowship, accountability people, sponsors etc in the other with HP on the top). Write down: We stood at the turning point. 1. We are part of the collective whole (we don’t stand isolated all by ourselves). We are part of a ‘spiritual we’. We are not alone or terminally unique. Asked. 2. We cannot assume that we will be helped unless we ask. We need to put aside our pride (the beginning of all half measures: the great ‘I am’) and have to ask God. Ask for a buddy, for accountability, for prayer.
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4/17/2014 0 Comments Recording For April 17, 2014(week120) 17 April 2014 12 step study workshop
AA 12 x 12 Tradition 2. For our group purpose there is but one ultimate authority- a loving God as He may express himself in our group conscience. Our leaders are but trusted servants; they do not govern. Bottom of page 134 paragraph beginning: ‘This brings us to the question….’ until the end of the tradition. Soul work look up: “connives” The bleeding deacon is one just as surely convinced that the group cannot get along without him, who constantly connives for re-election to office, and who continues to be consumed with self-pity. Q1a) Write on principles above personalities what does that mean? b) When you bump into someone’s controlling personality how do you become a Good Orderly Directed member of the group? c) Do you constantly connive power or re-election to office and continue to be consumed with self, self, self? Happily, most of them survive and live to become elder statesmen. They become the real and permanent leadership of AA. Theirs is the quiet opinion, the sure knowledge and humble example that resolves a crisis. These people sit at the back and pray and wait to be asked. And when they are asked they have wisdom and don’t go on for ages especially about the ‘good old days’, it is the here and now that matters. Q2. Are you an elder statesman yet?
Circle words in bold: This is the experience which has led us to the conclusion that our group conscience, well-advised by its elders, will be in the long run wiser than any leader. Next week back to the Big Book and starting step three. We need a group of god-honoring people in our lives. People who are in recovery and who love us enough to tell us, no, that is not a good idea. Anyone who has themselves as a sponsor has a fool for a sponsor. We need accountability because we can lie to ourselves – denial and rationality – due to our selfishness and self-centredness. Q3. NOTE: Write this down: When you don’t know what to do. Sit down and use your own wisdom. Make sure you are in a quiet environment then on the right-hand side of the page write down your experience strength and hope on the subject. Then empty your head and go to God: I am clueless I have this this and this. I am going to go to you. Listen to God and write down on the left hand side anything that comes to you. Then go to recovered godly people and run it by them before you make a major decision. (It does not have to be whether or not you buy or sell your house). This week practice this way and write down what they say on the left hand side of the page. Then wait a few days and return to back to Quiet Time: ‘I am clueless I have all this but I want your input God.’ Be sure to go to godly people as others may urge you to take care of No 1. No 1 will never be taken care of. You do God’s will and you will be taken care of. That has been Stephanie’s experience after 36years of recovery. Thy will not mine be done. It may not look as imagined, but it works out beautifully. 4/10/2014 0 Comments Recording For April 10, 2014(week 120) 10 April 2014 12-step Study All Addictions Big Book Workshop
AA 12 x 12 Tradition 2. “For our group purpose there is but one ultimate authority – a loving God as He may express Himself in our group conscience. Our leaders are but trusted servants; they do not govern.” From page 133 ‘The founder and his friends channel spirituality to newcomers…’ until end of paragraph on page 134: ‘…Thus throughout A.A. does the group conscience decree the terms upon which its leaders shall serve.’ website: 12stepstudyworkshop.com Send donations to support the website to: Stephanie Whiting P.O. Box 531 North Pembroke MA 02358 Recently Stephanie paid $900 to get an upgrade to the website. The more powerful server will cost the group $100 month and the P.O. Box is $50 a year. Not too many other expenses. Stephanie: ‘I really recommend that you use the website. The group pays for it and I think its pretty good. Have dedicated team of volunteers. On occasion we have paid our webmaster but the majority of the time she does it for free. We’re paying for the storage so if you want to go back and listen to the two years of steps 1 and 2, all the questions, it is all there. Really a remarkable website. Not blowing my own horn as nothing to do with it. It is Linda and Jen and all the others they have trained who can take the credit, not me. ‘Thank you Leslie for stepping up and helping Ashira.’ Soul work Q1. What was the last thing you did in service? What was your true motivation: a) to get a little glory? b) were you really doing it for your Higher Power? Q2. ‘When I start thinking I know how things should be run, I am playing God.’ Do you agree with this? Q3a With your husband/wife/boyfriend/girlfriend/children/colleagues, etc. are you a) trying to have a firm hand of control? b) trying to have healthy boundaries? c) Do you know the difference? Q4. Re-read the paragraph beginning: ‘The founder and his friends…’ a) Do you see yourself in this? b) If you don’t see yourself today can you relate to this in your past? Q5. In no sense whatever can we govern or direct anyone. We are servants. Write on this from your relationships with husband/wife/work colleagues/boss/children/neighbor etc. Q6. ‘These are universal experiences’. What does that mean? [Take it out of our 12-step groups and bring it into every area, family, work, etc.] 4/3/2014 0 Comments Recording For April 3, 2014(week 118) 3 April 2014 12-step All Addictions Big Book Study Workshop12 x 12 Tradition 2 Page 132:
“For our group purpose there is but one ultimate authority – a loving God as He may express Himself in our Group conscience. Our leaders are but trusted servants, they do not govern.” From the start of the tradition until page 133 third paragraph: ‘…Being on the human side, the founder and his friends may bask a little in glory.’ Soul work Look up: vague, nebulous naive, speculative, ethical. Q1. Read some AA history by Googling it. 2nd paragraph page 133 circle: ‘freely given’. Q2. What is your attitude on sharing (breaking your anonymity) wherever you go? Do you feel you have a spiritual and ethical obligation to help others – whether at work, family, church, extended family, in-laws, etc.? Q3. Are you prejudiced towards those who have the same problems that you have recovered from while they have not? write this down: They’re just like me. In the paragraph beginning: ‘John Doe, a good AA…’, circle: ‘He needs other alcoholics as much as they need him.’ Q4a. Draw the recovery triangle and review what it means to you. b) Beside it draw the circle and write what that means to you. c) Put them together and write on how the symbol of the triangle in the circle is truly your life-giving foundation in recovery. Suggestion: To keep in mind that God is the one who keeps us all going, put a copy of the symbol and your explanation in both your Big Book and 12 x 12. underline: ‘hierarchy of service – self-appointed, of course…’ Q5. ‘Being on the human side, the founder and his friends may bask a little in glory.’
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Our live phone meetings are every Tuesday at 8:00 AM EST. The phone number for these live meetings is (712) 775-7031, and the meeting ID number is 714744988#.
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P O Box 531 North Pembroke MA 02358 |
You can listen to our recorded meetings at (641) 715-3900, pin 95666# for our Tuesday Big Book Step Study workshop. You can also hear our Thursday Big Book Study recordings at (641) 715-3900, pin 298913#. These meetings can be accessed at any time.
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