Monday, October 22, 2007

Just about done with this AA business...

I'm filled to the gills with AA service... doing our local newsletter, running our website, trying to attend the various business meetings to make a difference... then getting sidetracked by personal concerns that pull me away from continued change. However, I think my lack of enthusiasm for continuing as an agent for change is due to fundamental defects in the AA "message" and service structure itself.

AA members accuse me of trying to "blow up" AA; my point is to remind AA of its higher self – "the better angels of our nature." AAs keep trying to make the Big Book and Twelve and Twelve into Bibles. Bill W is some sort of prophet, and his chloral hydrate mixture that led to his hypnotic supercalm is reinterpreted as a "spiritual experience." People keep reciting bad science and poor observations as if their repetition will eventually make their bullshit true.

My recipe for change is: "Fuck the Big Book, the Steps, God, the Traditions, Bill and Bob, the General Service Conference, and anything else that is supposed to be true." Nothing is supposed to be true - it is, it isn't, or it's kinda true with some qualifications. I would rather hear what happened to you without your self-editing to bring your truth into alignment with some dead text.

AA is (or should be) a process, the message is the process – not the Steps, Traditions, or Concepts. AA is the regular meeting of alcoholics (and why not addicts?) who share their experience, strength, and hope of a life without mood-altering chemicals.

One of the reasons for my service-junkee lifestyle over the past few years involves an amends I was making with AA. But I believe that amend has been made. Now I will go to AA and serve at my pleasure. I will speak out whenever I hear anyone preaching BS to people who need understanding and not sermons.

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