So I think I might actually take a chance and try out a meeting. I found one close by my house that's going on tonight and I think it's a "speaker" meeting and I won't have to talk.
I'm nervous, I've never been to one but everyone on here seems to think they are the greatest so I guess I'll give it a try.
I'm socially nervous all the time anyway so this is going to be a challenge. Walking into a strange place with strange people and hoping that no one really notices me too much. (with no "liquid courage" in me!!)
You words: ------------------------------------------------------------------------ "I'm socially nervous all the time anyway so this is going to be a challenge. Walking into a strange place with strange people and hoping that no one really notices me too much. (with no "liquid courage" in me!!)" ------------------------------------------------------------------------
Just thought I might give you some support for your words that you wrote, they are almost identical to thousands of people before walking into the rooms of AA and the Meeting. When I stop and think about that it makes so much sense. I drank alone, lived in my own hell at the end of my Drinking,.......totally isolated and introverted......then Ah Ha....we stop drinking, stop isolating and no longer, in a very short time no longer introverted.....
AA does that for ALL of us....So happy to hear you are going. Looking so forward to hearing about your first meeting.....
Hugs, and dont know if I was arround when you came in last week, but sure want to say Welcome to our Little family here.
Well I surprised myself and actually DID go to the meeting.
In my head I was picturing a room of maybe 10 or 15 people but there were like 70 or more people. On one hand I thought this was good because of the whole anonymity thing but on the other hand, it felt like these 70 or so people all knew each other and I was the loner.
It wasn't what I expected really at all. I thought it would feel more sincere. It kind of felt like a high school class filled with all the bad kids. (except the older gentlemen) Like they were being forced to get up and read their reports in front of the class. Not really doing it with sincerity. Kind of like wanting to look cool in front of the other kids. Mumbling and laughing and acting like they didn't really care. (they were reading the steps and stuff) They could have been reading a weather report for all I knew. The "speaker" who shared her story was sincere and I really enjoyed that part. All in all it just felt like the meeting was barely holding together at the seems if that makes any sense.
I wanted to love this meeting so much. I wanted to get "hooked" on AA meetings. I don't know what I'm left with after that. I guess it was more of a social gathering then anything even if not for me. I applaud the people who put the meeting together for their efforts and I don't want to sound like a downer. I just didn't like it.
Sorry the meeting didn't turn out the way you thought. Others will be better able to comment, but I believe the fact it was an Open Speaker meeting is the reason for your negative experience. I haven't been to one of those yet. I was going to go to one once, but there was such a huge crowd of people there that I just turned around and went home.
I think you will have a much better experience at a Closed meeting. Especially if it is a Closed Beginners meeting. I just came from one. There is usually around 15 people, with a mix of folks with good sober time and people just getting started. The topic sticks to steps 1-3.
Hopefully, you were able to pick up a schedule and see when the different types of meetings are held. Please don't let this one experience make you hesistant to go back.
Yeah, maybe try a different meeting.... a closed discussion group will be a little more intimate and perhaps "realer". You would be under no obligation to speak if you didn't want to, but you'd get a much more different take on the program in that situation, I think.
Michael
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"I answer to two people, myself and God... and I don't give a s#*% what anyone else thinks of me."-- Cher
Shop around, introduce yourself as new, when people come to talk to you after the meeting, ask around where a good meeting is, for example, in your scenario, since the speaker was sincere, I would have asked the speaker
Meetings come in all flavors, it's possible to find some you like if you persevere enough to shop around
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Build a man a fire and he will be warm for a night, light a man on fire and he will be warm for the rest of his life
These 6 words are to me, the most important 6 words of your post. I felt like this at EVERY meeting I 'dropped into' in early days in AA, and I hated everything and evrybody who ever set foot in the meetings!!!
I didn't like it because I didn't go with an open mind, I had prerequisites in my mind, and NOTHING could ever have come up to them. Basically, what I am trying to say to you, Oblong, is this.. Alcohol IS very cunning, baffling and powerful, and until we explore the phenomenon that is AA recovery and keep an open mind, it is unlikely that we will ever feel 'at home'
Imagine if you can, being in a lifeboat having gone down with a sinking ship. OK, you're lucky, you made the lifeboat, BUT, you look around and listen to the people in the boat with you, they're all sharing their own experience of what happened when the ship went down, some seem to be getting a laugh out of the experience (but to anyone listening closer, it will sound like that tense, nervous almost hysterical laughter which happens when we are in shock, scared, or absolutely terrified in case the lifeboat sinks)
SO what do I do?? Stay in the lifeboat with these morons who I don't like, and with whom I have nothing in common, other than we were all saved from drowning? Do I think, 'Hell, this is NOT what I was expecting- I'm going over the side' OR...
Do I tentatively try to speak to these people, since we are 'all in the same boat' and maybe between us, we can get some camaraderie going to help us along the way?
Believe me, I felt like you did for 7 years before I finally surrendered, and I surrendered by getting right into the middle of the lifeboat (less chance of falling out when you're in the middle)
Don't let that demon on your shoulder talk you out of recovery before giving it your best shot. Together we can make it, but you have to keep an open mind, the shite that you hear which you don't like is also heard for a reason, it helps you decide which way YOU want to go for recovery.
We are all the same, but we are all very different, so please try many meetings, until you find one you like a little more than the rest, then keep going to this and other meetings, and you will find a comfortable seat, I can almost guarantee you will - IF you have an open mind and IF you REALLY want recovery.
For 7 years on the old roller coaster, I bemoaned the fact that I was so different to all those oldies in meetings, but I eventually learned that although I SAID I wanted to stop drinking and recovery, I only WANTED TO want to stop drinking and recovery.
Stick with it, love, we ARE all in the same boat, this is HMS RECOVERY.
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Serenity is Wanting what you have, not having what you want
Always remember non-alcoholic beers are for NON-ALCOHOLICS
Oh God Avril, It's almost as if I was going to use that experience as an excuse not to go back. I didn't consciously tell myself I wasn't going back but when I read your post and you "life boat" example I felt slightly annoyed and realized the reason is because it rang true to me. You are right and I promise to give it another try. I'll check out a different meeting.
One of the first meetings that I went to (not the first, that is my home group now, I clicked with that right off the bat), two guys started insulting each other before the meeting, one guy decided to start calling for a coffee break fifteen minutes in, one guy was plastered and the chair started using funny voices to read from the Big Book.
Someone said to me after that "if you don't like one meeting, find another."
I love meetings now and love trying new ones. Sometimes I'll find one that is something like that bar in the original Star Wars, but since I've finally got some time in and perspective, I kind of like those ones even more, as they are a chuckle! ;)
Each meeting has its own flavor and even the same group changes day to day. I tend to get a negative bug in my ear, so I'll tell here was has been helpful to me: Look for and focus on things that you relate to, rather than what you don't like.
Now I am inspired by any meeting at all. I just went to one I said I'd never go to and it was great, I have totally different perspective now. I have my regular schedule. Really treasure the book study meetings, I do both a 12X12 and Big Book study weekly. It enables me to soak up all the invaluable tools for living a good and sober life. I go to two different women only meetings and really like that. There is a different feeling there. No better than mixed meetings, though. I prefer closed meetings, not that I've ever really noticed any non-alcoholics in the open ones, the closed meetings I go to have a good mix of people, especially those with great recovery for inspiration.
