Even If I Don't Know The Question

barisax · Senior Member

Even If I Don't Know The Question

AGO · MIP Old Timer

I agree, I would also add one thing, without the program outlined in the book, meetings alone don't do me any good either, otherwise I am just forming opinions about an experience I never had.

The spiritual awakening and the promises I get from working each step

It's like trying to participate in a book club without ever having read the book, yeah I will have a lot of opinions about the book, but since I have never read it, had it explained to me, and taken the actions described in it, none of them will be my own.

For example, if the book was about baking brownies, and I never read the recipe nor cooked the brownies and ate them, all I am doing is listening to other people describe what their brownies look like, tasted like, smelled like, and when I talk about the brownies, I have no actual experience with cooking brownies, so all I am passing on is hearsay, rumor, and opinion, and if I am in a roomful of people who also haven't cooked the brownies, and don't know what brownies smell or taste like, we are all just giving opinions about an experience we never had, which is what happens when we eat those brownies, how they taste and smell.

Sadly enough after awhile of this all we have is a roomful of people who have never eaten brownies telling other people how to bake brownies, and then the idea comes about we don't actually need brownies, that we can just sit around and talk about baking brownies, until the man comes who is starving and actually needs that brownie to stay alive and no one knows how to bake brownies or even recognizes this man will die without that broownie and just tells him all he needs to do is discuss baking brownies and they are surprised when he starves to death.

I needed my own brownie to stay alive, I couldn't stay alive just hearing about someone else's brownies, so I learned how to cook brownies from someone who had actual experience with cooking and eating those brownies, so then I cooked my own, no one could cook it for me, now I go to meetings to share my brownies and offer to show how others can get brownies by cooking them as well

Love, discussion and hugs are great, and very very needed, but some of us will literally die without cooking and partaking of that brownie contained in that recipe, I keep going to meetings to show others how they can cook their own brownie too, that also keeps my brownies fresh by me having to bake myself fresh ones, brownies only last a day or two, i can't survive on yesterday's brownies, I tried that, didn't work.

-- Edited by AGO on Monday 10th of May 2010 05:24:05 PM

mikef · MIP Old Timer

Thanks for the share Barisax.I also broke down in middle of my 5th step when I took it thinking how much I loved my best friend(different he shot himself in the head from being unable to break loose of his addiction)I was with him the night before ,we partied till 4:00 a.m. and I hugged him good night(came to the next day to a phone call that he killed himself,I was still semi comatose myself from night before..) and next time I saw him I was carrying his coffin to the grave.I actually still havent completely gotten over it.(even when my father died the pain wasnt the same,there was no room left for the deep pain I felt at his loss,I used to actually feel a little guilty about that as I loved my father deeply also,the first cut is the deepest?) I have forgiven myself and him for things that two people who love each other do to each other,and I often wonder but deep inside know ,that there was nothing I could do except,keep my memories of him alive,do 9th step work by going to his gravesite,pray for his family,maybe even write a letter to him and put it in a drawer. Only God knows why I am here and he is not(did I do the work and he didn't?).I do not try and second guess it and do all I can to reach out to to next individual,carry the message of recovery and be available when needed. God's will is also what I strive to do each and every day with a humble heart and a greatful spirit, We are all responsible for our own recovery but at times we do think "if only.....you..touched my spirit thanks,,,,,,, smile

,

barisax · Senior Member

AGO wrote:

I want my brownie, so I cooked my own, no one could cook it for me, I go to meetings to share my brownies and how others can get brownies by cooking them as well

So what meetings do you go to? I want some brownies!

Barisax

AGO · MIP Old Timer

barisax wrote:

AGO wrote:

I want my brownie, so I cooked my own, no one could cook it for me, I go to meetings to share my brownies and how others can get brownies by cooking them as well

So what meetings do you go to? I want some brownies!

Barisax

you in Ca?

I could meet you at the 6 Oclock meeting of "The Traditionals"

it's a blast, it's a bunch of stick in the mud codgers with a 3 minute egg timer that get descended on by the cast from "Welcome back Kotter" The "Sharing and Caring" Group who actually encourage cross talk and yell at the speaker as he is speaking in their meetings.

The dichotomy makes for one of the funnest meetings I have ever attended, I laugh so hard tears run down my face, and truthfully there is good sobriety.

barisax · Senior Member

AGO wrote:

you in Ca?

Not at the moment. I hopefully will be in a couple of months. I will be visiting both LA and SF and taking my official honeymoon one year after the wedding.

Barisax

AGO · MIP Old Timer

barisax wrote:

AGO wrote:

you in Ca?

Not at the moment. I hopefully will be in a couple of months. I will be visiting both LA and SF and taking my official honeymoon one year after the wedding.

Barisax

gimme a holler when you are in Sf if you want to catch a meeting or need a tour guide, or would like a list of some "don't miss for any reason" things in the bay area outside SF (Mt Tam, Muir Woods, Stinson, Bolinas, The Ferry to Tiburon, Sausalito) you can PM me for my email, I am actually having an AA couple from England stay at my house for 3 days in July I met online, on another site I frequent with much higher volume there are so many people we are actually able to meet f2f, send each other sponsees etc, it's more hands on, but admitedly, less love

I'm a lot more laid back IRL then I appear on online at AA forums actually, I don't talk much AA IRL if that makes sense, and for some reason my posts come across really hard edged and sometimes even antagonistic in print, when in fact I am just blunt and state truth as I see it.

-- Edited by AGO on Monday 10th of May 2010 02:31:36 PM

barisax · Senior Member

I've been to the Marina Dock a few times but not since 06. Also the Alano Club West in San Jose/Willow Glen, a few in Los Gatos area. I don't have an itinerary yet but we'll be working on it in the coming weeks.

Barisax

AGO · MIP Old Timer

barisax wrote:

I've been to the Marina Dock a few times but not since 06. Also the Alano Club West in San Jose/Willow Glen, a few in Los Gatos area. I don't have an itinerary yet but we'll be working on it in the coming weeks.

Barisax

I used to go to the dock, one of my favorite meetings was a few blocks away, Union Steiner on Friday Nights, that was, ummm...10? years ago

From SF my stomping ground is North, from there according to the map we can look "down" on those "southerners"

hehe joking

Mandy123 · Member

barisax wrote:

AGO wrote:

I want my brownie, so I cooked my own, no one could cook it for me, I go to meetings to share my brownies and how others can get brownies by cooking them as well

So what meetings do you go to? I want some brownies!

Barisax

Barisax,
If you ever make it up to the beautiful norhwest let me know. I bake cookies, brownies, banana bread and my Challah for my meetings and share with the AA meetings too :)

Mandy

ljc · MIP Old Timer

Very sorry to hear about your friend.

I lost a couple friends in the last few years. Sure, they stopped going to meetings, but that isnt what killed them. They forgot they were powerless over alcohol. They could not and would not see Our way of life.

And its really not a matter of 'better them than me'. Its more like ... there but for the Grace of God go I .

jonijoni1 · MIP Old Timer

" Without meetings, there is no AA for me."
--------------------------------------------------

That, barisax, is the CRUXX of what my life is all about, at this moment in it. And by the Grace of God may it stay that way. No small wonder that I myself wandered from AA, thinking I am cured after a couple of infantile years of AA and recovery, and then slipped, only to "come back" after a couple of weekends of insanity to find that several have died in just the few weekends I was out, or the few weeks thereafter.

The obituary of my very best friend in AA ever, Annie P., a 23 year old bright young artist, fresh out of prison and into college, into AA, into building a wonderful life.... the most beautiful girl without the usual obsession among very pretty young girls with the opposite sex... just a genuine loving intuitive creative quirky gorgeous soul.... dead of an overdose. ONE weekend of use after several years clean. One time. It has been quite a few years since she died, and I had walked obliviously past her obituary which I kept on my refrigerator a thousand times while in my complacency. She was crying out there from my refigerator for me to get busy saving my own life and I didn't even hear her. Now more have died and speak to me today loud and clear, and she does too.

I know the hurt and the grief and the prolonged sense of "Uck" of which you speak. It sucks. But it can indeed, as you said, bring us the humility that only the stark reality of something like that could bring. Life is precious. So are the lessons death teaches us.

Thanks for sharing this with us tonight. It helped me a lot.

Joni

janet · Senior Member

mikef wrote:

Thanks for the share Barisax.I also broke down in middle of my 5th step when I took it thinking how much I loved my best friend(different he shot himself in the head from being unable to break loose of his addiction)I was with him the night before ,we partied till 4:00 a.m. and I hugged him good night(came to the next day to a phone call that he killed himself,I was still semi comatose myself from night before..) and next time I saw him I was carrying his coffin to the grave.I actually still havent completely gotten over it.(even when my father died the pain wasnt the same,there was no room left for the deep pain I felt at his loss,I used to actually feel a little guilty about that as I loved my father deeply also,the first cut is the deepest?) I have forgiven myself and him for things that two people who love each other do to each other,and I often wonder but deep inside know ,that there was nothing I could do except,keep my memories of him alive,do 9th step work by going to his gravesite,pray for his family,maybe even write a letter to him and put it in a drawer. Only God knows why I am here and he is not(did I do the work and he didn't?).I do not try and second guess it and do all I can to reach out to to next individual,carry the message of recovery and be available when needed. God's will is also what I strive to do each and every day with a humble heart and a greatful spirit, We are all responsible for our own recovery but at times we do think "if only.....you..touched my spirit thanks,,,,,,,,

Mikef,

As it is often said, "stick with the winners," and I believe you are one of them.
It sounds to me like you have had your share of sorrows. If it had not been for people like you and others I would be dead myself.

Lost my dad in 1993 who died an alcoholic, I have lost several loved ones in recent yrs. (my loving but drinking mother last yr.,and an alcoholic brother year before that,etc.) and one friend in AA last Feb. I was still sober early in Feb. 2010 ( 2 yrs.2 mo.)
My friend in AA was beautiful...she had long red hair and she wasn't but 41 yrs. old.
Everyone thought she had a good program going for herself, because she had several yrs. of sobriety. We (at our local) had heard she was going thru a divorce, and we encouraged her to come back to meetings,some of us even went to see her on several occasions. The next thing we heard is that she had shot herself in the head,dead. I cannot tell you anymore about how painful going to such a funeral is, than you already know.

It wasn't but 4 months, since I had lost my mother, then my friend, and then found out my husband of twenty years was having an affair, that I slowly fell back into full blown alcoholism myself! My coping skills were sh*t and I became lost/ my life became a living hell again. Spiraling down everyday a little further...thinking to myself I may never be able to get sober again. So,here I humbly am again.

I do not want to be carried to the graveyard too soon. I have others depending on me and I choose today to not be selfish and today to stay sober.

I now have another 38 days,but I'm not counting as I used to...I'm learning life's lessons everyday. It is people like you, that give me hope. I thank you for that.
Click below:

http://www.youtube.com/watch_videos?more_url=%2Fmy_favorites&video_ids=wIyS87SAu-A%2Cnjg3bjbNlxY%2CpwZ15KGlk0Y%2CloyTCkV06xQ%2Cv0t-xvbfX1c%2CHdAXPWvy4E8%2CIdfZnWsps34%2CMOuEYSJCFqE%2CZD_MTzgU98A%2C-io-kZKl_BI%2COBysUxN_xdY%2CdRHetRTOD1Q%2C0bqgy1mebh8%2C3eke2TUIVR8%2CUJ3KtM-7M2Q%2C5SZgCt8F4oY%2Ck1bxlDAjGCo%2CHlkV-MNl0qY%2CLoNXsne8exg%2Ca9WL0WHc4Gg&type=7&index=14&no_autoplay=1
As Always,
Janet

-- Edited by janet on Wednesday 12th of May 2010 11:28:59 AM

JW · Member

"The greatest of disadvantages is that we are too prone to to welcome everybody else's wrong solutions to the problems of life. There is a natural laziness that moves us to accept the easiest solutions-the ones that have common currency among our friends. That is why an optimistic view is not always a virtuous thing. In a time like ours, only the coarse grained still have enough resistance to to preserve their fair- weather principles unclouded by anxiety. Such optimism may be safe, but is it comfortable? In a world where every lie has currency, is not anxiety the more real and the more human reaction?

Now anxiety is the mark of spiritual insecurity. It is the fruit of unanswered questions. But questions cannot be unanswered unless the first be asked. And there is a far worse anxiety, a far worse insecurity, which comes from being afraid to ask the right questions-because they might turn out to have no answer. One of the moral diseases we communicate to one another in society comes from huddling together in the pale light of an insufficient answer to a question we are afraid to ask."

~Thomas Merton from No Man Is An Island

In A.A., or on any spiritual path for that matter, the answer is not so important as the question. And The questions asked in the steps are not designed to lead to an answer. They lead to an experience.

-- Edited by JW on Saturday 15th of May 2010 10:56:23 AM