Daily Reprieve

“Don’t sponsor, not with that mind set. I have passed through many successful years when I wasn’t sponsoring anyone. You can’t give away what you don’t have”

Lydia, I have been attempting to secure sobriety since 2006 and have never made it to 18 months. I have achieved a year 3 times, I think. I hear you that this has not been your experience. That you have had several years sober without sponsoring. I assume successful equates to sobriety in the context of our discussion. You can’t give away what you don’t have AND you can’t keep what you don’t give away. My mind set will not improve in isolated self-maintenance, which I can fall into even while parking my butt in the rooms. Maybe the answer for me is to be a friend and a temporary sponsor, and just drop the whole rigid concept of sponsorship. It does remind me so much of the discipleship movement in churchianity. That was a sort of proselytizing pyramid scheme popularized by groups like the Navigators.

I have never really met anyone in AA, including past sponsors, who I would deem as having a continuous and inspiring mind-set.  I think if I wait for AA sainthood, I may justify doing nothing.

Of course, it is quite possible that I am totally misunderstanding your words.  Communication is a fragile thing.

And the real crux of Endigar 319 was the question, “What am I missing?”  I was not really asking whether I should sponsor.  My sponsor, my support network, hearing me talk as I do, pointed this out as a deficit in my program.  I am in my head too much, and a sponsee that forces me to render the solution rather than dwell in the problem would be helpful.

This entry was posted on October 14, 2012 at 11:48 am and is filed under Uncategorized with tags Addiction, Alcoholism, Journal, Life, Personal, Recovery, Spirituality. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.