I’ve been going to AA off and on for about three years, but I still don’t feel a connection to the fellowship. Is there something wrong with me?
I also struggle with the spirituality of it. I consider myself to be a spiritual person, but I don’t necessarily believe in God. I know I can make my higher power anything I want to. The thing I struggle with the most is the “giving yourself up to your Higher Power” part. And, the spiritual awakening. In a meeting I went to a few weeks ago, I shared that I didn’t understand this “spiritual awakening” that everyone was talking about. After my share, two members seemed offended and made me feel like I was wrong for questioning it. I thought cross talk wasn’t allowed…? I didn’t mean to insult anyone. I was only trying to understand.
I’m lost and I hate feeling like I’m doing everything wrong.
From my understanding your higher power doesn’t need to be god. It could be anything that isn’t you… the stars, the sun, the wind, a tree… maybe try a different meeting with different people. Keep trying til you find your tribe
The other members should’ve have felt offended at all. I haven’t had any “awakening” or what have you either, and I’ve mentioned that in the meetings I’ve attended. Maybe look at other groups? I go to AA and The Luckiest Club meetings. Sober community is hugely important for me.
I am 0 spiritual, not religious at all. I can’t really judge because I’ve never tried AA. I read the 12 steps, and didn’t seem something for me. Have you read “This Naked Mind” from Annie Grace? I liked it a lot. Since I’ve been falling off the wagon again, I’m gonna read it again, and start “The Alcohol Experiment” from Annie Grace on October 1st (even though I’ve already quit… again…)
I love when people bring up this topic! Some people talk about the blinding light experience where it all just clicks at once, but that’s rare. For a lot of people they don’t even realize they are having a spiritual awakening until after it’s long past. Usually by working the steps and then continuing to practice the 12th step you will one day just notice how much better your life is. That’s your spiritual awakening. Having something greater than yourself to believe in has made my journey easier, but certainly not required. I’m not religious at all, but consider God to be my higher power. It has cost me nothing to do so and I don’t feel like I compromised my values at all. Believing in any higher power of any variety is easy if you are willing and it costs nothing.
Luckiest Club? What is that?
It’s another sobriety community online. Just google “The Luckiest Club”. Again, I also go to local AA meetings. I love sober communities.
Maybe get a sponsor to ask questions .if you fling one in at a meeting to many will have a different concept., and if you do the steps you will experience a spiritual awakening . i was told i didnt know anything at the start just sit and listen i didnt question anything all i want was to be sober and i would do anything to achieve that so when my sponsor told me to sit and listen i did. sometimes we over analyze things . wish you well
I have never been to AA so can’t comment on it from personal experience. From what I’ve seen here it works well for some and others not so much.
There are lots of people here who got sober without a formal programme in place. This community has been my main sober ‘fellowship’. I started going to Recovery Dharma meetings (mainly online) last year and I like it. Haven’t done the programme in depth but I like the approach.
Edit to add - I host an RD meeting and we specifically say no cross talk. I think there absolutely is a place for getting and giving advice in sobriety but personally I really appreciate having our shares as opportunities to hold space for each other.
There are lots of other resources and support programmes out there too - more here:
The online group I go to regularly, which is based in my local area of Japan, must be really unusual, we are all atheists, and regularly talk about our struggles with the ‘God bit’.
I am pretty atheist, I join aa online and have done the steps. I feel a connection to aa as a place that helped me when I was at my worst, made me feel less alone. I have not had a spiritual awakening, I am still atheist. But I feel my focus has changed. Both outwards, to do service to others, and inwards, to try to improve myself. This change feels more humanistic than spiritual, but it is a change that has improved my life, and I credit it to aa.
I live in Irish Catholic central and that topic comes up here too.
Thank you for mentioning the Recovery Dharma program as it looks very appealing to me as an alternative to a 12-step program.
Welcome @giddy.rebel
2 copy n pastes of my previous posts the I hope will help. 1st is my reevaluation of my relationship with aa. 2nd is a tips list I put together with the help of other people with alcohol problems. Take from them anything that is helpful.
AA. Reevaluation. What’s in it for me.
This is going to be a ramble but please bear with me and please share your thoughts. I know what I want to say but how sell it reads, we’ll see.
My first journey with aa was one year ago. Looking back, it was a half-arsed, non-committing process. Truth is, I didn’t want to stop drinking. My relationship with alcohol had caused huge problems with my marriage and I needed to do something about it - or honestly in my case, be seen to do something about it! Sure, I told my wife and myself I needed to and was going to stop drinking - but I put no effort into it. Yes, I sat on the seat, I said “I’m Pete, I’m an alcoholic”, I told my story, I shared my problem, I shared my hope and desire. I book the big book online and kept it by my bedside. I never read more than a few sentences. I attend 1 or 2 meetings a week for a few weeks. I didn’t consciously do it, but what I did was got to a point where I thought I had ticked that box enough. Then followed various manipulative conversations with my wife whereby I managed to convince her and myself that I was “ok now”. We could return to normal. We could do the cheese n wine evenings, we could do the bottle of wine restaurant meals, we could do the sunny Sunday 2 pints at the pub…Ive done the work, the traumas, the lost driving licenced, the coming home at 4.30 to find me intoxicated, the spoilt evenings with friends because Peter’s pissed and being a twat again…thats all behind us now…ive done the work, I’m ok. Bullshit! At no point during my first round of aa did I actually, honestly assess my relationship with alcohol. I ticked a box, I did the bare minimum and as soon as I could rekindle my relationship with the bottle, I did.
16 days days ago, I got to a point where I spent the night alone in a hotel with a bottle of vodka, thinking about taking my own life. I’ve heard the phrase “rock bottom” many times in aa rooms and on forums. I call it my saturation point. I woke next morning after my few, hideously disturbed hours of sleep and, finally, said “enough!” I went to an aa meeting that evening, via the pub! I stopped at the pub to say goodbye to alcohol, a farewell pint, to tell it to fuck off out of my life. I had snapped, changed, penny dropped, lightbulb moment…call it what you like, you know that feeling…when your pushed and pushed and pushed…and then…“no more!”
So I went to my meeting. I’m Pete, I’m an alcoholic. I meant it! Step 1…I’m powerless over alcohol. I said it. I meant it. From my heart and my head and everything in between, I meant it! I felt it!
I went home. I felt the degree of predictable relief that many do on that first step, that share, that reach out for help.
I’m 16 days now. I have applied the same dedication, time, energy, thought, commitment etc to sobriety as I did to getting drunk. Audio books, loads of meetings, texts and calls to aa peers, endless and intense self analysis, joining and engaging in forums, sharing with and trying to help others…the list goes on. I equated it yesterday to being sent from work on a training course. You do 3 8hr days on a subject (food hygiene, COSHH, manual handling…whatever), you come out of it with a fair amount of knowledge, insight etc. My sobriety training has been 16hrs a day, 7 days a week for 16 days know. In my work, I mainly do gardening or decorating- neither of which require me to think much. I can weed without having to think, I can move a paintbrush without having to think about it. I’ve also got adhd. I’m also a caffeine and (a stop-start-stop-start) nicotine addict. The effect of my adhd, stimulant saturated brain means I have 10000mph thought processes. I’m basically a computer. I come up with a thought, reevaluate, throw out a new thing…this is blink of an eye stuff!
This morning has been more of the same. Now to talk about AA. Disclaimer here is it absolutely works for a lot of people, I see its value for them, they have got and maintained sobriety from it and I am genuinely and honestly happy for them.
Human beings basically started as grunting thugs who could just about avoid being eaten and wiped out by other wild animals. They discovered fire. Bit later, they invented the wheel. They built the colluseum. Somehow, they moved idiotcally big stones to Wiltshire and built stone henge. They made penicillin, found a vaccine for tb, made an atom bomb, made a rocket and landed on the moon, discovered dna, made the Internet, sent a rover to land on Mars. I’m not going to list every mind-blowing achievement- Wikipedia exists if you want to know more.
Here lies my newly discovered problem with AA step 1. Those amazing achievers listed above…I’m one of them! So are you! I’m one of a species that can make a nuclear bomb…but I’m powerless over a liquid? Millions of screws and bolts all in exactly the right place that enabled Neil Armstrong to do a small step/giant leap…and I’m powerless over a liquid? As I said, I’m not here to Diss aa or its work or its value…but the only word I can hear in my head is nonsense! In alcohol explained, William Porter said the only power alcohol has is the power we give it…and that power is ours to take back. I’ve completely undone my step1 this morning…I’m not powerless over alcohol…I’m powerFUL over it!
My next issue with step 1, in encouraging people to admit and feel a state of powerlessness (which is a constant in aa- carry that step1, that powerlessness for rest of our lives) is how does that mindset affect all the other aspects of our lives- surely admitting powerlessness is admitting having a complete lack of strength and must impact self esteem. How can that help with all the other trials of life?
Step 2 is where I end my aa reevaluation. Came to believe a higher power can restore my sanity. Apart from the obvious that this step is calling me insane, here’s what I think about it! I was in a rush, “came to believe”…there’s a time period in that phrase. I “made” myself believe! Day 1 onwards, at least twice a day and often more, I was on my knees praying! Just like all the other sobriety tools in the toolbox I was assembling, I threw prayer and higher power at my problem as hard as I could. I’ve not had an epiphany. No booming voice from the sky, no bright light appearing in my room, no warm fuzzy feeling or arms cradling me. Reflecting, I think its me I’m praying to. I am my higher power. The issues that worry me…“came to believe”. How long does that take? Listening in the aa rooms, for some people, a long time…for other people, listening in the rooms, it doesn’t happen at all. What do they do while they’re waiting to make the connection with, again listening in the rooms to what they have described as, an untangable, unsee able feeling or being or thing or spirit or whatever? Listening in the rooms, for some people while they’re waiting, they carry on drinking. Listening in the rooms, some people get some sobriety…but while waiting for that connection, relapse. My other issue is “restore us to sanity” - again I obviously have an issue with being called insane…but that statement says that someone or something else is going to sort this out for us…because, by implication from the wording, we’re incapable. Again, reinforcing the “fact” that we’re powerless!
So, am I going to a meeting tonight?
Yes!
Why?
For me, its “what’s in it for me?”
I spoke about my sobriety toolbox. AA is in that toolbox. The opportunity to share and evaluate my progress with peers, to hear their experience and learn from them, to receive support and encouragement, to get kudos and claps and tokens and back-Pats for my progress, for a chance to socialise in an otherwise fairly empty social calendar, for contact with other humans, for the chance to possibly help others…Yes, for me, even after my reevaluation and everything I’ve said, aa can and does offer and give so much. Will I be doing the 12 steps. Probably not.
Welcome. Well done for choosing sobriety.
Here’s a list of tips I’ve put together with the help of other friends on this path. Take from it anything that helps. Above all, stay here…we will help you. You’re in our boat now…the same boat we’re all in. Hope this helps:
1 Read Alcohol Explained by William Porter (you can get audio version from audible)
2 Go to as many aa meetings as you can. Listen, share if you feel OK to, engage, get phone numbers
3 Get busy. Housework, exercise, new hobby, gardening, baking, YouTube rapping, movies…anything. Don’t leave yourself any free time.
4 Be honest with yourself. Why are you stopping, how do you feel…
5 Read Alcohol Explained 2
6 stick to your decision to quit and never doubt or question it. You got it right.
7 If you do ever wobble or get tempted, ask yourself one simple question… What will it add? Will it make a good situation better? Will it make a bad situation better. My years of frequent horrid experiences have shown for me, the answer is it adds nothing and makes nothing better.
8 Stay here, keep reaching out, use your peers’ support and experience
9 help others as soon as you feel you can, even in the very early days. I’m only 13 days and honestly it’s helping me to help you. I can reread my advice to you and then reapply it to my own situation
10 Pray. Doesn’t matter if your not religious or don’t know who or what you’re praying to - I don’t, I could be praying to myself. But I’ve found over the past fortnight that getting on my knees, asking (out loud) for strength, asking for a sober day and then giving thanks for that strength and sobriety has felt extremely empowering.
EDIT: 11-14 thank you to Facebook friends:
11 Look for the fun in the journey!
12 Every day pay attention to what is improving. Even the little things, like being able to remember someone’s name after being introduced.
13. Make self care a priority; find the things that you can do to make yourself feel pampered and that will destress you in a healthy way.
14. Learn to identify and change your negative self talk.
Some more info about RD and weekly meetings I host which sometimes have some TS friends on it 
Hmmm, are there other AA meetings you could attend? Sounds like that group needs to have a Traditions meeting or a business meeting to discuss crosstalk is a good idea, too. I would encourage you to talk to someone after the meeting that you could trust.
Last of all, a spiritual experience can be of the knowledge route where we learn to think of others rather than our own selfish whims. I had no lighting bolt, either. There is nothing wrong with questioning the process.
For the life of me I could not understand how or why people were so happy when I first started going to AA
Man, this is the most accurate thing I’ve seen today haha
I think that reacting offended is offensive. These people aren’t accepting of people that may form opposing views…if AA doesn’t work for you, other people need to respect that and not force their beliefs on you…you can still do it without AA.