Sadly, a lot of people in AA who have strong recoveries come to sticky ends (drink, drugs, recluses who have left AA ... 'anyone can increase the list').
No one who is currently strong but who is going to come to a sticky end deliberately embarks on the path towards their own destruction, yet embark on a path some do, and most people believe, as they walk step by step through their lives, that each step they're taking is the right one.
Perdition is unintentional yet common. How can it be avoided?
On the roulette table of recovery, there are many numbers, and many paths to choose from. You have to pick a number. One might ask, 'but should you avoid putting all your eggs in one basket?' In recovery, however, you only have one egg: your sobriety. The egg cannot be split.
How do you pick? I have met or observed some people who are between 50 and 60 years sober. All of them have made it by having serving God through AA as the centre of their lives, and surrounding themselves by people on the same path, so we can wake each other up.
It is this that makes the difference: to embark on the wrong path, the path to perdition, one has to be asleep, dreaming one is awake. It is only by consorting with those that are themselves awake that remaining awake can be guaranteed.
Your job in AA is not just to have a spiritual awakening, but then to remain in orbit.
What's the formula these people have in common? Applying the Twelve Steps continually in their lives, not just the last three; service; fellowship. All in spades.
Having placed all my chips on the same number, I need do only one thing: relinquish the right to reverse the decision. And this I have done.
No one who is currently strong but who is going to come to a sticky end deliberately embarks on the path towards their own destruction, yet embark on a path some do, and most people believe, as they walk step by step through their lives, that each step they're taking is the right one.
Perdition is unintentional yet common. How can it be avoided?
On the roulette table of recovery, there are many numbers, and many paths to choose from. You have to pick a number. One might ask, 'but should you avoid putting all your eggs in one basket?' In recovery, however, you only have one egg: your sobriety. The egg cannot be split.
How do you pick? I have met or observed some people who are between 50 and 60 years sober. All of them have made it by having serving God through AA as the centre of their lives, and surrounding themselves by people on the same path, so we can wake each other up.
It is this that makes the difference: to embark on the wrong path, the path to perdition, one has to be asleep, dreaming one is awake. It is only by consorting with those that are themselves awake that remaining awake can be guaranteed.
Your job in AA is not just to have a spiritual awakening, but then to remain in orbit.
What's the formula these people have in common? Applying the Twelve Steps continually in their lives, not just the last three; service; fellowship. All in spades.
Having placed all my chips on the same number, I need do only one thing: relinquish the right to reverse the decision. And this I have done.