The great necessity for discussing ourselves with someone?

[Dallas]

"Notwithstanding the great necessity for discussing
ourselves with someone, it may be one is so situated
that there is no suitable person available. If that is so,
this step may be postponed, only, however, until we can
log on to Step12.com and spill out guts."

The times have changed.

Technology has removed one more of our excuses for not being
thorough with our Step work or following the principles that were
laid out for us.

[Toast]

So true,

Its amazing how even today i just cant keep secrets or not share unpleasant stuff i wish wasn't happening.

Around 10 years sober i almost went nuts, thought i had it cracked and i now had enough experience under my belt to fix me all by myself so i stopped sharing the stuff that bothered me round the rooms and played at being an elder statesman.

So the stuff that was bothering me never came out so i never got any feedback from members who had been there and done it as far as my little dilemma's where concerned. The upshot was i just filled up with garbage until i could take no more and almost flipped! I became the same guy i was when i drank, restless, irratible and discontent but this time i was stark raving sober!

Once i found the error of my ways i had to get back to basic's and start telling people what was going on in my head on that god given day and not give newcomers a lecture on how i went through the 4th and 5th Steps several years before.

I'll always be a patient in this fellowship, and you know i kinda like it that way!

Love,light,laughter!

John

[Frananne]

Cool! I liked your share.
Fran

[Toast]

Hi,

On the subject of discussion ourselves with someone today there aint much goes on in my head i can't discuss with my wife Anne. As we get older i find i use my sponsor less and seek Anne's council more, which is always very good.

Maybe that's because the only things that bother me today are family and Anne's motherly instincts shed's more light on these matters than any man could?

So now i ask myself why did i not do this before when i had problems i thought she would never understand so i'd take them to a meeting and share them there?

Then again our relationship back then wasn't the best, we both seemed to play the blame game about the mess our family ended up in. Then It was all about scoring points.

Guess that small village mentallity had a lot to do with it. An entire community of people pleasers who thought there only role in life was to produce grandkids for their parents and get a steady but boring job, which i'd done by the age of 22. Think thats where all my rebellion came from, my external environment told me i was doing Ok because everyone was pleased with my progress but deep down inside my instincts told me there was much more to life than that so i went out looking for it and ended up almost dead in the process!

Today i'm still looking but thankfully AA has shown me where to look, and i sure aint going to find it in no bar!

God Bless

[Dallas]

I think I understand.

I also think its kind of cool -- when we get to a place where
we no longer have to call our sponsors and talk about problems.

My sponsor sponsors many men and women. Most of them sober for a long time.
I seem to be one of the one's that has to try and find some kind of problem to
talk to him about.

I told him a few years back "I can't find any problems to talk to you about!"
He replied, "That's good! Keep doing what you're doing and hopefully,
you'll keep it that way!"

One of the things I keep doing is: to call my sponsor, whether I have problems or not,
to "Check in with him."

I figure it's far better for me to hear it from him -- that I'm doing good,
than it is for me to hear it from me. I've been able to successfully tell myself
all kinds of stuff -- true and untrue -- and gulp it down.

Plus, calling my sponsor regularly is part of what I was doing -- to get things going good.
Continuing to call him regularly helps me to remember about structure and discipline.
And, of course, I don't want him to forget who I am and that he's my sponsor. LOL

[Camel]

Most of the time, I hear the proper approach to any given situation, in my consciousness. Eventually. The "eventually", I'm speaking of, has come with practicing these pricnciples. Trust me, that was not easy in the coming. It took a lot of humiliation and pain, to overcome. And, in all honesty, sometimes my first impulse is to exercise all my character defects still lurking in anger and self-pity, when the occasion arises. By God's grace, I have made considerable progress in that department. Although I know the right thing to do at times, I still like to hear my Sponsor's views. The connection that clicks when he says, "Hello", on the phone, or when he says, "Come in", at his home, is beyond my ability to communicate here. And, like Dallas, I don't call to just whine and bellyache. I call because that's what makes this wonderful program work. One Alcoholic, talking to another.

Hub