On Apr 13, 2005, at 1:06 PM, Nick Arnett wrote:
On Wed, 13 Apr 2005 10:29:04 -0700, Warren Ockrassa wrote
Often, yeah. "Higher Power" and all that. IIRC the AA programs end with "The Lord's Prayer" too.
Typically, but there are many meetings that use the Serenity Prayer to
accomodate people who are uncomfortable with one particular religion's prayer.
Oh yeah. I forgot about that one. My favorite version of that is "Lord grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the good luck not to fuck up too often."
Therefore in saying that you're powerless over [substance], you're basically saying that you don't take responsibility for your actions. I have a serious ethical objection to that assessment.
If that's what it meant, then your objection would be reasonable. Like all
the steps, it is in the past tense -- we *were* powerless.
To me that seems like a very fine distinction. That is, if one were not *currently* powerless, one would not need the 12-step program.
Powerlessness
isn't the same as helplessness; what such programs teach is that there is help
available and to look outside ourselves, beyond the popular myth of self-
discipline (which in my experience condemns rather than frees).
Which is funny because I'm more inclined to think the power is within, rather than outside. That's not the same thing as self-discipline, which I agree can be rather condemnatory. It's more an issue of understanding where these addictive behaviors come from, understanding the cycle of behavior that leads to addictive relapses, and learning how to recognize and divert the signs before they become problematic.
It's a whole lot of letting go. Not that I'm an expert.
Letting go of that self-recrimination, yeah, which is often of no use and can even lead to more addictive episodes. Guilt = worthless = three-day binge on [substance]...
As for expert -- who is? ;)
As for the "Higher Power" doctrine. Well, I'm an atheist. ;) But looked at from the perspective of the "powerless" objection, I think you can maybe see an extension.
I've heard a number of people say that their sponsors urged them to write a
job description for their higher power, then work with that.
Huh. That's pretty clever.
So in essence one aspect of yourself (Higher Power) is being used to control your response to another aspect of yourself (reaction to [substance]). It's more efficient, I think, to eliminate both middle states and simply say "I'm not going to react to [substance] in the way I used to; I have control, I take responsibility, and the Higher Power can get stuffed."
But a higher power isn't an aspect of oneself, as far as I'm concerned.
That's one of our divergences, of course. ;)
Even
if it is the 12-step group itself, part of the point is to get outside
oneself, to stop being wrapped up on one's own stuff. Not that I'm an expert.
And "Get stuffed" isn't far from "F--- off."
:D
Getting outside oneself ... as a way of broadening outlook? Escaping from ruts, perhaps? Looking for and seeing the addictive cycle? Or did you mean that in some other sense I'm overlooking?
Certainly being trapped in one way of thinking can be painful. Very. Getting free of that can be liberating in many ways...
This doesn't really solve the problem. It doesn't strike at the root,
the source of the addiction. It simply replaces one behavior with
another behavior, but offers no guarantees that backsliding won't happen.
There are no guarantees, especially that one -- hence the saying, "One day at
a time."
True. I guess what I meant was that -- to my mind -- there are more effective methods. Maybe they're better explored *after* the initial 12-step phase, after the intervention, if you will -- once one is ready to get beyond what got one beyond the original problem. That's assuming it's necessary, of course...
To eliminate addiction, one must fundamentally alter oneself and one's responses to the world, not just to [substance], and I'm uncertain that any 12-step program provides the necessary tools to accomplish that fundamental transformation.
I'm quite sure that some do. I know people intimately who are far more kind,
loving and gentle as a result of working the steps.
Yes, absolutely.
But they don't address
addiction per se, they attack the acting out that goes with being an addict,
whether the addiction is a substance or a behavior.
Right, and that's where I have a philosophical issue. It seems your experience of the steps is a bit different from mine -- but that's to be expected as well. I don't want to come off like I'm bashing 12-step programs; as I said in the disclaimer this is just opinion. I just wanted to go into why I don't find them satisfying.
I know that there are some people who've tried the various step programs and not found the help they needed, and I've spoken to a few whose issues were similar enough to mine that I wonder if there isn't room for another, entirely different method. (What that method is I'm not sure.)
-- Warren Ockrassa, Publisher/Editor, nightwares Books http://books.nightwares.com/ Current work in progress "The Seven-Year Mirror" http://www.nightwares.com/books/ockrassa/Flat_Out.pdf
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