Sober is Not Well

(The following is a personal post from one of our group members.)

Recently in our local meeting we read through the chapter on Step Ten and shared our own experience with that Step. After taking us through the first nine Steps, the book's explanation of Step 10 takes us back to the reminder that sobriety is not the end goal. Here's what it says:

Sober Is Not Well

....
It is possible that, once relieved of the compulsion to act out our habit, we may feel cured and start coasting along with our tank on EMPTY. But the same personality defects that energized our addiction are still with us and, unattended, will take their toll again, sooner or later. Why are they still with us? Because they are us. Progressive victory over these defects, not their eradication, is the power of God at work in us. What we really do battle against is not other people but our old natures, the negative force within us we can obey anytime we wish, the force that is always willing and able to wrong another. This is why our program must come to fruition in our daily living or there is no recovery. (p. 130-131; final emph. mine)

I started off in SA by going to local meetings and "fellowshipping" with a group of guys after the meeting (hanging out, drinking coffee and eating pie). That was pretty much all I did for what I called "my program". I did read the SA book, and I did have some vague notion that working the Steps was what people who were serious about recovery did, but I was looking for sobriety in the easiest way I could get it, and those 12 Steps looked like really serious work, something I typically avoided. (And no kidding, they are serious work!)

Some people like to say "Step 4 separates the women from the girls and the men from the boys." There's something to that, but stopping short of working all of the Steps all of the way through to the "spiritual awakening" we are promised in Step 12 meant relapse was an inevitability for me. That's because I stopped short of the intended life-changing experience of connecting rightly with God, the Power that would keep me sober by continuing to change my attitudes and my whole life.

The problem for me early on was that any "success" in staying sober was evidence to me that I was getting it right and doing enough. I was under the delusion that I was gaining some level of control back from my powerlessness and unmanageability, and I was "measuring" that by my length of physical sobriety. I was thinking like a child, playing a child's game. ("Hey, look at that; I'm staying sober more days than I'm acting out!") That did not work.

"Sober is not well." And until I committed to working all of the Steps under the direction of a sponsor, I had not even taken Step 3! (My sponsor explained to me that Step 3 was a commitment to working the rest of the Steps.) That did eventually happen, but that was many years later after the "child's game" wasn't any fun anymore, and I was sick of myself and completely defeated in my efforts to do things my way and get "sober" without addressing the wrongs I had done to others and the character defects that kept me doing those wrongs over and over again.

The program of SA is designed to be a life-changing experience. It is in daily actions of living a new life of surrender of my whole self to God that I can be assured of his power over lust and over my character defects that so easily can drag me back down. This statement is so very true: "If I don't change, my sobriety date will."

Long-term sobriety is a miracle (and possible)

 (The following is a personal post from one of our members.)

I never thought long-term sobriety would be possible for me. Some people in the first meeting I ever attended already had years of sobriety, and I couldn't even imagine what that would be like. 

Fast forward a couple of decades (yes, it really was decades), there were three things I finally accepted as 100% necessary if I was ever going to find freedom from my slavery to lust: an SA meeting, an SA sponsor, the SA program of working the 12 Steps. 

God was preparing the path for me even when I didn't know what I was going to do. I "providentially" ran into another sexaholic who was also ready to get sober and stay sober, and we started a local meeting by just showing up together and following the meeting guide in the back of the SA book. (It's still my home group.) 

After being reminded by reading the SA book, I went looking for a sponsor who could give me direction to work the SA 12 Step program. Some guy named Ed was willing to be my sponsor if I was really ready and willing to do whatever it took to stay sober and work the SA 12 Steps. I was finally ready, and there is a note in the inside front cover of my SA book that says this: "I am willing to go to any length to stay sober." Ed told me that when I was really ready, I should write that.

I also made a commitment to God in prayer that whatever this guy told me to do, I would do it, even if it killed me. As I followed Ed's direction down the 12 Step path, I found that it really wasn't that complicated if I just did what he directed me to do. But I also discovered that it was very hard work and quite painful at times. Changing a life can be like that. But it was entirely worth it! 

Taking the 12 Steps started me down that path of change, and the 12 Steps gave me the basic tools to continue that process of change by continuing on that path. It is still quite simple, but at times, still quite painful. I've had to grow up. I've had to surrender again and again and again. I've had to do things I really didn't want to but I knew I had to. I've had to sacrifice. Thank God for providing for me as I've continued to have help from the fellowship of my local group, other SA groups, and my spiritual growth partners.

 Through this program, I stay connected to the Power I need to stay sober and free. Without that connection to God, I'd still be a slave to lust. By the grace of God and the help of others, I have long-term sobriety. And that's a miracle.