We made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others. While the previous step requires you to recognize your wrongs, this step requires you to go one step further and confess them out loud. Admitting your faults to another person can be difficult, so the step helps https://sober-home.org/reasons-to-attend-aa-meetings-and-how-often-to-go/ you prepare by confessing to a higher power first. This step is a form of surrender that is intended to help you develop a more positive attitude. For instance, if you find yourself drinking to relieve feelings of anger, pain, frustration, or depression, you can turn those feelings over to a higher power.
What Is Narcotics Anonymous (NA)?
NA says that “ours is a spiritual, not a religious program.” This step reinforces the lessons learned in earlier steps and encourages members to use what they have learned to help others on their path to recovery. “We continued to take personal inventory and when were wrong promptly admitted it.” “We made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others.” This step focuses on letting go of the old coping mechanisms and behaviors identified and acknowledged in the earlier step.
Further reading
- Anyone may join us, regardless of age, race, sexual identity, creed, religion, or lack of religion.
- Other meetings include an “open sharing” component, during which anyone attending has the opportunity to share.
- If you have questions, consider asking a member about it personally, and they can explain further.
- We did many people great harm, but most of all we harmed ourselves.
It signifies that a person is willing to let these things go and move toward healthier behaviors that will support long-term recovery. An NA group ought never endorse, finance, or lend the NA name to any related facility or outside enterprise, lest problems of money, property or prestige divert us from our primary purpose. We continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it. We made direct amends to such people wherever possible except when to do so would injure them or others. The Zonal Forums are service-oriented organizational structures designed to improve communication between RSCs. The Eleventh Tradition states that NA members “need always maintain personal anonymity at the level of press, radio, and films”.
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In some cases, only the RCMs in a region will meet to vote on issues; in other situations, all GSRs in a region will be invited to attend an RSC meeting. The RSC elects a delegate to attend the World Service Conference. The goal is to create a safe environment where people addicted to substances can connect with each other and support each other’s recovery. We feel that our approach to the disease of addiction is completely realistic, for the therapeutic value of one addict helping another is without parallel. We feel that our way is practical, for one addict can best understand and help another addict.
NA -Meeting Format & Readings
After the rapid succession of five editions during the 1980s, this was the first new edition in twenty years. In 1953 Narcotics Anonymous, was founded by Jimmy Kinnon and others.[21] Differing from its predecessors, NA formed a fellowship of mutually supporting groups. Founding members, most of whom were from AA, debated and established the 12 Traditions of the NA fellowship.
NA is a support group that focuses on helping people recovering from drug addictions. An NA meeting involves meeting with peers to discuss experiences, share advice, and offer encouragement. NA meetings are free and anonymous and follow a 12-step program to help members achieve drug and alcohol abstinence. Some are topic discussion meetings, some are speaker meetings, some are literature discussion meetings and some are part of or combinations of these and other variations. Some are open to the public (to listen) and others are for addicts only.
Many of us ended up in jail, or sought help through medicine, religion, and psychiatry. Our disease always resurfaced or continued to progress until, in desperation, we sought help from each other in Narcotics Anonymous. Anyone may join us, regardless of age, race, sexual identity, creed, religion, or lack of religion. Narcotics Anonymous is a fully self-sufficient organization that only accepts donations from its members.
The goal is to gain a sense of release of shame and guilt that can help people avoid unhealthy coping mechanisms going forward. “We made https://sober-home.org/ a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.” Our common welfare should come first; personal recovery depends on NA unity.
Virtual meetings are an option if you’re concerned about COVID. Many meetings are hybrid, so you can choose to attend in person or remotely. NA literature is also a great source of information about our program. Our Basic Text, Narcotics Anonymous, or our information pamphlets (IPs) are a good place to start. Most meetings offer IPs for free, while books are generally sold at the group’s cost.
We are recovering addicts who meet regularly to help each other stay clean. This is a programme of complete abstinence from all drugs. There is only one requirement for membership, the desire to stop using. We suggest that you keep an open mind and give yourself a break. Our programme is a set of principles written so simply that we can follow them in our daily lives.
If you’re already undergoing treatment, talk to your healthcare provider about whether a 12-step program can be beneficial to you. Individual drug counseling was based on the 12-step philosophy. The primary purpose of an NA group is to carry the message of recovery to the addict who still suffers. The group provides each member with the opportunity to share and to hear the experience of other addicts who are learning to live a better way of life without the use of drugs. The group is the primary vehicle by which our message is carried.
This was the first organization of its type, one that offered a peer-based support group for users of often illegal drugs who before, had few other places to turn. This quick guide to the Narcotics Anonymous meeting format will tell you what to expect. Other meeting formats include round-robin (sharing goes around in a circle), tag meeting (each speaker picks the next person to share), and stick meetings (each member draws a stick with a topic to share on). Some meetings focus on reading, writing, and/or sharing about one of the Twelve Steps or some other portion of NA literature. Some meetings are “common needs” (also known as special-interest) meetings, supporting a particular group of people based on gender, sexual identity, age, language, or another characteristic. These meetings are not exclusionary, as any addict is welcome at any NA meeting.
Like AA, NA is a free, community-based resource that anyone can access. If you are ready to work toward recovery from drugs or alcohol, treatment options are available to help. Twelve-step programs such as Narcotics Anonymous can be helpful, but you should start by talking to your doctor about your first steps.
If you’ve used today, please listen to what is being said and talk to someone at the break or after the meeting. It costs nothing to belong to this fellowship; you are a member when you say you are. Having had a spiritual awakening as a result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to addicts, and to practice these principles in all our affairs. “Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to addicts, and to practice these principles in all our affairs.” Members understand and agree that what is said in meetings and who they see there stays there.
This commitment to privacy creates an environment of security where everyone can feel comfortable opening up and sharing their experiences and feelings. There are local NA meetings available every day throughout the United States and hundreds of countries around the world. Members often find the support they need to recover from addiction.
“The media will not tell you that he died a real-life super hero,” said Allyson in a Facebook post. “They are not going to tell you how quickly he threw my mom and I to the ground. They are not going to tell you that he shielded my body from that bullet that came at us.” We keep what we have only with vigilance, and just as freedom for the individual comes from the Twelve Steps, so freedom for the group springs from our traditions. This sounds like a big order, and we can’t do it all at once. We didn’t become addicted in one day, so remember—easy does it.
In addition to talking about the challenges of drug recovery, NA meetings are also a place for members to offer advice to others, share their success stories, and celebrate their recovery milestones. NA meetings include people of every demographic and at various recovery levels, from many years to just a few days of sobriety. We sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God as we understood Him , praying only for knowledge of His will for us and the power to carry that out. The WSC through the World Board is responsible for the NA World Service Office located in the Chatsworth, a neighborhood of Los Angeles, California, United States. This office handles the production of all approved literature, provides resources for projects approved by the WSC, and also provides limited services to the fellowship as a whole. The office also administers the legal responsibilities of the fellowship concerning copyrights, intellectual property, and accounting.
