September – National Alcohol and Drug Addiction Recovery Month

And I didn’t know it. Well, like I said at today’s meeting – it isn’t Perfect’s Anonymous…

September is National Alcohol and Drug Addiction Recovery Month. B5 media’s Health and Wellness Channel (check out B5’s new design btw) is taking the moment to present our collective individual experiences with the Twelve Steps. Or, we’re going to do the research needed to offer our readers valuable information on the Twelve Steps relating to a number of areas in the human nature.

If you are a new reader here are the Twelve Steps according to Alcoholics Anonymous. There are over 2000 other variations relating to groups and gatherings and fellowships other than AA who have their own versions;

• Step 1 – We admitted we were powerless over alcohol – that our lives had become unmanageable
• Step 2 – Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity
• Step 3 – Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him
• Step 4 – Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves
• Step 5 – Admitted to God, to ourselves and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs
• Step 6 – Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character
• Step 7 – Humbly asked God to remove our shortcomings
• Step 8 – Made a list of all persons we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all
• Step 9 – Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others
• Step 10 – Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it
• Step 11 – 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
• Step 12 – Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to other alcoholics, and to practice these principles in all our affairs

If you’re not familiar with National Alcohol and Drug Addiction Recovery Month, here are the basics from Recoverymonth.org;

Every year, towns, counties, and states around the country observe National Alcohol and Drug Addiction Recovery Month (Recovery Month) in September. This year, the 19th annual Recovery Month recognizes the impact that real people and real stories have on recovery, and celebrates those who have worked to advance the treatment and recovery landscape.

In 2008, we are highlighting the people for whom treatment and long-term recovery have given a renewed outlook on life. We invite you to take part in our theme, “Join the Voices for Recovery: Real People, Real Recovery,” and spread the word that addiction is a medical illness and that treatment is effective and recovery is possible. By getting involved, you can help more people on a path of recovery to lead more fulfilling lives.

Our other Health and Wellness bloggers thought I could offer you all some background on the Twelve Steps. Strangely, that feels like a difficult prospect due to the fact that most folks aren’t familiar with them. I believe the best information I might give you is that the Twelve Steps, regardless of which fellowship they are associated with, are designed to do the same thing – bring the person who practices them to a spiritual awakening and a psychic change sufficient enough to bring about a radical change in thinking. The change in thinking defines a blueprint for living making clear the realities of life allowing us to live free from our addictions and to find happiness in life that we hadn’t known before.