Twelve Qualities Of Sponsorship
August 31, 2006 by Mark
Filed under Diseases & Conditions
I’d seen these before and, thanks to the West Baltimore group, I’ve seen this version too.
The Twelve Qualities Of Sponsorship
- I will not help you to stay and wallow in limbo.
- I will help you to grow, to become more productive, by your definition.
- I will help you become more autonomous, more loving of yourself, more excited, less sensitive, more free to become the authority for your own living.
- I can not give you dreams or “fix you up” simply because I can not.
- I can not give you growth, or grow for you. You must grow for yourself by facing reality, grim as it may be at times.
- I can not take away your loneliness or your pain.
- I can not sense your world for you, evaluate your goals for you, tell you what is best for your world; because you have your own world in which you must live.
- I can not convince you of the necessity to make the vital decision of choosing the frightening uncertainty of growing over the safe misery of remaining static.
- I want to be with you and know you as a rich and growing friend; yet I can not get close to you when you choose not to grow.
- When I begin to care for you out of pity or when I begin to lose faith in you, then I am inhibiting both for you and for me.
- You must know and understand my help is conditional. I will be with you and “hang in there” with you so long as I continue to get even the slightest hint that you are still trying to grow.
- If you can accept this, then perhaps we can help each other to become what God meant us to be, mature adults, leaving childishness forever to the little children of the world.
Certainly worth repeating…
Thank you, thank you, thank you. It is just what I needed to hear.
This is awesome. I’m new in the program, so this helps me to better understand the sponsor/sponsee relationship. It’s a new world for me, I tell ya
Thank you for sharing!
Very nice indeed.
I see you,
JJ
Perfect
Can you help me source this? Is this Al-anon conference approved literature?
Lindy,
I’m not sure I’m clear as to your request. I found this at the West Baltimore AA Groups’ web site and there is a link above. They would be the next reference for a source.
As for Al-anon conference approved? You’ll need to make that more clear for me to try to answer you…
I’m sure it could be applied to an Al-anon sponsor as well as an AA sponsor which is, I believe, part of its origin – an AA member. I’m not certain of that though which is why you’d need to contact the West Baltimore Group to begin to track the origin.
Mark
Thanks for clarifying that this comes from an AA website (I get the impression their sponsorship relationship is more “directive” than an AFG relationship), because it is in no way, shape, or form “Al-Anon Conference approved.” If I had to sponsor like that I would never do it. In Al-Anon we are recovering from judging and trying to manage others, but this list is all up on the sponsee’s side of the street, using non-Al-Anon phrases to encourage labeling the sponsee in a very harsh, rude way and to judge their progress, which is Higher Power’s work and not within our power to know, not our job! We are not therapists and are in no position to judge how HP is working in anyone’s life. That is a trap for the sponsor, and not at all healthy. It is also not Al-Anon program to point the finger and put labels on another person.
Thaks for clarifying that this comes from an AA website (I get the impression their sponsorship relationship is more “directive” than an AFG reelationship), because it is in no way, shape, or form “Al-Anon Conference approved.” If I had to sponsor like that I would never do it. In Al-Anon we are recovering from judging and trying to manage others, but this list is all up on the sponsee’s side of the street, using non-Al-Anon phrases to encourage labeling the sponsee in a very harsh, rude way and to judge their progress, which is Higher Power’s work and not within our power to know, not our job! We are not therapists and arre in no position to juidge how HP is working in anyone’s life. That is a trap for the sponsor, and not at all healthy. It is also not Al-Anon program to point the finger and put labels on another person.