A Change in Perception

On Friday morning I attended a memorial for an oldtimer from around here who'd died with 39 years of sobriety.  A great man.  His name was Wayne Smith from Walnut Creek.  He'd sometimes begin his shares with, "Hi, I'm Wayne S. from Walnut C."  He was a master storyteller and will be greatly missed.  At the reception, someone had placed a bunch of CDs of a speaker meeting talk that Wayne had given years ago and on the way home from the memorial I listened to Wayne's pitch.  It was wonderful, but it was even more wonderful to hear his voice again, full of life.  He mentioned in it that he'd loved AA from the very beginning and it was the longest love affair of his whole life.

In his story though, he said something about The Steps that I'd never heard before and that was that the Steps were all about perception, or more accurately, changing our perception on a variety of important things in our lives.  Each step was, according to Wayne, all about changing our perspective from what was unhealthy and/or untrue to a new perspective that was more healthy and true.  He then gave examples from his own life to explain what he meant.  He said that the 1st Step was, for him, all about changing his perception about who he was in terms of his relationship with alcohol: for years, he had thought that alcohol was something that he could control and manage....  And that the 1st Step was about changing that misperception to something more accurate and true: that alcohol was not something he could control and that with alcohol in him, his life had become totally unmanageable.

I knew exactly what he meant, I only wish that he had gone through with more examples from his life to show how each of the remaining 11 steps helped him change his perspective to become more healthy and true.  And since yesterday, I have been mulling over how each of the 12 steps have helped me change my perspective on my life and on myself.

For me, the 1st step didn't involve changing my perception of alcohol.  Rather, it changed my perception of me as an alcoholic.  In the past, I'd thought that it was possible to avoid becoming an alcoholic (like my dad, I must add) by controlling my drinking, by proving to myself (when necessary) that I could stop drinking or by drinking like a non-alcoholic.  What happened in my 1st step was waking up to the reality that I was an alcoholic and that being an alcoholic wasn't my problem!  My problem was my 30 year attempt NOT to be an alcoholic. Thirty years of trying to drink "like" a non-alcoholic!  That delusion changed the morning I woke up on October 20, 2001 and realized that I couldn't stop drinking and that "not being able to stop drinking" was called "alcoholism" and that I was, like it or not!, an alcoholic.  That morning, being an alcoholic was perfectly OK.  It was just a disease and I just happened to have it.  Everything in my past life immediately became understandable.  It all made sense!  That's why I did what I did!  Ahhhh.  That was two days before my first meeting of AA.

The 2nd step then changed how I was going to move forward with the remainder of my life.  It wasn't so much about believing in a particular concept of God.  It was more about my own letting go of the idea that I was God or God-like.  And my drinking was an essential part of me being God-like: that is, I could change people (me and others), places and things all by means of a drink.  And another.  And another.  People, places and things all had one thing in common: they were not the way I thought they should be!  And if God wasn't going to fix that problem, I would help Him out.  And when I couldn't do that on my own, I resorted to the use of alcohol.  Once I got sober, my perspective changed in relatively short fashion:  I began to realize that I wasn't God and that I didn't need to do that God Act any more.  Everyone, everything and every situation was perfect just the way it was at that moment in time and I didn't need to get back into the battle of making the universe conform to the way I thought it should be.  For me, the return to sanity didn't involve some sort of return to mental health.  My alcoholic insanity wasn't mental illness.  It was the deeply ingrained belief that there was something wrong with me and that I needed to be or to become someone different than who I was.  Trying to be someone I wasn't is my definition of insanity.  Sanity then was the gradual awareness that I was perfect just the way I am and that this perfection includes the fact that my body processes alcohol and other mind-altering drugs differently than non-alcoholics and non-addicts.

The 3rd step continued that change in perspective from the inside out.  My 3rd step did not involve kneeling down to some Higher Power or even a decision to do so.  My 3rd step involved letting go of my death grip on life and letting things be just the way they were.  I no longer needed to play God.

The 4th thru the 9th steps all changed my perception of myself in that I had deeply held beliefs that there was something very wrong with me.  I came into the rooms carrying quite a heavy sack of shit: an invisible but still heavy sack of guilt (for things I had done) and shame (for who I thought I was).  In the 4th step, I began this change from the inside: with who I was and with what I had done, both the so-called good and the so-called bad.  I wrote down all the things from my past that "made me wince".  With the help of my sponsors, I wrote without judgment or condemnation.  

In my 5th step, I shared my secrets and ultimately, I shared the "exact nature of my wrongs."  For me, that process changed me in the most profound of ways.  I was no longer a bad person trying to become good; I was a sick person trying to become well.  And I still am.  I began to look at myself with eyes of compassion and understanding and I was able to do that by first seeing that compassion and understanding reflected in the eyes of my sponsors as they looked at me.

The 6th and 7th steps were a continuation of 4 and 5: they were all about changing how I saw myself.  The change has not been so much one of identifying or changing what's supposedly wrong with me (i.e., shortcomings or defects of character) but rather, coming to see things that I thought were wrong with me and now seeing them more as being just perfect!  The greatest example of that truth is my alcoholism.  I'd thought for 30 years that being an alcoholic was the worst possible thing I could become: it turns out that it was the best thing that could ever happen to me!  Having alcoholism is not a shortcoming or a defect.  My shortcoming, if you want me to have one, was trying to be someone I wasn't.  The 6th and 7th steps have been extremely helpful in identifying other aspects of who I am that I once thought to be "wrong" and changing that perception to become more healthy and accurate.  More compassionate.  More loving.

The 8th and 9th steps started me on a journey more to the outside of me: to my actions and behaviors and how they impacted or harmed others.  Both in the past and now.  These steps allowed me to take my newfound perspectives and apply them to my relationships with others.  While all my past actions were needed for me to become who I am now, the fact is that much of my past acts harmed others in some significant ways and the damage to those relationships continued into the present.  These steps gave me a mechanism to go back to these people and begin a process of healing and forgiveness.  Only in a few instances did this amends process involve saying the words, "I'm sorry."  Most of the time, it involved my sharing my story and what was going on with me back when...  I hadn't meant to hurt them as I clearly did and I was now wanting to clean up those messes and harms as best I could.  My sack of shit got lighter and lighter as a result.

The last three steps have given me a regular daily routine whereby I can continue the basic "inside out" work I did in the previous nines steps.  The 10th step gives me a daily process where I can refocus my view of myself and my actions.  Where have I done harm and what can I do to repair the damage I may have done?  How can I do that with compassion and loving-kindness, both for others and for myself? 

The 11th step gives me a daily practice where I can be quiet and know that I am not God.  I am Mike and I'm an alcoholic.  And that's perfectly OK!  It gives me breathing room.

The 12th step has totally turned my life upside down and it happens again and again as I try to share what I have been given with others who struggle with this disease.  Each one of my sponsees, as well as many others in my life, have changed me by the fact that they trust me with their secrets and struggles.  I really don't think I give them much other than an ear and a few stories of what happened to me in similar circumstances.  I inevitably walk away from our time together with a totally different perspective on my day and myself.  I am blessed.

Wayne was right: The Steps and this whole recovery process are all about changing our preception and our perspectives.  I'll miss you my friend!!

Take care!

Mike L.

"I Just Can't Stop Drinking!"

I suppose that since I've always gone to many meetings (over 1 a day average over 8 years) that there are few things that can be said in an AA meeting that really bother me.  That said, there are a couple of statements that always have a visceral impact on me when I hear people say them in an AA meeting.  One is when a newcomer comes in to the rooms and says something along the lines of "I realize now that I need to stop drinking... for the rest of my life."   It's the "rest of my life" comment that makes my stomach twist and tighten.  Another comment is when people describe their moment of clarity as the point in time when the were finally able to stop drinking and they say something like, "I stopped drinking...".  In that phrase it's the "I" that ends up causing an immediate visceral reaction in me.  I not only don't relate to people's plan to never drink again for the rest of their lives or to alcoholic's claim to have stopped, I get concerned, if not outright nervous, that such approaches to sobriety are shaky foundations to longer term sobriety.

Yesterday I was at the 6:30am Concord Fellowship meeting and at the time when the secretary asked if there were any newcomers, a guy raised his hand and said that he was an alcoholic and had only a few days.  He wasn't sure how many days, but he looked pretty beaten down.  I'd seen this guy come in and go out of the meetings many times in the last 3-4 years.  Everytime he came back in, his life situation got worse and worse.  He would get a sponsor and begin the steps, but it seemed that he'd always disappear again within 3-6 months.  Yesterday seemed no different except for the fact that his life situation was even worse after this last relapse: ex-wife was dying of cancer and older son was facing 25 to life for abusing his son -- the newcomer's grandson.

After the chair had shared his story, he eventually called on this newcomer and asked him if he'd like to share.  The man told us of his worsening life situation and ended with a heartfelt admission that he "just can't stop drinking!"   As the meeting went on to other shares, I couldn't stop thinking about that comment, "I can't stop drinking!"  It was the one thing that I most related to in the whole meeting that day.  While I suspected that the newcomer felt he was the only one in that room that couldn't stop drinking -- I knew in my core that that was really the one thing that this guy had most in common with everyone in that room --- or at least, I knew that he and I both shared the same basic inability to stop drinking.  I eventually shared that view with the group, in a subtle form of crosstalk directed at this newcomer, and told him that I thought the idea that we are the only ones in the room who "can't stop drinking" is a mistaken belief.  In my view, the one thing I most have in common with other alcoholics, most particularly those in recovery, is the inability to stop drinking.

In fact, I think that's the good news of the AA program from the beginning.  In AA we discover that we can't stop drinking because we are powerless over alcohol.  We are powerless over alcohol in the sense that our bodies process alcohol differently than non-alcoholics and because of the nature of that particular disease, we are unable to change or alter that fact.  Our only solution then is to give up trying to stop drinking (as that's impossible for us) and to begin trying to stay sober today.  Just for today.  Not tomorrow.  Not for the rest of our lives.  Just for today.  And if today's too much for us, we can narrow the scope down even further: Just for this hour.  Just for this minute.  Just for now.  And now, just for now.

As I was talking, I glanced over at the newcomer and tears were falling down his cheeks.  And I knew that I'd touched something in him.  And then I stopped.  To go further would be to lecture. 

After the newcomer had originally raised his hand at the beginning of the meeting, the secretary had asked for members of the group who were willing and able to sponsor men to raise their hands.  Because I already have at least a dozen active sponsees, I didn't think I could take on another sponsee at this time in my life.  I was tremendously proud though when I looked across the room and see one of my sponsee's raise his hand and offer his service in this regard.  I've always thought that he would make a great sponsor despite my poor example.

At the end of the meeting, I did go over and hug the newcomer and tell him to hang in there.  Things were going to get better (and worse) if he found a way to stay sober today.  That said, it goes without question that if he's unable to stay sober today, things would continue to get worse and worse and that that progression downward would pickup more and more steam the longer it took him to get and stay sober, one day at a time.  I also suggested to him (and to my sponsee) that it might be a good idea for him to get into a detox facility sooner rather than later (he was addicted not only to the drug alcohol, but to some other very powerful drugs that make his situation all the more tragic/urgent).

I wish him well.  This is not a pretty disease.

Take care!

Mike L.

Three Stories About Hopelessness

For some time now, I've been a firm believer in the synchronisticy of life events.  Some people refer to them as coincidences.  This last week, I knew that I was going to be chairing a meeting on Friday and during the week, I was on the lookout for a topic or a direction for that chair to take.  By the time I was sitting in the chair at noon on Friday, I knew that the topic had to be hopelessness.

On the previous Wednesday, I been in San Francisco for the day and was able to go to an afternoon meeting at Old St. Mary's Church.  The meeting format was for a woman who had just reached her 6 month sobriety milestone to tell her story for the first time, for her to pick a topic and then for people to share.  The chair would pick one person to begin the sharing and then it would just go around the room until everyone got a chance to share briefly on that topic.

The woman was so relieved by the time she finished her chair that she couldn't think of any topic, so she made the topic, whatever you'd like to talk about.  I didn't really have anything going on, so I just listened to each person share about what was going on with them.  After each person shared, I felt a connection with each one of them and I also came up with something relevant to that person's comment and that relieved me of the temptation to think about what I was going to share and thereby not listen to the next person who shared.  Anyway, that happened each time that someone shared.  I identified with them and I remembered a story from my own life that related to what each person was struggling with in their lives.

By the time it was almost my time to talk, I had no idea which of my stories I wanted to share.  So many stories, so little time.  I'm not a short story sorta guy.  In fact, I'm realizing now, that I wanted to tell three stories about Hopelessness and I'm not even done with the first story and I've gone on too long already for one blog.  Oh, well.

Anyway, the time came for the woman two seats to my right to share and I could tell she was very troubled.  She'd come into the meeting a little late, shortly after the time had come and gone for newcomers to raise their hands so that we could begin to get to know them and be of help.  She shared with us her name and said that this was her first day back in meetings.  She'd relapsed and it was horrible.  She cried.  She couldn't say anything more.  She looked around the room quickly and then shrugged her shoulders and said, "I'm hopeless!".

Well, now I had a story to tell.  I didn't even try to listen to the man's share next to me.  I just began trying to piece together my own hopelessness story in the hope I could tell it well enough to be helpful to the woman to my right.  I knew instinctively that she believed that her hopelessness was bad and a clear sign for all of us to see of her failed attempts at life and sobriety.  I wanted to gently let her know that things were not so bad, in fact, she was experiencing the most important event of her life.  A new beginning possible only from a moment of hopelessness.

I shared my moment of hopelessness which came after ten months of being unable to stop drinking.  The ten months had begun when my 15 year old son reached his own moment of hopelessness and began his own journey of recovery from addiction.  My moment of hopelessness came the morning of October 21, 2001 --- the night before my son had almost caught me drinking.  I'd successfully lied my way out of his discovery, but I'd gone to bed the night before feeling like shit.  Pat was 5 months and 10 days sober: how come I couldn't stop drinking and support him in his recovery?

Anyway, my moment of hopelessness occurred the following morning.  I woke up at 6am with the clearest of ideas greeting me:  "I just can't stop drinking!"  It was a thought that I had had most mornings for the last couple of years of my life.  What was different that morning though was that this first thought of hopelessness was followed by a second thought: "Not being able to stop drinking is called alcoholism and alcoholism is a disease."  For the first time in my life, it was perfectly OK to be an alcoholic.

I then looked at the woman to my right and said that some years ago I heard the greatest line I'd ever heard.  It was at a meeting when the chair shared what she considered her favorite line -- she'd stolen it from her sponsor years ago.  Her sponsor had said that she'd gotten sober "at the corner of Grace and Willingness."  I loved that line from the get go.  I went up to the chair woman after the meeting, thanked her and let her know that I too was going to steal her sponsor's line about the corner of Grace and Willingness.  She laughed.  I asked her to chair a meeting for me in two weeks at the Lafayette Hut and she graciously accepted.

As soon as I left the meeting, I realized that while it was a great line, it didn't describe where I'd gotten sober.  I had surely gotten sober as a result of Grace: my sober moment was not the result of my effort or thought process.  My sober moment was a gift from something or someone outside of myself.  It took me about two weeks of chewing on this question.  Eventually it came to me two weeks later, just as the chair woman walked into the Lafayette Hut.  She sat down next to me at the head of the table and I leaned over to thank her for coming out to chair this meeting.  And then I reminded her about her line about getting sober at the corner of Grace and Willingness.  She smiled and then I told her that while I loved the line, it was not where I got sober.   She smiled and asked, "Well, then, where did you get sober?"  "I got sober at the corner of Grace and Hopelessness!  It's about a half block down from the corner of Grace and Willingness!"

I then looked over at woman to my right in her first day of sobriety --- she was laughing and I think things were now becoming "right" in her world.

Thank God for Hopelessness!  It gives us the ability to accept things as they are without any need to change or pretend to be someone we're not. My problem wasn't that I was an alcoholic.  My problem was that I was an alcoholic who was trying (hopelessly!) to be a non-alcoholic!

Take care!  I will tell you my third story about hopelessness in a day or so.  My wife and I are getting on a cruise ship later today for a two week cruise to Alaska.  I'll try to get that blog published before she throws me overboard.

Mike L.

I'm not ready yet....

I read a great little story the other day that shed a lot of light on some uncertainty and doubt over my own ability to sponsor others.  Or at least do that well.

The story was about a therapist who was walking home one day when he was acosted by a guy who walked up to the therapist asking if he knew where a certain street was located.  The therapist replied, "Yes, just go down the street here and turn left at the first intersection."  The stranger seemed to understand the directions, so the therapist continued toward his home.  At one point, the therapist looked back and saw that the stranger was going in the opposite direction than he'd directed him.  The therapist called out, "Hey!  You're going in the wrong direction!"

The stranger turned around and yelled back, "Yes, I know!  I'm not ready to go there yet!"

So true!  I rarely (if ever) find myself in a position where I know, without uncertainty, what a sponsee or other friend in recovery may need to go or what they should do.  There are times where I sense that what might good, better or best for the other person and I will then share that as a suggestion which might be worth their consideration. 

That's all well and good.  I just need to learn how to let it go at that point and detach myself from whatever it is the other person chooses to do.  That's their issue and it has nothing to do with me.  Even the suggestion that the other should consider not drinking --- the truth of the matter is that some people are simply not ready to go there yet.

When they are ready, I can try to be there for them with my hand extended.

Take care!

Mike L.

AA Didn't Work for Him... Really?

I was listening to someone's chair/story the other day and he mentioned that before getting sober he once spent 5 years as a member of Synanon, founded by someone who'd once tried AA but found it didn't work for him.  During the discussion period afterward, someone shared that this Synanon founder eventually got drunk and died.  People laughed.  I admit that I joined them, chuckling by impulse, but something felt odd about laughing at someone's dying from this disease and also about their claim that AA didn't work for them.  The presumption seems to be that when people claim that AA didn't work for them, these people weren't ready or weren't willing to do what it takes for this program to work.  If AA doesn't work, it's not AA's fault.

I'm not sure that's always the case.  Does AA not work for some people?  Sure!  But why?  I've been mulling this over for awhile now and I want to share some of my thoughts on this topic. 

First, I don't think "AA" fails anyone.  AA is an organization and doesn't have some separate personal existence or identify that any one person can "experience" by walking into any particular meeting or by talking to any particular member of AA.  Whatever a meeting or member might do or say in terms of conveying the AA message (whatever that is...) to an interested non-member will never represent AA in it's entirety or completeness.  It will always fall short of the ideal that we each might have in mind when we think of AA in all its potential and beauty. 

To the extent that an incomplete or distorted message of recovery gets conveyed to the newcomer, that's not a failing of AA.  It's an unavoidable failing of that particular meeting or member of AA.  Unfortunately, far too many (one would be too many...) people experience such incomplete or poorly conveyed message of recovery by a group or individual.  We're not perfect, as a group or as individual members of AA.

Luckily for me, when I walked into my first meeting, I was just willing and desperate enough to overcome some of the defects/flaws in the messages being conveyed to me, intentionally or not, when I first started coming to AA meetings over 8 years ago.  And as I listen to or read stories from others, members or not, who had bad experiences when they first tried AA, I'm glad that I didn't face some of the intellectual hurdles others had to overcome in order to make it all the way into this weird organization called Alcoholics Anonymous. 

All that said, I don't want to become complacent and just trust that we're doing good enough for those who are willing and desperate enough to overcome all obstacles to giving AA a chance at providing a solution for suffering alcoholics.  It seems incumbant for us all to try to do everything we can to remove any obstacles to a suffering alcoholic's recovery as possible, to take care with our words and message so that we give as many people as possible an ability to find a solution like we have here in AA.  That's not to say that we try to become all things to all people: but it is to say that we should always strive to reach out to more people and to be more effective at conveying the AA message of recovery.

Secondly, I think that given the weirdness of this particular organization, where there is no Pope or ultimate authority or rigid structure/doctrine, the message conveyed to the newcomer will always include something of a mixed bag of fruit and nuts.  I personally think that there's as many ways to work this AA program as there are members of AA.  True, many might strongly disagree with that opinion of mine, but that really only proves my point because all of us who disagree and agree with that statement are still equal and full-fledged voting members of AA even though we have strong differences of opinions on pretty important inside issues.

These two points may appear contradictory: we need to do more and we will always fall short.  But that's not the only paradox I've found in my recovery or in the AA progam.  I'm sure it won't be the last either.  I'm grateful that AA has worked for me and has given me a framework through which I've been able to fashion a way of sober living that works just right for this alcoholic.

Take care!

Mike L.

Life Boring?

At my Wednesday night home group meeting last night, a guy who'd just passed the 30-day mark in his sobriety shared about how although he was glad to be sober 30 days, he was feeling somewhat bored with his life.  He felt that all he was doing was getting up, going to work, going to a meeting and then going to bed.  He was bored sick!  We all laughed, I suppose because we'd all been there -- and even those with years of sobriety were still capable of feeling such boredom even now.

Since at this meeting we allow others to give us feedback during the meeting, this guy got some feedback based on what others had done when they found themselves in similar situations:  try taking up a commitment in one of your meetings just so that you're "a part of" and not just a passive observer in your own recovery....  be patient, don't drink and these periods will pass... when these feelings come, talk about it with your sponsor or, like he had just done, with other alcoholics...  try making a gratitude list and if that's difficult, read pages 416-420 of the Big Book.

I shared with him that when I hear someone complaining about being bored with their life, I ask them to tell me more about what they are doing with their days over a week or month's time.  Invariably, what I discover is that the reason they are feeling bored is that they are leading a boring life!  The cause of boredom is oftentimes BEING boring!  The definition of boring is doing the same thing over and over again, expecting the SAME results! 

Doing the same thing today for my sobriety that I did yesterday or last week or last year will not keep me sober today.  Thank God!

I'm all for structure and routine.  In fact, I'm probably obsessively just that!  But I regularly shake things up in my schedule and routine.  I try to go to different meetings, new meetings that I've never been to before.  I will sometimes leave the house with the intention of going to a 6:30am meeting (like I did today) and realize that I really don't want to go to that meeting today.  I'd rather go to work early and spend an hour blogging about something, anything!  Even boredom!  Sometimes I do, sometimes I don't.  I sometimes do something just because it's uncomfortable or different.

I love my life.  It's rich.  Multi-colored.  Curvy and zig zaggedy.  Full of different and oftentimes contradictory feelings, moods and attitudes.  My life often doesn't go according to plan and, in retrospect, that's what makes it so rich and full.  And when the rare time comes where I find my life becoming boring, I know from experience that the ball's in my court.  Life isn't waiting to live me.

Take care!

Mike L.

Why Communal Prayer Seems Inappropriate Within AA Meetings

I was at a meeting Saturday morning when someone announced to the group that at the request of one of the members, the group was going to go through a group conscience process concerning a request by one of the members to change the meeting format such that the customary closing of the meeting would no longer include praying the Lord's Prayer and that we would begin using the Serenity Prayer instead.  Although the meeting was a Step meeting (and that week we were reading the 8th Step from the 12x12...), several people during the meeting shared their thoughts and opinions about the issue of the Lord's Prayer, most seemed against changing the format and gave various rationales for keeping things as they were. 

I wasn't surprised by the trend given my sense that AAs don't like change and the only thing they dislike more than change is controversy or differences of opinion.  In fact, my only surprise was my ability to not talk about this issue until towards the end of the meeting.  I have strong feelings about this issue.  Not just about the Lord's Prayer, but any communal prayer in the context of an AA meeting.  I think it's wrong. 

I think it causes harm, most particularly with the newcomer who hears one thing in our literature and format, but another thing quite the contrary in our actions.  In the literature, we tell the newcomer that they don't have to believe in God to get or stay sober, that it's a purely personal decision for them to investigate for themselves and that they were completely free to define their "higher power" in any way they chose.   Blah, blah, blah.  And then, at the end of most meetings, the leader stands up and asks us to join him in closing the meeting with the Lord's Prayer.  The people then stand, join hands in apparent solidarity and say this Christian prayer together.  So much for a higher power of our own understanding.

To be clear, I am not against prayer.  I pray frequently.  I often use other people's prayers as a jumping off point for my own prayer.  I memorize many prayers that I've found to express some deep resonating truth to me and recite them aloud as I drive to/from work---eventually modifying those prayers so that they become more "my" prayer and less someone else's prayer.  Communal prayer though seems appropriate only in a religious community where there is a shared or common faith.  Stealing such a communal prayer from any community, which is a strong AA tradition by the way!, seems a bad idea for AA (at least when we only steal prayers from one of the available religious traditions in the world).

The use of sectarian prayers, which includes the AA favorites of The Lord's Prayer, The Serenity Prayer and St. Francis (or Eleventh Step) Prayer, in an AA meeting expresses the reasonable interpretation or mistaken belief that we "in the circle and holding hands" are a part of that Christian or Judeo-Christian sect and that all our words, spoken or written to the contrary, were just meaningless words.

Am I going to bring about change in AA's long practice?  I doubt it -- at least nothing substantial or quick.  I share my thoughts on this inside issue whenever I think that I can be helpful, especially for someone who is new to this weird organization called AA.  I do it with a sense of humor and, as best I can, with humility.  Sometimes, I speak loudest by simply doing what I've done consistently for the last six or seven years: when a group is going about doing a communal prayer, I stand and join in the circle and I do nothing other than listen.  Sometimes I pray silently.  Sometimes I just observe others in the circle. 

Sometimes, especially during the Serenity Prayer, I join the others by inserting my own silent words inbetween theirs:  When they say, "God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change..." -- I say to myself:  "That would be you and much else out there!"  Then, when they continue with, "Courage to change the things I can..." -- I say to myself, "That would be me and my attitudes!"  And as they close with "And the wisdom to know the difference." -- I say to myself, "Yes, please!"

If the secretary asks me to take the group out with a prayer of my choice, I say the word "God?" with a question mark and then stop.  The group usually doesn't notice that I just asked a question or plea toward God and they assume that the prayer of my choice is the Serenity Prayer.  It isn't.  The prayer of my choice is the word God followed by a question mark.  That's it.

I believe one of AA's strongest and longest held traditions is the tradition of stealing prayers from other traditions and making them their own.  We've taken great liberties with massaging these prayers of others to suit our own circumstance.  I love people who when the Lord's Prayer is being prayed, change the word "name" to "names" -- those folks are aware of everything I've been saying in this blog tonite.  Bless them! 

I also noticed this last weekend when I was at my favorite Step Meeting that at the end of the chapter on Step 12, it closes with a different version of the Serenity Prayer than the one I hear prayed in AA meetings or placed on placards in meeting rooms.  The version of the Serenity Prayer in the 12x12 is sometimes referred to as "The We Version of the Serenity Prayer" -- it isn't prayed in the 1st person.  It's prayed together with others:  God grant us the serenity to accept the things we cannot change..."

Someday, I'll make a motion at a business meeting that we take that version of the Serenity Prayer and, with  a few changes, begin to use it to begin and close that meeting:  the motion would be to begin using the new AA version of the Serenity Prayer:

Higher Power grant us the serenity to accept the things we cannot change; courage to change the things we can; wisdom to know the difference and love to do the next kind thing.

Higher Power gives everyone the ability to address this prayer to whatever they have come to hold as their higher power: whether that be some sort of personal, localized God, or not.  It could mean a door knob.  It could be Truth.  It could be Not God.  It could be the group itself.  And, of course, this closing prayer would be purely optional to those who would like to participate.  Anyone should feel perfectly free to not participate without separating themselves from the group or from AA.

Of course, for me to do that, I'd have to attend a business meeting.  Not sure I'm that sober yet!  ;-}

Take care!

Mike L.