My View on Sponsorship
Submitted by candyfinnigan on April 25th, 2009Shortly after I came into AA, I heard about the “three things everybody should have” if they were to stay sober: A sobriety date, a home group, and a sponsor. I got all three pretty quickly and my life has been improving ever since. I intend to write a little about each one in separate entries, but today, I want to address the importance of having a sponsor.
I’ve heard people say that the first 164 pages of the Big Book don’t say anything about sponsorship, but that’s because at the time it was written, there were only two groups; Akron and New York, and the purpose of the Book was to carry the message of AA to a world that, up until 1939, hadn’t heard yet about the ray of hope that had broken through the dark clouds of alcoholism. There’s plenty about sponsorship in the personal stories in the second section of the Big Book and in other AA literature. Taking on a sponsor represents a further surrender.
It’s an admission that, on our own, running our own show, we didn’t do such a good job and that perhaps, in the new sober life, we ought to be willing to listen to another voice. The Big Book says, “The alcoholic is an extreme example of self will run riot, though he usually doesn’t think so.” Having given up on self as the answer to my problems, and come into AA, I knew I was going to need a lot of help. I admitted that I didn’t know a thing about staying clean and sober, so it only made sense that I allow someone to guide me through the !2 Steps, and through the rough patches that would inevitably come up as I began the scary, unfamiliar, journey to wholeness.
The basic requirement for a sponsor is that they themselves have a sobriety date, a home group and a sponsor, and that they have taken the 12 Steps. Practical experience has shown that taking the !2 Steps alone, is just another “half measure.” We need direction from another source. A source with sober experience and knowledge of AA literature. Reading the Book with a sponsor is a revelation. Alone, I might have missed many of the suggestions and instructions, which are vital to recovery.
The Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions says that even people of high spiritual development make a habit of consulting with others. Maybe some day, I’ll be one of those people of “high spiritual development,” but in the meantime, I’ll continue to rely on the loving guidance of another sober alcoholic. Someone who isn’t emotionally involved in my life that can provide another perspective on whatever problems and difficult situations that arise. I often don’t see the way I can apply AA principles to these matters, but my sponsor always does.
May 19th, 2009 at 6:23 pm
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May 20th, 2009 at 6:35 am
Hi Candy!
I am excited about you, Jeff and Ken giving us some insight into your own experiences with recovery. I love what you have written about sponsorship. I often call my sponsor and ask how willing I was in early recovery to do as she suggested, especially when I have a sponsee who is not. We women are some incredibly stubborn creatures!!! LOL
I would like to share your thoughts on sponsorship with them – perhaps it may help them to recognize the value of going to any lengths and to at least consider the fact that their way has not done them much good.
By the way, I do still bounce my struggles and joys off my sponsor and other trusted friends in recovery. I often need someone to point out the obvious to me.
I am in school for Addiction Counseling and have a strong interest in becoming an interventionist. I have a few obstacles because of some of the choices I made during my use, but I truly believe that they can be overcome. A dear friend on the same educational path as I began to use again when he found out about these obstacles and ended his life getting high. On this very day, I cannot and will not let hopelessness win…. My friend’s lack of hope is a daily reminder of how important it is.
I look forward to more of your pearls of wisdom!
May 20th, 2009 at 10:10 am
When AA began it began with two drunks being willing to sacrifice their lives for each other. That is the sort of spiritual moment dotted throughout time that keeps alive the better aspirations of humanity. Then naturally they began to write things down. Then we had education and interpretation. But it is the spirit of self sacrifice that created and helps our fellowships survive and albeit despite our own best efforts to the contrary or detriment of our often hastily overlooked failings. Headstones,headlines and media presentations do not speak for the now 96% who are driven from recovery by a glaring absence of true spiritual fellowship and the humility associated with self forgetting. i too have a sponsor and irrespective of how it certainly helps me in my life his first question is always the same: “Who are you helping”. Motive! Sure i write on forums and try be helpful but last night i had a newcomer in my home. Then a young man called who had no weather clothes so i went to my wardrobe and gave him my padded waterproof jacket. The spiritual development is in the remembering of when i lived in rags, survived on chocolate bars and walked 14 miles to 3 meetings a day. The desire to seek help came when suicide was as ordinary as having a cigarette or drinking a cup of tea. Something changed forever and i got a desire. Thankfully i met men and women who knew of that desire in a tornado of self destruction and despite my terrors welcomed me in their homes. i got the best seat in the house, the largest cup and the largest slice of cake. i was driven home to a remote location where even my family were afraid to drive me. Then i was listened to and kept safe until sleep was apparent. But there were two men in the front of the car and i was attracted to what they had and whom neither regarded as anything but a spiritual gift shared. My desire has grown since then through application of spiritual principles such that it is mostly my life today. High Spiritual Development only occurs when “WE” carry a message “WE” share based on “Our” experience strength and hope. My sponsors sponsor came with me on my first 12th step call and never was sponsorship seen by me in any other context than this. One of our most famous Irish poets once wrote “Life is half murdered by language” so i guess books and words are all fine but action is the key and the “We” that prefixes all our steps until the ‘having had’, ‘these steps’ and this message. Hence the small i. Not that difficult to reprogram Microsoft to permit the insignificant little i but to transform a life of the big I takes an awakening of the spirit. Scariest journey on earth but i think your great. Lem
May 31st, 2009 at 2:13 pm
Everyone has there own opinion, here’s mine. I’ve had a sponsor after I found out what that was. 15 years have past and what I tell the newcomers today is, just remember, your sponsor has admitted that there life is unmanageble, they have admitted insanity and have by there own admission been restored to sanity……..Always consider the source, always question what comes out of another alcoholics mouth.