I went to an NA meeting on Monday April 11, 2011. There were around 30 people who attended the meeting. My perception was very changed. I always thought that Narcotic addicts would look a certain way or there is an archetype for addicts. However, that is not the case. They were common people; people you would see in a grocery store or out in the public somewhere.
The meeting interested me so much that I looked into the history of Narcotics Anonymous. The first Narcotics Anonymous meetings were actually held in Los Angles and branched out to other parts of the world. In the world there are more than 58,000 NA meetings(1.). What I learned from the meeting was that there are twelve steps to recovery. The meeting I went to actually started with the recitation of the twelve steps to stop addiction. The first step is to admit that one is powerless over the addiction.
To be powerless over something means that you’ve given up all your will to it. This is a strange thing to say at first because why say that you are powerless over something that you want to defeat. The interesting thing to note is that these people really are truly powerless to these drugs. These drugs totally and utterly consume their lives in a way that it disrupts everything else in their lives. So to admit that you are powerless over it is the first step to your recovery I saw this first hand when I went to the meeting that most of the people talked about how the drugs controlled their lives. At first they said they could hold a job for a while, but when the money went dry from all of the drug use they had to resort to other ways of getting money, which would take time away from their work.
The second is to believe that a power greater than themselves could restore someone back to a better state. This would lead some to believe that there is some religious connotations, but to know that there is someone out there who is always willing to help under any circumstance is a fulfilling feeling. I think the purpose of this is not to promote a religious ideologue, but to provide a source to turn to when the addiction is at its worst.
The third is to turn your entire will to God as is understood by the addict. This means that the addict puts the burden on God to help him. I like this one because it really, like the previous one, lays out the foundation that God is the one, whom reliance is needed. This is true in my life also, where I find that God is whom I rely on the most and is whom I need support from.
The fourth is to make a fearless and thorough moral account of oneself. This means that one searches within himself and sees what may be right or wrong with one’s actions and behaviors. I think that the step being referred to means that a person needs to see that what he has been doing is wrong in society and in order for the person to function correctly he/she must stop what they are doing.
The fifth step is to admit to oneself and God that what they have been doing is wrong. Like the previous one it means that you understand what you have been doing is wrong.
The sixth one is to be ready for God to remove the ills in character. The addict needs to be ready for change to occur.On a similar note,the seventh one is to humbly ask for the removal of the shortcomings.
The rest are quite similar so I will give you the gist of them.: learning to live a new life with a new code of behaviors and helping others with similar addictions.
The meeting I attended was quite formal actually. Everyone who spoke started out by saying they were addicts and then tell their names. There were around 30 or so people in attendance with diverse backgrounds. A lot of the people looked like you or I and could be found anywhere on the street. Many of the attendees did a great job at explaining how addiction controlled their lives. Some talked about how they had to sleep with other people to get what they wanted. Others talked about how they recently saw people they got high with and how they brought them to other NA meetings.
The majority of the people there were former crack addicts. The one I went to was also majority African American. I felt very welcomed by the attendees. People would randomly come and give me hugs. Some would shake my hand and thought I was on narcotics.I was deeply moved by the amount of love I received from these random people.
One of the things that has moved me was in one of the pamphlets it states:
“You may be feeling hopeless and afraid. You may think that this program, like other things you have tried, will not work. Or you may think that it will work for someone else, but not for you because you feel you are different than us. Most of us felt like that when we first came to NA. Somehow we knew that we couldn’t go on using drugs, but we didn’t know how to stop or stay clean. We were all afraid to let go of something that had become so important to us. It is a relief to discover that the only requirement for membership in NA is a desire to stop using.”
It touched me because this really states that this is the last hope for most of the attendents. At first, most of them were mistrustful and fearful trying a new way of doing things. About the only thing they were sure of was that their old ways were not working at all. Even after getting clean, things didn’t change for them right away. Often even their usual activities, such as driving a car or using the telephone seemed frightening and strange, as if they had become someone they did not recognize. This is where the fellowship and support of other clean addicts really helps and they begin to rely on others for the reassurance they so desperately need.
What I have learned from attending this meeting was that recovery does not stop with just being clean. As they abstain from all drugs (and yes this means alcohol and marijuana, too) they need to come face to face with feelings that they have never coped with successfully. They may even experience feelings they were not capable of having in the past. By far what is most true is that they must become willing to meet old and new feelings as they come.
