Honesty and Boundaries in Sharing at Meetings

Anonymous

I’ve always valued honesty—sometimes to a fault. I have engaged in exceptionally self-absorbed behavior at meetings, and there are some things I’ve learned over time about how I can be useful to others. When I first came to SLAA, I was severely mentally and physically ill, as well as deep in my disease. I remember talking really fast at meetings about plenty of irrelevant matters, including by promoting events that I was proud to be a part of. The longer I’ve worked the Program with a really rigorous sponsor in years since, the more conscious I am of the twelve traditions of SLAA, including of “attraction rather than promotion.”

The mental and physical illness was out of my control, but to my surprise, everything didn’t just magically get better when that ended. It took starting to work a more literature-based Program with a rigorous sponsor a year later for things to really start to change in my recovery. One of the most immediately obvious things that started to change in how I shared at meetings started around then was that I started welcoming newcomers consistently and working to follow the fifth tradition, about carrying the message to the sex and love addict who still suffers.

I’ve also changed in how I give leads—for better or worse, I try to not script what I’m going to say so that I am in touch with my Higher Power and not trying to fix, manage, and control what I say—or others’ reactions. I’ve always liked to talk at meetings, but I’ve found that honesty about struggles I have working the steps, for example, is a lot more useful to myself and others than just being honest about my feelings about outside issues (see tradition ten: “SLAA has no opinion on outside issues, hence the SLAA name ought never be drawn into public controversy”).

So, over time, in a Program about boundaries (as I experience it), I have learned to place more appropriate boundaries around myself and what I share at meetings. I still share good news and positive accomplishments that might sound irrelevant, but I share them because my work with my SLAA sponsor has made my life bigger, so part of how I share the good news of SLAA is by sharing my own good news—as long as I’m not promoting anything. SLAA has truly changed my life.

I’ve also learned to appreciate meetings where the solution is the greater focus of the meetings, rather than just on the myriad personal issues of Program members. Such an atmosphere promotes healthy recovery for me in a way where the traditions, discussion of the steps, and a lack of cross talk, among other things, are respected.Today I try to share by focusing on myself and my experience with the steps, traditions, readings, and leads, as well as using my experience to welcome newcomers. Having boundaries around discussing outside issues and promoting events, among other issues that the twelve traditions bring up, has given me greater practice at being a better person outside of the meetings and at going against my character defects. I don’t give advice, though I admit that my character defects, including being judgmental, can show up when I see and hear others breaking traditions and giving advice. I need to work on that.

But did I see any of the positive changes coming when I started Program over half a decade ago? Not in a million years. My recovery is about progress, not perfection. And I and others feel that I’ve made progress in practicing healthy honesty with boundaries at meetings. Cheers to SLAA, because I can’t do this alone.