April 12, 2010
Alcoholics Anonymous Meeting Reaction Paper
I attended an A.A. meeting on April 5, 2010. Before the meeting I seemed very anxious. This was not my first meeting I have been to meetings before but they all seem to make me nervous. When I arrived the nervousness had eased off because everyone had made me feel welcomed. I was made to feel like a part of their family from the beginning to the end of the meeting. I seemed to have realized I missed going to these meetings and I miss the fellowship but it has not interfered with me staying sober. The meeting began with some readings. I read on the AA Promises which I thought was a waste of time. In my opinion I felt like they should have left the readings for you to read to yourself because the meetings are on a time frame and people seem to have a lot of other important issues to talk about and be concerned with other than reading the same readings every time. The topic of the meeting was on feelings and emotions which I definitely could relate to. As people discussed their emotions and feelings I started feeling sad for some of them. I did not realize how much pain these people are in. I could feel their pain as they talked about what was weighing so heavily on their minds. I sat there and thought what I could do to help them. I started to feel a little sorry for some of them because I feel they depend too much on others to keep them from drinking. Don`t get me wrong the support network they have is amazing but only you can do it for yourself. I wanted so bad at times to tell some of these people only you can keep yourself clean. I think some of these people acted like only these meetings could keep them clean. I do not believe that to be the truth. I felt sorry for one girl because her friend had just committed suicide and she was having a hard time not taking a drink over it but the ones with more recovery time seem to come to her rescue. However, I thought what these people would