The Self-Help Group Discussion

Ever been to a self-help meeting? Did you ever dig into the program behind the meeting? Share your experiences with that in here if you care.

If you are currently attending them your reflections of how you feel about them/why you go to them are asked for too. If you have only been to a couple in the past, you are just as welcome to discuss.

I find some are set in stone. Some are open to adapting to new research about addiction that science discovers.

For instance twelve step programs (we can also discuss exactly where the original steps were borrowed from) and a Buddhist-oriented program that has recently grown popular called Refuge Recovery are pretty much set in stone, kind of like dogma except one asks you to have blind faith while the other does not. Set in stone as they are based on something that would not change due to advancing knowledge of addiction, designed as such by recovering addicts (Bill Wilson & Noah Levine). Now something like SMART Recovery explicitly states it changes with the advancements in scientific understanding of addiction, at least I think SMART says that.

They also seem to differ with how they view addiction. For example AA would say alcoholism is a spiritual disease while a program like SOS would say (its founder says actually, also a recovering addict, Jim Christopher) addiction is a cellular disease first and foremost. And getting a bit off-topic for this discussion but some would also say addiction is not at all a disease (heard that from a doctor and a monk).

Anyways I am not sure I should delve into how I view addiction in this thread but I will share my own experiences with self-help programs. I am not sure I view them as bulletproof solutions so to speak but I am involved with them and feel like it is only temporary but I also don't think they are a waste of time.

 

I really wanted to hear someone's thoughts before sharing my own.

A song, an ode to self help,



(Wow the kids listened to them in my high school I think years back)

Be back in here in the future. Apologies if I reply late, if any replies are left.

 

AA is super dogma. The 12 Step Promises? Blind faith...

I love Jung but the Steps are actually taken from The Oxford Group's content.

I never heard of a correlation between Bill Wilson and Carl Jung but it is an interesting thought. Not asking to fact check the history of it.

 

So I am done with self-help meetings.

I have more ideas to join communities (non-addiction related) offline than I actually can explore right now. Will talk about this somewhere else but ya I basically feel like a compulsion problem (for myself) is my sole responsibility to deal with. Not devaluing the need for social interaction and community at all.

Just feel like self-help communities (addiction specific ones) are somewhat stuck on the subject of addiction (some are more recovery oriented but the nature of the group is relating around a compulsion issue) when I don't think that is necessary nor a good place to be for me personally to grow in life.