Spirituality and Recovery, can one happen without the other?

Hi Friends, just shared the following with a recovery

professionals group on Linkedin and thought you may be interested:

Scott Duncan

Executive Director at Sharing The Burden

Hey Rodney,

Great topic!

First of all I'm a 12 step believer from away back, so obviously Spirituality is number one! There is not a step in the twelve, in my opinion, that can be accomplished without a spiritual dimension. We cannot recognize true powerlessness without accepting that something else must have power and that's step one.

In working with some 12 step folks with Wally P's "back to basics" program, I've found that the sooner one gets spiritually connected to some form of God, that is acceptable to his/her belief system, the sooner the sharing and subsequent healing will begin. Wally's program brings the newcomer through the twelve with sponsorship and actual taking of each step in 4 one hour sessions over a 4 week period. I've done it and provided leadership for the program several times. It is the quickness to accept the possibility of God, that allows for a real solid foundation for systematically working the steps with in depth inventory processing and so on, a little later on.

The most amazing aspect of his program by far though is the two-way prayer which teaches one "How to Listen To God" and to record all experience during a session in writing.

The program introduces a form of prayer (two-way prayer) that proves very quickly to those who truly try it, that there is evidence of its value. When the new person listens to the stats that the earliest programs achieved with up to 75% documented recovery for example and then sees other new folk getting answers to prayers, he/she starts to believe in possibilities! Our program (Sharing The Burden) uses prayer in every meeting to open and close. People seem touched in ways I did not notice in my own 20 years of co-recovery in the traditional 12 step programs I attended. I am the father of a self admitted addict who worked the 12 on and off for 20 years as I did in support of him and of course to assist me with my own shortcomings as well. He lost the war and accidentally overdosed and died June 8, 2012.

Our Sharing The Burden program, that was begun as a result of my journey, which started with my son's addiction back in 1994, is very much focused on the Spirituality aspect taught as it was in the beginning, by Bob and his group (AA co-founder Bob Smith). We have expanded the concept (two-way prayer) to allow 2, 3 or even more people to be involved in a session. One person praying for direction for another's problem and the others quietly recording their thoughts and experiences (without qualification). The sharing of recorded experiences after a session is nothing short of amazing. Answers to much more than the enquiry and not always answers for the person seeking direction! For the spiritually inclined, this is a format you must try! Check out the original format by clicking on the small words How to Listen To God" at the foot of our web page sharingtheburden.ca. You can do this by yourself and if you want any more info on experimenting with getting more people involved, just let me know!

Again thank you for a great topic! You encourage me to expand our charity to much greater lengths than we originally intended!

!

STB takes family recovery to jail

Sharing The Burden (STB) will bring the 12 steps to the prison system starting this month.
We will take the approach that we all hurt whether we can label our pain or not and we invite you to come share your efforts of overcoming or simply listen yo ours. We use this proven formula that has already saved millions of lives and it matters not what your major setback, problem, illness or addiction happens to be; this sharing we do today here and now, is the first and major step toward recovery from the pain. Our family members can practise the same program and recover from the effects of sickness in the family, regardless who shows the symptoms of the illness. As we meet today behind bars we will start the ball rolling for entire families who have slipped through the cracks of society and have little hope of something called RECOVERY. 

We will stress in every meeting, how important the program of 12 steps has been to me, who lost a family member to drug addiction. We learned to love and respect each other and we learned the true meaning of disease (particularly the disease of addiction), how no one asked to have it nor did he/she want it. We learned a common language in the steps and in all the moments that Sean desired to turn away from his addictions, we could share at spiritual and emotional levels that most fathers and sons never experience. The 20 years of effort that went into recovering from the illness were the years that would dictate the importance of CO or FAMILY RECOVERY. They were the hardest yet by far the most meaningful years of my life. Sean's life started STB and his death demonstrated the power and the gift of this form of recovery, shared and followed by as many family members who will take part. His shortened life caused me to raise the bar and share the power of this intimate sharing (12 step-style) ASAP as the urgency screams out. I can tell the young inmate today, face to face what works and I can share the tears of a dad whose son paid the ultimate price for his addiction. More importantly, I can demonstrate the love and relationship that he can have with his family, regardless the state of things at this moment. WE CAN BRING FAMILY HOPE TO THE INCARCERATED! Family care-givers need the hope every bit as much as the inmate and no better person to take that message home than the inmate himself.

                                                                           Sean 

Why we came?

After 20 years of 12 step, the 2nd step spoke differently to me this month as we began our dig into its significance. We spend the corresponding month (2nd month February-Step 2) focused on the depth and totality of each step, searching out its spiritual message and its special teaching for each individual!

STEP 2
"We came to believe that a power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity!"

I looked at those first four words and I knew why we came to the programs of 12 step recovery!
We came------to believe or we came so that we could believe in something or we came because we did not know how to believe in anything and therefore said we believed in nothing or we came because someone else believed there was hope for us or we had tried everything imaginable and we had to find a way TO BELIEVE in something or we would surely die of our predicament in life, whatever that may have been.

WE CAME so that TO BELIEVE could provide the hope that would keep us coming back,

until the decision to believe felt real and the concept of knowing God (the personal and unique way that each of us do so) and trusting in that God empowered us to follow all the steps to FREEDOM!

As long as we recognize our OWN Powerlessness....

How to listen to God, 

Click on this at the bottom of our website and experiment with two way contact with God.

Arrange one of these unique encounters any time with us. We would love to walk you through a process that has made our relationship to the living God, very real!

This a way to "come to belief" immediately, so that you can work your program of life (whatever that may be) with the Power of the Spirit of the almighty Creator of the universe.

Yes we are all human and will still experience all the flaws of humanity, but we will have a sense of CONNECTION to the God that orchestrates the whole thing, in a way like no other (my honest belief anyway)!

In recovery work, the Spiritual connection has been the answer all along; unfortunately many programs consider the spiritual part to be optional or accessible only after a length of time in recovery. I strongly disagree! FIND YOUR GOD AND CONNECT, THEN YOUR PROGRAM WILL WORK!

Believing Together is so much easier!

This week we moved into our look at believing (possibly when we first believed) and how today, that no matter how long ago or recent that was, we still need to "remember when we did not believe", when things seemed hopeless! These "remember when experiences" keep us coming back to our support system so that together we can remain strong and emotionally sober!

The thought that impacted me most at last night's meeting in Wexford, was how different my handling of a troubled situation is today compared to before. Today I use prayer and relationships with other believers to deal with stress. The biggest difference is that I am satisfied today that the outcome, regardless my perception of it, is the right one, because God took part and trusted friends with the same fundamental belief system, agreed (whenever I feel any uncertainty with what I think God is telling me, I seek out another believer's sense of it).

So today I have prayer, scripture (God's Word), and trusted friends to help me resolve difficulties: I am no longer alone as the slogan says!

Before believing I would have found some sort of escape, how could I possibly resolve anything if I knew of nothing greater than me or other men? I panic today at the thought of "it really is all up to me to resolve on my own!"

If you have a Life Recovery Devotional, check out the readings and scriptural references on Pages 36 and 37 entitled respectively "Hope in Faith" and "Internal Bondage"

Meetings every Tuesday and Wednesday evenings at 730. All welcome, call me any time for details.