The Twelve Step program of recovery from alcoholism and other addictions rests on a notion of spirituality that is not about having the “right” beliefs. Instead, it is about adopting daily practices that help people stay clean and sober.
These daily practices are the subject of Step Ten of the Twelve Steps of Alcoholics Anonymous: “Continued [...]
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A raging motorist accosts another driver for not moving fast enough. A harried, tired parent, preoccupied with details of the difficult day ahead, drives to work on autopilot, forgetting to drop off his sleeping infant in the back seat at daycare. The parent goes into the office as usual; the child suffocates from the heat [...]
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Nancy Kehoe, Ph.D., is a Massachusetts psychologist who for 20 years has trained mental health care providers to tend to the spiritual as well as the psychological needs of their clients. At a Hazelden Women Healing conference in April, Kehoe emphasized that although spirituality and religion can be integrally linked to mental health, the therapeutic [...]
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As John Mac Dougall, manager of Spiritual Care at Hazelden, points out, abstinence is but one element in recovery from addiction. Many people quit drinking or another addiction only to start practicing it again. They don’t realize that quitting is merely the beginning of recovery, and they treat the symptoms of the disease and not [...]
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Open the doors of Central Park United Methodist Church in St. Paul, Minn., on a Sunday morning and you will hear the singing of hymns, the murmur of voices in responsive readings, the quiet hush of meditative prayer. You might see an offering plate being passed or communion being served by Rev. Jo Campe, the [...]
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A small circle of men listened attentively as their counselor at a mission in St. Paul announced their
assignment. Their faces might have belonged to anyone–professionals with post-graduate degrees or
homeless individuals who constantly struggle. But they were late-stage, chronic alcoholics, the kind
who huddle beneath city bridges in the December cold or who simply revolve through local [...]
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Members of Alcoholics Anonymous often describe the Twelve Steps of AA as a spiritual path. Yet the word “spiritual” immediately points to a dilemma: At times, it is easy to be spiritual, to feel light and joyous, free and forgiving. But what does spirituality mean on Tuesday afternoon at 5 p.m. after you’ve been laid [...]
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In the concentration camp, Viktor Frankl was prisoner No. 119,104. He spent most of his time in forced labor, laying tracks for Nazi railway lines. At one point, his job was to dig a tunnel for an underground water main. He worked alone. His reward was a coupon worth 12 cigarettes. Instead, he exchanged the [...]
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Basil Brave Heart’s journey of healing began 31 years ago when a Lakota medicine man took him to a
sweat lodge, made a circle in the dirt with a stick, then planted the stick in the center of the circle. “He
told me, ‘This is you in the center, and alcohol walks around you on the outside [...]
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Quoting Groucho Marx, film director Woody Allen once said facetiously, “I’d never join a club that would allow a person like me to become a member.” But there is a club so universal that adults join and rejoin it many times. The only requirement for membership is living in a world replete with change.
AuthorMelody Beattiecalls [...]
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