Wisdom of Sponsorship Part B

B.1.1 First Step - Costs

Every so often, newcomers at our meetings ask for a sponsor at one of their first meetings. Unless they have been in another 12-Step program, they have no idea what they are in for. Are they ready to do step work? Probably not to any great depth, most of the time. Still, those first few weeks or months when newcomers are struggling with abstinence, struggling to figure out what the program is about, can be a time in which a healthy start can be made.

My experience is that this start needs to be something that touches both head and heart, but that doesn't overwhelm the newcomers' ability to cope. This means something that is simple, makes plain the sense of powerlessness and unmanageability, and touches into the core values. I have found a series of exercises that work effectively without producing a sense of hopelessness.

The first thing I ask sponsees to do is to calculate approximately how much money they have spent on their addiction. I encourage them to write it down and do their calculations on paper. I suggest they calculate the cost of pornography of all types, the internet, prostitutes, "toys", sexual paraphernalia, lifestyle items (specific cars, clothes, jewelry, makeup, costumes, furniture, and so on), and surgery or drugs or medications to "enhance" their sexual activity. This is not an exhaustive list. Next comes what the addic-tion has cost them in treatment of injuries or diseases, lost jobs or promotions, therapy, divorces and other breakups, legal issues, lost inheritances, lost time to their employers, lost educational opportunities. Generally, people soon come to recognize that this much money could have been put to much better use elsewhere.

Occasionally, sponsees tell me they didn't spend a lot of money on their addiction, or that it didn't have a high financial cost. I remind them that it is important to add the word "yet" onto that statement because more than likely it will happen sooner or later. Such "low-cost" newcomers are often affected more by the next two inventories.

The first inventory calculates the amount of time spent in the addiction. I ask the newcomers to look at the time a particular addictive ritual took and multiply that out by the number of times per week, by 52 weeks per year, and by the number of years of acting out that way, and then to do this for all behaviors. Finally, I ask the newcomers to work on fantasy. I once figured that just the fantasy time spent in my acting out ritual (this doesn't include my walking around fantasy) was 3.5 years out of the 20 years of my active addiction. This fact alone put a huge hole in my denial.

A final exercise that often helps relieve the newcomers of any sense of control over the addiction is simply to make a list of all the ways they have acted out, including the dif-ferent variations tried. For the forgetful, I encourage them to look at the list in the appendix in Don't Call It Love. While the list is not exhaustive (for example, the internet was not around when the book was written), it will stimulate memory and help the newcomer get past much denial.

Taken together, money, time and a list of acting out behaviors give newcomers (or any other addict, new or old) a comprehensive snapshot of the unmanageability of the addiction. One or more of these has never failed to touch the sponsees who have tried these exercises. At the same time, they have not been overwhelmed by this work. These three inventories form a simple base for a first pass at the First Step and help the newcomers see how much the program can be of benefit to them. They can also be a starting point for work on Step Four."

Anonymous PBR Volume 14 Issue 3 Jun Jul Aug 2002

B.1.2 First Step - Unmanageability

Recently a newcomer to the program, "Kevin," presented his dilemma with the First Step. He could see that he was powerless over sex addiction. For example, he was able to identify many situations in which his addiction took up more time than he wanted it to, when he couldn't keep himself from pornography on the inter-net and when he was unable to stop gawking at people he found attractive. How it kept him from managing his life, however, was not clear to him.

This is actually a fairly common problem. Many of us have struggled to accept one side or the other of the powerlessness/ unmanageability equation of the First Step. This is one of the ways addictive denial keeps us locked into addiction. For me personally, early recovery was an effort to see these two simultaneously. I could only grasp one at a time and it shifted daily whether I could embrace my powerlessness or my unmanageability. It was when I finally could experience both together that I really felt the First Step start working in my life and I started to get clean.

For Kevin, the challenge was to define unmanageability in terms that flowed from his powerlessness. We started by talking about what it meant for him to manage his life. He said that it was to live successfully in the different sectors of life: family, education, business, religion, and community were some of his examples. Successful living happens when he manages each sector by a set of principles and values. I asked him to explain this.

Kevin said that he was in business and that his management training taught him to identify the key principles, values and practices that would allow him to work productively. Success came from sticking to those principles and following them to the end of the project or deal. He said that as long as he did this, he was managing his business.

I suggested that if he was not living by these principles or was actually violating them in the various sectors of his life then that would then lead to unmanageability. He agreed. So we looked at this idea in the area of family life. Kevin said that the key principles for him were to provide for, be an example to and spend time with his family. When he did those, he believed that he was successfully managing his family life. So then we looked at how he did or didn't stick to those principles when his addictive behaviors came into play. He noted that when his addiction was absorbing many hours each day, he wasn't spending time with his family; when he was uncontrollably sexualizing women in public he wasn't being a good example to his children; and when he was purchasing sexual stimulation on the internet instead of working on his business he wasn't providing for his family. As a result, his family relationships were a mess. He recognized that he was not successfully managing his family life when he was being controlled by his addiction. His uncontrollable addiction was making his family life unmanageable. We briefly reviewed the other sectors of life that he thought were important and he saw that in each one his addiction was leading him to violate the principles, values and practices by which he was trying to manage his life. Sex addiction was truly making his whole life unmanageable. This recognition was quite sobering for Kevin. It touched him deeply.

He started to feel the pain that came as his denial broke down. He started to experience the First Step, rather than just say the words.

This is one way to help sponsees and newcomers face the reality of their powerlessness and unmanageability.

Anonymous PBR Volume 17 Issue 1 Jan /Feb 05

B.4.1. Getting Started on Step Four

At some point, if we are patient, our sponsees may ask us about working the Fourth Step. Having avoided it for three years myself, I appreciate the value of procrastination as a tool of pain avoidance. However, it was the continuing insanity and the pain of reemerging addictive behaviors that made me finally say, "I'm ready." Pain is probably the best starting place for anyone doing this work. The reason is that, like any other Step, Four is more than just an intellectual journey; to be effective, it needs to be a union of facts and emotions.

Before any of my sponsees has ever done fruitful Step work, I tell them they must have some abstinence under their belts first. As much as some would like to claim otherwise, the reality is that denial and emotional numbness always are controlling a per-son when he or she is acting out. (This is true no matter how long a person has been in the program.) Abstinence from all addictive behaviors is the best sign of progress on Steps One, Two and Three. There is no sense in starting Step Four without it.

What has seemed to help my sponsees the most on the first time through is to work a wide ranging Step Four. There are many resources. One of the best is the outline presented in Alcoholics Anonymous, chapter 5, pages 64 to 71. It takes an individual through a list of some of the most serious character defects and makes some general suggestions on what to write; the section on resentments is outstanding. However, this out-line is very .difficult to work without a lot of guidance from a sponsor who has worked the Big Book Step Four him or herself. Even if this is not the format chosen, however, sponsees would benefit from reading this chapter for an understanding of what an effective Step looks like. AA also has a pamphlet on working Four that gives a more detailed explanation.

Another resource is the many Step workbooks available from different sources. I have worked with a few of these; some are better than others. My chief complaint about a few of the workbooks is that they reflect more of a psychological approach than a spiritual one. They can get very heady and move away from a focus on behaviors and what those actions reveal about one's spirituality.

A third approach that has worked for some of my sponsees is using the Seven Deadly Sins as an outline. This approach is suggested in the Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions book of A.A. To do this, start with the Sins: pride, greed, lust, anger, gluttony, envy and sloth. (Some people suggest adding fear to the list as an eighth Deadly Sin.) Take them one at a time and write out a list of specific incidents which shows how this defect has warped one's character. The chapter on Step Four in the Twelve and Twelve offers a number of questions that can help a newcomer get started. Yet another approach that is used in some areas of the country is a Twelve Step workshop. This is a group of people gathered together to work through the Steps together. These have worked m AA for decades.

My only concern about workshops in SAA is that these sometimes they are composed only of newcomers. Without some kind of guidance from oldtimers, the participants are likely to fall into old patterns of denial. In other words, they can become the blind lead-ing the blind. Workshops need old-timers or sponsors to be effective.

Once the sponsee has clean time and have found a Step Four tool, there are still a number of things that I do as a sponsor to help make it safe and productive. I suggest the sponsee always call me every time after doing some writing, if they don't reach me, they are to call someone else. Step work is painful if it is effective, and it is at those vulnerable moments that the addiction offers "relief." A call to the sponsor is an important bit of support through the pain. Even if it isn't painful one time, the habit of calling may be what gets the sponsee to seek support the next time when it is. I also encourage sponsees to pace themselves in a self-respectful and consistent way; don't hurry through it because the pain will accumulate and become overwhelming, and don't draw it out over years. One specific suggestion is working three or four times a week for about thirty minutes, lessening this pace when the more painful times hit.

A final suggestion responds to the question, "How do I know when I'm done?" The answer is one week after you feel like your Higher Power is indicating that you are done; the week provides a chance to see if anything else comes up. Then it is important to schedule a time to present Step Five as soon as possible. Whoever the sponsee chooses to hear the Step, it is important not to wait very long, because the denial and emotional disconnection can quickly reappear. As with Four, Step Five is only effective when the facts and the emotions are united. This is where so much healing can take place."

Anonymous PBR Volume 14 Issue 2 Apr May 2002

B.4.2 When to back up a Step

"Marcus" (not his real name) is a fairly new sponsee who came to SAA after three years in another fellowship. After a few months checking us out, he realized the seriousness of his sex addiction, hit bottom and was given the gift of abstinence from his addictive behaviors. He did some great work on the first three steps in his first few months and seemed ready for Step 4.

He had worked Step 4 in the other fellowship a couple of times and we discussed what format he might use this time. His past experiences had been with the three-columns ap-proach suggested in the book Alcoholics Anonymous (pp. 64 to 71). For those who are not familiar with this, it is well worth examining. Page 65 gives an example for examining resentments. The first column lists each person we resent, the second lists the specific cause, and the third identifies how it affects us. The last column identifies effects on security, self-esteem, ambitions, personal relations or sex relations. It also notes how fear is a common and destructive thread. This can be a helpful format for doing a Fourth Step and Marcus had found it so in his other program. However, he thought maybe he wanted to try something else.

I suggested a worksheet that had been passed around which gave a list of character defects, asked for a list of manifestations of each defect and then for stories about each manifestation. Marcus wanted to try that and took off working on what he saw as one of his major defects. After writing as much as the worksheet suggested, he moved onto another defect. This is where he struggled.

Marcus found himself writing for a while and then fighting work on the inventory. He didn't feel right doing it, and was ashamed to tell me about it. When we finally did talk about it, I suggested that he try an old piece of AA advice. The saying is, "If you are having trouble, back up a step and work on that."

He did this. He went back to his Step 3 and looked to see if this particular character de-fect somehow was something he would not or did not want to surrender to his HP. He spent a lot of time searching himself over this and found that while he was afraid to sur-render it, he was willing to. His problem wasn't at Step 3.

We then explored backing up half of a step. In other words, Marcus went back to the first character defect to see if there was something there that was holding him up. He realized that he had a lot more to write about that particular item in his inventory. While he had written out the ten or twelve items that the worksheet had suggested, he recognized that he had more manifestations and more stories he needed to explore. It was as if that particular defect was keeping him from moving on to the next. After he went back and wrote as much as he felt he could, Marcus found that he naturally went on to the next de-fect and completed it.

This seems to work when people get stuck. Backing up a step or a half step can help us find what we may be missing. Sometimes we cannot see what is interfering with our progress; the problem has not yet entered our consciousness. By backing up,we allow our Higher Power to show us a possible source of the obstacle.

Anonymous PBR Volume 16, Issue 2 Mar Apr 2004

B.12.1 Sponsoring as they sponsor "GrandSponsoring"

Some of my sponsees are now sponsors themselves. They have worked enough of the Steps and have maintained abstinence for more than a year so that they have some "experience, strength and hope" to share with newcomers. It is very exciting to see them carry the message in this important way. While I have nudged each one when I thought he was ready, each told me that he would do it only if I helped him. This I took as a sign that they were approaching sponsorship seriously.

I discussed with each one some suggested guidelines to help him get started. They each agreed to: I. Sponsor no more than two people at first so they could get some experience. (A quick note: In some regions of the country, sponsorship is almost a one-on-one activity. Locally, we do not do anything that intense. Even in other Twelve Step fellowships, including AA and NA, multiple sponsees are the norm.) 2. Limit themselves to providing support and guidance on working the Twelve Steps since that was all that they had to give away at this point. 3. Give themselves permission not to be experts and to tell their sponsees "I don't know" when that was the case. 4. Talk with me about what was going on in the sponsorship relationship from time to time.

For my part I had guidelines for myself: I do not tell them how to sponsor. I only share what I have learned when they ask and encourage them to explore their own approaches and styles. I help them keep themselves focused on their own recoveries by asking about their own work as well as listening to them talk about their sponsees' progress. I stand back so that they can learn from sponsorship, while trying to be close enough when they believe they need some guidance.

This last guideline actually ended up helping one sponsee grow quite a bit in his own pro gram. "Cal" discussed it with me before he took on a request to sponsor "Eric." I had my doubts about Eric and guessed that he was looking for someone to talk to until he could "fall in love when the right woman came along"; I didn't tell Cal of my suspicions. So Eric took up quite a bit of Cal's energy and time for about two months, and then left the group when he fell in love. Cal was sad and mad about being dis-carded so easily. When we talked about it, he recognized that he had gotten over-involved in Eric's life and that he needed to develop some boundaries for himself as a sponsor. Boundaries and expectations had been a big problem for him with most of his relationships anyway.

This was a valuable lesson that he got to test four months later when Eric called him again. He was quite depressed because that woman had had the sense to end their relationship. He came looking for Cal to take care of him again and Cal wouldn't fall for it. On his own, Cal extended his boundaries into the way that he shaped his sponsorship relationship with Eric. At the same time, he also encouraged Eric to set some boundaries against falling in love that way. So far, it seems to be much healthier this time for both of them.

While the guidelines have been helpful (mostly to me to keep my nose out of their business), my sponsees have found that they don't need me that much. When they share what they have gained from the program and limit it to that, they carry the message quite well. Their own recoveries are the best tools they have in sponsoring newcomers.

Anonymous PBR Volume 15 Issue 2 Mar Apr 2003

B.12.2. Service Work

"Finally, we look at service. This area includes outreach to newcomers, acting as a trusted servant in a meeting, starting a new meeting, writing an article for the local SAA newsletter or the PBR, and helping to organize the SAA convention. It also involves some of our intergroup services: committees, outreach efforts, telephone answering committee, and serving as a meeting rep.

Finally, service also includes examining their readiness to be sponsors. Most of them wanted to duck sponsorship, but I told each of them that after he had a year or more of abstinence-based recovery, he will want to be open to it. We talked about what they needed to do to be ready to sponsor, if and when the time came. I assured them that I would be there to help them work through any difficulties."

Anonymous PBR Volume 14 Issue 5 Nov Dec 2002