THE TRADITIONS SAVE OUR 11TH STEP MEDITATION MEETING
(Editors Note: The Gratitude Club in Sarasota, FL, has fourteen 11th Step Meditation meetings each week. I think they win the prize for the most in any one recovery community. Does yours have more....let us know!)
By George L., www.mystictwelve.com
It was in the fall of 2000 when I first wrote our 11th Step Meditation and began holding weekly candlelight Meditation Meetings. We held them at my home for a few months and then in one of our member's home, Connie from Toronto. We had only four or five members initially. The meeting consists of the meditation, which includes an evening self-examination and the Saint Francis Prayer with discussion during the last half. We actually do a complete 11th Step at each meeting. Our members announced the meditation at every A.A. meeting that they attended. At first, we met with a good deal of resistance when announcing our meeting. Old-timers felt that we were not a true A.A. meeting.
I recorded a meditation CD that has three meditations, a morning, evening (the 11th Step Meditation), and a sleep meditation. We ask for a $4.00 donation to cover our costs and if that is too much for any member we freely give them one. We believe that the more people who meditate the better the world will become. We also suggest that if they have the ability to duplicate the CD that they do so and give them to newcomers and to their friends.
As time went on, we grew to ten or twelve core members with one or two others that would come for a meeting or so and not return. In 2004, we were able to get a room in a church and scheduled our meeting right after a regular A.A. meeting held at 5:30. This was a great spot as we were visible to members of the A.A. meeting and our membership grew. We were there for several months until a few of the Church members began to realize that we were meditating and believed this was too 'New Age' for their liking and they asked us to leave. We went back to our homes. This went on until 2006 when we moved into a local clubhouse in Sarasota called the Gratitude Club located at 530 Paine Parkway.
Now, we really hit resistance. We tried to get into our local A.A. meeting schedule the "Where and When" and were turned down on the basis that we did not meet with our Traditions. We knew this was not true but that it was because meditation not been a local custom and some A.A. members had difficulty dealing with a meeting outside of their experience. Locally, meditation had become known as reading a spiritual piece from one of the daily meditation books. We were able to defend our meeting by using the Traditions. We were not in violations at all. We registered with New York as a regular group and the meeting was put into the "Where and When.'
Unfortunately, this was not the end of the resistance. Our clubhouse meeting was held at 6:45 p.m., sandwiched in between 5:30 and 8 p.m. meetings. Right at 7:45 members of the 8 p.m. meeting would come into the meeting and physically try to nudge us out of the chairperson's table. The fearful resistance was amazing.
Fortunately, we survived all protests and we have grown to fourteen meetings a week. We meet daily at 3 p.m. and at 6:45 p.m. During our tourist season, it is common to have 25 or 30 people meditating on a Monday evening. For all the time that we have held these meetings, we have made the format available to anyone who wants to start a meeting locally or anywhere in the world. Because Sarasota is a tourist city with people coming from all over the world, the format has proliferated. There are meetings using this format in many cities here in the States and in several other countries. We suggest that they offer the CD as long as they do not charge more than their duplication costs. We make the CD label and the format available at www.mystictwelve.com.
Respectfully,
George L.