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From: [email protected]
Category: Category 1
Date: 14 May 2000
Time: 15:53:06
Remote Name: ip154.atlanta14.ga.pub-ip.psi.net
Dear Teresa,
It seems this experience of yours is the exact place where the line is drawn between what NA should and should not be. I am using 'should' to describe the approach position and not value judgement. NA should be free, open, participatory, inclusive and informative. Wrongs should be righted and members joyously working their Tenth Steps by admitting wrongs promptly. Dale Carnegie says that getting folks to admit fault ever - much less promptly - is almost an impossiblity. Part of the trouble may be that if a person is knowingly doing something against group policy, they may never reach a point of personal discomfort sufficient to trigger the self-examination required to acknowledge or admit the fault.
I have found in my experience with NA World Services that many things we done in opposition or avoidance of approved policies on such a broad scale that the cover-up is complete. No one seems to think it odd that we plunged into a ten year inventory process and wound up being run by a super-board which has no guidelines, all the money and total control of the printing, publications, employee selection, literature content, etc. Hey, if that is alright with some members, I just have to assume they are in on something cool I know nothing about. I am forced to go my way in peace. Life is too short to waste on futile controversy. Writing is my outlet.
I think you just have to start a new meeting and try to establish good policies from the beginning. This it not to 'side' with you and assume I know enough to find the other members at fault. I have looked at sixty sides to that coin. It is just that people right now are being very arbitrary meaning they are assuming that their understanding is the correct one and that anyone who attempts to point out an oversight or error is just being negative and trying to make them look bad. This is not going to be known as the 'age of reason' in NA history.
It is just that you and the many members showing up for that business meeting have enough strength and cohesion to do a new group. Perhaps the absent at the first GC will express concern. Don't hold your breath. You just make a safe place for addicts seeking recovery and go on like nothing happened. God will work out the details. We need some central documents stating clearly that we don't overturn a group conscience just because we and our friends were not there that day. On the other hand, I have known of cases where that would be ok. Mostly, there is no one answer for these types of questions.
In the days when NA had a Board of Trustees to respond to members asking guidance on matters regarding the 12 Traditions, they always used to close with a reccomendation that the members go to the area or regional service committee closest to the members concerned believing that personal insight and direct contact with the parties involved was superior to any kind of abstract generality.
I feel for you and wish I had a better response than this. It is just not a time when people are communicating well. I believe our writing may be a step towards a solution. If it is, at least it will be easy to copy!
In Loving Service,
Bo S.