Prayer at Al Anon Meetings

I was writing an entry about Tradition 4 (Each Group should be autonomous, except in matters affecting another group or Al Anon or AA as a whole.) and I got off track because I realize that the example I was using was not the best one. I'm talking about how some Al Anon groups use The Lord's Prayer as part of the meeting.

I dislike when Al Anon groups close with The Lord's Prayer. I have nothing against it and I say it in church all of the time. However, I don't want to say it at an Al Anon meeting because I think it imposes the idea of one Higher Power on all members. This goes against the Al Anon belief that we need to define our own Higher Power for ourselves. In fact, an Al Anon meeting I attend to regularly was the only one I  knew where members recited The Lord's Prayer. At that particular meeting we had a number of members who had bad experiences with Christian religions and simply did not participate as it was said. At first I recited it along

(Photo by Korry_B of stock.xchng.)

with everyone else but as I watched these members I also began to abstain from reciting the prayer in solidarity with them. As I began to learn more about defining a Higher Power, I absolutely felt that what this group was doing was a violation of Al Anon principals. I was happy when the group voted to abolish this practice, as eventually over half our the members were not saying this prayer!

So, you can imagine how I felt last fall when I went to an Al Anon workshop in a rural area where, at the end, a member sternly called out, "Who's father?" which was their cue to begin, "Our Father..." I was offended by this and I did not participate in that recitation of The Lord's Prayer. I also didn't say anything to members of that group because I was only visiting and it was in an area much different than where I lived. For people there, it was comfortable to assume that God was their Higher Power because the area was predominately white and Christian. If their members ever became offended, I knew it was their problem to work out amongst themselves and they didn't need my interference. I could just go back home to my regular groups where we didn't recite The Lord's Prayer at the end.

 I truly believe that it violates the Al Anon principals to incorporate a specific religion into the meetings. But, it is really ingrained in some 12 step meetings and I've found that some are passionate about keeping it. I am passionate, too, but how important is it that I get upset about what a group that I never go to is doing? I just abstain when it comes up but I'm proud that the group I attend chose to think more carefully about this issue.

Al-Anon's Step 11

Al-Anon's Step 11 - Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God as we understood Him, praying only for knowledge of His will for us and the power to carry that out.

Sometimes I think of this as my favorite step, and many times it looms large in my mind as one I am consciously working on. However, going through my notebooks I realized that I have not been to very many meetings on Step 11. I procrastinated in writing on this step as I have gone through a lot lately and writing about how I work this step is almost too personal to share at this time. But, I will write about how I got into it.

(Photo by Selma Yalazi.)

I was not excited about the “prayer” part of this step in the beginning because I had some issues with the religion of my origin. I thought of prayer as an obligatory thing, and so when I did it I rarely felt a connection with God. The idea of meditation was, and still is, more accessible to me. To get used to talking to my Higher Power on an intimate basis I had to learn to be quiet so I could tune in to the messages I was supposed to receive. I learned that I should not pray for others or for a specific cause, but to ask for guidance in my situation. Then, I had to accept how my Higher Power resolved my problems, which may not be the way I intended. I have to be confident that my Higher Power will take care of my loved ones and myself and that things will work out, even if I don't know how.

Learning to meditate had been a big part of my Al Anon experience. For most of my life I could not imagine sitting still and clearing my mind for even three seconds.  I found yoga invaluable for calming my mind for mediation as I could work out the compulsion to always be doing or thinking about something and instead focus on the class. (I have heard is the original purpose of the yoga poses – to quiet your mind and to focus on meditation.) Part of the reason I began taking yoga classes is that I knew that there was meditation included in the class, and I had no idea of how to do meditation on my own. I knew I needed someone else to guide me. It is only in recent months that I began doing meditation on my own. 

I tried a number of different ways to learn meditation outside of Al Anon and yoga. Once, a Buddhist monk led a meditation workshop at the local library, and that helped a lot. At that time I was not yet practicing yoga and the monk helped us to learn how to just sit in a regular chair and meditate. He said for us to simply sit upright, place our feet flat on the floor, and rest our hands in our lap. (I mention this because an Al-Anon friend injured himself trying to meditate. He thought you had to meditate while sitting cross legged on the floor, but he did not realize that at his age he was no longer physically able to do so.)

I did not get much out of reading books on the subject, even though I am a big reader and love to learn "how to" from books. It seemed to me that books were full of quick novelty exercises while what I needed was just to listen to someone else guide me. I found a couple of web sites with recorded meditations on them, and YouTube had plenty. (Alas, my favorite night time sleep meditation from that time has been removed.) I also like the evening meditation from the DVD AM and PM Meditation featuring Rodney Yee and Maritza. I would put it on my bedroom TV, skip the yoga part (because I have my own practice, but it is not necessary to use the yoga part to do the meditation) and use it to get to sleep at night.

I had a big breakthrough when I followed the Yoga JournalMediation Revolution series.  (I wrote about my experiences as I was going through them, so see this tag on meditation for all of the entries. As with the DVD, I had my own yoga practice and skipped that, using only the recording at the bottom of the page.) It took me a couple of months to get through the whole series, and it was hard, but I grew tremendously from it. I use techniques from the Great Heart meditation when I need to feel connected to my HP. In fact, the whole series made me more independent in my meditation and I can now sit quietly and meditate on my own, using my own intuition instead of a recording.

These days, at night before I go to bed I do some kind of relaxation yoga practice and then sit quietly in bed and meditate. This helps wind me down so I can sleep, no matter what is going on in my life at the moment. I feel that I have been working Step 11 hard over the past few months, but now I am reaping great rewards from it.

Shackin' Up With Jesus

Today I went to church with my boyfriend. It is a Methodist church, but we aren't Methodists. We started going at the invitation of Boyfriend's Daughter and this proved to be a rare and non-confrontational way to spend time with her. She has since become a member. We don't go every week, about twice a month. I don't want to get into talking about my long struggle to define a Higher Power, but I've never been back to the church of my origin, and it took me a long time to be comfortable at any church service. Now, boyfriend and I alternate between this and another church, simply because we feel comfortable and happy in both places.It also provides a way to discuss our beliefs and values.

(Photo by Irina Martynuk.)

Today, the pastor asked to speak with us both after the service and she wanted to ask us to consider becoming members. (Typical of my boyfriend, he assumed that she had asked for him only and asked me to wait for him until they were done.) I know that this is probably a natural outcome of regularly attending one church, but I felt a little cornered by the discussion.

This minister is big on service to the church and often makes that a part of her sermon. I told her that I didn't live nearby and didn't have a car. I only come with Boyfriend and since I couldn't get there by myself I wouldn't be able to do what most members do. She said that didn't matter but then said that she wanted to grow her membership because it was unfair to call upon the same people to do things around the church. She wanted to press this further with me, but luckily Boyfriend's ego intruded and he wanted to tell her all about himself, directing the attention away from me.  To conclude, she said we were "shackin' up with Jesus" when we needed to make more of a commitment.

Afterwards, this reminded me a bit of my dilemma with my former Al Anon home group. It was the first Al Anon group that I went to. Boyfriend thought I should go to some meetings and volunteered to take me to the first available meeting since he was curious about it himself.  This turned to be an adult child oriented meeting far from where I live.

Even though I loved the group once, I always had to turn down service opportunities because I couldn't get there without boyfriend. Plus, I always felt like I was in his shadow, because he is the more outgoing one who is very attention seeking. People there often asked about him, but not me. If we weren't stuck together all of the time, people thought there was something wrong and we became a source for gossip. That is really against the Al Anon principals and not why I go to meetings.

Yesterday was the first day I didn't go with him to my former home group and it felt great. I went to the farmer's market and saw people I know from Al Anon in my neighborhood, so it was a little "meeting before the meeting" discussion. I found out that a Saturday morning group that used to be in the building where I work was switched to another place. (For obvious reasons, I didn't feel comfortable going to it.) An Al Anon friend reached out to me and invited me to the meeting and so I went. It was nice. I got what I needed, and I didn't miss boyfriend at all.

I don't know which group I will pick for my home group but it will be a group that Boyfriend never goes to and it will be close enough to where I live so I can do service regularly. My Al Anon service is usually related to events like luncheons or online because I hate leading groups. I used to secretary in small groups and may go back to that again.