Here I am in my hotel room at the Swiss Convention, snow is falling outside, it is unusually cold for this time of year. We had our press conference yesterday, and as expected, there were less people than we hoped for. NA here in Switzerland is not doing so well, many of the oldtimers don't show up anymore and meeting growth has been stagnant for years. 

I am clean for more than 20 years and one of the first members of NA in Switzerland. Four of us met in AA and started the first NA meeting in Basel. The meeting took place on a Sunday because I had to go back to the army by Sunday midnight. We met in a private home for the first few weeks, before we decided we should continue to meet regularly and open up for all addicts seeking recovery. We found a room and the meeting started to grow. More meetings opened up. As more members started to do service it became time for the ones who started to let others follow. Some years later, the meetings were full, all service positions filled and the message was carried to treatment centers and other institutions. I had performed my duty as the service representative for the German Speaking Region, first as alternate then as rep, for a total of 4 years, I took part in structuring the European service structure (what is now called the European Forum) as well as some World Service Groups. Being left with no obligation to serve and not accepting further nominations, I kept going to meetings.

Going to meetings and listening to the constant whining of people who were mostly still in treatment centers or in a bad place in life started to get to me and I felt like some "step nazi" or NA fundamentalist. I did what was best for me, even if people called me a "hardliner". I worked my program and shared about it. I started to go to different meetings, not travelling every Sunday for almost 400 kilometers to get to my meeting (I had moved to a different part of Switzerland). Coming back to "my" meeting and others, I found myself in discussions whether to let people on substitution programs such as methadone, share and take service positions. I was and still am, strongly against it. My belief is that where there is drugs inside, drugs come out while sharing. But the majority of members felt that these members should be allowed to share. I have always opposed majority decisions in NA, I don't believe in democratic decisions because in my eyes, democracy ist the dictatorship of the majority, hence not spiritual in the NA sense. Other issues such as continous sharing about treatment center related issues started to bore me at meetings and I ended up going less and less. My recovery was still going strong, my spiritual path clear. When I would go back to meetings I felt somehow alienated, service committee meetings were dreadful. People would sometimes call and ask me for advice or to do some service when noone else could. Decisions were made by the service committees that in my experience made no sense, efforts pointing in fruitless directions. I fought my own self righteous opinions and felt that everyone has the right to make his/her own mistakes. I let go.

I would occasionally go to meetings, still attend the conventions that had become a fixed part of my annual schedule, keep in touch with old NA friends i made over the years, but my involvement on a local level became almost inexistant. New meetings started, others closed - I didn't even know about it. At the Swiss Convention last year, I realized that NA is not doing well and decided to do something about it. But between deciding and doing is still a long way, especially for me. Now it is a year later and I still have not gotten involved. I have started to go to meetings as much as possible usually 2 times a week. In the time that I didn't go to meetings much, I moved away from what saved my life.

I am doing fine today, I never felt my abstinence threatended, but I know I need NA. The program gives me the foundation on which I base my life. The place where I nourish that foundation is the meetings. If I want the meetings to be strong I need to get involved. If I want NA to grow, I need to do my part. I have a lot of experience in service, an investment that NA has made in me by electing me as a trusted servant. This experience belongs to NA it does not belong to me. I need to make it available by showing up - however annoying that might be - for me and others...

thank you for taking the time to read my post and letting me be part of this group

Tags: Service Oldtimer NA Recovery

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