Twelve Ways To Tell The Difference Between Your Sponsor And Your Therapist:

 1)  Your sponsor isn't all that interested in the "reasons" you drank.
  
 2)  Your therapist thinks your root problem is your lack of self-esteem, negative self-image, and your poor self-concept. Your sponsor thinks your problem is a 3-letter word w/no hyphens... YOU.
  
 3)  Your therapist wants u to pamper your "inner child." Your sponsor thinks it ought to be "Spanked" or "Taken out and Shot!"

 4)  Your sponsor thinks your inventory should be about you, not your parents!

 5)   Speaking of parents, your sponsor tells you not to confront them, but you apologize to them.

 6)  The only time your sponsor ever uses the word "closure" is  before the word "mouth."

 7)  Your sponsor thinks "boundaries" are things You need to take or tear down, not build up.

 8)  Your therapist wants you to love yourself first; your sponsor wants you to love others first.

 9)  Your therapist prescribes care taking and medication; your sponsor prescribes prayer making and meditation.

10)  Your sponsor thinks "Anger Management Skills" are numbered 1-2-3...12

11)  Now that u haven't had a drink in six months, your therapist thinks u should make a list of your goals and objectives for the next five years, starting with finishing up that college degree.  
Your sponsor thinks you should start today by cleaning the coffeepots and helping him or her carry a heavy box of literature to the jail.

12)  Your sponsor won't lose his license to practice if he talks about God...

 :-)  STAY SOBER!  (-:
One Day At A Time


Twelve Steps of Sponsorship

1.   I will not help you to stay and wallow in limbo.

2.   I will help you to grow, to become more productive, by your definition.

3.   I will help you become more autonomous, more loving of yourself, more excited, less sensitive, more free to become the authority for your own living.

4.   I can not give you dreams or "fix you up" simply because I can not.

5.   I can not give you growth, or grow for you.  You must grow for yourself by facing reality, grim as it may be at times.

6.   I can not take away your loneliness or your pain.

7.   I can not sense your world for you, evaluate your goals for you, tell you what is best for your world;  because you have your own world in which you must live.

8.   I can not convince you of the necessity to make the vital decision of choosing the frightening uncertainty of growing over the safe misery of remaining static.

9.   I want to be with you and know you as a rich and growing friend;  yet I can not get close to you when you choose not to grow.

10.  When I begin to care for you out of pity or when I begin to lose faith in you, then I am inhibiting both for you and for me.

11.   You must know and understand my help is conditional.  I will be with you and "hang in there" with you so long as I continue to get even the slightest hint that you are still trying to grow.

12.   If you can accept this, then perhaps we can help each other to become what God meant us to be, mature adults, leaving childishness forever to the little children of the world.

It's Never to Late to Call, Better if its before you take that Drink!








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11/15/2008

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