(Essay written in 2006)
It sometimes
strikes me as hilarious that I am a Trustee on the General Service Board of D.A.
I don’t feel particularly qualified or worthy of the position. I’ve been free
from incurring unsecured debt for only eleven years. There are many D.A.s with
many more years of recovery. I’m sure there are a multitude of D.A.s who are more
spiritually evolved. Certainly I know there are many who have newer cars,
bigger houses, wiser investments, and wads of cash in the bank. So, what makes
me think I am worthy of being a GSB Trustee?
Here’s what I’ve
figured out: All it takes is honesty, openmindedness, willingness, and good
time management and organizational skills! You can do it, too.
This is some of my
service story. What I hope you will come to realize is that people who choose
to do service at the Board level aren’t smarter, wealthier, or more spiritually
evolved than anyone else; we are just more willing than your average D.A. to
immerse ourselves in the sometimes messy business of helping D.A. operate and
grow.
I got my first
taste of D.A. service in Southern California, where there are enough meetings to
attend three a day if one needs to. So many meetings means a thriving
Intergroup, and that’s where I found myself: sitting on the periphery of an Intergroup
meeting. I was shy and terrified, completely out of my comfort zone. I couldn’t
bring myself to speak, but I listened and took notes, dreading in advance my
group’s business meeting. I was too scared to give a verbal report, but I
diligently published a concise, spell-checked paragraph about issues I didn’t
understand, and left it on the literature table.
I learned that if
you hang around as an Intergroup rep for very long, people start to know your
name. When that happens, you can expect to be elected to an Intergroup
position. In Southern California at that time, Intergroup was large enough to
have a Service Board, and so I found myself on the Service Board as a workshop
coordinator. I was way over my head, and I knew it, but something inside me knew
that I needed D.A. more than D.A. needed me. So I said ok.
They say recovery
begins when we stop debting. I believe my recovery in D.A. moved to a new level
when I learned to say “yes” to service. Keeping my records, not using credit
cards—for me, those weren’t the challenges. For me, the hardest part has always
been—and still is—connecting to my fellows. I had felt apart, alone,
“terminally unique” for so long; doing service meant I was constantly being
challenged to interact with others. It was a painful, exciting, growing time,
the heady early days of service. I wasn’t in D.A. to make friends, but somehow I
did anyway. I began to feel part of something bigger than myself, something
that had meaning and purpose.
Through this time I
worked the Steps with a sponsor, and as is sometimes the case, things changed
fast—and not in a pleasant way. My relationship fell apart, I couldn’t seem to
find a job or a place to live, and in despair, I moved to Portland to figure
things out. Portland struggles to maintain five D.A. groups. I found one I felt
relatively comfortable with, and once I got over my tendency to say, “Well, in
California, they do it like this!” the group elected me as their GSR. I felt
like I was getting on a roller coaster, not a very comfortable feeling.
My first World
Service Conference was across the country, in Craigville, Massachusetts, a
little town way out on the end of Cape Cod. GSRs from everywhere came to a
rustic retreat center to conduct the business of D.A. It was mid October, and
frosty cold; we slept five to a room. Being vegetarian, I lived on hummus and
pita bread for the week, while the others put on bibs and ate lobster. I joined
the Literature Committee, and met D.A.s from all over the country. I met a skunk,
too, one night as I was walking back from the dining hall. I didn’t meet any
Trustees, though; on the podium, they looked elegantly inaccessible,
intimidating, and overdressed. The Convocation—the assembly where the delegates
make motions and vote—was chaotic and confusing, and happened to be held in a
rustic church with wooden pews. I saw the sun rise over the Atlantic Ocean. The
entire experience was magical.
I traveled to
Albuquerque in 2000, and again joined the Literature Committee, where I
presented the piece that my subcommittee had worked on during the year. When I
saw people I remembered from the previous Conference, I felt glad, like we were
family, and they remembered me. I felt like my presence made a difference. I
was asked to be a member of the now disbanded Editorial Board of the Literature
Committee, a small group that reviewed literature projects and recommended them
to the General Service Board for approval. I witnessed the final revisions of
the D.A. Promises, sitting in the sunshine by a huge window. Outside it was 95 degrees
and hot air balloons floated down a green river valley.
For my third year
as a GSR, the Conference gathered in Baltimore at a maritime academy. We shared
the cafeteria with young cadets in uniforms. The towels were awesome. Again, I
returned to the Literature Committee, ready to report on Editorial Board
activities. To my surprise and intense discomfort, I was elected committee
chair. With the help of three GSB liaisons, I fumbled my way through the
committee meetings, and managed not to faint when it came time to give a report
to the Convocation. I was particularly proud of my written report, which I
hoped would make up for all the things I would have said if I hadn’t been
petrified with fear.
Somewhere along the
way, my perception of D.A. shifted: I started thinking beyond my local group and
Intergroup, and began to see D.A. as a whole. I learned that the delegates’
responsibility to their groups continues during the year as they work on the
action plans they created in their committees. I spoke with new GSRs attending
their first Convocation and remembered my own fear, confusion, eagerness, and
excitement. I saw how some delegates returned the following year, and how most
did not. I felt like I was witnessing a grand, slow ballet. For the first time,
I began to trust the committee process instead of allowing it to frustrate me.
Partway during that
year, I was asked if I wanted to submit my name to be considered for General
Service Board Trustee. By that time I knew two or three Trustees, so I was no
longer intimidated, but I didn’t feel like I had enough years of recovery to
serve at that level. I gave it some thought and decided to follow my personal
service motto: When the finger of service points my way, say “yes.” I submitted
a service resume. Some weeks later some Trustees called me and gently probed to
see if I had a clue about what I was getting into. I didn’t, but I said I was
willing to let Higher Power direct the outcome. And so I was elected to the GSB
and began my first 3-year term when I was ratified in New York at the 2002
Conference.
I am coming to the
end of my fourth year as a Trustee. I think I’m just now beginning to get a
grasp on the dynamic and fluid relationships between the GSB Trustees, the
General Service Office, the Conference, the committees of the Conference, and
the groups. Most days I feel bogged down in the day-to-day details of trying to
get things done, but every once in awhile, like when I write a share about my
life in D.A. service, I set aside the action plans, and ask God for a wider
perspective, a bigger picture of what D.A. is now, what it is becoming, what it
could someday be. Then I am rewarded with a view of my own small part in the
grand, slow ballet of D.A.
My recovery had
deepened and broadened in ways I never would have thought possible even a few
years ago. My attitude is more likely to be serenity than frustration these
days. I strive daily to understand what it means to be a servant leader. Every
day I have a chance to connect through service to a Higher Power of my understanding.
I try to do service
without any expectations. I have hopes, but I try to steer clear of making my
happiness contingent on achieving a certain outcome. I don’t always succeed.
Usually it’s after I don’t get my way that I realize how attached I was to a
particular agenda. Service is humbling. Service is ripe with opportunities to
practice humility. A D.A. friend once said, “Service is the pit that sucks you
dry.” I laugh whenever I find myself saying it, because it is true that doing
service can suck the life out of you if you have an expectation of a specific
outcome. Service is an opportunity to practice surrendering all outcomes to
God.
Service in D.A. is
practical. I learned communication skills by speaking at D.A. workshops; that
experience qualified me for the job I enjoy today. Every day I hone my
organizational skills. Sometimes I actually accomplish things. I am learning
when to speak and when to keep my mouth shut. If those aren’t practical skills,
then I’m not a debtor.
I am perplexed by
D.A. members who say they are taking a “service moratorium,” or doing 90 days of
“task abstinence.” I don’t think I would have survived if it hadn’t been for
service. Nothing kept me coming back to D.A. except my service commitments.
Nothing keeps me connected to D.A. except the service I do today. My recovery depends
on my willingness to do service. Even if I totally flub things up, even if I’m
not perfect, I still need to show up and offer what service I can, “to live
usefully and walk humbly under the grace of God.”
I was told early in
D.A. to remember to pass it on if I want to keep what I’ve been given. I like the
life D.A. has given me. I do service for me, not for you, because I I can’t keep
my recovery unless I give away what I’ve learned to others. If it helps you and
D.A., wow, that’s wonderful. But I never forget, I need you all a lot more than
you need me.
I expect to rotate
off the Board at the end of my sixth year. Would you like to be the one to take
my place? I’d be honored to pass the service baton on to you.
Thanks for letting
me share.
Hope Newlyfound
2006
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