Margie J., Area 53 Alternate Registrar
Service work has enriched my sobriety by strengthening my relationship with AA as a whole. Service work has taught me that the responsibility of carrying the AA message goes beyond me reaching my hand out to a newcomer or making coffee for a meeting.
While it involves the hubris of me taking action by stepping into shoes that need to be filled, it also requires me to have the humility to talk less and to listen more, including to those I do not agree with. It requires me to put aside what I think I know, to silence my opinion, and to speak out for what is good for AA as a whole.
If I want the hand of AA to always be there, then I am responsible today to do the work to ensure that AA and its message are there for the newcomer tomorrow.
Nicholas B., Chair - CPC & PI
It was nearly 5 years ago that my sponsor and I started a new group in the King-Lincoln neighborhood of Columbus. I was a little more than a year sober and I can still remember, as if it were yesterday, the excitement I felt believing we were contributing in no small way to the legacy of AA's primary purpose. This weekly literature meeting was initially slow in attracting others, especially home group members, which fortuitously opened a personally uncharted territory of service opportunities I was eager to explore.
The adventure of a new experience coupled with a few AA pamphlets pertaining to service work & "beyond the rooms"; stirred my curiosity and not unlike my spiritual initiation into our program's fourth dimension I offered myself unreservedly to the principles that not only saved my life but ultimately keeps this fellowship unified - that our common
welfare is also my welfare.