In her experiences in recovering from her own life-spiraling alcoholism and sponsoring over one hundred alcoholic women in Alcoholics Anonymous, Andrea S. learned that being a good sponsor requires knowing about the nature of the AA Steps, the process of AA and the actions a person must take if he wishes to stay sober. The author argues that AA has become watered down as its members have departed from the principles discussed in AA’s basic text, The Big Book of Alcoholics Anonymous. In an effort to get sponsors back to basics, Andrea fuses her wealth of experiences in a compelling new book. ‘The Unexpected Joy of Sponsorship: An AA Sponsor’s Handbook’ is a proven guide to helping anyone get and stay sober.
Mclean, VA -- (SBWIRE) -- 05/13/2014 -- While she has attended numerous prestigious universities, received a slew of impressive academic credentials and taken her company public on the New York Stock Exchange, Andrea S. has also battled the self-loathing and near-death experiences brought on by alcoholism.
Like millions of others in similar situations, she was transformed thanks to the AA Twelve Step program. However, Andrea didn’t stop at finding happiness and joy, but showed her gratitude by sponsoring over one hundred amazing women and has combined her own story and the life-changing wisdom she has gained into a powerful new book.
‘The Unexpected Joy of Sponsorship: An AA Sponsor’s Handbook’ was written to help refocus readers on the core messages and simplicity of the Twelve Steps.
Synopsis:
This book is a handbook for sponsors in all Twelve Step programs. It includes practical advice, a discussion of the Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions, Worksheets of all the Steps, a Spiritual Inventory, and other pertinent material. Written by a woman with many years of sobriety and a lot of experience in sponsoring recovering alcoholics, it is useful, interesting and inspiring.
“AA and other Twelve Step programs are under huge threat from the regurgitation of inane ideas. Sponsors are often unintentionally the problem, so I wanted to use my experiences taking meetings everywhere from jails and mental institutions to women’s shelters, sponsoring women and trying to stay sober to demonstrate the process of getting and staying sober,” says Andrea.
Continuing, “The Twelve-Step idea is very simple, but execution is not. It’s like running a marathon, easy to understand, difficult to do. To help sponsors I’ve included a myriad of worksheets as well as lessons (good and bad!) from my own journey through recovery. The main thing is to not teach or preach – but rather to share so that I can empower others to get stronger.”
Andrea has developed some original and sound information for sponsors. The following excerpt demonstrates just a few of the hundreds of takeaways her book offers:
“THE RULES
- DPDT: Don’t preach; don’t teach. Share.
- When doing the Steps with a sponsee, don’t ask her to do anything you wouldn’t do.
- Don’t expend more energy on a sponsee’s sobriety than she does.
- Don’t take anything a sponsee says or does personally.”
“I also share some helpful ideas. For example, unsolicited advice is always judgemental; all of my character defects derive from my inadequate relationship with God; silence is golden except when it’s yellow; and if someone is powerless over alcohol you can’t ask them to try to stop drinking - what you can do is ask them to take positive actions. This is just a tiny sample of what the book contains. The volume is about sponsorship but also about getting and staying sober.
‘The Unexpected Joy of Sponsorship: An AA Sponsor’s Handbook’, published by Peripatetic Publishing, is available now: http://amzn.to/1uzIPER.
About the Author: Andrea S
Andrea S has a BA, MA in Philosophy, and a DJ (Doctor of Jurisprudence). She has practiced law for seventeen years and then started a company which went public on the New York Stock Exchange. She is very close to her children, their spouses and her grandchildren. Andrea is a voracious reader and has taught herself the finer points of digital art. She has been sober for more than twenty one years and has been very active in AA.