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Questions |
Answers |
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"NA is a nonprofit fellowship or
society of men and women for whom drugs had become a major problem. We …
meet regularly to help each other stay clean. ... We are not interested
in what or how much you used ... but only in what you want to do about
your problem and how we can help." |
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Who is an addict? |
Most of
us do not have to think twice about this question. We know! Our whole
life and thinking was centered in drugs in one form or another – the
getting and using and finding ways and means to get more. We lived to
use and used to live. Very simply, an addict is a man or woman whose
life is controlled by drugs. We are people in the grip of a continuing
and progressive illness whose ends are always the same: jails,
institutions and death. |
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What is the Narcotics Anonymous
Program? |
NA is a
nonprofit fellowship or society of men and women for whom drugs had
become a major problem. We are recovering addicts who meet regularly to
help each other stay clean. This is a program of complete abstinence
from all drugs. There is only one requirement for membership, the desire
to stop using. We suggest that you keep an open mind and give yourself a
break. Our program is a set of principles written so simply that we can
follow them in our daily lives. The most important thing about them is
that they work. There are
no strings attached to NA. We are not affiliated with any other
organizations, we have no initiation fees or dues, no pledges to sign,
no promises to make to anyone. We are not connected with any political,
religious, or law enforcement groups, and are under no surveillance at
any time. Anyone may join us, regardless of age, race, sexual identity,
creed, religion or lack of religion.
We are not interested in what or how much you used or who your
connections were, what you have done in the past, how much or how little
you have, but only in what you want to do about your problem and how we
can help. The newcomer is the most important person at any meeting,
because we can only keep what we have by giving it away. We have learned
from our group experience that those who keep coming to our meetings
regularly stay clean. |
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Why are we here? |
Before
coming to the Fellowship of NA, we could not manage our own lives. We
could not live and enjoy life as other people do. We had to have
something different and we thought we had found it in drugs. We placed
their use ahead of the welfare of our families, our wives, husbands, and
our children. We had to have drugs at all costs. We did many people
great harm, but most of all we harmed ourselves. Through our inability
to accept personal responsibilities we were actually creating our own
problems. We seemed to be incapable of facing life on its own terms.
Most of us realized that in our addiction we were slowly committing
suicide, but addiction is such a cunning enemy of life that we had lost
the power to do anything about it. Many of us ended up in jail, or
sought help through medicine, religion, and psychiatry. None of these
methods was sufficient for us. Our disease always resurfaced or
continued to progress until in desperation, we sought help from each
other in Narcotics Anonymous.
After coming to NA we realized we were sick people. We suffered from a
disease from which there is no known cure. It can, however, be arrested
at some point, and recovery is then possible. |
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From "Who, What, How, and Why", Reprinted from the White Booklet
Narcotics Anonymous,
Copyright © 1989, 2000 by Narcotics Anonymous World Services, Inc. All
rights reserved |
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