My Thoughts On The Business Stuff
What does all that boring business stuff I've been sending you from State
Assembly and National Service Conference have to do with our home group
meetings?
My own thoughts on the subject. As always, take the best and leave the rest
Tradition five says "Each group has but one primary purpose - to carry its
message to the codependent who still suffers." In short, it costs money to
carry the message. Home group meetings have to pay rent and buy literature.
National rents a PO Box, pays a phone bill, maintains a Website, and pays a
contract worker to conduct daily business like receive and acknowledge
donations, mail information on request about CoDA, and register new meetings.
Also, somebody has to do the work of both carrying the message and supporting
the infrastructure needed to do so. At the home group meeting, somebody
facilitates the meeting, people show up and share their recovery during
meetings, someone collects the 7th tradition donations, someone pays the rent,
and someone orders literature. At National, people develop literature, people
publish and distribute literature, people maintain the website, people update
the meeting list, people answer e-mail, snail mail, and phone inquiries, people
plan and put together Conference and Convention.
Finally, for all these people to work together as a team they need to know what
to do and who's going to do what and how to do it, and that requires some
structure. At the home group meeting we use a written format to guide the
meeting. National has Bylaws, and the Fellowship Service Manual.
I admit that business meetings from Home Group to National do spend a lot of
time figuring out what we're going to do, who's going to do it, and how are we
going to pay for it. You know, business. But that's a part of getting the
message to people who need it including ourselves. We call it service. We call
it 12th Step work. The only way to keep it is to give it away, and that's our
business in CoDA.
Thanks for letting me share.
Peace,
Allison