When a thought occurs to me, do I immediately act on it without considering the consequences? In what other ways do I behave compulsively?

This is old behaviour. Addiction is Compulsion.
I was compelled to buy drugs with money that was needed elsewhere. I felt compelled to take sexual actions that led immediately to shame and suffereing. I compulsively left jobs and relationships and cities, thinking I was solving problems, when of course, looking back I se simple addiction and its' consequences at work.

No longer. In meetings I have heard "Play the tape thru to the end". I can and do do this today. I no longer run my life Compulsivley. Thanks God

What is it like when I'm obsessed with something? Does my thinking follow a pattern? Describe.

"Obsessed"...To have the mind excessively preoccupied with a single topic.
A. What's it like to be obsessed?
Hmmm. Back in the using days it was "normal". I was obsessed with drugs, perfectly described in the NA meeting pre-amble: "getting & using and finding ways and means to get more".

After 16 years of recovery, I find obsession to be unpleasant and am deeply suspicious of my mind doing this. I can get obssessed with people : A passing interaction with some random woman can see me obsessed; imagining scenarios that result in me selfishly experiencing her sexuality. Or some other interaction with (typically) a male that leaves me feeling disrespected and bitter; allowing me to sink into yet another pit of resentment. I have earnt many methods to avoid this ugliness.

• I pray for them.
• I write my petty bitterness on paper and burn prayerfully.
• I challenge my arrogance, that gives me seemingly god-like abilites to interpret the motives of others

B. Does my thinking follow a pattern?

Hmmm. Not so much a pattern of thinking, more a pattern of experience: My focus turns inward. I am no longer living in the moment, allowing life's sounds and sights and feelings to move past me: The focus moves inside my head, switching from my memory of the whatever caused the pain to projections of vengeance.

Has my disease been active recently? In what way?

OF Course! In meetings I've heard: "Even when I'm not using, my disease is "out_the_back_doing_push-ups"", meaning my disease is always preparing for the day it gets to run my show again. Yet more specifically? Yes, my disease has been active recently:
I no longer see my disease as simply "Using Drugs". My disease is more subtle, more pernicious today. Surfing the internet looking at photo's of naked women, and negatively comparing them to the reality of the loving and real woman in my life today is also "diseased"; and I have done this again just last night. This could be the begining of a general dissatisfaction that will ultimately lead me to sabotaging all the good in my world. I know this thru past experience, not just coz... "I been told". I will talk to my sponsor about this AND ask my Dog for help (Dog being my quirky name for my Higher Power: God as some call him).

All forms of general dis-satifaction are my diseaseactively at work.

• thinking my job is not paid enough,
• that I don't get the recognition I deserve
• that my kid's don;t text ot ring me 'enough'...
• that i havn;t yet had enough sex partners (and should thus ditch the Mrs and go get MORE

What does the disease of Addiction mean to me? Early in my recovery, I was irritated by this notion. I saw weak addicts avoiding personal responibilty, people weasling out from under the consequences of their actions by saying "oh well..."that'll be the disease at work". Looking at my judgementalarrogance came much later. I thought "disease" meant simply and only such things as "Leprosy" or "Cholera". I first had to find definitions such as ,"disease" is often used to refer to any condition that causes extreme pain, dysfunction, distress, social problems, and/or death to the person afflicted, or similar problems for those in contact with the person. In this broader sense, it sometimes includes injuries, disorders, infections, isolated symptoms and deviant behaviors" (Wikipedia)

Hmmm I realised.... Pain? I suffered in my addiction. This was not news to me. Those I loved and who loved me sufered too. Neither was this news to me. Infections? Hmmm I feared Hepatitis and contracted Sexually transmitted diseases as a direct result of my behaviour when wasted. As is typical when I was using, I thought this was simply "what happened", was unavoidable and that a passive acceptance was the only option. I did feel dreadfully guilty for taking that sexual infection home and exposing my wife to such danger. I knew that was wrong, but could see no alternative. Fidelity is not an option when wasted.
Deviant behaviour?? If itweren't so painful, so embarrassing, so humiliating...so dangerous, then it'd be funny: Carrying a sawn-off pump action shotgun with me everywhere; 'in case I happened upon a mass murderer. Getting into bed with any and most every woman whose house I happended to be staying at, irregardless of whether or not she had given me any "Welcoming' signals. I justified this in my mind by always stopping if they ever displayed signs my inept advances were unwelcome

Step One - My Answers

"We admitted we were powerless over our addiction, that our lives had become unmanageable."

A "first" of anything is a beginning, and so it is with the steps: The First Step is the beginning of the recovery process. The healing starts here; we can't go any further until we've worked this step.
Some NA members "feel" their way through the First Step1 by intuition; others choose to work Step One in a more systematic fashion. Our reasons for formally working Step One will vary from member to member. It may be that we're new to recovery, and we've just fought-and lost-an exhausting battle with drugs. It may be that we've been around awhile, abstinent from drugs, but we've discovered that our disease has become active in some other area of our lives, forcing us to face our powerlessness and the unmanageability of our lives once again. Not every act of growth is motivated by pain; it may just be time to cycle through the steps again1 thus beginning the next stage of our never-ending journey of recovery.
Some of us find a measure of comfort in realizing that a disease, not a moral failing, has caused us to reach this bottom. Others don't really care what the cause has been-we just want out!
Whatever the case, it's time to do some step work: to engage in some concrete activity that will help us find more freedom from our addiction, whatever shape it is currently taking. Our hope is to internalize the principles of Step One, to deepen our surrender, to make the principles of acceptance, humility, willingness, honesty, and open-mindedness a fundamental part of who we are.
First, we must arrive at a point of surrender. There are many different ways to do this. For some of us, the road we traveled getting to the First Step was more than enough to convince us that unconditional surrender was our only option. Others start this process even though we're not entirely convinced that we're addicts or that we've really hit bottom. Only in working the First Step do we truly come to realize that we are addicts, that we have hit bottom, and that we must surrender.
Before we begin working the First Step, we must become abstinent-whatever it takes. If we're new in Narcotics Anonymous and our First Step is primarily about looking at the effects of drug addiction in our lives, we need to get clean. If we've been clean awhile and our First Step is about our powerlessness over some other behavior that's made our lives unmanageable, we need to find a way to stop the behavior so that our surrender isn't clouded by continued acting out.
The disease of addiction
What makes us addicts is the disease of addiction-not the drugs, not our behavior, but our disease. There is something within us that makes us unable to control our use of drugs. This same "something" also makes us prone to obsession and compulsion in other areas of our lives. How can we tell when our disease is active? When we become trapped in obsessive, compulsive, self-centered routines, endless loops that lead nowhere but to physical, mental, spiritual, and emotional decay.

1. What does "the disease of addiction" mean to me?

(My answer will be posted here: ..... )

The Narcotics Anonymous Step Working Guide

The Narcotics Anonymous Step Working Guide

This is NA Fellowship-approved literature
"Copyright ~ 1998,

World Service Office, Inc.

All rights reserved."

Preface
The idea for this piece of literature came from the Narcotics Anonymous Fellowship itself. Beginning in the early 1980s, we began receiving Twelve Step guides and step worksheets along with requests that we develop a standard set of guides for the NA Fellowship to use in working through the Twelve Steps. Fellowship demand propelled this project up the NA World Service Conference Literature Committee's priority wordlists, and finally resulted in the World Service Conference directing the WSCLC to go ahead with the project at WSC'95.

The working title for this project for many years was the "Step Writing Guides." However, we recognized that the word "writing" imposed a limitation on members who may be unable to write or may choose not to use writing as the means for working the Twelve Steps. Therefore, the title became the Step Working Guides.

Each chapter includes both narrative and questions. The narrative is meant to provoke thought about the questions, but is not meant to be comprehensive. There is a difference in "voice" between the narrative and the questions. The narrative is written in the "we" voice in order to promote unity about what we all have in common: our addiction and recovery. The questions are written in the individual "I" voice so that each member using these guides can personalize the work. The Step Working Guides is a companion piece to It Works: How and Why. Thorough discussion of each of the Twelve Steps is contained in that work. Additional information about NA recovery can be found in other NA literature. If we find that any of the terms used in this book are unfamiliar, we should feel free to make use of a dictionary.

These guides are meant to be used by NA members at any stage of recovery, whether it's our first time through the steps or we've been living with the steps as our guiding force for many years. This book is intentionally written to be relevant to newcomers and to help more experienced members develop a deeper understanding of the Twelve Steps. As NA grows in numbers, in diversity, and in strength and longevity of clean time, we need literature that will continue to serve the needs of the fellowship1 literature that "grows" along with the fellowship.
However, as open and inclusive as we tried to be when writing these guides, we realized that we would never be able to write something that captured every member's experience with the steps. In fact, we wouldn't have tried to do that, even if we thought it were possible. This book contains guides to working the Twelve Steps toward recovery; it does not contain recovery itself. Recovery is ultimately found in each member's personal experience with working the steps. You can add to these guides, delete from them, or use them as they are. It's your choice.

There's probably only one inappropriate way to use these guides: alone. We can't overemphasize the importance of working with a sponsor in working the steps. In fact, in our fellowship, a sponsor is considered, first and foremost, a guide through the Twelve Steps. If you haven't yet asked someone to sponsor you, please do so before beginning these guides.

Merely reading all the available information about any of the Twelve Steps will never be sufficient to bring about a true change in our lives and freedom from our disease. It's our goal to make the steps part of who we are. To do that, we have to work them. Hence, the Step Working Guides.

Like every piece of NA literature, this was written by addicts for addicts. We hope that every member who uses this book will be encouraged and inspired. We are grateful to have been given the opportunity to participate in this project. Thank you for allowing us to be of service.
WSC Literature Committee

Narcotics Anonymous _ Recovery from Addiction

There is one promise : "Freedom from active addiction"

The tools are simple: Don't use no matter what. Ask for help from a Higher Power. Work the Steps. Help others.