A. In the early, wild, and woolly days of Alcoholics Anonymous, there were no hard and fast rules for how individual meetings or the fellowship as a whole should operate. Nor was life in a Twelve Step program like it is today, where you can just find a meeting directory online and take a seat in the back. Initially, as we’ve talked about elsewhere, you had to take the first three Steps before they would even let you into a meeting. In some cities, you had to have a membership card. At times, there were dues, and you had to be a white, heterosexual male to join the program.
No, I’m not kidding.
Obviously things changed, but slowly and fitfully. To paraphrase the Big Book, remember that we’re dealing with alcoholics, who are cunning, baffling, and powerful. With such potential for conflict, how would we all get along?
There’s a famous story that makes the rounds in the fellowship that tells us how one group ended up posting sixty-one rules for its members, the complexity of which were ultimately swept away by rule sixty-two—don’t take yourself too seriously. Sometimes today, Twelve Step members will say to each other, “Rule sixty-two,” referencing that long-ago long list of dos and don’ts.
Eventually, people figured out what worked and didn’t work, across the various fellowships. Part of that process started when Bill decided to codify the system by which the AA fellowship as a whole managed its affairs. He wanted to do this in time for AA’s international convention in 1955, twenty years after its founding. The question Bill faced: how do you get a bunch of unruly alcoholics to buy into a whole new set of rules?
Bill came up with a brilliant idea—or in his terminology, a ten strike—to call them traditions instead of calling them rules.
You have to laugh. Here’s an organization that’s only existed for twenty years, and suddenly it has a brand-new set of rules, but what are those rules called? Traditions. Typically, traditions are things that evolve over generations or even centuries. So here’s Bill, pulling yet another fast one, getting the organization to buy into his thinking by tapping into the sense of history, loyalty, and virtue implied by the word traditions.
Do you really need to know about the Traditions right now? Not especially. Your sobriety will get along just fine without you having to study them. But if you’re curious, it’s said that the Traditions are to the fellowship as the Steps are to the group—the suggestions for having things go smoothly in life.
Perhaps the most important Tradition that applies to the newcomer is the Twelfth and last one—anonymity. When AA started—and remember that AA is the foundation for all the other Twelve Step programs—people would identify themselves on radio or in newspapers and magazines as members of Alcoholics Anonymous. Back then, the fellowship was so small that it only would take a sober celebrity or two to get drunk and damage the reputation of AA.
Then there’s the question of how anonymity supports our humility in working our program. Bill himself faced a dilemma between his ego and his spirituality when TIME magazine invited him to have his face on the cover. Regretfully—deeply regretfully—he declined.VII
And so the guideline remains to this day.
Anonymity protects the fellowship from the bad publicity that follows if someone slips or goes out, but it also protects the individual. It’s really cool to be a sober member of the Twelve Step fellowship—but only within the rooms of the fellowship. In the outside world, not so much. Not everybody “gets it.” Not everybody is thrilled for your sobriety. Anonymity means that you don’t have to tell people that you’re clean and sober in a Twelve Step program. It means that you get to live your sober life, and just as you do not disclose to others the names of the people you meet in meetings, those folks will also protect you. A lot of people are worried about the fact that “if I go to a meeting, people will see me.” They forget that they’re going to see a bunch of people managing the same disease. The only people who show up to meetings wearing sunglasses are movie stars who don’t want to be noticed.
Of course they do.
So that’s anonymity.
Another important Tradition is that groups are autonomous—they can govern themselves as they see fit, as long as they don’t hurt the fellowship. There are groups that have a lot of weird rules. A few won’t let you speak unless you have ten years of sobriety or more, or require that you take the Steps in the exact way that the other members in the group take the Steps, even if you are not wearing a suit and tie or a dress that covers your knees. It’s fine. If you don’t like those rules, go to a different meeting. Or start your own.
There’s a joke in Twelve Step circles that all it takes to start a meeting is resentment and a coffee pot. It’s hard to change the culture of a meeting that’s been around for a while. If you’re really uncomfortable, it’s probably best to go elsewhere—or just see if you can live with however they do things in that group.
Another key Tradition keeps the fellowship “nonprofessional.” The Eighth Tradition means that we don’t get paid to do things in our Twelve Step groups; we’re not compensated to speak, sponsor, set up chairs, or anything else. Central offices and inter-groups can hire typists, secretaries, webmasters, or whatever, but individual members do not receive financial compensation for what we do.
This is one of the best things about the program—it’s not about the money. The groups are not trying to get your money, and there are actually limits to how much you can give. Everybody is asked to kick in a couple of bucks when the basket passes, and that money goes for rent, literature, and snacks. The fact that money is not a factor in the program and in the fellowship is a guarantee that the newcomer can trust it.
The funny thing about the Traditions is that they work really well. If you really want to get technical, there’s something called the Twelve Concepts of Service, but you have to be a real Twelve Step nerd even to know they exist. Oops, I guess that includes me. Anyway, stick with the Steps for now, learn about the Traditions as you go along, and all will be well.