EARLY RISER Meeting Format

Early Riser- Format updated 5.8.24Download

The AA Preamble:

ALCOHOLICS ANONYMOUS is a fellowship of people who share their experience, strength and hope with each other that they may solve their common problem and help others to recover from alcoholism.  The only requirement for membership is a desire to stop drinking.  There are no dues or fees for A.A. membership; we are self-supporting through our own contributions.  A.A. is not allied with any sect, denomination, politics, organization or institution; does not wish to engage in any controversy, neither endorses nor opposes any causes.  Our primary purpose is to stay sober and help other alcoholics to achieve sobriety.

From The Big Book, Forward to The Fourth Edition
“Modem-to-modem or face-to-face, A.A.’s speak the language of the heart in all its power and simplicity.”

Welcome to the Early Riser Fresh Start Zoom Group. My name is __ and I am an alcoholic. We meet every day at 6:45a-7:40a. Join us early at 6:30am for fellowship before the meeting starts! For more information about this meeting, visit the earlyriserlife.org. website.

  • For a phone list or to add your number to the list, you can email our group secretary at earlyriser508@gmail.com. (secretary is Jill D)
  • There is a business meeting the first Saturday of every month directly following the meeting. All decisions are made by group conscience, and all are welcome. Email the secretary if you would like to add an agenda item.
  • Does anyone have any A.A. related announcements?
  • Please refrain from using profanity
  • For everyone’s comfort, please mute your audio at all times, unless you are speaking (including the chairperson.) We encourage everyone to share their experience, strength and hope.
  • The 1st Monday of the month we read the Tradition of the month, and every Wednesday is a step meeting

Are there any newcomers, visitors, or friends just coming back who would like to identify themselves? Welcome all!

Let’s start the meeting with a moment of silence, followed by the Serenity Prayer:

“GOD, GRANT ME THE SERENITY TO ACCEPT THE THINGS I CANNOT CHANGE, THE COURAGE TO CHANGE THE THINGS I CAN, AND THE WISDOM TO KNOW THE DIFFERENCE, AMEN”.

  • And now _______ has volunteered to read ___for us today

Next, ________ has volunteered to read today’s Daily Reflection. The reading is posted in the chat.

Here we focus on sharing our experience, strength, and hope. Please avoid crosstalk which is defined as giving advice to others, questioning or interrupting the person speaking at the time.

  • We have 3 to 4 minute shares. Our timekeeper will give a gentle reminder that you have one minute left. Who would like to be the timekeeper today?
  • Clicking on the chat icon will open the chat window. Private chat is disabled. Your chat message is viewed by everyone. Please stay after the meeting and join us for more fellowship or need more time to talk with another alcoholic.
  • Before we open the meeting, does anyone have a burning desire to share?

The meeting is now open.

At 7:15, please “pass the basket”

Our 7th Tradition reads:  “Every AA group ought to be fully self-supporting, declining any outside contributions”.

COMING SOON To make a donation directly to this online meeting, please click on the VENMO or PAYPAL link posted in the chat or contact the treasurer (Jill) if you’d like to mail a check.

Additionally, if you would like to donate to the Addiction Referral Center (ARC), a nonprofit organization that helps those who struggle with addiction and where this meeting began during Covid, please visit, https://theaddictionreferralcenter.org/donate/

RESUME MEETING. Sharing ends at 7:40 am. Stay on after this meeting if you want to connect with other alcoholics for more recovery.

  • Before we close, does anyone wish to claim their seat?
  • If you have 90 days of sobriety and access to a computer, please volunteer to chair the meeting. Do we have a chairperson for tomorrow? It’s a great way to be of service and stay active.
  • And now ___________ has volunteered to read the Promises.

The Promises – A.A. Big Book, Chapter 6 – Into Action, pages 83-84

If we are painstaking about this phase of our development, we will be amazed before we are halfway through. We are going to know a new freedom and a new happiness. We will not regret the past nor wish to shut the door on it. We will comprehend the word serenity and we will know peace. No matter how far down the scale we have gone, we will see how our experience can benefit others. That feeling of uselessness and self pity will disappear. We will lose interest in selfish things and gain interest in our fellows. Self-seeking will slip away. Our whole attitude and outlook upon life will change. Fear of people and of economic insecurity will leave us. We will intuitively know how to handle situations which used to baffle us. We will suddenly realize that God is doing for us what we could not do for ourselves.

Are these extravagant promises? We think not. They are being fulfilled among us—sometimes quickly, sometimes slowly. They will always materialize if we work for them.

The 10th step Promises – A.A. Big Book, Chapter 6 – Into Action, pages 84-85

And we have ceased fighting anything or anyone – even alcohol. For by this time sanity will have returned. We will seldom be interested in liquor. If tempted, we recoil from it as from a hot flame. We react sanely and normally, and we will find that this has happened automatically. We will see that our new attitude toward liquor has been given us without any thought or effort on our part. It just comes! That is the miracle of it. We are not fighting it, neither are we avoiding temptation. We feel as though we have been placed in a position of neutrality – safe and protected. We have not even sworn off. Instead, the problem has been removed. It does not exist for us. We are neither cocky nor are we afraid. That is our experience. That is how we react so long as we keep in fit spiritual condition.

  • And now ____________ has volunteered to close the meeting with the Lord’s Prayer. 

Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day, our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us, and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. For thine is the kingdom, the power, and the glory forever, and ever. Amen

CLOSING THE MEETING (switch host if needed)

Readings used during the opening:

Chapter 3 – More About Alcoholism

Most of us have been unwilling to admit we were real alcoholics. No person likes to think he is bodily and mentally different from his fellows. Therefore, it is not surprising that our drinking careers have been characterized by countless vain attempts to prove we could drink like other people. The idea that somehow, someday he will control and enjoy his drinking is the great obsession of every abnormal drinker. The persistence of this illusion is astonishing. Many pursue it into the gates of insanity or death.

We learned that we had to fully concede to our innermost selves that we were alcoholics. This is the first step in recovery. The delusion that we are like other people, or presently may be, has to be smashed.

We alcoholics are men and women who have lost the ability to control our drinking. We know that no real alcoholic ever recovers control. All of us felt at times that we were regaining control, but such intervals usually brief were inevitably followed by still less control, which led in time to pitiful and incomprehensible demoralization. We are convinced to a man that alcoholics of our type are in the grip of a progressive illness. Over any considerable period we get worse, never better.

We are like men who have lost their legs; they never grow new ones. Neither does there appear to be any kind of treatment which will make alcoholics of our kind like other men. We have tried every imaginable remedy. In some instances there has been brief recovery, followed always by a still worse relapse. Physicians who are familiar with alcoholism agree there is no such thing as making a normal drinker out of an alcoholic. Science may one day accomplish this, but it hasn’t done so yet.

Despite all we can say, many who are real alcoholics are not going to believe they are in that class. By every form of self-deception and experimentation, they will try to prove themselves exceptions to the rule, therefore nonalcoholic. If anyone who is showing inability to control his drinking can do the right about-face and drink like a gentleman, our hats are off to him. Heaven knows, we have tried hard enough and long enough to drink like other people!

Here are some of the methods we have tried: Drinking beer only, limiting the number of drinks, never drinking alone, never drinking in the morning, drinking only at home, never having it in the house, never drinking during business hours, drinking only at parties, switching from scotch to brandy, drinking only natural wines, agreeing to resign if ever drunk on the job, taking a trip, not taking a trip, swearing off forever (with and without a solemn oath), taking more physical exercise, reading inspirational books, going to health farms and sanitariums, accepting voluntary commitment to asylums; we could increase the list ad infinitum.

We do not like to pronounce any individual as alcoholic, but you can quickly diagnose yourself: step over to the nearest barroom and try some controlled drinking. Try to drink and stop abruptly. Try it more than once. It will not take long for you to decide, if you are honest with yourself about it. It may be worth a bad case of jitters if you get a full knowledge of your condition.

How it works – Chapter 5

Rarely have we seen a person fail who has thoroughly followed our path. Those who do not recover are people who cannot or will not completely give themselves to this simple program, usually men and women who are constitutionally incapable of being honest with themselves. There are such unfortunates. They are not at fault; they seem to have been born that way. They are naturally incapable of grasping and developing a manner of living which demands rigorous honesty. Their chances are less than average. There are those, too, who suffer from grave emotional and mental disorders, but many of them do recover if they have the capacity to be honest.

Our stories disclose in a general way what we used to be like, what happened, and what we are like now. If you have decided you want what we have and are willing to go to any length to get it — then you are ready to take certain steps.

At some of these we balked. We thought we could find an easier, softer way. But we could not. With all the earnestness at our command, we beg of you to be fearless and thorough from the very start. Some of us have tried to hold on to our old ideas and the result was nil until we let go absolutely.

Remember that we deal with alcohol — cunning, baffling, powerful! Without help it is too much for us. But there is One who has all power — that One is God. May you find Him now!

Half measures availed us nothing. We stood at the turning point. We asked His protection and care with complete abandon.

Here are the steps we took, which are suggested as a program of recovery:

  1. We admitted we were powerless over alcohol — that our lives had become unmanageable.
  2. Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.
  3. Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him.
  4. Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.
  5. Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.
  6. Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character.
  7. Humbly asked Him to remove our shortcomings.
  8. Made a list of all persons we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all.
  9. Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others.
  10. Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it.
  11. Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God as we understood Him, praying only for knowledge of His will for us and the power to carry that out.
  12. Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to alcoholics, and to practice these principles in all our affairs.

Many of us exclaimed, “What an order! I can’t go through with it.’’ Do not be discouraged. No one among us has been able to maintain anything like perfect adherence to these principles. We are not saints. The point is that we are willing to grow along spiritual lines. The principles we have set down are guides to progress. We claim spiritual progress rather than spiritual perfection.

Our description of the alcoholic, the chapter to the agnostic, and our personal adventures before and after makes clear three pertinent ideas:

(a) That we were alcoholic and could not manage our own lives.

(b) That probably no human power could have relieved our alcoholism.

(c) That God could and would if He were sought.