The Tools of the Program
How do we work the program? There are nine tools that we use to work the program. These tools help us recover.
A plan of eating helps us abstain from compulsive eating, guides us in our dietary decisions, and defines what, when, how, where, and why we eat.
A Plan of Eating
We ask a sponsor to help us through all three levels of our program of recovery: physical, emotional, and spiritual. Find a sponsor who has what you want and ask that person how they are achieving it.
Sponsorship
Meetings give us an opportunity to identify our common problem, confirm our common solution, and share the gifts we receive through this Twelve Step program. In addition to face-to-face meetings, OA offers telephone and online meetings that are useful in breaking through the deadly isolation caused by distance, illness, or physical challenges.
Meetings
Many members call, text, or email their sponsors and other OA members daily. Telephone or electronic contact also provides an immediate outlet for those hard-to-handle highs and lows we may experience.
Telephone
Putting our thoughts and feelings down on paper, or describing a troubling or joyous incident, helps us to better understand our actions and reactions in a way that is often not revealed by simply thinking or talking about them.
Writing
We read OA-approved literature, which includes numerous books, study guides, pamphlets, wallet cards, and selected Alcoholics Anonymous texts. All this material provides insight into our disease and the experience, strength, and hope that there is a solution for us.
Literature
Creating an action plan is the process of identifying and implementing attainable actions to support our individual abstinence and emotional, spiritual, and physical recovery. This Tool, like our plan of eating, may vary widely among members and may need to be adjusted as we progress in our recovery.
Action Plan
Anonymity is the spiritual foundation of all our Traditions, ever reminding us to place principles before personalities (Tradition Twelve). Anonymity assures us that only we, as individual OA members, have the right to make our membership known to others. Anonymity at the level of press, radio, films, television, and other public media of communication means that we never allow our faces or last names to be used once we identify ourselves as OA members (Tradition Eleven). Within the Fellowship, anonymity means that whatever we share with another OA member will be respected and kept confidential. What we hear at meetings should remain there.
Anonymity
Any form of service—no matter how small—that helps reach a fellow sufferer adds to the quality of our own recovery. There are many ways to give service.
Service
Meetings
We have face-to-face and online meetings. Meetings are open to anyone who would like to attend.
Where do I start?
Want to know more about starting the program? You can find the Where Do I Start? brochure in various languages here.