Quote:
Originally Posted by FirstLove
@hopeforthehopeless, 12-step meetings aren't about any particular religion. The "faith" is basically that there's something more powerful than yourself. You can make that power the OA group itself, if you like. The saying is, "Take what you need, and leave the rest." A great motto! Good luck to you.
They aren't based upon any particular religion, but they are based upon a "higher power." Now, they'll tell you that doesn't mean you have to believe in "god", per se, but the "higher power" thing is kinda meaningless without that. But I do agree you don't need to be the slight bit religious to get something from OA.
Personally, I did not find OA helpful. The whole process involved people sharing their feelings. That's great in order go get things off your chest that you want to share. But OA discourages "cross talk", i.e., discourse among the participants. I would find the meetings much more useful and helpful if there were discussions wherein people could talk about resolving problems -- rather than just sharing with everybody what their problems are.
Regarding the question of should you join. You probably need to attend a few meetings (at least one) to know if it would help you. But just know that you can get a lot of help and support from right here on this very forum. IMHO, I think the support is better than what I ever got from OA.