Teaching a Group discussion.

Tomorrow night my co-worker and I have to teach an Anger Management group. My co-worker has been a tech at the treatment center for 8 months and is a nursing student, she is not an alcoholic or addict but is the adult child of one. Last night we were talking about the upcoming discussion group, she has a hard time coming up with ideas, we talked about having a training session on mediation. On the way home last night I thought more about this and didn't think we could fill a 45-60 minute period with a discussion and group participation on just mediation. My mind went to the reason I mediate and that is to neutralize or accept suffering. In Buddhism we say the cause of suffering is desire, desire is a manifestation of selfishness. I have desires because I want things, physical and emotional. Desire isn't always a bad thing but putting importance on our desires and wants is because nothing is permanent, everything changes; nature, people and ourselves. Desire is also about placing expectations on ourselves and others, even material things. We expect our desires for love, security, companionship, careers, knowledge, material things and the like to make us happy. The trouble being we never have any of these things 100% of the time, we sometimes have disagreements with the ones we love or worse, we have financial troubles, our jobs is eliminated, people die, people move away, material things break or their newness wears off etc. This led me to thinking about the passage in the Big Book on selfishness. I talked to my co-worker today and told her I would like to do a group discussion on selfishness and self centeredness using the Big Book and she is fine with this.

Here is my basic outline of what I would like to do. First I want the clients to give examples of what they think suffering is, then ask them how many of those examples can lead to anger, either inward or outward anger. Next explain to them how our desires based on self/our wants manifest the suffering. Next I will read pages 60-62 of the Big Book which is about the 3rd step and explains selfishness better than I can. Page 60 starts with the story of the actor who trys to arrange things to fit his needs and how the play still doesn't work and how his actions based on self both nice and aggressive are at fault. Page 62 is the important passage about how selfishness and self centeredness are the root of all our troubles, and really nails how we alcoholics use selfishness and why we need a God of our understanding. I also plan on read the short couple of paragraphs on page 66 about resentment and anger. I will then open up the lecture, for lack of a better word, for feedback from the clients. I will end the discussion with pages 86-87, the great passage about the importance of prayer and mediation which starts with "Upon awakening let us think about the twenty-four hours ahead". My hope is the clients may grasp a bit about our selfish nature and understand that it is through pray and mediation that we learn to control our angers and fears which stem from selfishness, how we learn to become aware of our character defect as they arise, not all the time but with practice we are more aware so that we can stop them before we hurt others. I have no expectations of any one client walking away with an Aha moment but that is not the objective, the objective is to plant a seed so that if they are willing they can nurture the seed themselves with the help of their God, a good sponsor and AA or NA.

I would appreciate any feedback good or bad that anyone has concerning this. Steve you owe me one after my comment to you yesterday so feel free to share your years of experience with this young buck.

Peace Love and Light
Scott