Go to Meetings
All over the Memphis area there are meetings: 365 days a year, morning, noon and night. The schedule for these meetings may be found in our meeting directory, available at every group or from our office, or on this web site. Take in as many meetings as you can: many long-sober AA's suggest jump-starting your program by attending ninety meetings in ninety days.

Have a Home Group and Get Involved
For most of us, one particular AA group has become a unique haven for our sobriety, a place where we have many friends, where we can feel particularly safe in sharing exactly what's going on with us today. This special place is known throughout the AA fellowship as the Home Group.

In the Greater Memphis area there are a number of large AA groups that meet several times each day, and there are smaller groups that meet from once to five times per week. You are encouraged to visit groups of different types before deciding where you feel most at home. Ultimately, involvement at the group level will be more important to you than the size of the group or how often it meets. Our AA experience tells us that giving away what we have been so freely given is fundamental to our continued sobriety, and we can always find many varied ways to be of service in our home groups.

Get a Sponsor
A few members may tell you that they stay sober without the aid of a sponsor, and having one is indeed not a requirement. However, our AA experience tells us that you will have a much better chance with a sponsor than without one. In fact, you will probably find that communicating with your sponsor is a vital part of your participation in the AA program.

Your sponsor will listen to you and make suggestions based on his or her experience. S/he will not serve as a financial advisor, marriage counselor or psychologist, however. Sponsors are but experienced guides to the AA program of recovery: the Twelve Steps. Some AA groups will help you find a temporary sponsor; if you are not certain about your group's practices regarding sponsorship, simply ask the chairperson after a meeting.

Live One Day at a Time
AA is a "one day at a time" way of living. We try to break life into small pieces that we can handle. We stay sober one day at a time, or when necessary, one hour at a time. We do our jobs one task at a time. We solve our problems one problem at a time; we clean up our past one mess at a time.

"The 24 hour program" is a phrase used to describe a basic A.A. approach to the problem of staying sober. AA's never swear off alcohol for life, never take pledges committing themselves not to take a drink "tomorrow". By the time they turned to A.A. for help, they had discovered that, no matter how sincere they may have been in promising themselves to abstain from alcohol "in the future", somehow they forgot the pledge and got drunk. The compulsion to drink proved more powerful than the best intentions not to drink. The A.A. member recognizes that the biggest problem is to stay sober now! The current 24 hours is the only period the A.A. can do anything about as far as drinking is concerned. Yesterday is gone. Tomorrow never comes. "But today" the A.A. says, "today, I will not take a drink. I may be tempted to take a drink tomorrow - and perhaps I will. but tomorrow is something to worry about when it comes. My big problem is not to take a drink during this 24 hours." From the pamphlet "44 Questions"

Your New Beginning
You've made a new beginning. If you are like most of us, there may be times that you feel terribly frightened and lonely. If you are willing to use the tools that AA offers, you will never have to be alone again. You are among people who have been where you've been, felt what you've felt, thought what you've thought. Use those phone numbers and email addresses you've been given and join us on the path to recovery from our common problem - alcoholism. We can do together what we can't do by ourselves.