I’ve enjoyed the gift of sobriety for a while now, but sometimes I get wrapped up in petty concerns with my worldview, my drama, me me me. When I’m in such an ego state, I can’t will myself out of it, because I have lost self-awareness and connection. The button of the washing machine has been pushed, and I can only go round for a full cycle. Imagine my silly rotating face, coated in suds, visible to any sane spectator watching me through the porthole. Eventually, I am restored to myself. I have a moment of connection, of choice. And then what? Sometimes I just choose to push the button again, and go round for another wash.

Well, these are fine fixes. But what about prevention? Do I really need to go through so much random misery? My sponsors over the years have all advised me to acquire a variety of AA Service commitments as part of my regular weekly schedule. It’s not foolproof (I’m quite the fool) but I think it’s made my recovery much more robust, and given me a richer quality of life.

Regular doses of this “Vitamin S”, whereby I must do something for other folk in recovery, reduces the amount of time I would spend in the dark recesses of my head. Although it takes some time and effort, service participation is essentially free because otherwise I would fritter these resources away in insane washing-machine behaviour. In the remainder of this article, I will briefly touch on some of these forms.

Other times, I manage to say: “OK enough, let’s do something different”. Such a decision is fragile – I need to take action immediately. Sometimes even dropping to my knees by the bed or in the shower, I ask my Higher Power to restore me to sanity. And if I listen, I can hear a quiet voice in the back of my mind telling me what to do next: “go home” or “apologise now” or “don’t worry” or “sleep”. Another kind of action involves contacting another member of the Fellowship. AA has a collective reservoir of sanity, which we are all free to tap into. We are usually not all crazy in the same way at the same time.