This workshop was part of our 2020 OA Region One Convention on Zoom and included two speakers, a writing prompt with writing for ten minutes, sharing in small group breakout rooms, and sharing as a large group at the end of the workshop. For each question, participants were asked to put their “one thing” in the chat.  Here (with only minimal editing) are their responses to our three "Just One Thing" questions.
 

One thing I have done to bolster my recovery in 2020:

• Willingness to use Zoom
• Attended lots of different meetings across the country as we are able to attend meeting virtually.
• Went to an OA Rise meeting.
• honestly saying "I don't know" and being teachable
• I started a virtual meeting
• agreed to be a temporary sponsor, which opened a lot of doors
• "Balance" (more of it in life)
• studied the principle of the traditions once a month
• Doing Step 10 from Big Book - spot checking throughout the day, not just at night, I became aware of the sixth sense and intuition. This is the voice of HP.
• I make a choice everyday which road I am choosing to take 1/ the path to recovery abstinence living joyous and free or 2/ control, overeating, despair and suffering
• Setting Boundaries
• Getting a sponsor
• Attended Zoom meetings out of state.
• Making 3 or more outreach calls every day.
• Hosting virtual workshops
• began sponsoring
• Working the first 3 steps with sponsees.
• Learn to surrender to my Higher Power.
• More exercise. Discovering an online gym.
• Working with a sponsor to keep accountable so that I keep moving forward with my Ninth Step work
• Joined the Step 10/11 train which is a group of women who get paired up for two weeks and call each other with their inventories.
• Also to join Step 10/11 train, you can email 1011steptrain@gmail.com. There is an orientation meeting you'll need to attend first.
• listened to my instinct in asking for a particular person to be my sponsor.
• realizing I am a food addict and that changed everything
• Made a decision to live (a healthy life) rather than continue to compulsively overeat.
• Coming to this Convention.
• getting "back to basics" with my program...asking what wirjs? and doing that
• Acting on any small willingness that came to me
• Meditation walk daily
• Lots of shares about steps 10, 11 and 12
• Attend or facilitate a 12 Step workshop from the green workshop guide
• More service
• Started a Step Study using the 12 Step Study and Workshop
• Facilitated a Virtual Step Study using the 12 Step Workshop and Study guide of OA (Green spiral)
• Sponsoring a newcomer very different from me with food and HP issues
• Even with COVID, I can still attend my Yuma meeting and see my Yuma OA’ers even if I am not going this year.
• I took on new service position
• Worked the steps with my first ever step sister from 20+ years ago and together we used the green workshop book. It was amazing. I also started using a meditation app twice daily.
• 3 meals 1 day at a time with nothing but life in between. My choice is to be in recovery.
• acceptance of necessity of shutting down, vs winter travel to warm places, of needing to scale back on risky activities (mountain climbing, skydiving) that also help with weight maintenance, willingness to give up diagnosed food allergens, break with family of origin. Willingness, acceptance, surrender, life on life's terms... etc...

  
Just one thing I would say to a newcomer that might be helpful to them, OR one thing that really helped ME as a newcomer:

• wanna temporary sponsor?
• don't do this alone
• Welcome Home
• Go to as many meetings as possible.
• go to a Virtual newcomer meeting
• find a 12 day sponsor
• slow down and KISS! (Keep it Simple, Sweetie!)
• You're not alone, here's my number, keep coming back.
• This is an addiction and needs to be treated seriously.
• grab a sponsor guide
• Try at least 6 meetings
• listen for your story in others shares
• There is no one right way to do the program. Keep coming back until you find what works for you.
• it works if you work it
• ask for a glossary for all the acronyms
• Don't give up because the program doesn't make sense at first...keep going to meetings, get a sponsor who can guide you through it.
• Put yourself in the middle of the herd so that you create connections and break the isolation!
• Take what you want and leave the rest.....p.s. we do pick up more as we keeping coming back.
• Try the “New to OA” meeting every Saturday at 6PM through Oregon Intergroup.
• oa.org - find a virtual meeting
• Let go of defiance; and remember you have a choice; you don't HAVE to do anything; you are choosing to do this!
• you are welcome you are deserving you are special and you are not alone
• tradition 3, together we get better
• It's a we program!
• It's ODAT, I don't give up eating a certain food for the rest of my life, but for today, I choose not to eat it.
• let us love you  until you love yourself
• Here's my phone number, you're very welcome to call.
• Get a sponsor
• Keep a journal from day 1 to reflect on as you go through your program.
• the only way you fail is to leave
• OA is the "Good Clean Plate Program" at a buffet of ideas.  Take what you want, and leave the rest. However, you might consider taking what you need and leave the rest.
• know that you can't do it wrong ❤
• a desire to stop eating compulsively is the only requirement
• this is a rough time to join a fellowship. congratulations on your bravery. keep coming back.
• Ask someone if they would like a temp sponsor!  it helps!
• Give yourself some grace while learning the lingo and ask questions if you don't understand!
• A sponsor helps in working the 12 Steps and progressing in your recovery. It is okay to ask for a sponsor, even if you are new.
• bring your journal to meetings to take notes for recovery tips!
• Keep coming back and keep trying new things, even if abstinence eludes you.
• Join a Step Study Group
• life will change, the world will change, you will change over the long haul. but this can be the thread of your life....
• go to oaregion1.org/sponsorship.html to get a sponsor
• Ask someone to take you through the Newcomer's First 12 Days.  (Let newcomers know about this resource. 12 Days may seem do-able to a newcomer and make it easier to start.)

 
One thing I would like to commit to adding to my program for the rest of 2020:

• 30 meetings in 30 days....30 phone calls in 30 days...30 meditations in 30 days.  Set up a calendar for whatever you decide to do 30 days on!  Keep it Simple.  :)
• More meditation...walking meditation
• A E I O U 10th Step:   a = abstinence    e = exercise   I = what I did for myself   o = what did I do for others   u = what was uncomfortable (more classic 10th step)  (some people add “Y” for Yahoo’s/Gratitudes) to the above format
• Begin looking at the Principles of the Steps/Traditions/Concepts
• Go to a meeting in every state / every province / why not in other countries?
• Ask for willingness, then act on it as soon as it comes!
• look at my food plan.  Not perfection, but ask my sponsor if I can start committing my food.  Or, find a food plan partner.
• I felt JOY at the idea of attending meetings in other countries -- I'm going to start doing that!
• oa region 9 can take you to Europe meetings
• Make outreach calls on a weekly basis
• really committing to an action plan, including being more open to service.
• continue project -- catch myself in being negative toward myself. work on this and make more progress.
• start a daily practice that supports my well-being for the day -- commit to making this a more regular, daily thing each morning
• Have been working on my action plan.  Have made an action plan surrounding food plan, which helps me eat more regularly and on time. This helps me with daily routine.
• reach out to newcomers. call out and be humble and real
• Daily 3:00 tea time when depression sets in.
• I want to commit to loving myself fiercely for the rest of the year. Being kind to myself.
• Wake up and say I'm glad to be alive and today I'm going to be excited!
• I would tell newcomers that OA has taught me tons of new tools to live my life free of food addiction, obsession, and shame.
• So grateful for this experience. All the best to you for the next 24
• I love this banquet of ideas and the fact you set it up to record commitments in chat!!!

  
Thank you to everyone for your amazing shares!

When I first attended a Twelve Step program, I quickly “did” all twelve steps in about a month.  That was expected. The Fifth Step, which I chose to do with my priest, was somewhat scary, but I continued on.  When I had completed Step Nine, I felt a great sense of burdens being removed. I joined other fellowships and worked through the steps similarly.
 
Approximately ten years after I first entered “the rooms,” I joined Overeaters Anonymous. I started the same way, not taking long to go through the first nine steps, then continuing to work 10, 11 and 12.  In OA I found that it is common to take the Fourth and Fifth Steps again regarding another person or a particular situation. I have gone through the steps several times in my OA life. 

I have thought of the Sixth and Seventh Steps as the “working steps” for my character defects, but I am beginning to realize I have neglected a wonderful gift in the Fifth Step. To write out a Fifth Step around a character defect, share with Higher Power and then with a sponsor or partner in recovery is truly working the program.  After all, the spiritual Principle of Step Five is integrity.  
 
As it says in For Today on November 3rd:  “I need not be afraid to admit anything to God and to another person, under God’s guidance.”
 
To continue to grow in recovery I need to use the Fifth Step, and I am grateful to do so!
 
Lesley – Region One

​“I think I’m doing pretty darn good in this OA program.  I don’t think about food very much anymore.  I go to meetings and try to be of service.  My clothes are fitting quite nicely, thank you very much.  I think I’m going to take a break from all this OA busyness.  Thank you OA, but I’ve got it from here.”
 
Oh, aren’t those words I’ve thought about saying more than once?  When can I stop doing this?  It takes so much time and effort and don’t you know that I really am starting to like myself now?  I’ve got all the information I need to set me on the right path.  Off I go….
 
Wow! For me, that type of thinking is indicative of the lies I tell myself.
 
What I know to be true is that the night I believed the lies that “I’m ok now, I’m at a normal body weight so it won’t matter and I just want it!” was the night my food addiction came waltzing right back in.  Waltzing like a gorilla, that is.  It picked me up and threw me down, and you know what they say, “When you’re dancing with a gorilla, you’re not done until the gorilla says you’re done.”
 
Yes this program takes time, but the results give me a life of peace. Peace with myself, peace with my Higher Power and peace with those around me.  It is true what they say that we never graduate from this Twelve Step program.  It is a design for living that works and as long as I’m living, I want to follow this design!
 
The Big Book of AA says:  “We are not cured of alcoholism.  What we really have is a daily reprieve contingent on the maintenance of our spiritual condition.” (Alcoholics Anonymous, 4th edition, page 85)
 
Today, I know, that I know, that I know, I am an addict.  I will always need this Twelve Step program to guide me.  There is no leaving it behind because I’m tired of doing it. Well, there is, but the gorilla is waiting and I truly don’t want to dance anymore!
 
Gratefully done dancing,
 
Nadine D. – Region One

Our Eleventh Step talks about prayer and meditation. Meditation continues to be a struggle for me. In many practices, one of the first instructions is to close your eyes. Because of my childhood trauma, the idea of closing my eyes doesn’t feel safe for me right now. I feel too exposed. Too vulnerable. I used to use this truth as a weapon against myself. “You think you’re recovered? You can’t even sit with your eyes closed. What kind of an example is that?!” the vicious voice of my disease chimes in at every opportunity.
 
It’s important to note that through working the Twelve Steps with a sponsor, and some outside help, I have experienced recovery beyond my wildest dreams. For the most part, I do not regret the past nor wish to shut the door on it. I believe in my heart that my experiences can benefit others. I know a new freedom and happiness. I feel useful and I am confident in my abilities. I have talents to share.   So where is my freedom from fear of other people?
 
Program has taught me to accept myself unconditionally. I love and accept my body – a miracle for someone who has tried to starve herself to maintain someone else’s unattainable ideal. I love who I am as a person, another miracle for someone who did not believe she was worth the space she took up in the world. And, I have a self-preservation skill that, so far, I am unable to, and may never be able to, let go of. I have a strong connection to my Higher Power. I know with all of my being that HP is with me 24/7, showing me grace and direction. And still, my instinct, when I try to close my eyes to meditate, is to recoil as if from a hot flame. The miracle here is that I am not a lesser person because of it. I accept it, refuse to let the voice of my disease define me, and remain open to other ways to quiet my mind so I can hear HP’s will for me. Because that is what meditation is all about – strengthening our connection with a power greater than ourselves. How we get there doesn’t matter.
 
So, how do I meditate? I go for a walk. Because of my past, it took a lot of work to be able to walk by myself. I stay vigilant, and present, paying attention to everything that is happening around me. As I do, something amazing happens: my mind begins to clear and I hear and feel an amazing inner silence. An overwhelming sense of peace. I feel safe. And in that safety, a thought materializes that leads me to my next action. A plan forms and I can visualize the path ahead. Random thoughts start to connect and form a coherent picture in my head. As I embrace whatever was just revealed to me, I feel a deep sense of joy.
 
Does this happen every time I walk? Not hardly. As anyone with a meditation practice will tell you, reaching the stillness is not always possible every time you sit. But when it does happen, it is profound and I feel an unbreakable bond with my Higher Power.
 
When I am not able to walk and I am feeling restless, irritable and discontent, I have learned to doodle. I sit at my desk or dining room table with a blank piece of paper. In the middle of the paper I write a word. One that calls to me in the moment. Examples include Peace, Beauty, Loneliness or Heartbreak. I draw a circle or box around the word, and I start to create patterns. The patterns flow easily out of me and onto the paper as I concentrate on the word in the center. The goal again is to quiet the stories I am telling myself and find a calmness to replace the restlessness. I open my heart to HP’s message for me. If I can’t seem to find the flow, I surrender to the process and release each self-judgment as it appears. Like any new skill, it took some practice to let go of my expectations and be present during the doodle meditation.
 
The point is that however we choose to quiet our minds and open our heart to a power greater than ourselves, the only way we can do it wrong is to not do it at all.
 
Alice W. – Region One

My OA friend said, “I have an assignment from my sponsor.  Can you tell me about your Second Step experience?”  I didn’t have an immediate answer.
 
Later that week I was reading a wonderful story in the Big Book (Alcoholics Anonymous, 4th edition) titled “A Drunk, Like You.” On page 405 a spiritual awakening was discussed.  Aah!  My friend had been asking about my spiritual awakening!  In the story, the writer was disappointed that he hadn’t had a “more dramatic” spiritual awakening.
 
I was transported back to 1976, when I first entered the rooms of the 12 Steps at the tender age of 26. I had accompanied a friend who didn’t want to go alone.  I had been very depressed, but didn’t know that I was about to find the answer I needed. Walking into that room is something I’ll never forget.  It felt like walking into sunshine (and it was winter in Fairbanks, Alaska). I felt loved and accepted. And I kept coming back. That was my first spiritual awakening!
 
Jumping ahead to 1987. I was no longer a member of that first fellowship.  I was desperate to lose weight. I saw an ad for Overeaters Anonymous in the paper and wondered if it could be a Big Book fellowship. Their meeting was held fifteen minutes after I got off work and only three doors away, so I brought my Big Book and found that they were starting a Big Book study that night!  It was a renewal of my spiritual awakening.  Here was where I belonged!
 
Fast forward to 2009. We had moved and moved again. I had wandered away again. I had tried other methods of weight control.  Nothing worked. I got the bright idea of going to an Oregon OA retreat to get back on the wagon, but thought that afterward I wouldn’t have to attend meetings afterward—that I’d be able to do it by myself. But I discovered at the retreat that I love meetings!

Later that year we had to move again, back to my home town of Ketchikan to care for my mother.  I found an ad for OA in the paper, but when I went to the meeting no one else showed up.  I called the paper and was told the meeting wasn’t happening and they didn’t know how the ad had gotten back in the paper.  The time and place for a meeting were provided for me, and there were many weeks of just myself attending, but slowly a fellowship has grown around me.

I pray I have learned the lesson for good that this is where I belong and where I can stay spiritually awake, growing in recovery!
 
Lesley – Region One
 

PLEASE DO NOT INCLUDE LAST NAMES IN BLOG POST COMMENTS

As I've trudged the Road of Happy Destiny, I've developed a list of words to live by. Through working the Twelve Steps, practicing these principles in all of my affairs, and giving away what was so freely given to me, I walk a spiritual path every day.
 
I work my program as if my life depends on it, because it does. This disease of mine, this addiction to self-loathing, almost killed me. It causes an obsession of the mind so strong that my symptoms took the form of self-starvation and purging everything I ate.

​The maintenance of a fit spiritual condition is the ONLY thing that worked for me. This list is the result of developing that fit spiritual condition, which I achieved through working all twelve Steps. It is evidence of the true miracle of this program. Before recovery, I was a frightened, wounded person who hid in plain sight. Now, I gladly follow the path of my Higher Power, who has led me to this marvelous way of life.
 
Do your work and you will find your list too. In the meantime, you can share mine with me.

• Choose to be kind.
• Stay open to all life has to offer.
• Say yes to adventure.
• Feel the fear and do it anyway. 
• Always remember that you have something unique to offer the world. 
• Believe you can make a difference and you will.
• Live a life of integrity. 
• Always speak your highest truth with love.
• It works if you do the work.
• Find joy in every day.
• Keep coming back. 

 
Alice W. - Region One 

In one of my meetings there is a woman who has been abstinent for over forty years. She often shares that “It is my job today to practice the Spiritual Principles of the OA program.”  
 
Step One – the Spiritual Principle is Honesty.  One of the definitions of honesty is "adherence to the facts" or "sincerity."    This seems like the perfect spiritual principle for Step One to me.   To truly understand that I am powerless over food and my life is unmanageable, I needed to be honest with myself about my life. 

To be honest, I do not think I really believed Step One when I arrived in OA.  I came to OA after being in another 12 Step program for almost a year.  I could understand and believe Step Two – Came to believe that a power greater than myself could restore me to sanity.   I had seen that step work for members of the other program.  So, when someone there mentioned OA to me in reference to my overeating, I was immediately interested in finding out more about the OA program. 
 
But I do not really think I took Step One for several years after I started coming to OA meetings.  I certainly did not get abstinent consistently until I had been in OA for about eight years. 

The bottom came after I had been living up near Mt. Hood, outside of Portland, Oregon, for about a year.  During the summer while I worked at a camp for handicapped children, I had been wonderfully abstinent.  It felt easy to be abstinent – I just ate the three meals per day they served in the dining hall, no sugar and no wheat and NO snacking. 

​Then, at the mid-summer OA retreat, I realized I really needed to be close to the OA program and to OA people to stay abstinent during the rest of the year.  I could NOT do this by myself; I was powerless over the food.  I decided I needed to move back to Portland, where there were more meetings and more OA people around me.  I could not do my life by myself.  I had to be honest with myself and with other people.  That is when my first abstinence started. 
 
Margie - Region 1