I have spent two days searching the web for someone saying what you are saying in this article. My experience in the clergy, doing liturgical and experiential groups many years ago, and as a family therapist more recently, put me in position to appreciate the dynamics of 12 step procedures, I believe.

I have attended around 600 meetings of codependents anonymous during the past eight years and it has been transformative for me from the beginning. Perhaps I was primed for this while in the seminary. I heard of the first step of AA and immediately knew this to be the beginning of spiritual growth. But my struggles did not involve alcohol or any other drug, so I considered myself unqualified for the programs.

In the meantime, codependents anonymous came into being and I found my way there. And ever since I have been both leaping ahead in my own growth by comparison with prior years, and I have been clinically evaluating the processes that were accomplishing this in myself and others.

This finally precipitated my search of the web for articles on the dynamics of 12 step groups and I congratulate you for capturing so well what I have experienced and observed.

Since I don’t qualify for other groups, coda is the only 12 step format I am familiar with. But many other members of the group I attend do qualify and continue to make use of them. Nonetheless they speak of coda as the “graduate course” because of the more general focus, on relationships, and because of the greater sensitivity to crosstalk.

I get the impression from speaking to others that coda may be more consistently successful in creating a sense of safety than other 12 step groups, by being more focused on the processes you write of.

So thank you for your article. I believe you are in the vanguard of articulating some very important understandings of group dynamics. Nobody else seems to be saying it and it needs to be said.

Sincerely,

John Rose