Greetings. My name is Ewa C. and I hail from the East coast. I split my time between Boston and the South Coast of Massachusetts, where I started a LifeRing meeting in New Bedford (home of Moby Dick) in 2017, with the the help of my co-Convenor, Jess F.
I launched my sober journey with LifeRing many years ago when I googled “secular recovery” and discovered the empowering support of the online LifeRing community. There were no FTF meetings around me at the time, so I joined LSRmail and then LSRsafe, the email groups where I felt accepted and supported while talking about my addiction to alcohol openly for the first time in my life. What a relief that was! Being part of an email group was especially powerful for me, since I find writing to be an incredibly therapeutic tool in both recovery and self-knowledge.
I’m so grateful for my sobriety and the role that LifeRing has played in my recovery that I wanted to somehow “give back”; thus, I’ve tried to help out in a variety of ways over the years, such as volunteering to be a pen-pal to prisoners and then taking on the role of Board Secretary back in 2015. Since 2019, I’ve been serving on the Board of Directors and my term will end in 2022.
Somewhere along the way I became convinced that the “opposite of addiction is connection” and so my involvement with fellow sobrietists is the foundation of my ongoing growth and well-being. It is amazing to work with all the volunteers who make LifeRing what it is: an open, welcoming recovery organization dedicated to helping us all empower our sober selves.
With the isolation imposed on us as a result of the pandemic, it’s become ever more important to keep these important connections alive, and I’m gratified to see how swiftly LifeRing has moved to bring its FTF meetings online….thank you, Zoom! My own little meeting in New Bedford will benefit from this new way of connecting and many Convenors are seeing large numbers at their online meetings. A shout out to Robert, our Executive Director, for helping us all with this transition to online.
Our recent Annual Conference and Congress went virtual with a successful turnout at the Convenors Workshops held on Saturday, May 30th. Thank you all for attending and helping us grow our presence in the recovery community worldwide. A lot of great conversations grew out of the workshops and we will now be having monthly Convenors meetings via Zoom. If you are interested in convening, please join us! You can obtain more details by contacting service@lifering.org
Bobbi C. and I will be taking turns blogging. We’ll be introducing the rest of the Board members as well as updating you on any LifeRing news.
Volunteers are needed! We know that there are many talented individuals making up our membership and we urge you to consider helping out as we all continue to work together to keep LifeRing a viable option for those seeking Choice in Recovery.
We hope that everyone is taking good care of themselves during these challenging times.
Till next time…
Ewa C.
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