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Welcome to a Wonderful New Year!
January/February 2023
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HAPPENINGS AROUND CONNECTICUT

Event Recordings:
Did you miss any of our Workshops in 2022? Click here for event recordings available on our website!






Happening Now:
In-person meetings are happening again - here are a few:
-Cromwell MON/6:45 PM (Mask required)
-Lakeville TUES/7:00 PM
-East Hartford WED/10:00 AM (Hybrid)
-Danielson WED/7:00 PM
-Windsor WED/7:00 PM (Hybrid)
-Litchfield THURS/7:00 PM
-Vernon THURS/7:00 PM
-West Hartford SAT/9:30 AM (Masks Optional)
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Upcoming Events:
-January 8: Connecticut Intergroup Journey Through the Steps 4:00 - 6:00 pm EST.
Registration now closed.

-January 16: Annual planning meeting for Connecticut Intergroup. Everyone is welcome to come join the discussion and brainstorming about our 2023 activities. Zoom information @ https://www.connecticutoa.org/ct-meeting-list/ (end of 2nd page).

-January 21: OA’s 63rd Birthday Virtual Celebration, 2-4 PM EST. Speakers, Q&A, Sharing and more! Zoom meeting ID: 731 088 9762, Password: BEABSTN8    

-January 29: Relapse and Recovery workshop on Zoom, 4-6 PM EST. Information @ https://oasandiego.org/workshops/relapse/.

-February 4: 9-5:00 ET: NJIOA Winter Retreat: Passport to Recovery, 9-5 EST, on Zoom.  Information @ https://oa-phila.org/the-njioa-winter-retreat/

-Multiple dates: Zoom training - OA's San Diego Intergroup is offering Zoom classes; more information at https://oasandiego.org/zoom/

-In addition, we're offering Newcomer Orientation Meetings
*By Request - Contact [email protected]
From your Connecticut Intergroup Chair – 2022 in Review

Greetings – and happy New Year! Or, should I say “happy new DAY” since we’re trying to live one DAY at a time?!!!

It’s hard to believe that 2022 has come to a close. I want to take a minute to let you know about all the great service work that your Intergroup Representatives and Committees did last year. We worked hard to keep our focus on Connecticut Intergroup’s Strategic Goals for 2022-2025:
Help members strengthen their
personal recovery.
Increase the number of sponsors.
Increase the number of newcomers.
Increase the retention of newcomers.
Help those in relapse.
Increase outreach activities, especially
to health care professionals.
Inspire people to give more service.

So, what did we do in 2022? I’ll divide our activities roughly into two “buckets” – internal (Twelfth-Step Within activities for existing members and newcomers) and external (Public Information/Professional Outreach for people who don’t already know about us). 

We held four workshops, two sponsor support meetings and 16 newcomer orientation meetings. We conducted three Step Studies: two Quick Step Studies and a 15-week Step Study. We launched a fabulous new website and a terrific new newsletter. We created two new documents: the “CTIG Newsletter for Newcomers” (available on the Newcomers page of our website https://www.connecticutoa.org/newcomers/) and “What is Connecticut Intergroup?”- also on our website https://www.connecticutoa.org/what-is-connecticut-intergroup-ctig/. We transitioned to a new email system so that the email addresses of our members would be more secure. Our Speaker Bank is available to all groups who need an OA speaker for their meeting. We have shared ideas on many topics, including sponsoring newcomers using the “First 12 Days” document, keeping our on-line meetings safe from intruders and handling cross talk. AND, we have just launched a Sponsor Bank to help connect members with available sponsors! 

We’ve had a lot of great PIPO (Public Information/Professional Outreach) activity to help carry the OA message to potential compulsive eaters outside of OA. The committee has organized, set up and staffed tables at four health fairs – where our members have spoken with more than 100 people to let them know about the hope and help that OA offers. They applied for (and received) a Public Information grant from Region 6 that allowed us to double our billboard activity this year with multiple billboards in multiple cities - PLUS “mobile” billboards (large PI signs on the side of para-transit buses). We’ve had small ads in several community papers, sent out letters to health care providers, put up public information posters and more. We’ve answered calls that have come into the hotline in response to all this activity and helped people find their way to meetings. We increased activity on our Facebook page (CT Intergroup of Overeaters Anonymous) with 70+ posts this year, including our “Slogan Share-a-thon” and our “Big Book Promises” campaigns...

I am SURE I’ve missed a lot of other great things that our Intergroup reps and members have done this year, and I apologize for that. I am very excited about what 2023 will bring (a day at a time, of course)! There is so much positive energy at Intergroup that I’m sure we’ll continue to carry the message to those who still suffer outside of OA and provide support to our OA members. I hope you’ll join us at our Intergroup meeting on January 16th to brainstorm our activities for 2023!

-Kimberly C.
CT Intergroup
Small, Unobserved Service

In the Big Book it advises, “Ask Him in your morning meditation what you can do each day for the man who is still sick” (Alcoholics Anonymous, 4th ed., p. 164).
My ego tells me I need to do something spectacular, like curing cancer, so everyone can see wonderful me. But since I don’t have the time to cure cancer, I might as well do nothing, right? Wow, what an egotistical diseased mind.

So, what can I do daily to help the fellow who is still sick? How about I assist with set-up or shutdown of meetings? Talk to members who linger after the meeting and may have questions? Answer the phone when a fellow is calling and may be on the verge of eating compulsively? Attend sponsorship workshops and consult with my sponsor so I can feel more confident in sponsoring? How about I plant seeds of public information (without preaching) when someone says I look great instead of just thanking them?

OA members are not the only people who need service. How about I assist someone who is struggling with packages or reaching for an item high on a store shelf? How about instead of shrinking in my chair when people ask for volunteers or assistance, I take a step in that direction to see where I may fit?

There are so many daily opportunities to help others in small, unobserved ways that still make a difference that we could fulfill our call to service several times a day. My charge is, instead of a nightly review to recall where I could have been of service, to have those experiences in real time. This will not only benefit me, but the persons in the line of that service who may have thought there was no one out there who cared enough to assist or hear them. It may not matter to everyone, but it will matter to that one, and one at a time is more than enough.
-Edited and reprinted from Looking Up newsletter, TriCounty Intergroup, January 2019
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January & February
Steps

Step 1: We admitted we were powerless over food—that our lives had become unmanageable.

Step 2: Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.
"The Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions of Overeaters Anonymous, 2nd edition, copyright Overeaters Anonymous, Inc. All rights reserved.”

Living the Step Principles
 
Step 1: Honesty: Practice honesty in all aspects of my life, particularly self-honesty. Accept that I’m not truly in control of ‘anything,’ only my own choices. I’m in charge of actions, but God’s in charge of outcomes. Stay honest with myself, i.e., accept I have a disease that I can’t control with my own will power.

Step 2: Hope: Cultivate an attitude of hope & positive thinking rather than gloominess and negativity and faultfinding. Expect the best, not the worst.

-Don C., CT
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January & February
Traditions

The OA Traditions - Am I Practicing These Principles, too?

Tradition One: Our common welfare should come first; personal recovery depends upon OA unity.

• Do I contribute to a calm and comfortable environment in my meetings, or am I argumentative and quick to find fault?

• Do I react sharply when others don’t act the way I think they should? Or am I kind, even to people who rub me the wrong way?

• Do I try to connect with other OA members in ways that are comfortable and helpful to all of us?

Tradition Two: For our group purpose there is but one ultimate authority - a loving God as He may express Himself in our group conscience. Our leaders are but trusted servants; they do not govern.

• Am I critical or supportive of the members who give service in my meeting or at Intergroup? Do I do my part?

• Am I willing to do service in my meetings or Intergroup, or do I wait for someone else to do all the work?

• Do I listen with an open mind when I don’t agree with another member? 

"The Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions of Overeaters Anonymous, 2nd edition, copyright Overeaters Anonymous, Inc. All rights reserved.”
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A New Year's Eve Kiss?

A New Year's Eve kiss?
A Valentine's Day Date night out? So many of the societal and interpersonal opportunities for intimate connection were taken from me by the disease of compulsive eating & food behaviors. By continuing the ingestion cycle of the alcoholic food and practicing bulimic behaviors within my day to day life for decades; my bites, licks and tastes of 'rewards' overshadowed the love I could find for myself or share with a significant other or lover. By working the steps with my sponsor this past year we came up with an affirmation I used as a bookmark in one of my daily readers. I hope by sharing it with you that you too can release old shame and guilt in your sex relations and gain more connection to the higher power within yourself and others. "God/dess, I trust that you only want what's best for me: an emotionally stable & available, and spiritually healthy person- who we are mutually intrigued by each other's authentic truth. Let our cores shine visibly & magnetically. When; How; is up to you God. I believe you will guide me,inspire me and hold me accountable to nurturing this new life, relationship and mission. You're in charge of my romance". 

-Jacki A., CT
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