Recovery

Brandywine Intergroup Newsletter
May-June 2019

The Recovery newsletter is bi-monthly.
The Blast sends out a monthly report and any time-sensitive alerts.

The Steps, Traditions, and Concepts of OA

Step Five: Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs. The principle behind Step 5 is Integrity.

Tradition Five- Each group has but one primary purpose — to carry its message to the compulsive overeater who still suffers. Principle- Purpose

Concept Five - Individuals have the right of appeal and petition in order to ensure that their opinions and personal grievances will be carefully considered. Principle - Consideration

Step Six: Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character. Principle -Willingness.

Tradition Six - An OA group ought never endorse, finance or lend the OA name to any related facility or outside enterprise, lest problems of money, property and prestige divert us from our primary purpose. Principle – Solidarity

Concept Six - The World Service Business Conference has entrusted the Board of Trustees with the primary responsibility for the administration of Overeaters Anonymous. Principle - Responsibility

Information regarding "The BLAST"

"The BLAST" news update of the Brandywine Intergroup is sent out once a month. It is meant to precede the monthly Intergroup meeting which is held on the 2nd Saturday of the month. Submissions forThe BLAST must be received no later than one week BEFORE the Intergroup meeting. Please send all submissions to: theblastfrombrandywine@gmail.com

Chair's Corner

As I approach the end of my service as the chair of Brandywine Intergroup, I am very grateful to the board members and meeting reps who have supported me and continued to support Intergroup. Together we are moving forward, as we expect a new board to assume service at the close of the June meeting. I expect to still attend BIG as a meeting rep as my schedule allows; after 26 years, it’s as big a part of my recovery as my weekly meetings. Everyone is invited to attend the BIG meeting and the speaker meeting that follows on the second Saturday of the month at Paoli Hospital at 10 AM in Board Room 206.

There are some online resources that I recommend to increase your knowledge of the offerings of Region 7 and the World Service Office. These websites not only are informative, but also are supportive of our recovery. Please see what they can offer you.

* Region 7 - oaregion7.org
There is an explanation of the region’s composition, the services it provides, and upcoming events. Please check out the R7 convention, “Waves of Recovery” in Ocean City, MD on November 1-3. You can take advantage of the Early Bird registration price now. About a dozen BIG members attended last year along with more than 200 others - please join us in this weekend of recovery.

* World Service Office - oa.org
What a treasure trove of information! Start anywhere and wander down the various pathways. You’ll be informed at every turn. There are podcasts and videos, quarterly news bulletins, and information for professionals in the fields of health care and the clergy. The Step Ahead newsletter provides quarterly information from our trustees, motions to be considered at the annual World Service Business Conference, new literature, and an Ask it Basket where program questions are answered. There are many categories to explore including, but definitely not limited to:
▪️Group Support includes workshop guides and worksheets.
▪️ Group Treasurer Materials supports those giving this service.
▪️ Guidelines for many categories of activities and services eliminate the need to
               reinvent the wheel.
▪️Lifeline Magazine a monthly magazine written by and for our members.

▪️ Public Information guides us in spreading the word.
       Service Body Support helps all of us in the present and in the future.

▪️ Workshops and Skits can add interest and fun to our events.

It’s hard to believe that we’ll need a resource or information that hasn’t been cataloged in this comprehensive website. Take a trip though the many aspects of our program - and you don’t even need to leave the comfort of your home to get there!

In service,
Marilyn
Intergroup Chair

At the 2018 World Service Business Conference, delegates voted to change OA Unity Day celebration dates and times to be more inclusive of all members of our Fellowship:

Therefore Unity Day will be celebrated alternately on the last Saturday of February in even years and the last Sunday in February in odd years. Plus, Unity Day will now be celebrated at 11:30 a.m. local time (previously Pacific Standard Time). The next Unity Day celebration is at 11:30 a.m. local time on Sunday, February 24, 2019. (As mentioned above, the Brandywine Intergroup Unity Day event will begin @ 1:30 pm)

For the purposes of 2019 Intergroup event planning the other OA holidays for the year 2019 are celebrated as weekends except for Twelfth Step Within Day.

* OA’s Birthday will be celebrated every third weekend of January. Next year’s OA Birthday weekend is January 19–20, 2019.

* Sponsorship Day will be celebrated every third weekend of August. Sponsorship Day weekend 2019 is August 17–18, 2019.

* International Day Experiencing Abstinence (IDEA day) will be celebrated every third weekend of November: November 16–17, 2019.

OFFICERS

Chair: Marilyn

Ex Officio: Mary Frances

Vice-Chair: Louisa

Treasurer: Laura W

Corresponding Secretary: Linda R

Recording Secretary: Irene

Minutes

April Meeting Minutes

Brandywine Intergroup Meeting – 2nd Saturday,10am-11:30am
Paoli, PA 19301
255 West Lancaster Avenue Board Room 206
Paoli Hospital Board Room

A speaker meeting follows the intergroup meeting from 11:45 am to 1:00 pm. All are welcome! (Bring a brown bag lunch.)

Do you or does your meeting have a voice? If no one from your group attends Intergroup meetings, you have no OA voice outside of your group. All are welcome to attend to check it out. Please consider being a representative for your group if no one is currently in that role.

Thank You!

The Board would like to thank the following meetings which made financial contributions in the past few months:

Monday Media
Monday West Chester
Tuesday Royersford
Friday Valley Forge
Saturday BIG Speaker
Saturday Amblern

Contributions to help send delegates to WSO:

Monday Overbrook
Wednesday Devon
Saturday Havertown

Note on donations: Donations are down at both our local intergroup and the national levels.
Automatic Recurring Contribution (ARC) is available for our World Service Office here.

Please give to keep our Fellowship thriving.

(https://www.oa.org/files/pdf/seventhtradition.pdf)

Brandywine Intergroup Website: www.brandywineintergroup.org

For submissions to Recovery, send by the 20th of the month prior if possible: brandywineintergroup@gmail.com
Please share your news, experience, strength, and hope.

From the Editor

This newsletter is for you, the members of our local BIG meetings, and you make it yours by sending in your own stories, thoughts, prayers, poems, favored readings that express your experience, strength, and hope. You may include your first name and last name initial, or leave anonymous.

Send to BrandywineIntergroup@gmail.com and I will get them in as soon as possible.

You don't have to understand the Steps to work them.

You work the Steps to understand them.

In Step Six, I use love, insight, and vision to release my current identity and self-image and open myself to further growth and recovery.

(Overeaters Anonymous. Voices of Recovery)

After I completed Step Five, many of my fears diminished, my attitudes changed, and my defects troubled me less.

(Overeaters Anonymous. Voices of Recovery)

I don’t think less of myself, I think of myself less.
(OA Slogans)

How did OA Start?

In January 1960, three people living in southern California began meeting for the purpose of helping each other with their eating problems. They had tried everything else and failed. The program they followed was patterned after the Alcoholics Anonymous program. From that first meeting, OA has grown until today there are approximately 7,500 meeting groups in over 50 countries throughout the world. (Aware, PAIG)

🦉🦉🦉 🦉 🦉

Members sharing Experience, Strength, and Hope
~ ~ ~

This statement from the AA Big Book was important in my recovery (anon):

Hence it was most evident that a solitary self-appraisal, and the admission of our defects based upon that alone, wouldn’t be nearly enough. We’d have to have outside help if we were surely to know and admit the truth about ourselves—the help of God and another human being. (AA Big Book)

Questions I ask myself when my program seems off track:

What is going on around/in me?
Am I fudging my portions?
Am I eating triggering foods?
Am I t following my food plan as it's meant to be followed?
How is my exercising?
Am I working most of the tools?

(ML)

Prayer/Meditation

Does this food I’m putting into my mouth serve my mind, body, and spirit?

Words from my sponsor: when you find a combination of recovery actions that work for you - Lather, Rinse, Repeat! -Louisa

Laura shared this from Lifeline:

A Better Understanding
Is the meeting a welcoming place for both long timers and newcomers?
Is the nature of our illness discussed? In my opinion, a strong meeting will explain that this is an illness and both the physical allergy and the twist of the mind make up its nature. Even if it’s only read aloud in the meeting format, this should be talked about.
If it is a speaker meeting, is the speaker abstinent? Does the speaker talk about the way they work the Steps on a daily basis? If there is no one who meets that criteria, perhaps a piece of OA approved literature can be used instead.
Does the meeting emphasize the need for a spiritual awakening, the result of working the Steps? Is it made clear, either by the speaker or the readings, that the only relief we have from a “seemingly hopeless state of mind and body” (Alcoholics Anonymous, 4th. ed., p. xiii) is that vital spiritual awakening? Basically, does a newcomer or longtimer come away from the meeting with a better understanding of the illness and its spiritual solution? If this is covered, then I believe that meeting is strong.

— Harlan G., Scottsdale, Arizona USA

Suggested topics for the 2019 newsletter sharing:

1) What does OA mean to me?

2) Awareness and Recovery

Find many virtual meetings at OA.org

For hundreds of podcasts visit the Los Angles Intergroup site here.

Tools of the OA:

Plan of eating, Sponsorship, Meetings, Telephone, Writing, Literature, Action Plan, Anonymity, Service

Men's Group Tele-Meeting

Men in OA will want to get acquainted with this special men's Tuesday evening telephone meeting.

https://files.acrobat.com/a/preview/b0e3232c-7316-4bf9-8e25-5b081f6d3d55

Speaker's Bureau

If you are willing to be a speaker for regular OA meetings (or for an OA event), please contact Carolyn M. to give her your information. She can be reached at 267-255-2639 (call or text) or carolynmcgill@comcast.net. Each meeting has been provided with a current list of available speakers. Please do not call Carolyn to find a speaker.

Check out the logo for this year’s World Service BusinessConference to be held May 6 – 11 in Albuquerque.

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Spring breathes new life into the world around us. Spring is life reborn, so too can our lives be new in recovery.

Latest from the World Service Organization (WSO) link

OA has released or revised more than twenty pieces of literature in the past three years, including three new books: The Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions of Overeaters Anonymous, Second Edition; The Twelve Step Workbook of Overeaters Anonymous, Second Edition; and Twelve Step Workshop and Study Guide. It’s been an incredibly productive period, yet there is still more work to do, for example, making large print versions available and updating existing literature with the new language that reflects our current group conscience. Plus, there’s more literature already in the development pipeline! As a result, the Executive Committee of the OA Board of Trustees has decided to temporarily suspend the consideration and development of new proposals for Conference-approved literature from WSBC 2019 through WSBC 2021 or until the Board and WSO determine it is feasible to begin work on new literature.
SHOP LITERATURE HERE

The new “Amazing Recovery: Passport to Unity” Workshop is now posted on online and is available for free download.

Find it online at What’s New (oa.org/whats-new), at oa.org/documents; “Workshops and Skits,” or under Groups/Service Bodies on the Workshop Formats page under Resources. There are six files to download.

The revised and redesigned New Prospect Card is now available in the OA bookstore.

Here is the direct link: http://bookstore.oa.org/pc_product_detail.asp?key=0B62ED3971ED4216B1DE486D99729F58

Use the New Prospect Card to Invite Potential Members to OA!
Reach out with OA’s redesigned New Prospect Card. The business-size card has OA’s web address, includes space for local meeting information, and carries the message: “OA. It Works!” Look for the New Prospect Card (#450K), available in packs of 30, in the OA bookstore.

http://www.oalifeline.org
Consider subscribing to Lifeline.
Many wonderful stories sharing experience, strength, and hope.

Free!

New! Twelve Step Within: Fun and Fellowship
What does it mean to live happy, joyous, and free? Enhance your recovery and encourage membership retention by using this Fun and Fellowship download, created by the Twelve Step Within Committee.
Here is the direct link: https://oa.org/files/pdf/Fun-and-Fellowship.pdf

"A Step Ahead"

Latest World Service "A Step Ahead" Newsletter here

Philadelphia Intergroup Newsletter Aware

From PAIG:

“How I plan to do service in 2019?” is a great topic for a meeting!

OA Preamble

Overeaters Anonymous is a Fellowship of individuals who, through shared experience, strength, and hope, are recovering from compulsive overeating.
We welcome everyone who wants to stop eating compulsively. There are no dues or fees for members; we are self-supporting through our own contributions, neither soliciting nor accepting outside donations. OA is not affiliated with any public or private organization, political movement, ideology, or religious doctrine; we take no position on outside issues.
Our primary purpose is to abstain from compulsive eating and compulsive food behaviors and to carry the message of recovery through the Twelve Steps of OA to those who still suffer.

Service

Any form of service — no matter how small — that helps reach a fellow sufferer adds to the quality of our own recovery. The Tools of Recovery

This is the Recovery newsletter of the Brandywine Intergroup (BIG) of Overeaters Anonymous. Use of any content specific to BIG is prohibited without permission.

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Brandywine Intergroup of Overeaters Anonymous · PO Box 605 · Bryn Mawr, PA 19010-0605 · USA

Recovery Brandywine Intergroup Newsletter May-June 2019