Community Information Session Meeting Format
Note to the Meeting Organizers and Speakers: During this meeting, there are several places where newcomers can ask questions. Sometimes, newcomers are reluctant to ask questions before a group. If there are few questions from participants, we recommend that speakers come prepared with a few questions and can present a question this way: “I have often been asked…” and then response “In my experience….” This format is designed for four speakers. Adjust the format accordingly if you have fewer.
Moderator stands:
Welcome to this Information Session of Food Addicts in Recovery Anonymous, FA. My name is XXXX and I’ll be your leader for this meeting. We customarily begin our meetings with the Serenity Prayer. If you would like, please join us in a moment of silence and the Serenity Prayer.
God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and wisdom to know the difference.
The agenda for this meeting includes a brief introduction to FA, a panel of FA members who will share some of their story, and an opportunity to ask questions. After the meeting, we will be available for individual questions. The meeting will last until XXXX.
You may ask yourself, “What is FA?” Some of the answers to that question are found in the FA Preamble, which we read at every meeting:
Food Addicts in Recovery Anonymous, or FA, as we are informally called, is a fellowship of individuals who, through shared experience and mutual support, are recovering from addictive eating.
We welcome all who want to stop abusing themselves with food. There are no dues or fees for members; we are self-supporting through our own contributions, neither soliciting nor accepting outside donations. FA 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 addictive eating and to carry this message of recovery to those who still suffer.
Through years of experience, we have developed a definition of food addiction.
Food addiction is a disease of the mind, body, and spirit for which there is no cure; but it can be arrested a day at a time, by our adapting to a disciplined way of eating and using the Twelve Step program of Food Addicts in Recovery Anonymous. When we abuse food by using it as a drug, our lives become unmanageable. Food addicts have an allergy to flour, sugar, and quantities, that sets up an uncontrollable craving. The problem can be arrested a day at a time by weighing and measuring our food and abstaining completely from all flour and sugar.
This disciplined way of eating, which we call abstinence, consists of weighed and measured meals, eating nothing in-between our meals, no flour, no sugar, and avoidance of individual binge foods.
This way of eating has a long record of working in the lives of FA members whose food addiction can take many forms, including overeating, under-eating, obsession with weight, or trying to manage body size through purging or exercise.
But we are clear that changing the way we eat is not enough. Since this is a disease of mind, body and spirit, we need to practice the Twelve Steps as originally established in Alcoholics Anonymous and – with AA’s permission – adapted for FA. These are the Steps:
- We admitted we were powerless over food – that our lives had become unmanageable.
- Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.
- Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him.
- Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.
- Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.
- Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character.
- Humbly asked Him to remove our shortcomings.
- Made a list of all persons we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all.
- Made direct amends to such people whenever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others.
- Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong, promptly admitted it.
- Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God as we understood Him, praying only for knowledge of His will for us and the power to carry that out.
- Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message of recovery to food addicts, and to practice these principles in all our affairs.
In addition to practicing abstinence, we have a number of other tools that help us to live according to these steps. These are strategies that we build into our daily lives that ensure us consistent, contented abstinence one day at a time.
One of these practices is attending FA meetings regularly which keeps us from isolating and allows us to serve others by sharing our stories. You’ll hear some of those stories today.
The people sitting on this panel have a variety of experiences to share. Perhaps their story is not exactly your story. But some parts of their story – particularly where they hurt themselves with food – may feel very familiar.
We will pause for a few minutes after our speakers share, to describe more of the FA tools, and answer any questions about the terms our panelists have used.
I’d like to introduce our first speaker, XXXX.
The first speaker speaks.
Moderator stands:
I mentioned that we use a number of tools or practices to keep us focused on recovery instead of depending on food or weight control to get us through life. For example, in addition to the tool of Abstinence, we sit for Quiet Time each day and use the Telephone to contact other members in times of stress. Other daily tools include reading FA conference approved Literature, Writing, practicing Gratitude, and being of Service to others.
I’d like to introduce our second speaker.
The second speaker speaks.
Moderator stands:
Another tool that is important in Twelve Step groups is Anonymity. Anonymity means that whomever we see at a meeting and whatever we hear at a meeting is not discussed with anyone else. If I see you on the street, I will not mention seeing you at an FA meeting, and I expect that you will not mention my membership in FA.
Does anyone have any questions?
I’d like to introduce our third speaker, XXXX.
The third speaker speaks.
Moderator stands:
Another tool you should be aware of is Sponsorship. Sponsors use their experience in recovery to guide us through the program. Sponsoring and being sponsored help us to rely on the Steps instead of the food.
We have people available to sponsor who will identify themselves at the end of the meeting. If you want to start working the FA program today, you can talk with them after the meeting and get started.
Introduce the fourth speaker:
The fourth speaker speaks.
Moderator stands:
Does anyone have other questions?
Will all sponsors with time available, please stand and identify themselves? If you want to start FA, please talk with one of these people after the meeting.
It is helpful to know the potential of what can happen in recovery. In the AA Big Book, there is a description of this potential that we call “The Promises.”
If we are painstaking about this phase of our development, we will be amazed before we are halfway through. We are going to know a new freedom and a new happiness. We will not regret the past nor wish to shut the door on it. We will comprehend the word serenity and we will know peace. No matter how far down the scale we have gone, we will see how our experience can benefit others. That feeling of uselessness and self-pity will disappear. We will lose interest in selfish things and gain interest in our fellows. Self-seeking will slip away. Our whole attitude and outlook on life will change. Fear of people and economic insecurity will leave us. We will intuitively know how to handle situations which used to baffle us. We will suddenly realize that God is doing for us what we could not do for ourselves.
Are these extravagant promises? We think not. They are being fulfilled among us – sometimes quickly, sometimes slowly. They will always materialize if we work for them.
Thank you for coming. If you have any questions, we would be happy to talk with you after the meeting. There is literature available at the table, and we invite you to visit our website at www.foodaddicts.org.
We customarily end the meetings in the same way we began, so if you wish, please join us in a moment of silence and the Serenity Prayer.
God, grant me the Serenity to accept the things I cannot change, Courage to change the things I can, and the Wisdom to know the difference.
Revised 2021 0822