The Fellowship Creates Gratitude Month
“Gratitude should go forward, rather than backward,” wrote Bill W. in a 1959 letter. “In other words, if you carry the message to others, you will be making the best possible repayment for the help given you.”
For many A.A.s, these words, especially when combined with the quote referenced throughout the Big Book that “Faith without works is dead,” serve as a sure-fire
recipe for love and service.
Gratitude is an integral part of sobriety—both on an individual and a group level—and for over 50 years the Fellowship has officially focused on gratitude in the month of November. This began in 1956 when the Sixth General Service Conference approved a motion asking the
General Service Office to designate Thanksgiving Week each year as “A.A. Gratitude Week.”
Grateful for the sobriety they’ve been given and eager to pass it on, countless A.A. groups use the month of November to open the door of gratitude ever wider. Many groups hold Traditions meetings or topic meetings focused on gratitude. Many hold Gratitude Dinners, combining home cooked meals with A.A. speaker meetings and fellowship, renting halls, selling tickets for the meal, and sending any proceeds raised to the General Service Office or their local intergroup/central office. On a personal level, many A.A. members are busier than ever,
reaching out to Loners, people with special needs, members of minority groups and previously unreached alcoholics, finding their own special ways to say thank you during Gratitude Month and, indeed, all year long.
Some groups like to take time in November to focus on A.A. history and remembering the vital strands of spiritual influence, information and help that A.A.’s nonalcoholic friends brought to the Fellowship in its early years—help and influence that they continue to provide today. By holding Big Book meetings and meetings centered on A.A. history, or having a group video night showing “Markings On the Journey,” A.A.’s critical legacy of service can be
nurtured and expanded, giving newcomers a sense of connection to the Fellowship’s illustrious past.
A couple of Canadian members recently came up with an innovative way to celebrate Gratitude Month (which is October in Canada), suggesting contributing the price of a
bottle of beer for each year of their sobriety in order to buy subscriptions to the Grapevine for local institutions. “Many members thought it was a good idea,” wrote Jack S. of
Sault Ste. Marie, “because when they were incarcerated the Grapevines they received helped to keep them sober.”
At least twenty members, from two months to fortythree years sober, donated money toward this goal and Jack was happy to report “we collected enough money for ten three-year subscriptions to the local institutions in Ontario, Canada.”
Gratitude can be expressed through actions big and small, and some A.A.s find November to be a good time simply to invite a sponsor or sponsee to lunch, or to reach out to oldtimers and out-of-towners who show up at their home group meetings. As noted in the essay on Step Twelve in
Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions, “We sit in A.A. meetings and listen, not only to receive something ourselves, but to give the reassurance and support which our presence can bring. If our turn comes to speak at a meeting, we again try to carry A.A.’s message. Whether our audience is one or many, it is still Twelfth Step work.”
Gratitude. It serves us best when it’s kept alive, in our individual lives and in our group conscience. A.A. is a program of action and while gratitude can’t possibly be confined to a single week, a particular month, or even a given year, a special investment of gratitude during November will often bring a full return.
“I try to hold fast to the truth that a full and thankful heart cannot entertain great conceits,” wrote Bill W. in a March 1962 Grapevine article. “When brimming with gratitude, one’s heartbeat must surely result in outgoing love, the finest emotion that we can ever know.”
