Good for you! Our primary purpose is to carry the message, and the doors must be open to do so.
My HG recently changed seating arrangements from seat at three different angles, and speaker/leader behind a desk..to a circle, with no desk. I think it's a better atmosphere for sharing. The format should always be open to change, based on whether we are carrying the message. Did a format stop working, get old, or may be improved, then change it! You can always change it back....
As for personalities, we have 34 different meetings in our county. It is a little much imo. People break off when they don't like somebody, or just want something new. It's common to hear groups asking for experienced HG members at Area. My group meets in aclub house that's been having meetings for more then 20 years. If we moved, people would still come to the old place!
-- Edited by Davethewave on Wednesday 26th of December 2012 06:06:15 PM
Hi All~! Sorry it's been so long since I've posted regularly. Six years ago a friend and myself started a meeting in our hometown. It's still open today (thankfully, cuz I'd went back out for awhile there, luckily there were other HG members that stayed committed while I was out)...
while on hiatus, a few strong personalities took over the group. Well for the past six months my hubby & I have attended it pretty much each week. We had refused to make it our homegroup due to the conflict of personalities - not that we argue with this person (only one is left today)...it's a matter of that person thinking (s)he is the great guru because of the decades of clean time (s)he has accumulated. We were told the mtg may end up closing now that they (the 2 that were left) are leaving. We were told at the last group conscious that by the end of this month these two people would be DONE with our meeting. ((HALLELUEAH!!)).
So now hubby & I and the remaining HG member who is a really nice guy,he just has hardly any service experience, are changing things up a bit (cuz the mtg format was boring, mis-spelled, and an every week reminder of the self-will run amok...we are all having a lot of fun with it now! We have only had one meeting and one grp cons w/out the others but so far so good! They dropped it, so we three are picking it up!
So Dec 4th of this year was the meeting's 6th Year Anniversary...which was forgotten about cuz they didn't care or cuz they were leaving and figured the mtg would crumble...
Well, we are having a belated Anniversary party at the end of January. It'll be a 3 hour function with a free meal. We don't want to do a speaker or a panel of speakers...any ideas of fun meetings you've attended that we may be able to incorporate into our anniversary?
I thought maybe we could do a certain time with open podium, can discuss whatever is on your mind (or we can give topics), but that's all we've figured out so far is no speakers and maybe podium...LOL...this Sunday is group conscious so if you have any ideas let me know~!
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"We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars." ~Oscar Wilde~
Kudo's to you for keeping the door open. I don't really understand the difference between a "podium" meeting and a speaker meeting. I think the important thing is that you are having fun while being in service. After that everything is gravy.
What we mean by podium meeting...I've seen it done only a couple times before at Thanksgiving...the meeting didn't have a speaker, but the topic was Gratitude and you could just step up to the podium and share your ES&H on gratitude in front of the group...many people had the chance to stand up in front of the group and share. Also, if time allowed you could go back up if you wanted to.
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"We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars." ~Oscar Wilde~
Our group has decided to do a type of Ask It Basket for the Anniversary party. We are going to give all addicts in attendance a number, then randomly draw numbers to share on either a topic of their own, or they draw a topic out of the basket.
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"We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars." ~Oscar Wilde~
