Introduction to MA: A Meeting Format in a Pamphlet

What is Marijuana Anonymous?

Marijuana Anonymous is a fellowship of people who share our experience, strength, and hope with each other that we may solve our common problem and help others to recover from marijuana addiction.

The only requirement for membership is a desire to stop using marijuana. There are no dues or fees for membership. We are self-supporting through our own contributions. MA is not affiliated with any religious or secular institution or organization and has no opinion on any outside controversies or causes. Our primary purpose is to stay free of marijuana and to help the marijuana addict who still suffers achieve the same freedom. We can do this by practicing our suggested Twelve Steps of recovery and by being guided as a group by our Twelve Traditions.

Who is a Marijuana Addict?

We who are marijuana addicts know the answer to this question. Marijuana controls our lives! We lose interest in all else; our dreams go up in smoke. Ours is a progressive illness often leading us to addictions to other drugs, including alcohol. Our lives, our thinking, and our desires center around marijuana—scoring it, dealing it, and finding ways to stay high.

How does Marijuana Anonymous work?

(From the meeting format of Marijuana Anonymous)

How It Works

The practice of rigorous honesty, of opening our hearts and minds, and the willingness to go to any lengths to have a spiritual awakening are essential to our recovery.

Our old ideas and ways of life no longer work for us. Our suffering shows us that we need to let go absolutely. We surrender ourselves to a Power greater than ourselves.

Here are the Steps we take which are suggested for recovery:

1. We admitted we were powerless over marijuana, that our lives had become unmanageable.

2. Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.

3. Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God, as we understood God.

4. Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.

5. Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.

6. Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character.

7. Humbly asked God to remove our shortcomings.

8. Made a list of all persons we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all.

9. Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others.

10. Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong, promptly admitted it.

11. Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God, as we understood God, praying only for knowledge of God’s will for us and the power to carry that out.

12. Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these Steps, we tried to carry this message to marijuana addicts and to practice these principles in all our affairs.

Do not be discouraged, none of us are saints. Our program is not easy, but it is simple. We strive for progress, not perfection. Our experiences, before and after we entered recovery, teach us three important ideas:

• That we are marijuana addicts and cannot manage our own lives;

• That probably no human power can relieve our addiction; and

• That our Higher Power can and will, if sought.

The Twelve Traditions of Marijuana Anonymous

1. Our common welfare should come first; personal recovery depends upon MA unity.

2. For our group purpose there is but one ultimate authority, a loving God whose expression may come through in our group conscience. Our leaders are but trusted servants; they do not govern.

3. The only requirement for membership is a desire to stop using marijuana.

4. Each group should be autonomous except in matters affecting other groups or MA as a whole.

5. Each group has but one primary purpose, to carry its message to the marijuana addict who still suffers.

6. MA groups ought never endorse, finance, or lend the MA name to any related facility or outside enterprise, lest problems of money, property, and prestige divert us from our primary purpose.

7. Every MA group ought to be fully self-supporting, declining outside contributions.

8. Marijuana Anonymous should remain forever nonprofessional, but our service centers may employ special workers.

9. MA, as such, ought never be organized, but we may create service boards or committees directly responsible to those they serve.

10. Marijuana Anonymous has no opinion on outside issues; hence the MA name ought never be drawn into public controversy.

11. Our public relations policy is based upon attraction rather than promotion; we need always maintain personal anonymity at the level of press, radio, t.v., film, and other public media. We need guard with special care the anonymity of all fellow MA members.

12. Anonymity is the spiritual foundation of all our traditions, ever reminding us to place principles before personalities. What happens at an MA meeting? All meetings are autonomous and formats vary from meeting to meeting. Sometimes there is a speaker. Sometimes we study the Steps or other literature. Many meetings have a topic for discussion.

We have no dues or fees and are proudly self-supporting through our own contributions. It is customary to pass the basket and uphold the Seventh Tradition. Newcomers need not feel obligated to contribute, others are privileged to do so.

If you have any questions that go unanswered, please introduce yourself to someone after the meeting and exchange phone numbers. We are all here to help.

Please remember that anonymity is the foundation of this program and that whatever is said at a meeting is not to leave that meeting.

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.