August 27
Holding the Keys
Being given the keys to the meeting room is a practical arrangement. Someone needs to open up. Yet a responsibility can acquire a little extra meaning in our minds. We start deciding who belongs in the kitchen, how the chairs must stand, and whose suggestions deserve attention. Without any election or discussion, opening the door has become a claim to owning what happens inside.
Tradition Two describes service in terms of work that helps a group function. That is a useful place to return when a position begins making us feel unusually important. Our responsibility may require real decisions, and the group deserves someone willing to make them. It does not give us a larger share of membership than anyone else. The keys are entrusted to us for a purpose. Other members remain free to ask how that purpose is being served.
What extra privileges have I quietly attached to a responsibility I accepted?
The keys still belong to the group.
For the A.A. nerds: Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions, Tradition Two, pp. 133–135.