Welcome to Narcotics Anonymous of NJ. Our Message Is…
That an addict, any addict can stop using drugs,
lose the desire to use, and find a new way to live.
Helpline
If you feel you have a problem with drugs, call our helpline
Events
See upcoming NA events and activities in NJ
Narcotics Anonymous is a nonprofit fellowship or society of men and women for whom drugs had become a major problem. We are recovering addicts who meet regularly to help each other stay clean.
– Narcotics Anonymous Basic Text, page 9
Recovery from addiction is possible and available through the 12 Steps and 12 Traditions of Narcotics Anonymous.
Narcotics Anonymous is FREEDOM from active addiction.
Narcotics Anonymous is an international, community-based association of recovering drug addicts with over 61,000 weekly meetings in over 131 countries worldwide.
Just for Today
The NA program has given us more freedom than we ever dreamed possible. Sometimes, though, in the daily routine, we lose track of how much we've been given. How, exactly, have our lives changed in Narcotics Anonymous?
The bottom line of recovery, of course, is freedom from the compulsion to use. No longer must we devote all our resources to feeding our addiction. No longer must we endanger, humiliate, or abuse ourselves or others just to get the next "fix." Abstinence itself has brought great freedom to our lives.
Narcotics Anonymous has given us much more than simple abstinence--we've been given a whole new life. We've taken our inventory and have identified the defects of character that bound us for so long, keeping us from living and enjoying life. We've surrendered those shortcomings, taken responsibility for them, and sought the direction and power we need to live differently. Our home group has given us the personal warmth and support that helps us continue living in recovery. And topping all this off, we have the love, care, and guidance of the God we've come to understand in NA.
In the course of day-to-day recovery, we sometimes forget how much our lives have changed in Narcotics Anonymous. Do we fully appreciate what our program has given us?
A Spiritual Principal a Day
As we begin to work on the Fourth Step for the first time, it's highly likely we already have an opinion about it. Chances are that it's not very positive. Most of the words of this Step are daunting in their own right. Searching. Fearless. Moral. Inventory. Ourselves. That last one is the core of it. We will be getting to know ourselves honestly, something that most of us have had limited experience doing prior to getting clean. Isn't that who we ran from for so long?
By the time we get to Step Four, we're already practicing some self-honesty. We've admitted that we are powerless over our addiction and that we need help. The next step is to learn what we're holding on to that is keeping us from progressing in our lives. We identify our resentments toward other people, institutions, and ourselves. We look at our guilt and shame, our fears, our sexual and relationship behaviors, abuses we've suffered and wrought upon others, and our secrets.
Working Step Four also provides another, perhaps unexpected, gift--revealing our assets. For many of us, this is the most difficult part. We tend to be far more comfortable obsessing about what's wrong with us than owning our positive qualities. But our inventory is inclusive of our whole selves. Assessing our assets is absolutely critical to our new way of life. We need to know what we have that we want more of, not just the negative aspects we want to rid ourselves of.
Our honest and courageous self-assessment doesn't end with Step Four, or with Step Ten that helps us to make this process a consistent practice. Beyond what happened during our using days, we continue to look at the patterns and behaviors that follow us into recovery. We learn to differentiate what's really true about us now from what our head tells us. Through this work, we develop trust in ourselves and in this new way of life. Our pasts instruct us; they do not define us, and they no longer control us.
