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
There were probably hundreds of times in our active addiction when we wished we could become someone else. We may have wished we could trade places with someone who owned a nice car or had a larger home, a better job, a more attractive mate--anything but what we had. So severe was our despair that we could hardly imagine anyone being in worse shape than ourselves.
In recovery, we may find we are experiencing a different sort of envy. We may continue to compare our insides with others' outsides and feel as though we still don't have enough of anything. We may think everyone, from the newest member to the oldest oldtimer, sounds better at meetings than we do. We may think that everyone else must be working a better program because they have a better car, a larger home, more money, and so on.
The recovery process experienced through our Twelve Steps will take us from an attitude of envy and low self-esteem to a place of spiritual fulfillment and deep appreciation for what we do have. We find that we would never willingly trade places with another, for what we have discovered within ourselves is priceless.
A Spiritual Principal a Day
Being clean doesn't give us immunity from life's struggles. Fortunately for us, we don't have to navigate life on our own. When we ask for support and allow people to be there for us, we access perhaps the Fellowship's greatest resource: each other. If cleantime and other successes have caused us to lose touch with this asset, life's difficulties can provide a gentle nudge in its direction. When we summon the courage to reach out for support, our NA communities respond with empathy. It helps to have someone to lean on, to sit with us as we sit with our feelings, to cheer us on as we put one foot in front of the other, and to empathize as we heal, regroup, and start again.
Our fellow members understand our urge to run away or to find some temporary relief in food, sex, or spending. We can identify with that impulse to shut down or be massively controlling or lean into other character defects to manage our troubles and feelings. We empathize because we've been there emotionally--or at least in the neighborhood. We can connect deeply and share the burden of each other's sorrows and emotional pain. Even if we don't have direct experience with a specific way in which life has shown up for a fellow member, we're all capable of listening, bringing a hot dish, or taking the kids out for ice cream. Sometimes, a reminder that there will be sunshine after the rain helps us get through the day.
When we share with an addict in pain, we're able to get outside ourselves. The empathy we experience creates identification, gratitude, and perspective. "The therapeutic value of one addict helping another" is beneficial to both the helper and the helped--we know this because we've been both. One member's comment to another captures this dynamic: "Someone told me that my struggle would give me the strength I'd be needing down the line. That strength was for you, and when my experience helped you, I got to heal on a whole new level. Your call for help was a real mitzvah."
