"I always have a chance"
For the 4th time the inhabitants of the commune participated in the Nationwide Meetings of Soberiety in Lichen. 21 meeting were held in this year under the slogan ‘I always have a chance’. On 27th July very morning seventy people started their trip to reach the target at 9 o’clock in the Lichen.
This year we invited the whole families and supporters of the movement to attend. The participants of the trip could be anyone who meets in his life with the problem of different types of addiction whether thought personal experience or in their area but also through the work. Each meeting in Lichen carries baggage of knowledge, new information and rich experience and profound truths of live of the man and his capabilities.
Many of these information cannot be read in any publications because information can be transmitted only through individual contact with another man where happens one unique act of meeting on the basis of the authentic truth of conscious suffering and consent to the change.
In 2012 appeared support groups for anonymous gamblers, this year offered support for people who had undergone treatment or antidepressant therapy but need strengthening to not repeat that treatment again. One of the most important topics discussed at the meeting was also a trafficking problem which affects those who are seeking work outside Poland borders. Unfortunately life carries still new challenges and as experience has shown, self-help groups are extremely effective drug in refraining from addictions and recovery from social difficulties.
First meeting took place in 1993 and about 300 people attended it. Its initiators were: Intergroup AA ‘Unity’ from Konin, priest Stanisław Kowalski from Koło and Sobriety Apostolate from Lichen.
From year to year Lichen Sobriety Meetings’ became more and more popular. Meetings accumulated more and more numerous numbers of representatives of sobriety from country and abroad. In the X Jubilee in the meeting there were 15 thousand participants.
Anonymous alcohols, drug addicts, smokers, gamblers, erotomaniacs, gluttons, their relatives and friends. These people come to Lichen every year to give a certificate they can overcome addiction and support and motivate to fight. Among these people there are also thousands of others who are just looking for motivation, they want to see for themselves that life without alcohol, drugs or binge eating is possible. They all have one goal – overcome addiction.
Sober life is a gift from God so we have to care about it and respect what we have. I used to not believe that I can give up drinking. And what was my motivation? I met a man who told me he had not dunk 7 years. I began to envy him and I thought that if he had done it then I could also try. And in pursuit of this man I have not drunk since 22 year – said Zbyszek from Cieszanow. Because of alcohol I fell to the bottom. In the apartment I had worse than in the barn. Through therapy I realized that I was alcoholic and I felt my helplessness. Today I work in AA groups and make up for lost time. I am pleased with the small things, I respect what I have and I ask God every day about surviving the next 24 hours sober – says Jerzy who drank for 30 years. Meeting are the hope for addicted. They show that alcoholic is not alone, that can rely on somebody, that there are many people who have similar problems and who succeeded. Alcoholism can be stopped.
I know many people who did it, you just need to decide that you want to do something about it. You have to believe, trust and work hard and then alcoholism stops and as a matter of no way to distinguish between a man who i san alcoholic and that who is not. Although I will always recognize the recovering alcoholic because he is richer internally not from alcoholics (…) because of the reason that alcoholism has caused many bad, nasty stuff, a lot of downs – the man was forced to think about changing the quality of life, thinking, feeling, relationships with others and that why it so cool – says Dr. Bohdan Woronowicz.
Today – from a few years – the main organized of the meeting under the Stars is Family Assistance Centre and People Addicted in Lichen.
The centre was established on the basis of two ministries – the Sobriety Apostolate and Wellness Family Clinic. It was opened in 2000 as a gift for Pope John Paul II. During the visit of the Holy Father in Sanctuary on 6-8 July 1999 was lodged at the hands of the Pope’s design of the centre and the order of implementation as a votive offering of the Congregation of Marian Fathers. The Holy Father received the promise from the Marians that there would be opened clinic which would take care of ‘new poor’ in the modern Church and the world = addicts and their families.
Meetings are held every year on the last week of July.
Its permanent parts are: Masses, confessions, Way of the Cross, individual meetings with psychologists, therapists, volunteers, family counsellors, lectures, meetings. This year in individual talks took part sixty psychologists working volunteerism, many involved alcoholics take leaves to send time on organizing meetings of sobriety because they see point and build chance for other from that they once benefited. Very often they say about themselves that they need to live a support group and the presence of other alcoholics who want help to have the strength to own sobriety from minute to minute, hour to hour and for every sober day to thank God.
The annual trips to Lichen organizes Consultation and Information for Addicted People and Co-addicted at the Local Social Welfare Centre in Kowala the implementation of activities in the Commune Programme for the Prevention and Counteracting Alcoholism in 2011 – 2013.
