Alano.ONLINE - Your 12-step group's affordable online clubhouse!

About 12-steps

Alcoholics Anonymous

In Ohio in the 1930's, Bill W. and Dr. Bob found that they could not relieve their alcoholism through any human power, but only by taking spiritual account of their lives with the guidance of a higher power of their own understanding. They founded Alcoholics Anonymous (A.A.) on the basis of 12 simple but difficult steps:

1. We admitted we were powerless over alcohol—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 Him.
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 Him 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 Him, praying only for knowledge of His 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 alcoholics, and to practice these principles in all our affairs.

A.A. works for atheists and agnostics too. As they say, "It doesn't matter if you believe in God, or you don't believe in God, as long as you admit that you are not God." Each person develops their own beliefs about a higher power working in their lives.

Autonomous meetings

Bill W. and Dr. Bob found that 12 Traditions accepted by the independent, autonomous meetings of A.A. were sufficient to guide the administration of the groups without placing any person or organization in charge.

That's something that a lot of people find to be a foreign concept. No one is in charge? How does that work? Meetings are independent gatherings of people, freely associated, who make decisions for their groups democratically, and rotate their leadership frequently. Local service centers and the central office that publishes literature are separate legal entities (nonprofit corporations), with skilled workers, but they are accountable to the people they serve. Meeting attendees have no legal or financial relationship with them.

"Most effective path to alcohol abstinence"

A Stanford Medicine meta-analysis study published in the Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews in 2020 found that Alcoholics Anonymous (A.A.) and similar 12-step programs are highly effective in treating alcohol use disorder. The meta-analysis reviewed 35 studies involving over 10,000 participants and concluded that A.A. was often more effective than other treatments, including psychotherapy, for achieving and maintaining sobriety over long periods. Participants in A.A. had significantly better abstinence rates, with some studies showing up to 60% better outcomes compared to other treatments. (Stanford Medicine)

"Reduced mental health costs by $10,000 per person."

The meta-study highlighted that A.A.’s success stems largely from its social interaction model, where members support each other emotionally and practically in their efforts to stay sober. It also found that A.A. participation can lead to significant cost savings in healthcare, further reinforcing its value as a treatment option for alcohol use disorder. These findings have helped solidify A.A.'s position as a legitimate and effective treatment method alongside traditional medical and therapeutic interventions.

Other 12-step programs

When Bill W.'s wife Lois and the other wives of early A.A. members discovered that they were losing their own sanity "because" of their spouses' uncontrolled drinking and behavior, they founded Al-Anon, for family and friends of Alcoholics to get support. Al-Anon practices the same 12 steps to make their own lives more sane, regardless of whether their family members continue to drink or not.

In the following 90 years since the founding of A.A., many other programs have been founded to deal with other issues like gambling, debting, co-dependence, sexual compulsion, and other chemical addictions like cocaine and narcotics. See our resources list.

Alano Clubs

Just like service centers, physical Alano Clubs are separate nonprofit entities, usually run by A.A. people, but distinct from the meetings they serve and from the organizations that serve the program itself. Alano Clubs are clubhouses with meeting rooms for A.A. and other 12-step meetings.

About Alano.ONLINE

Founded to lower costs for online 12-step meetings

Dues-paying members of Alano.ONLINE share our business Zoom account. Instead of a meeting paying seperately for Zoom accounts, or becoming dependent on an individual's personal zoom account, a member of Alano.ONLINE gets a video meeting for a much lower cost to study 12-step programs. They can also pass the meeting to the care of another member, without having to change the link for the meeting, which is published in directories.

Alano.ONLINE is a §501(c)(3) nonprofit charity corporation

Alano Dot Online is an independent entity, just like physical Alano Clubs. It is not affiliated with Alcoholics Anonymous, any other 12-step service corporation, any other Alano Club, any recovery center, any mental health program, any substance abuse program, Zoom Video Communications, Inc., nor any other organization.

Alano Dot Online claims no endorsement by any other organzation. Our sole mission is to provide lower-cost videoconferencing to our members to host informal, autonomous, ad-hoc meetings that study and practice the 12 steps of recovery, in any recovery program that follows steps, traditions, and concepts of service substantially similar to Alcoholics Anonymous.

Directors

Executive Director and Founder

Hi, I'm Mark H. from Oregon. I'm grateful to find a way to apply my technical background in service to fellow travelers on the road to recovery. I thank my higher power daily for nine years of freedom.

After paying Zoom expenses from membership dues, and reimbursing business registration costs, the nonprofit will pay me "resonable salary" for administrative and technical work, clocked in 15-minute increments, if funds are available. For now, I volunteer until there is enough to cover ongoing expenses and then pay me back for incorporation costs.

Director

Volunteer director #1. (Statement TBD.)

Seeking Volunteer Director

Transparency and Accountability

We are committed to transparency and accountability. Donors may review accounting information on request.

Volunteer directors will always have full transparency and access to all financial information.

Members have full access to accounting information in the account dashboard.

Accessibility

We have endeavored to make this website accessible to people with vision challenges. Please let us know if we can make any improvements.

Web Site

Web site design, database and systems engineering by Stellarator Game Development.

© 2024 Alano Dot Online, a §501(c)(3) non-profit company.

Contact: alano.online@outlook.com