Tim Leighton, formerly of Action on Addiction, is someone I’ve always held in the highest regard ever since we first met at Clouds House back in 2004. He has been a power house as a practitioner, educator and consultant. In the interview below, Tim talks to Wulf about his earlier heroin using days, his decision to attend a clinic which helped him on his road to recovery, and the years he was actively engaged with Narcotics Anonymous (NA) in London.
Enjoying Life in NA [5’41]
Tim fell into drug use in his teens and drugs progressively became more central to his life. However, he led a double life, as even up to the end of his using he was still functioning to some extent—for example, he was attending university. He suspects that his using was about him feeling very lost in the world. He doesn’t think he suffered trauma or anything like that, but he didn’t have a purchase on life. He didn’t know what to do with his life. After eight years of injecting heroin, Tim decided he needed to get help. He went off to a clinic.
Tim was now very lucky. In the early 1980s, many clinics that ran the Minnesota Model were very confrontative and dogmatic. If he had gone to one of those, he is sure would have been out the door in a couple of days. His clinic was humanistic and client-entered. They introduced him to Narcotics Anonymous (NA), and again he was really lucky. His group was very tolerant and pluralistic.
That sort of pluralism is not there in all 12-Step groups—they are often very rigid. That works for a lot of people, but not for Tim. Today, Tim is respectful of people who like a rigorous and structured 12-Step approach, but that doesn’t work for everyone. He advises people to try a range of meetings before making up their minds about the 12-Step approach.
Tim had no paid work at this time. He lived in London for two years where NA was his job. He was fully committed to NA and loved it. There was lots to do, as they organised conventions and parties and things like that. He still didn’t know what he wanted to do with his life.