Origin - reportedly written by a lady in either the New Jersey, PA or Portland, Maine area - perhaps with the nickname DD.

Email received in this regard - 9/27/02 :

The author was introduced to recovery in Cherry Hill, NJ;
has a sister in Portland, ME;  and now lives in Orlando, FL.
She would also prefer authorship of this piece read anonymous.

Twelve Qualities of Sponsorship

1.   I will not help you to stay and wallow in limbo.

2.   I will help you to grow, to become more productive, by your definition.

3.   I will help you become more autonomous, more loving of yourself, more excited, less sensitive, more free to become the authority for your own living.

4.   I can not give you dreams or "fix you up" simply because I can not.

5.   I can not give you growth, or grow for you.  You must grow for yourself by facing reality, grim as it may be at times.

6.   I can not take away your loneliness or your pain.

7.   I can not sense your world for you, evaluate your goals for you, tell you what is best for your world;  because you have your own world in which you must live.

8.   I can not convince you of the necessity to make the vital decision of choosing the frightening uncertainty of growing over the safe misery of remaining static.

9.   I want to be with you and know you as a rich and growing friend;  yet I can not get close to you when you choose not to grow.

10.  When I begin to care for you out of pity or when I begin to lose faith in you, then I am inhibiting both for you and for me.

11.   You must know and understand my help is conditional.  I will be with you and "hang in there" with you so long as I continue to get even the slightest hint that you are still trying to grow.

12.   If you can accept this, then perhaps we can help each other to become what God meant us to be, mature adults, leaving childishness forever to the little children of the world.