Welcome to Narcotics Anonymous

What is our message? The message is that an addict, any addict, can stop using drugs, lose the desire to use, and find a new way to live. Our message is hope and the promise of freedom.

PSA Overlay

“When new members come to meetings, our sole interest is in their desire for freedom from active addiction and how we can be of help.”

It Works: How and Why, “Third Tradition”

Is NA for me?

This is a question every potential member must answer for themselves. Here are some recommended resources that may be helpful:

Need help for family or a friend?

NA meetings are run by and for addicts. If you’re looking for help for a loved one, you can contact Narcotics Anonymous near you. 

Never before have so many clean addicts, of their own choice and in free society, been able to meet where they please, to maintain their recovery in complete creative freedom.

Basic Text, “We Do Recover”

Narcotics Anonymous sprang from the Alcoholics Anonymous Program of the late 1940s, with meetings first emerging in the Los Angeles area of California, USA, in the early Fifties. The NA program started as a small US movement that has grown into one of the world’s oldest and largest organizations of its type.

Today, Narcotics Anonymous is well established throughout much of the Americas, Western Europe, Australia, and New Zealand. Newly formed groups and NA communities are now scattered throughout the Indian subcontinent, Africa, East Asia, the Middle East, and Eastern Europe. Narcotics Anonymous books and information pamphlets are currently available in 49 languages.

Daily Meditations

Just for Today

August 09, 2026

The Power of love

Page 231

We begin to see that God’s love has been present all the time, just waiting for us to accept it.

Basic Text, p. 47

God’s love is the transforming power that drives our recovery. With that love, we find freedom from the hopeless, desperate cycle of using, self-hatred, and more using. With that love, we gain a sense of reason and purpose in our once purposeless lives. With that love, we are given the inner direction and strength we need to begin a new way of life: the NA way. With that love, we begin to see things differently, as if with new eyes.

As we examine our lives through the eyes of love, we make what may be a startling discovery: The loving God we’ve so recently come to understand has always been with us and has always loved us. We recall the times when we asked for the aid of a Higher Power and were given it. We even recall times when we didn’t ask for such help, yet were given it anyway. We realize that a loving Higher Power has cared for us all along, preserving our lives till the day when we could accept that love for ourselves.

The Power of love has been with us all along. Today, we are grateful to have survived long enough to become consciously aware of that love’s presence in our world and our lives. Its vitality floods our very being, guiding our recovery and showing us how to live.

Just for Today: I accept the love of a Higher Power in my life. I am conscious of that Power’s guidance and strength within me. Today, I claim it for my own.

A Spiritual Principle a Day

August 09, 2026

Practicing Tolerance and Self-Acceptance

Page 229

As we learn to gently accept ourselves, we can start to view others with the same accepting and tolerant heart.

Just for Today, “Expectations,” July 29

Working an NA program uncovers a considerable need for self-acceptance, and slowly we proceed on that journey. Our work also reveals that the people who get under our skin the most are among our greatest teachers. Just like us, they deserve our acceptance and empathy. There’s a reciprocal relationship between self-acceptance and tolerating others who bug us. We learn this from the harsh truth that we often share some very similar traits with those very same people. As we extend grace and dignity to other flawed people in our lives, we often find it easier to treat our less-than-perfect selves with the same compassion.

But then how is tolerance a spiritual principle? Shouldn’t we just be unconditionally loving and accepting of everyone? “Earlier in my recovery,” a member remarked, “I rejected tolerance as a spiritual principle because when I practiced it toward the person who was driving me nuts, there was nothing spiritual going on in my head. I wanted to go right to acceptance . . . or scratch their eyes out. But now I see it as an act of love.”

“Tolerance, in my mind,” another member responded, “is like a gateway spiritual principle. It’s a layover on a multistop flight on the way to your final destination: acceptance.”

“Or it’s an appetizer principle,” a third member joked. “You have it first, to tide you over before the empathy entree. And maybe unconditional love is dessert.”

No matter how we slice it, tolerance helps us combat unrealistic expectations we place on others’ behavior and our own spiritual condition. Whether we practice it with an open heart or through gritted teeth, it helps prevent us from acting out in fear or anger or expressing our impatience with others who may not be as far along in their journey as we believe we are.

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Today when I practice tolerance, I’ll know that it relates directly to my level of self-acceptance. I’ll try to let people be where they are and focus on what I can change about myself to invite serenity in.

Do you need help with a drug problem?

“If you’re new to NA or planning to go to a Narcotics Anonymous meeting for the first time, it might be nice to know a little bit about what happens in our meetings. The information here is meant to give you an understanding of what we do when we come together to share recovery…” 

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