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AWG Secular 12 Step Self-Esteem Group 🚀


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Zoom access and meeting times Meeting description Workbook Readings
Zoom access and meeting times

Meetings are every Tuesday from 11 am to 12 pm Eastern US Time. See Meeting Time in a Different Time Zone (normal calendar)


* Zoom link not working? Search the meeting ID below in the Zoom meeting database and then use the code to sign in: 

Meeting ID: 824 1142 4876
Code: 781927


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Meeting description

This is a secular 12 Step meeting focused on self-esteem recovery for late-identified autistic women and members of all other marginalized genders (nonbinary, gender fluid, MTF/FTM trans, agender, autigender, and more). 

We meet each Tuesday on Zoom, practice the AWG 12 Steps using the AWG 12 Step Workbook, share in response to weekly readings, and participate in the optional co-mentorship program if we so desire. 

It is not mandatory to turn on your mic or camera. Coming to listen is totally fine. By taking part, we hold space for others, and ourselves, to participate in a way that is manageable for us as we exist right now.

It is not necessary to actively be doing the AWG 12 Steps in order to be a full participant. Any contact with the group and its resources can be beneficial as long as it’s sustainable for each of us as individuals. Many of us participate simply by attending meetings.

As we participate in this meeting over time, we might find ourselves seeking to…

  • Find our own concept of self-esteem and grow toward it
  • Come to discover a more realistic sense of our place in the world
  • Reassess our relationships, especially in terms of our responsibilities towards ourselves and others
  • Come to understand personal boundaries, their roles in our lives, and how to develop and maintain healthy boundaries
  • Understand the concept of nonviolent detachment and how and when to enact it
  • Develop more manageable lifestyles
  • Develop a sense of self that leads to more health, well being, and manageability in our lives
  • Release others from the responsibility of defining or reinforcing our sense of self-esteem
  • Form personal goals about self-esteem and self-concept based on our own understanding of our own needs, as they exist today

AWG 12 Step Self-Esteem Readings

Intrinsic human value and self-esteem

Tuesday, November 10, 2026

If I have fundamental worth, where does it stem from?

After several months of working the AWG Steps, I think I'm discovering a fundamental difficulty I have on self-esteem: the concept of intrinsic human value.

Specifically, I'm having trouble believing that I have intrinsic human value, because I'm not sure I believe in the concept.

If all humans have a value that's intrinsic, beyond their performance or the value that they bring to the community, what does that value stem from?

Some of my questions about intrinsic human value are logistical. If I have fundamental worth, is it limited to the moral right to exist? To pursue happiness or comfort? That people will not be mean to me? That I will have enough to eat and drink? That I will have a place to live? Looking around me, I see few guarantees that intrinsic human value entitles anyone to any of these things.

I might have an easier time accepting the idea that I have intrinsic human value if I saw the concept more respected and celebrated in the world around me. Where is the evidence that all humans have a fundamental worth?

At the same time, if I've learned anything from being late identified and watching our community grow, it's that I can benefit from trying to embody the values I want to see around me. Could foregrounding intrinsic human value in my mind and life make it easier for me to believe that I, too, deserve certain things? And to find out what those things are?

I'm still not sure whether the idea of intrinsic human value is necessary for me to have healthy self-esteem. But if not, then what can I base my self-esteem on?

How about you? What is your relationship with the concept of intrinsic human value? Does it influence your perceptions of your own self-esteem and self-image?

Share questions:

  • Do you believe in intrinsic human value? Why or why not? 
  • Do you think believing in intrinsic human value is necessary to having healthy self-esteem? Why or why not? 
  • Do your autistic traits play a part in how you feel about the concept of intrinsic human value? Black and white thinking, perfectionism, justice sensitivity, demand avoidance, aversion to hierarchies, other? 
  • If intrinsic human value is real, what benefits should it confer on every person? Moral benefits? Physical/material benefits? Other?
  • Where do you see the concept of intrinsic human value around you in the world today? 
  • Any tools, resources, or strategies to share? 
  • Anything else to add?
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AWG 12 Step Self-Esteem Workbook

Step 1

We admitted that despite our efforts, many of the factors affecting our sense of self and self-esteem seemed out of control, leading to increased unmanageability in our lives.

Step 2

Coming Soon

Step 3

Coming Soon

Step 4

Coming Soon
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