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Source: Beth K – Speaker Talk – Date Unknown.mp3 File: beth-k-speaker-talk-date-unknown.mp3 Duration: 00:31:42
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Ladies and gentlemen, the chairman wishes to express his thanks to the people in the rear of the room for keeping the din down, and we hope you'll do it for the following two speakers. My name is John, and I'm an alcoholic. And I tell you I'm an alcoholic, and not too many years ago, the sovereign state of Montana saw fit to commit me to the state hospital in Warm Springs as a chronic alcoholic. So I believe I'm qualified to be here.
This is the AA definition. Alcoholics Anonymous is a fellowship of men and women who share their experience, strength, and hope with each other that they may solve their common problem and help others to recover from alcoholism. The only requirement for membership is an honest desire to stop drinking. AA has no dues or fees, but we are self-supporting through our own contributions. AA is not allied with any sect, denomination, politics, organization, or institution, does not wish to engage in any controversy, neither endorses nor opposes any causes.
Our primary purpose is to stay sober and help other alcoholics to achieve sobriety. Now to any of you people who have corresponded with our general service office in New York, our next speaker will probably be familiar. And without anything further, Beth K. from GSO. Thank you, John. Hi, everyone. First of all, I'd like to thank Frank and the wonderful committee here who seem to be working so effortlessly.
And everything is going along so smoothly, as Nick said earlier, made everything very fine for me. The arrangements are great. I feel right at home, as I always do at an AA gathering. So thanks to all of you here in Chicago for having me. My name is Beth K.. I am an alcoholic and a member of the Manhattan Group in New York City, and also a member of your general service staff in the same city.
On my way out here, I couldn't help but feel a tremendous strength. And I know it came from my thinking about being here with a group of AAs and friends, non-alcoholics who are here. And it made me feel more grateful to be a part of this wonderful thing. I knew from my first contact with AA that there was something very wonderful and that I wanted to be a part of it. As you know, most of you know here, we have just completed a wonderful week in the city, a 16th annual meeting of the General Service Conference.
And it would be very hard for me to describe the activities that went on and the people who were there, 88 delegates, some of them are here today, some of them who have been there in the past, where they and other conference members discussed important AA matters. Later on, perhaps I'll have a chance to share with you just what we talked about. Thank God for these people who are active today and who were active long before I came around, so that there would be AA available and a group waiting to help me and save my life.
Because I feel and truly believe that I would be dead, I wouldn't be here with all of you had I not found AA. I went through a lot of wonderful people who thought enough and who stuck around, didn't give up when things were going tough and stayed there to hold out their hand for me. I would like to just go over a bit about the way I felt before I came to AA, for I'm an alcoholic who feels that I had a problem long before I took a drink.
I don't know what you'd call me, anything, I guess, neurotic perhaps. I hadn't a purpose on this earth, no aim, no philosophy. I had all the training that came along, but it was all a mechanical thing, and I did everything I was told, but it had no meaning for me.
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In fact, life did not have a meaning for me until I came into AA.
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I didn't accept things very well. I was very immature. I rebelled. My father was an alcoholic and I had no understanding. I didn't know I had, later on when I was drinking, I didn't know that I had an illness and I didn't know that he was sick. I thought he was weak. And I think the first big thing in my life that sort of, as I look back on it now, points out to me how I was unable to accept things.
I was never able to make a decision. I would drift along and go along with the crowd. I didn't know, as we learn in AA, to sit quietly and listen to this inner voice within us that helps us to make decisions. It just never occurred to me. And I think the first thing, as I said, was when I was 21, and I had a friend who thought it might be nice if we went into the service or at least found out about it. This is World War II, I'd like to add.
So I went down to New York City, I'm from a small town upstate, to find out all about the Navy. Now I wasn't going anyplace, I didn't really want to go anyplace, but by 5 o'clock that day I was sworn into the Navy. And I, from then on, I didn't accept things very well. I didn't accept this, I blamed life for this predicament I was in. And I was homesick right from the very beginning. And alcohol helped me to get through the next two years.
Another incident came along, and I can see now that this wall was beginning to build around me, where I'd let no one near me, I was very hard to reach, no one could get close to me. I'd been in the service a year and a half, and my roommate had talked to her brother, that it might be nice if we went overseas. And so I hurried and appeared before an overseas board, so that my roommate would not go without me, and within a week I was on my way to Hawaii, and again she never made it.
And I used to sit and wait for her at Pearl Harbor, crying and saying to myself, well I'll never ever get attached to anyone. You see I was always very dependent upon an individual. If it wasn't my mother, it was someone in the family. I had no dependence on a higher power, or a people like I'm feeling toward all of you here. It's a wonderful thing because you'll always be here. But it was always someone in those days who would move on, and then I would be left suspended and alone, not knowing how to cope.
I believe that when I took my first drink at 16, that I stopped growing emotionally right at that point. And so from 16 to 30, I drank for 14 years. The last five I would say very bad, but I stopped living. And so at 30 I arrived here at your doorstep with no idea at all how to live and how to cope and how to get along with myself or with anyone else. And it's sort of a sad way to be, but I don't regret it today.
I'm just grateful that I was shown the way. I knew about AA for two years before I got sober, and it's a dreadful, miserable way to drink. If any of you have done this, you know that there is an answer, and you keep on drinking, and I was filled with despair. I attended my first meeting in September of 1949, and I shall always be grateful to this employer who, out of his busy life, and because I was on the phone yelling at him drunk, which helped a little, he asked me if I would like to see someone from AA.
Now, I didn't know what Alcoholics Anonymous was. I thought, really, I believed it was probably a big building, and it was down near the Bowery someplace, and that's where all the drunks went when they were all washed up and you were taken care of down there. Someone took care of you. You see, it never occurred to me that an alcoholic could be still fairly respectable. I didn't know it was a progressive illness, and that the folks on the Bowery had once, too, started, you know, a normal life the way I had.
So I did say yes, because I was lonesome, and I was willing to talk to anyone, and this wonderful gal came over and talked to me. Now, she didn't scold me or yell at me or anything. In fact, she didn't ask me any questions at all. She just took me home with her. For two days, it was a weekend, and took me to my first AA meeting out in Little Neck, Douglaston. It's a small group out on Long Island. I heard at this meeting that I had an illness,
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that alcoholics, if they kept drinking, they lost everything. I felt that you had to have an incentive in the material way in order to do something about my problem. I could not understand what I was doing to myself at this point. But if you're an alcoholic, and I am, and you keep drinking, everything happens to you, and if you live, you find out that there's no other way, that you keep going down if you continue to drink, and that everything can happen, and it's not good.
I really didn't believe it. I really couldn't believe it. These men said at the meeting that they had lost their families and their homes, and I had never had this to lose, so I said, well, why should I bother? And I had never gotten out of the furnished room in New York, you know, so I haven't lost a home, so why should I get sober? I drank hopelessly and wishing for death throughout the whole thing.
I started this, as I remember, in my early 20s. It was sort of a sad way to be living, just to live to die, and filled with self-hate, which I was, and hated everyone else. I also heard at this meeting that alcoholics fib a little about how much they drink. They always say they only had a couple. So I decided in order for me not to be an alcoholic, I would start telling the truth. And so I lost a few jobs in the next month because employers take a dim view of your calling up and saying I'm on my way to Bellevue, which is a city hospital in New York.
Believe me, I wound up there a few times. I once heard a speaker say at a meeting, a young AA, he said that he wound up in the Bowery in the city, and he came to after being down there about eight weeks, and he said to himself, gee, if I'm not careful, I'm going to wind up down here. And that is exactly the way I felt. These things were not happening to me. I was always an observer. I was in Bellevue, and really, I didn't get the message.
I had no feeling that was happening to me, and I felt I must suffer, and this is what I had to go through. Now, I don't know what happened in this period of time, the two-year period. I would call AA during this time every time I got in a tough spot. As you can imagine, I kept a few AAs sober during that two-year period. They would look at me and say, if I take a drink, I'll look just like her. So I would call, and they were very kind, and that's the one outstanding thing that I remembered during this period was the fact that you always came.
You never said, look, you've had your last chance now. You can't come back here anymore. I was welcome no matter what I had done, and you didn't judge me. You accepted me just as I was. And I remembered this, even though I hated to do it. I didn't call you again and admit defeat. I didn't know that the only way I was ever going to be a success was to be completely defeated and to be down and out and completely surrender.
But again, I kept drinking and being a sick alcoholic. It happened. And I remember this last drunk, it was in August of 1951, and my husband had put me in Bellevue, and he stayed drunk long enough to get me out, and then he went to Knickerbocker, and I was annoyed with this and drank for the four days that he was there. While he was up there, he wrote me a letter, and he said, he was in and out of AA2, and he said, I'm going to try to do something about my problem, and if you don't, we're finished.
That's the end of it. So I was really scared because I was very close, and before I'd been married, I'd been close to the streets, and I knew it. All of a sudden, I began to feel that it could happen to me. I could very easily be on the street, and I was really frightened, although the thought of living without alcohol was completely depressing to me. The thought of taking on any responsibility for myself and for anyone else was frightening, and I didn't want it at all.
But I did stop drinking that night. The night before, my husband's sponsor brought him home from the hospital, and I heard the speaker this morning talk about being a wino and on wine, and that's exactly what I was on, always, and I had this half a bottle of sherry, and I stopped drinking, and that was my last drink, although I didn't know it at that time. My husband came home, and I started to go to meetings with him, and I went to a meeting every single night, and my husband was getting sponsored like mad, you know, and I was going along.
And finally, the wife of my husband's sponsor, who was also a member, said to me one night… The sponsor, who was also a member, said to me one night,
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You know, there's a wonderful organization called Al-Anon, and I think it would be a great help to you, and it would help you to understand your husband's problem. Laughter So, I'd like you to meet one of the girls, and perhaps have lunch with her, and I'll arrange that. Well, I was astounded, and I said out loud, now I've been sober a month for the first time in many years, I'm an alcoholic, too. And Lib looked at me and said, that's slick.
And I said, oh no, to myself, because I didn't think it was very slick to be an alcoholic. I was very depressed. It wasn't very easy for me, because I, again, could not face life without alcohol. Now, I was willing, at least, to be physically sober, I'm beginning now to feel a little bit better, you know, physically, getting up in the morning, going to work. The friendship. Something happens here, I know it had nothing to do with me, it's something much bigger than I could ever put into words.
But all I can say is it's a miracle, and I received a gift, because if it had been up to me, I never would have stayed sober. That I know. And the miracle of all miracles is the fact that I started to like it. By hanging on and going to a meeting every night. And I think I received a release when I was in maybe about nine months, when it came to me that I wanted to be sober. And this was a joy, to be able to feel it.
As I look back now, I think I was introduced to service early in my AA life. I wasn't aware of it. But I'll always be grateful to these older members, and my sponsors especially. I had several. I sort of picked up about five women in this period, who all were there willing to help me. I had a lot of problems. As I said earlier, I was 30 years old, and I hadn't lived at all on this earth. And I didn't know how to cope with people.
Of course, as we know in AA, we are given a philosophy, and we're given tools to help us to live a happy, useful life. And also the rare privilege of giving, and to provide service. When you hold your hand out to that new person coming in the door. I did it automatically. I needed help because I couldn't hold my hand out to anyone. And I know you know what I'm talking about. It was painful for me to walk up to anyone and say hello.
But doing it once, and with the kind encouragement of my fellow members, I was able to do this. These older members not only helped me each day to stay away from that first drink, but they introduced me to many, many other things that I could do. Like Nick said in his talk how busy he kept, you know, and he didn't have a chance to think about himself, so that he didn't know that he was confined in the prison.
And this activity is so wonderful. At least it was for me. It was suggested that I go down to visit the hospital that I came out of, the psychiatric ward at Bellevue. And this I did. Went down to a meeting on the Bowery. Went to the intergroup office and manned the phones. But they told me about this. I was not the type of person to go out and hunt. I was always very shy, backward. I needed guidance into all of these things.
And they did this. They told me and suggested what I could do to make me a happier person. And I think that because they made AA so attractive to me and so stimulating that it made me want to stick around and wanted me to continue to be an active member. I know myself pretty well. I won't say I know myself altogether, but I know I would have drifted. I'm the kind, I'd be very enthusiastic for maybe a while, but then I would lose interest.
It just didn't happen. Because my sponsors and these older members told me about these things that I could do, and they guided me into them. I was framed into the coffee detail, and I'll always be grateful for it. My sponsor said they asked me to help her one night. She knew I would never volunteer, and I never saw her again after that night after I helped her. You know, I was on it for ten months.
Well, this was good for me, and that's just what I needed. I needed this kind of help. And it's wonderful the way these things come to us in AA as we need them as an individual. What might be good for me may not be good for another AA, but somehow each one of us is reached. And this is beautiful, I think. I knew very little, and I do want to share with you about the general service office that belongs to you.
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And it's such a part of my recovery story. It really is. My life has taken on great new dimensions since I've been working there. And I know you're all interested because I knew as an AA member I wanted to know what was going on, and I was surprised when I found out that it was something that would belong to me as a member of AA. So what were they doing up there, you know? I got curious. I knew a little bit about it because my sponsor worked there.
But I was very busy with my own problems, you know, bill collectors and everything. And local activities. And I really didn't know much what she was doing, except it was a nice atmosphere. I stopped by there to tell her my troubles once in a while. And I knew she'd be off traveling, like, you know, to Chicago or some wonderful spot to attend an AA convention, and I thought that was very wonderful. But I didn't quite understand it until 1959 in April, just seven years ago now, that I became part of your general service staff.
And then it really took on great meaning for me. Somehow the office, it is located in New York, and it's not far from the UN, which seems to be a very appropriate location. But when I step off the elevator on the 18th floor, I know a lot of you have visited there and shared with me this feeling of love and AA all over. It loses its location in New York. It could be any place. As soon as you walk into the office, you learn that there are drunks all over the world.
And I thought, first of all, I thought I was the only one in the world, you know, who was having trouble with alcohol and the only one in the world who was behaving the way I was. And then I found AA, and I thought, well, the only drunks in the world are right in New York. There are drunks in no other place, and I find that there are alcoholics all over the world and that there are no limits to what I as an individual or a group can do to help the alcoholic.
And this was a wonderful part of my growth, because as an active alcoholic, my world was limited and made so small that it was just sad. I knew no other world but the drinking bottle world. And now in AA, the world has grown, and there isn't any limit to the growth that I can have as an individual. And this is good for me. The office, for the past 25 years, has grown through a need for service, and it'll be there and continue to grow just as long as it is needed.
And that need is expressed through all of us in AA. There are six of us there who are members of AA and a part of the staff, gals. There's one gal on a leave of absence right now who is also a member, and she'll be back this summer. And we have a manager who keeps us in line. They say there are no bosses in AA, and I guess he's probably the nearest thing to it. He does all right keeping us all together and doing our job each day, and he's a member of AA.
Now, the remaining staff in the office, there are about 40, I guess, are non-alcoholics, and they do a wonderful job for us. In fact, I don't know how you can really tell. You couldn't tell in this room who are and who aren't. You can't tell by looking, really. And these gals and fellows who work in the office have a wonderful attitude. They're very interested in AA, and they think that every letter that they write and every piece of literature that goes out of the office is saving a life, which I think is very wonderful because for us, we know, and we have a different feeling about it, members, but for the non-alcoholics, I think this is great.
Earlier in my talk, I mentioned the General Service Conference, which has just been completed, and this, as you know, is the voice of AA. One staff member acts as a conference secretary, and she has quite a job because all year long, she coordinates everything. She's in touch with delegates from all the states, and she prepares the agenda through suggestions from all of you. All the agenda subjects came in from AAs and groups, all conference members, and she sets this all up for this week's meeting every year in April, and this is quite an exciting time.
Matters are discussed there that affect AA as a whole, and I thought maybe I could give you just a couple of the things now that were discussed and approved. The first one was that there's going to be a new conference institutional committee. There seemed to be a need expressed for this, and this is wonderful, and that will take effect immediately. Some of you went to the convention in Toronto in 1965.
Well, we're working on the one in 1970,
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and it was decided, the convention committee decided that after all the bids were in, that the first choice was Miami, and if Miami proves unacceptable, after our manager goes down and the board checks it out, Chicago and Seattle will be the next in line. This is exciting. They reaffirmed that the world directory, there'd be no commercial use for the world directory, that it would be used just for AA activities, you know, for mailings, for being in touch, for traveling AAs who want to contact a member in a town.
Ontario, which is a large province, was granted a fourth delegate. They asked for it because they have great distances up north where the delegates cannot cover, and so they now have an extra delegate to do this job. The restructuring of the general service board has now been increased. The board will be 21 seven-non AAs, 14 AAs and seven nons, and things of this kind. All of the groups will receive a highlight on this.
They'll be mailed out May 20th, so you'll all have news about what's going on in AA worldwide. I'm sure all of you know that AA lost three dear friends during recent months, and resolutions were made at the conference for these people. Dr. Harry Kibo, who was the first psychiatrist, backed AA, our beloved sister Ignatia, and Bill sponsored Ebi. So it was sort of a sad time for all of us. The availability of that conference report that I mentioned earlier will be announced in the one means of regular communication with our fellowship, the AA Exchange Bulletin.
I know you've all seen that. It goes out to a mailing list of 16,000. The first bulletin went out in November of 1940 to 50 AA groups, and now the mailing is 16,000. Someone suggested recently that the name of the bulletin be changed from the AA Exchange Bulletin since 1956 and call that the Exchange Bulletin. So if you have any ideas, let us know. Let me know today. I've had three suggestions during the conference.
One was the pipeline, AA International, and sharing sessions, which are all good. So if you have any ideas, let us know because we'd love to hear from you. I feel so good to be out here just a week after the conference because there's a lot of new things I can show you that you may not know about or may be breaking news. This is the new world directory that was just printed and made available last week.
Now this was done by the records department from information received at the office from all groups. And in case you're wondering who made the decision on this color, we call the gal in charge of the records department and responsible for this her first directory, Rose. And she picked it. My present job in the office is public information, which may sound complicated. It's really quite exciting. Anything pertaining to media communications, you know, TV, radio, or anyone writing a story or wanting information about AA would come over my desk.
And I think probably the most recent thing to become available through a need, again, we received many requests from AAs that they could use a spot announcement for their local TV stations. And so one was prepared and introduced at the conference last week. And it's a one-minute public service announcement with four anonymous AAs, members, and our chairman of the board, Dr. Jack Norris, very briefly telling about AA and where he can find it.
And this is available. So far, oh, I think about four intergroups have gotten it. This is mostly four intergroups or groups or AAs who want to place this on a TV station. AAs are in remote regions. And an AA member may find his work on a seagoing vessel. So we have loaners and internationalists. Your general service office provides services for these loaners and seamen. Groups adopt loaners. In fact, a very nice story is the group in California who adopted a loaner in Italy.
And when it came to her first AA anniversary, they had a birthday party for her at their group in California and sent her a picture of it and a piece of cake. I don't know how they manage that. And she felt wonderful that she belonged. Some AAs are not as fortunate as we are to be where there are a lot of groups. International start groups all over the world. Many of the groups overseeing Bombay have been started by seamen who have been in AA here and who travel and carry the message. Now, I could go on and on and on to tell you about the many services of the office. I hope each one of you will have a chance to come there and visit and see for yourself. I've enjoyed having the opportunity to be a part of this group. I hope you'll join us again in the future.
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I'll give you the address of the office once again. It's 305 East 45th Street. We're on the 18th floor. And the red carpet is out. In closing, I'd like to share a few words that I heard our co-founder Bill say at AA's 11th General Service Conference in 1961. Quote, in describing AA, we are more than a therapy, more than a group of alcoholics trying to get along in the world. We are a family. End quote. I want to thank all of you for being my family. Bless you.
Thank you, Beth, for a very wonderful message. Now, if in this session any members of the press, radio, or TV have come in, it is the policy of AA that we are anonymous at this level. So please do not use the names of any of the speakers or anybody use their full names. We wish you would respect this. Thank you.