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Source: Mike F – Cedar Rapids Roundup – May 2008 – Date Unknown.mp3 File: mike-f-cedar-rapids-roundup-may-2008-date-unknown.mp3 Duration: 01:08:37
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Hi, everybody. I really wanted to bring some warm weather with me. I should have just brought a jacket. I'm always afraid when I get up here somebody in the back is going to say stand up. I noticed Joe the Taper came and lowered the microphone. I thought he ought to at least put a stool up here for me to stand on. My name is Mike F. and I'm an alcoholic. My sobriety date is April 23, 1985, and for that I'm grateful. Yeah, I just had a birthday. I celebrated 23 years on the 23rd of April. That was a nice time.
What was really cool about that day is I went to the meeting at my home group that night and right behind me was a young man who was there the year before when I got my 22-year chip, but it was his first meeting. And he sat behind me again at this meeting and I have to tell you, I felt more joy for his one year than I did for mine. But that's what's cool about Alcoholics Anonymous is we can get to a point where we can celebrate each other's recovery. And I think that's what we do at these roundups. And I do want to thank the committee for inviting me and having me here. And my hosts, you know, I've got like a whole harem of hosts, which has been, which has really been great. It's like, you know, I had two girls picking me up at the airport and I'm like, man, they know me. This is, this is a way to welcome me to town. I won't want to leave, just next time bring me a jacket, please. And I appreciate David coming down from Minneapolis and I promised my friend Joni that I would say something about the Al-A-Nons. And I want to recognize all of the non-alcoholics and the Al-A-Nons that are here this morning. And we certainly know that your commitment to recovery and to the solution is something that we all need and we all benefit from. And Bill W., in his first message to the General Service Conference of Al-A-Nons in 1961, said that Al-A-Nons was the biggest thing that happened since AA started. And the reason for your phenomenal growth is due to your determination to fill that vast vacuum of family relationships. And we know that that's the most important because it's the most deformed. And I'm just glad that we have Al-A-Nons participation at these functions and I thank you for being here.
Now with those few kind words. Now I told Joni, my mother just celebrated 42 years in Al-A-Nons and she's still not well. Now I got sober in Texas and there was a story down there that they told when I was getting sober that there was this couple, Lance and Chris. And Lance was the alcoholic and he was trying to get sober and Chris was his wife and she was really involved in Al-A-Nons and going to a lot of meetings and had a great sponsor and was really getting into the program. And Lance was really having some trouble staying sober and one Saturday afternoon he came home and he was fractured. And the fight started and it went on for about two hours. And Chris had been learning about tough love and Lance went in the bathroom after they had been fighting and little Chris went and knocked on the door and said, Lance what are you doing in there? And he said he was in the tub and he had the gas turned on. He says, I'm committing suicide. And Chris said, would you put some towels around the bottom of the door? It's making the cat sick. I guess that's tough love.
Now in Texas they give their sobriety day and that's why I gave mine every time I speak. I know that what they told me is if I didn't give one I might not have one. And from the time I started giving one until today I've had one and I'm grateful for that. But you know they do it differently. Some people say I'm Dave and I'm an alcoholic and I've been sober since this period of time or I'm Tommy and I haven't found it necessary to drink.
And one Saturday night this guy says, my name's Ed and I haven't found it necessary to take a drink in 14 years, 6 months and 9 days. And the guy in the back of the room says, Ed, I saw you drunk Saturday night. You couldn't even walk down the street. And he said, yeah,
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but it wasn't necessary. Now I think all of the drinking I did was necessary to get me to Alcoholics Anonymous, at least to get me to accept the surrender. And I'm grateful that I did. I grew up in a house where AA was there. I don't remember my dad's drinking. My dad got sober when I was very young. I don't really remember his drinking but I still remember some of the fighting, you know, some of that kind of stuff and the fear and, you know, being afraid and being in bed at night and knowing things weren't right. And then all of a sudden, you know, he was going to these meetings and things were getting better and my mother was going to Al-Anon. So I got to see in my home that AA and Al-Anon worked and it was not only a family disease but it was a family solution. You know, I got to see families, you know, brought back together and participate in that. And that was a wonderful thing as a kid to grow up and see that. And, you know, it wasn't uncommon in my house if, you know, at night if the police picked up a drunk that they'd put him on our front porch and my dad would take him to a meeting that night. And so for us to get up in the morning and find somebody sitting at the table shaking or, you know, come home from school and find some AA folks there waiting for a meeting, that was a pretty common occurrence. My dad and his sponsor would take the guys to meetings. I grew up in a small town outside of Buffalo, New York and I was one of seven children. So, you know, and I was a middle child so, you know, maybe that was my problem. I don't know. You know, I kind of got lost in the middle. Yeah, I don't think that the problems I had had really anything to do with my upbringing.
I think my folks did a good job with what they had to raise their children. I just, you know, I think what happened to me was my first drink, you know, Terry, I think it was, last night, was talking about that first time he drank when it went down and that warm feeling. You know, I don't remember that. What I remember about my first drink was that it was at my brother's first communion. So I was probably about eight years old because he was my older brother. And I remember stealing some beer from the cooler. And I remember drinking it. And I remember going back and taking some more and hiding it so that I could have it the next day. Now that I remember, and for some reason looking back on that, that was the way I always drank. I was always planning for the next time. Like, it wasn't going to be enough. And from the get-go, I loved it. And there was something amazing about that because prior to that, just growing up, you know, normal, just a normal kid, you know. You know, was I dysfunctional or whatever? You know, I don't know all of that psycho babble, okay. But I know this, that when I drank alcohol, I felt better, you know. I felt like I fit in. I felt like things were right. And that's what happened when I drank.
So I wanted to do it as often as I could because it felt right for me. It wasn't a problem. It was a solution. And that was really what alcohol did for me from when I started drinking it. The problem became that at some point, I feel like I'm like banging into this thing. And I'm not. But I can imagine Joe's ears over there. At some point, I crossed over whatever line that is that we cross over to where it really no longer was a solution.
It had become a problem. And for me to go into a long drunk-a-log and give a lot of details would really be silly. When I talk at an AA meeting, I'm trying to talk to a newcomer, you know, somebody here that's new at one of their first meetings. There's somebody sitting there thinking, you know, when I get out of here, I'm going to go get a drink. That's who I'm talking to because I came to AA and had some difficulty. You're going to hear about that. But my first detox was in Children's Hospital in Buffalo, New York.
And they don't have a detox ward in Children's Hospital. They might today, but they didn't have one then. So they put me in a hospital there and, you know, I was in a room across from the nurses' station so they could keep an eye on me as I detox from the chemicals and the alcohol and all the things that I'd been doing at that point in time. And while I was in that hospital, they called on me and had said, well, it was kind of like this, Mike, if you want to get out of here, you're going to have to do a few things. And one was that I would go to counseling and the other was that I would go to AA. And I was 15 years old and I was scared and I was sick and I wanted to please people. I wanted people
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to be proud of me. I didn't want to be a disappointment and I felt like I was a disappointment. So I agreed. And I started going to counseling and six weeks later I was smoking pot with a counselor. That wasn't working. I liked the therapy, but it wasn't very effective. I see the gentleman turning the heat on back there. I'm going to slow this talk down a little bit until the room gets a little warmer. Yeah, I went to my first meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous in the bottom of a police station in Orchard Park, New York, with my dad and his sponsor. And it was on a Friday night. It was in 1975. And I walked downstairs into that meeting and it was a meeting just like every meeting that we go to today. And they went around the room and there was old wooden tables and a low ceiling and smoke filled.
Good AA. Donuts and coffee, I mean, that was. And this one said, I'm Bob and I'm an alcoholic and I'm Dave and I'm an alcoholic and I'm Art and I'm an alcoholic. And it came to me and I said, I'm Mike and I'm a problem drinker with alcoholic tendencies. See, I didn't want to be an alcoholic. As a matter of fact, I didn't have any idea what I wanted to be, but one thing I knew and that was that I did not want to be an alcoholic. See? And the nice people in Alcoholics Anonymous, because we have traditions, didn't throw me out. They didn't ask me to leave and didn't make me feel less than. They said, you're welcome here, kid. You keep coming back. If you walk like a duck or quack like a duck, you're probably a duck. And I'm thinking, man, there's something wrong with those people. And they said things like, keep coming back. And I did. And for the next ten years I kept coming back to meetings of Alcoholics Anonymous and I never got sober. When I'd come to those meetings, they would tell me, kid, if you keep doing these things, this is what's going to happen to you. And over that ten year period of time, most of the things that they told me that would happen to me happened to me. I got to visit a lot of places that I never want to go to. And when I finally got toward the end of my drinking, you know, there's a lot of programs out there that use the 12 steps. And when I do a little history thing this afternoon, I'm going to talk a little bit about the development of some of those programs, if I have time. But, you know, they've got N-A and O-A and C-A and P-A and G-A and S-A. They've got a new one. It's Paranoia Anonymous. They've got an unlisted number. They don't tell anybody where they meet. Anyway, I probably qualify for 90% of the 12-step programs that are out there, but I found my solution in Alcoholics Anonymous. And, you know, I'm up here speaking and this is really for the newcomer. Nobody has a right to speak for Alcoholics Anonymous as a whole. This is only my opinion of how I interpret the program of AA. And it's also my opinion of how I interpret my own story. Because if you ask somebody in my family about my story, they're going to tell a little differently than me, you know. And they have a right to do that. They usually tell a much worse version than I do, you know. It's like, I'm always wondering, wasn't that bad. I don't know where they're coming from with some of these things that they come up with. For some reason, I have a little trouble with recall. I don't think there's a thing wrong with my memory. It's just a recall part of it I have trouble with. It's like we won't wish to forget our past or shut the door on it. I can't remember it. You know, by April 21st, 1985, I got myself to a condition of hopelessness. I had tried many programs during that time. I got to go to psychiatric wards and hospitals and on and on and on. And I broke into a house that night because I had finally gotten the courage to commit suicide. And I knew that these people had a gun. So, downtown Buffalo, it wasn't a real nice area. And I broke into this house because they were gone. And I looked all over for his gun and I never found it. And while I was doing that, it was beginning to get daylight. And I was up on the third story of the house. And I'm looking out the window and I'm trying to decide, I'm trying to determine, if I dive out the window head first, am I going to die or am I going to flop around on the sidewalk in pain? or I'm going to flop around on the sidewalk in pain until someone finds me, and I've had
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enough pain. I didn't want any more pain. I only wanted to do this if it was going to be a permanent solution to my problem. I wanted it over. And while I'm looking out that window, I see three ladies walking down the street. Now, this is probably a hallucination, because why they'd be walking down the street, I have no idea, but they were wearing these funny hats, and it reminded me of my grandmother. I was growing up. She would come by the house after church on Sundays, and her and her friends would wear these church hats. So when I saw these ladies, I thought of church, and I thought of the God of my childhood. And for the first time in a very long time, I got down on my knees by myself in that room, and I said a prayer that everybody in this room has said. Whether you're an alcoholic or not, you've said it, and it's just, God help me. I didn't feel a great wind, and the room didn't light up, and I didn't feel like I was on a mountaintop, but some things began to happen in the invisible that I was completely unaware of. But for the first time in many years, I'd hit a bottom that had gotten me to a point where I was willing. And see, the rest of that day, I went through that day, and I knew that somehow I was going to get the courage to pick up the phone once again. And I did. So that night, I called the only person left that I thought might be willing to help me, and it was because he was related. It was my dad.
And it was because he was an AA, and it was because he always extended that hand of kindness and consideration that we do to his own kid. He never shut the door. He never jammed it down my throat. He never belittled me or made me feel less than. He always had that door open. And I picked up the phone, and I said, I'm ready. I don't remember the exact words, but he and another member of AA came and met me the next day, and they talked to me about my options. My options were very limited. Actually, I didn't have any. I didn't have a lot of choices to do anything. I mean, I was out of options. We tried to get me into a hospital, and I actually had made the arrangements for the next day to get me into the hospital.
And I had my little bag, you know, my little bag with a toothbrush in it, and they dropped me at the front door. And I walk in, and my brother had dropped me off. And I walk into the hospital, and the admissions intake counselor comes out, and he puts his hands up, and he says, you're not coming in here. You've been here too many times. We can't help you. And I walked out of that hospital with a feeling of hopelessness and helplessness like I'd never ever felt. And what was really, really devastating to me was that guy was in AA, and he was 12-stepped by my dad. And I've got to tell you, that's a bottom I never want to see. See, that's a bottom that I knew about because I heard you folks telling me about these places. But here I was, completely hopeless. And I did what most good alcoholics do. I got in a taxi cab and said, take me to the closest bar, and he did. And I went into that bar, and I ordered a drink. And it was on a Monday afternoon, and the sun was shining, which is kind of rare, April in Buffalo. But the door was open. It was a beautiful spring day. And I'm sipping on this drink, and I look outside. And a city bus rolls up, and a lady is trying to get on the bus, and she falls to the ground. And for some reason, I went out, and I helped that lady get on the bus, and I walked on after her. And I've never gone back to get that drink. And that was the last drink I ever had. And I've got to tell you, if I knew that was my last drink, I'd still be there trying to get it right.
And if it was three days before that, I'd have gone out there and taken that lady's purse and ran. Now, why I decided to do that, I don't know. You see, again, I got on my knees that night, and I said, God, help me. And I believe that things began to happen. I began to change, even though I didn't know that I was beginning to change. And I think that was a message of hope that Ebi brought to Bill. When he said Bill, it's a new kind of giving. It's a giving without expectation of return. Because certainly, when I helped that lady on the bus, I wasn't expecting her to do anything. And I followed her on the bus. And I went on. And a series of events happened. And my dad, they didn't know what to do with me. They had to get me out of town. There were some people that were looking for me. And so I called a friend of his in Texas. And this guy said, send him down here for a couple of weeks. So they bought me a plane ticket to Abilene, Texas. This guy lived in
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Brownwood. His name was Big John. And on May 5, 1985, I got on an airplane in Buffalo. And they flew me to Abilene. They picked me up at the airport, brought me to a meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous that night. And there were three sober members of AA that met me at the airport. And they took me to that meeting. And, you know, the meeting was just like all the meetings. So, you know, but again, you know, John said, here we give our sobriety date. So if you got one kid and it comes to you, why don't you give it? And it came to me and I made one up because I didn't know what it was. And it didn't really matter at that point in time. The fog was still there. You know, it was early sobriety. And you got to see, you know, John got sober in 1951. So in 85, he was considered a long timer.
We used to call them old timers, but they don't like you to do that anymore. I try to be politically correct. He was dry so long, he was a fire hazard. I must have been a joy. I got off that airplane carrying a cardboard box weighing 90 pounds, wearing somebody else's pants. And that's how I came to you folks. Took me to a meeting. After the meeting, we go back to his apartment. And we were left alone there. The other guys had left. And John was a big man. I always say he was about nine foot tall. He was probably about 6'2", 6'3", but he looked big to me. And he says, how long you been around the deal, kid? He always called AA the deal. How long you been around the deal, kid? And with as much ego as you can have when you're wearing somebody else's pants, you know. I said, oh, about ten years. He said, well, I don't know if you got the guts it takes to make it. But if you do, we can show you by living proof how you never have to live that way again.
And if you want to get sober, I'll go to hell and back with you. And if you don't, you can go to hell alone. I'm thinking, welcome to Texas. Can you feel that heat? Wow. A couple minutes later, I'm sitting there. And he looks at me and he said, kid, you're nothing but a thief. He said, maybe not the kind of thief that'd kick in a joint or steal money from your mother's purse. You're a worse kind of thief than that because you stole from those you love the most their right to happiness. You stole from those you love the most their right to happiness. I began to have a spiritual experience because for the first time in ten years I was faced with the truth about myself. See, for all that time I kept saying I'm not hurting anybody but me. If you'll get me out of this gym, I'm going to be okay. Next time I'll manage a little bit better and it's going to be all right and things are going to work out. Just get off my back. Just help me out. Give me a couple of bucks. Don't you understand?
I'm a victim here. And when he said you're nothing but a thief because you stole from those you love the most their right to happiness, I knew I was faced with the truth of myself. And I couldn't argue it. And I began to get open-minded. I began, he penetrated me. And my ears started to open up. My heart started to open up. And I started to see that just maybe, just maybe there was something in this deal for me. And the next day we got up and we went over to see John's best friend. This guy's name was Bill O. And Bill and his wife are beautists. Bill came into the program October 21st, 1951. And John came in October 28th, 1951. So Bill had one week more than John. And he never let him forget it. These guys were a blast. Now Bill had one arm and one eye. Due to the alcoholism had taken one of his arms and his eye. Bill became my co-sponsor and John became my sponsor. And I'll tell you about that in a few minutes too. But Bill and our beautists are busy there in the tape library. We pull up and John says to me, kid, this is the Midwest Tape Library. And I'm like, so what? And he says, it's the largest AA tape library in the world. Whoopee. Yeah.
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AA could have been Acra and Acrobats for all I care. I'm dying. We go in there. And these guys start to talk about history of Alcoholics Anonymous. They're talking to me about people that they know in the program and knew when they came in and got to know Bill W. and John knew Abby. And just the things they were talking about. And at some point during that, and I probably jumped way ahead in my story, but I think I will do that. I had mentioned I felt like a disappointment. It was like every time something was going good in my life, for some reason, I'd find a way to bring down the wall, to bring it to a point where I would feel as though I was being a disappointment to other people. And I really felt that way.
It wasn't like my intentions weren't there. Like 10 years ago when I went to AA, see the problem was I'd go to AA and I had selective thinking and selective hearing. And my thoughts were AA was you don't drink, you go to a meeting. That's what I thought Alcoholics Anonymous was. Well, heck, I wouldn't drink and I'd go to a meeting and I'd want to die. So I'd drink. It was the only thing that made sense. Because me not drinking, I can't live that way. Give me three days of not drinking, I'm going to commit suicide or I'm going to drink.
That's the way it is. And that's what happened. Somebody would get a 30 day chip and I'd get a resentment because I couldn't do that. I had somebody tell me my first year in AA I averaged a meeting a day. Well, heck, I averaged that my last year drinking. The meetings don't get me sober. Meetings are not the solution for this alcoholic. And I knew that. So I didn't think AA would work because I had convinced myself that AA was those going to the meetings and not drinking. Because I thought that's what I heard. And I know that that's not what I heard today.
I understand the level of my own insanity today. I understand that I had heard things and allowed those things to become reality because it was my perception. But because it was my perception didn't make it what AA was. AA was a program of recovery with a solution for guys like me. I just wouldn't open my eyes to see it. There was a reason I went there. Because I wanted to back up to this point. I was one of seven children. I was the second one to earn the privilege of graduating high school. And I don't know how I earned that because I didn't go. But it came graduation day and on the way there I stopped at the bar and had a couple of shots of wild turkey so that I could do it. And then they called my name. Now I got out in the audience, my father and my mother and my grandmother and probably a couple of other family members. And here they call Mike F. and I start walking across the stage to get my diploma while my family's there to be proud of me. And someone in the back of the room yells as loud as they can, drugs, because that had become one of my nicknames. And before I picked up that diploma I knew again I was just a disappointment. Because this is what my life was. It was one disappointment after another to those people who loved me. And I knew that. And when I came to you I was broken. When I came to you I had no self-confidence. I had no self-love. None. I couldn't have anything for you. I had none for myself. And here this guy brings me to this other guy's house. And you know I had a vocabulary at that time of about, I could get a sentence out with about seven words in it. And three of them started with F. And they're talking at this, they were drinking instant coffee. And John and Bill are talking this day in the library there in Texas. And somehow I thought it was my turn. So I decided to say something. And it was one of my sentences. And Bill, this is the first time I met this man. He, I'm just trying to see what we're doing on time here. Bill starts pounding his finger down on the table and he says, young man, the first thing we clean up in here is our mouth. Up in here is our mouth. I nicknamed him Grumpy. I never had the guts to tell him that. So when
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John and I left that day, because I had warmed up to John already, I knew him a little bit because of a relationship he had with my family and he would occasionally come up to Buffalo and I had met him years before that. But I said, what's up with that guy? Here I'm 25 years old, still weighing 90 pounds. Might have weighed 91 by the second day there. I said, what's up with him? You mean to tell me that you folks think you're going to try to tell me how I can talk now? And he said, listen kid, this program saved our lives and we have tremendous respect for this program, for the men and women that came before us. And what Bill was referring to is that we want you to be a good example of what AA is because the day may come that you might be the only big book that some new guy or gal ever sees. And we want you to be a good example of what this program is and we don't want you to talk that way in meetings of Alcoholics Anonymous. And I never have. And I hope I never do. Because I bought into it. I bought into the fact that I have to have a little respect for this program that's saving my life today, that's giving me an opportunity to live a life I never thought I could live. I had stopped dreaming before I came to AA. I wasn't one of these kids that had, well I want to be an attorney or I want to get married. I didn't have those dreams. They were all gone by the time I came to AA. There was nothing left but a shell.
And I came into AA and I started coming to the meetings with John and they would give me assignments. They'd say things like, kid, tonight you're going to stand at the door and shake hands and tell people you're glad you see them. And I'd say, I'm not. And they'd say, we didn't ask you to do that. And I began to do it because I was afraid I was going to drink. See, by then I had a fear because I knew if I was to drink again I'd never get sober again. I knew it. I knew I had gotten to a point where I could not drink again. And I was afraid of that. And that fear helped me to be more willing to do the things that I was unwilling to do prior to that. You know, they said things like read the big book. And I did. And I remember I said to John, he traveled a lot and he came back from one of his trips. And I said, I read it.
And he said, what? And I said, the big book. And he said, I read Moby Dick, kid, and I don't remember a damn bit of it. He said, we've got to study that book. And the next day we were sitting in his den with highlighters on our hands studying the big book of Alcoholics Anonymous. And I read the doctor's opinion that these people were having a psychic change. And I thought, that's cool. I want to have one of them.
That's what I want. And right after that I said, the only necessary is to follow a few simple rules. I didn't think they had rules. I thought they were suggestions, you see. It's like the guy in Texas said, yeah, here are the steps we took. You better took them. A little later in the doctor's opinion it said that the folks that were getting sober were becoming sold on the ideas contained in the book.
And Alcoholics Anonymous has turned me into a salesman. And if you feel like you're being sold on the ideas contained in the book, it's because that's what I want to sell you on. Because my experience was getting drunk and getting loaded and being a disappointment and not being able to do those things. But collectively our experience is an experience of power, an experience of unity, an experience of hope, and a solution, a restoration of families and of people. You know, I read in that book it said, lack of power is our domain. And I said, well, I don't know.
That's my dilemma. I thought too much booze is my dilemma. See, it said lack of power is our dilemma. And then right after that it said that the main object of this book is to enable you to find a power greater than yourself that will solve your problem. My problem was lack of power. The book would help me to find a power greater than myself that would solve my problem. I didn't understand that before I read that and had somebody walk me through that and help me to understand what that was. And I read a little further on in the book, it said something like, and I'm not one of these guys who are going to quote big portions of the book to impress you. Impresses me. I can remember them. But you know, there's a section and it says that it's a great obsession of every abnormal drinker that somehow some way he'll control and enjoy his drinking that the persistence of this illusion is astonishing and many pursue it to the gates of insanity or death. I'm looking out a window trying to decide if I go
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head first, am I going to be dead? Dead enough that I don't have to feel any more pain. Alcohol brings us to that place. See, that delusion that somehow some way he'll control and enjoy his drinking. I don't know that I ever controlled or enjoyed my drinking after I was very young. But I do know I was powerless. Completely powerless. And it wasn't until I surrendered and accepted that. And John said to me, this deal is as simple as ABC. I thought, man, he's lost it now. He said, yeah, kid, it's ABC. Accept, begin, and continue. And you know, to me today, the program really is as simple as ABC. I have to accept that I'm an alcoholic, that I'm powerless to my innermost self, that that is not an option for me. And I need to begin to do the things. And that's the action that's outlined in the first 164 pages of the big book of Alcoholics Anonymous. It gives me precise directions on what to do. And then what I need to do is continue to do that every day. One day at a time. And in here, they told me I could get up, stand up, and stay up. It's amazing what can happen. I was in the library one day over at Bill and Her Beautuses. And I've got to tell you, John was right. The library was incredible. They had somewhere between 3,000 and 4,000 reel-to-reel recordings of AA talks dating back to 1946. It's massive. And Bill's goal, you know, his life goal, was to make sure that the people in the library were aware that this recorded history would be preserved and passed on to the next generation of AA and Al-Anon. And he wasn't able to do that in his lifetime. I now have that library in my home. And we are committed to making that happen. Okay? We're working on getting those recordings digitized and hopefully making them available. We're not sure how we're going to do that yet. But that's a service project that I'm committed to. My kids think I'm crazy. Some of the people I sponsor think I'm crazy. Well, that's something else. Somebody said, how many guys do you sponsor, Mike? About half of them. But we're working on getting the library restored and hopefully one day we can pass it on. And I do want to thank the tapers and let you know that, you know, the commitment that they make to go out to these conferences and to provide this service is incredible. And, you know, I truly thank you for the service that you're providing. It saved my life. You know, getting to hear these recordings and listen to these tapes have taught me so much about recovery and how to live my life one day at a time and how to overcome the things I needed to overcome. And I didn't have to do it by myself. See, I got drunk and we get sober. That's the miracle of Alcoholics Anonymous. One day I was in that library and I'm going to talk more about history this afternoon. But I'm going to touch on a little bit on it here because it is so important as far as my own personal recovery. You can tell, look at this, I have three drinks here. Some of us are sicker than others. I'm in the library one day and Dr. Bob's son is in there, Smitty. He was sponsored by Arbutus.
Smitty was in Al-Anon. Some of you knew him, I'm sure of that. And Smitty looked at me one day and he said, Mike, did John and Bill tell you about AA number, about the first guy that my dad and Bill W. tried to work with? Now, this is Smitty talking to me. And I said, oh yeah. Now, I'm learning enough about AA history to be dangerous. So I said, oh yeah, Bill D, AA number three, Akron City Hospital. And he says, well, Mike, there was a guy before Bill D. And I'm like, huh? And he says, yeah, there was a guy named Eddie. And he said, Eddie, they moved Eddie into our house and they were trying to get Eddie sober and they put him up in the bedroom and Eddie would open the window and he'd climb down the drain pipe and he'd go get drunk. And Bill and Dr. Bob would go round Eddie up and bring him back and try to get him sober. And they were trying to carry the message to him as they were getting it because, you know, Dr. Bob had only been sober a matter of days. Well, anyway, Eddie was a bad alcoholic and they really had a lot of
[00:40:05]
trouble with Eddie. And one afternoon Eddie was chasing Dr. Bob's wife Ann around the house with a butcher knife. And he had to be committed. So the very first guy that Dr. Bob and Bill tried to work with was a complete failure. And he had to be committed. And Dr. Bob and Bill didn't stop there. They went on to Akron City Hospital and they met Bill D, AA number three. And Smitty said, Mike, this story doesn't end there. He says, 15 years later at my dad's funeral, a guy came up to me and said, do you know who I am? And he said, yeah, you're Eddie. And he said, and I'm sober. See, the seed was planted. And that day when I left that library, that spiritual experience that had begun to happen when I was sitting in John's apartment a while before that, again, was just blossoming. Because I realized for the first time in over 10 years that Alcoholics Anonymous wasn't built on success, it was built on failure. And it was guys like Eddie and guys like me that made AA work. And for the first time in 10 years, I knew I belonged here. I was home at Alcoholics Anonymous. And I was home because of the history and because of the stories of the men and the women that went before us. And the very first guy that Bill and Dr. Bob worked with was a complete failure. And had they stopped, none of us would be here. But they went on and God brought Eddie back. And I'm grateful for that. That really helped me. Because I just felt so much a part of. Like, man, because I had come to these meetings and I would see you get sober and you get sober and you'd celebrate a year and this family would be back together and I wouldn't be able to do it. I'd be getting drunk. And every time that would happen, I thought I was a failure. And I don't care how many times you've been in and out of this program. Get in the program. Accept the program to your innermost self. Study that big book and surround yourself with sober members of Alcoholics Anonymous and stand at that door when people come and welcome them. And tell them you're glad to see them. And I'll tell you, all of a sudden you're going to start feeling a whole lot better about what you're doing. Because any time that I came to Alcoholics Anonymous, I didn't feel welcome. And the reason I didn't feel welcome is because I wasn't allowing myself to feel welcome. I was one of these guys that somebody licked all the red off their candy. Okay? Here's the picture. I'd cheer up all this whole room by leaving. I was negative. I was not happy. John said to me for months, kid, you've got to get out of the debating society. What do you mean I've got to get out? I'm not debating. What are you talking about? Debating society. He says, kid, you want to get even with someone? I said, sure do. Why don't you try to get even with someone that's been good to you?
That's why I'm in Cedar Rapids freezing today. Because I'm trying to get even with the men and the women that were good to me. Okay? That loved me when I was unlovable. That loved me when I didn't know how to love myself. You know, that first step of the program is that step of acceptance. The second step, where it says, came to believe that a power greater than ourself could restore us to sanity. I said, I don't think I'm insane. He says, it doesn't say that, kid. It says sanity, which is soundness of mind, wholesome thinking. Do you think your mind was sound or your thoughts were so wholesome when you've been out there doing the things you were doing? And I said, of course not. And I began to see that a power greater than myself had to restore me to some soundness of mind. And then the third step says, made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood him. And I said, I don't know if I can do that. I don't think I can turn my will and my life over to God or you. I don't know if you or AA or anybody else. And he says, it doesn't say that, kid. It says made a decision. Not sure you're capable, but if you are, let's try it. And I opened that door to a relationship with a power greater than myself. And the door was a door of willingness, see, a door of open-mindedness and a door of honesty. And then you get to the fourth step and it says, now it's time to take an inventory of ourselves and what we've done. And I did that. I started writing. See, I don't know if I did it right, but nobody was there to grade it. You see, see, that was before people started grading your four steps. I didn't do that. I just wrote it. And I did the best job I could with it. And when I was done, I said, I'm done with this. What do I do? And he says, Now we do a fifth step, see, and you share with God, to yourself, and to another human being the exact nature of your wrongs, I was able to do that, and I was able to be relieved
[00:45:00]
of the bondage of the past. And six and seven, again, I had to be entirely ready to let God remove these defects from me. Okay? Not just today, to remove them, they're gone, goodbye, that's it, I don't have to go back and pick them back up. In step eight, where I've got a list of people I need to go make amends to, I could begin to do that. And step nine was the action where I was able to do it, and I went, and some of the amends I made were difficult, but some of them were just beautiful.
You know, one of the greatest amends I got to make was to speak with my dad at an AA meeting in Canada, you know, I was five or six years sober, and we both spoke together. What a joy, what an opportunity, what a blessing to be able to be where I was at, and where he was at, and where the relationships were at, and the family was at, and to be restored to where we could do that together and have people come up and say, wow, that's a miracle, and it is a miracle, and I'm glad I get to live it.
You know, and step ten gives me an opportunity every day to see the progress that I'm making, and when I need to do something, I can act on it. You know, and throughout the day, I can look and say, hey, okay, Mike, you need to change that, okay? And step eleven opens that door back up so that I can get into contact with God each day and I can see how I'm bringing the principles of these steps into my life, and how I'm living them today with my family, with my work, and am I driving down the road, and do I have good thoughts, am I thinking about what I can do to help somebody else?
See that's, when I came to Alcoholics Anonymous, I was very limited, I'd get down on my knees every day and say, God, help me get through this day without thinking about taking a drink, because I wanted a drink. I didn't want a drink, the obsession wanted a drink, the drink wanted a drink, the thoughts, the fears, the angers, the resentments, the jealousy, the envy, the lust, all of it wanted me to drink, and I'd get down on my knees and say, God, help me just get through this day without thinking about that drink, and I'd do what you folks taught me to do, I'd still think about it, just a little bit, but I'd do what you were telling me to do, but I was getting through that day and I wasn't taking a drink, and then one day would turn into two, and then into six, and then magic started to happen, and the day came where I recognized at the end of the day, I went through a whole day and I didn't think about taking a drink.
That was a miracle for me, because I knew God was doing for me what I couldn't do for myself, and in the Nine Step Promises it says, we'll be amazed before we're halfway through, we're going to come to know a new freedom and a new happiness, that we won't regret the past or wish to shut the door on it, that we'll comprehend the word serenity and we'll know peace, that no matter how far down the scale we've gone, we'll see how our experience can benefit others, the feelings of uselessness and self-pity will slip away, that we'll realize that God's doing for us what we couldn't do for ourselves.
You know, those are the experiences that happened, those are what happened in my life. See it's not, you know, it's not because I'm different than you, I'm exactly the same as you. That's what's neat about when we get to the twelfth step, so I went to eleven, and then I went there, and I'm going to twelve, because it says, having had a spiritual experience or spiritual awakening as a result of these steps, as the result of these steps, it doesn't say some of us have this.
It makes the assumption that we're all going to have this as a result of those steps, and I believe that we all will if we go through those steps, and we bring the principles that are in the program into our daily life. You know, today when I kneel down and say a prayer, I don't have to, and I do this every morning, you know, I don't have to say, God, help me get through the day without thinking about taking a drink, you know.
Not that that prayer was not a good one, it was probably as good a prayer as I pray today, but today, today I get down and I say, God, help me to be of service to you and to my fellow man. I tend to be more thoughtful of someone else than of myself, because, you see, I'm spring-loaded towards self. That's what my sponsor says. And spring-loaded towards self. Selfishness and self-centeredness is the root of my problem.
And when I pray, I ask God to help me be of service to a fellow man, to him, and then I add, and help me to not think that I need to take the credit. Let my eyes be open when someone comes in front of me so that I know I'm there to serve. For this alcoholic, that's difficult, because when I came to you, I'd take your eye out and try to convince you you look better without it. It was all about me. It was all about what I could get, what I could take, how I could get it, because I thought that's what I needed to do.
And you folks taught me how to be a different kind of person.
[00:50:02]
I barely resemble the person that came to you, and I think in a doctor's opinion, that's what it talks about when it says psychic change. Oh, I've got lots of time. Now I'm warm. You know, I've been blessed with the opportunity and the privilege to travel a little bit the last couple of years, and to go to AA meetings in a lot of different places. And I'm one of these guys who really tries to have a good attitude, and I met a guy early in AA in Brownwood there named AJ, and I said, how are you doing, AJ?
And he had this big grin on his face, and he says, I'm doing fine. And I thought, nobody should be that happy. And I said, do you really mean it? And he says, yeah, and things just keep getting better. And I thought, I'm going to try to have a little bit more of an attitude like AJ's, and just take the attitude of things are good, and they're getting better. And I started doing that, and people would say, how are you doing, Mike?
And I'd say, I'm doing great. And then they would say things like, just wait until you fall off the pink cloud. I remember going back to my sponsor and saying, what's that all about? And he says, don't worry about it, kid, just keep doing what you're doing. I was fortunate to have a sponsor and to be surrounded by people that knew Bill and had been around shortly after the traditions were introduced.
And my dad's sponsor was on stage in Cleveland when the traditions were adopted in Alcoholics Anonymous in 1950. He got sober in 1946, and he was at our house every day. And I didn't know I was beginning to learn the history by being around it. I'm grateful today that I do have the skills to be able to remember some of that. Sometimes I hear things at meetings. And I was glad last night that Terry, when he talked about a couple of comments that his sponsor had said to him, he said his sponsor pulled him aside or whispered in his ear.
So I hear people say things at meetings every now and then, like, you don't know nothing, shut up. Take the cotton out of your mouth or out of your ears and stick it in your mouth. And I'll tell you something, I've been around AA for quite a number of years. And all the people that I know that have been around a lot longer than me, I've asked things to, and none of them have said that they were treated that way when they came to AA.
I sure wasn't. I was treated with love and kindness, tolerance. They lifted me up. They lifted me up. They didn't make me get up to where they were at. They came down to where I was at. They made me feel welcome. I remember John would say, kid, could you cook me breakfast? And I'd make him a couple of eggs. And he'd go around the rest of the day bragging about how well I made breakfast. I remember he asked me to cook him spaghetti and meatballs one time, and I did, and I think I got two weeks of compliments out of that.
Oh, the kid can cook. This kid's the best cook. And then he would have me drive him from Texas to Canada, and then I was the best driver. And it didn't matter what, but he was finding the things I could do, and he was bringing them out, and he was bragging on them, and he was making me feel like a person. He was making me feel whole. He was lifting me up, and he was building a man. He wasn't beating me down.
My disease beat me down. When I came to Alcoholics Anonymous, I needed to be loved. He said one time that Bill O was going to be taping a conference up in Casper, Wyoming, and he invited me to drive with him. And when we left the house that day, the library, John said, you know, kid, that's a pretty good privilege that you got there to drive Bill up to Wyoming. He never lets anybody drive. And I'm like, finally recognizing who I am.
It wasn't until about five years ago his daughter told me that, you know, he let people drive all the time. I'm like, don't tell me that. Yeah, I don't need to hear that. I mean, I felt lifted up.
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Here I got to do this. It was a privilege. And he didn't let me drive the whole way. As a matter of fact, we were driving through Denver, and it's snowing. And he's driving, and it's snowing hard. And he's from Texas. He's a good old boy. One eye, one arm, you know, he's driving around. He liked to smoke the pipe, okay? Eighty miles an hour. You know, in Texas, they don't really pay much attention to speed limits.
If the car will go that fast, it's okay. You know, they have a relationship with their higher power. There we are. He's driving through Denver. It's snowing down. He's lighting his pipe with his one arm. Driving with his knee, 80 miles an hour. I'm having a new relationship with my higher power. What was so sick about it is he was watching me the whole time. Unbelievable. Yeah, we're blessed to have these people in our lives.
And the people that you're surrounded about with today, you know, are the people that you'll be remembering in the future. You know, and those are the things that are great about this whole thing, is that seriously, I got drunk, but we get sober. We don't have to do this alone. You know, when I came in, they said, oh, you never have to be alone again. I'm like, yeah, right. Yeah. You talked about putting a list down of things that you wanted and shortchanging yourself.
When I came to Alcoholics and Alcoholism, I knew precisely what I wanted. I wanted a girlfriend. I wanted a job. And I wanted a place to live. And I would have taken a girlfriend that had those in the hand. None about soft, easy methods for me, you know. Today, today, I have an abundant life, an abundant life. I didn't even know how to tell you about my life today. It is so, it's like I'm living out a fairy tale and I get to be in it, you know.
And I didn't write the, is that my phone? It really was. Speaker's phone's going off and it's on vibrates and now that's God calling. It's like my favorite book. I don't know if you've ever read that book. There's a book called God Calling. It's just a great book. Maybe I'll tell you about that when I do the history talk. Our 24-hour day book, actually, the meditations come from the book God Calling.
And God Calling was edited by a guy named A.J. Russell. A.J. Russell was a reporter in London who was asked to check out and investigate the Oxford Group. So he did. And when he went in to investigate the Oxford Group over in London, they got him. And he became an Oxford Group member. And he wrote a book called Four Sinners Only, which became like the mainstay, the main book of the Oxford Group. And then a couple of ladies got that book and they read it and they thought, wow, this is great because they were talking about prayer and meditation and quiet time every day and developing this communication with a God.
And they called each other and they decided they were going to do this every day. So they got together and they did that. And while they were doing that, they felt the inspiration of God's voice telling them. And they would write down what they heard. And they tried to get this published when they were all done because they felt that this message needed to be out there. And none of the publishers around London would publish their work.
So they went to A.J. Russell thinking, well, maybe he will. And he got their work and he looked it over and he said, I will as a meditation. I'll do it as a daily meditation. And they said, well, we want to remain anonymous. So they were known as the two listeners. So the book was edited by A.J. Russell, but it was written by the two listeners. And that book was first published in December of 1935.
And they did 5,000 copies. And they had to do 5,000 more copies the same month because they all sold. The book is still published and as of today, it's the number one. List, and as of today, it's the number one selling meditation book ever written. Just thought that was just in my head, so now it's in yours, for what that's worth. And I have
[01:00:01]
the opportunity to do that because I'm up here. You have to be careful who you invite. I really do enjoy attending functions like this and seeing recovery and seeing the family and seeing people together. And I remember the first conferences that I got to go to and how important they were to me to feel part of. To see AA as a bigger family than what it was just in my home group or in the area. And that's part of participating. And I think that getting involved and participating in these things is so important for all of us to do. But also participate at the local level. Participate in your group, even if that is limited to being a door greeter or a coffee maker or setting up the chairs or cleaning the floor or chairing the meetings. Whatever it is that you're called on to do.
Those are the things where we really find the joy. I was talking a little bit about my life today. I have three children. This is a good story, so I'll share it. I'm getting real close to being done. I know it's getting time to have a little food. I went to Texas for two weeks and I stayed for two years. Does that sound like an alcoholic? My sponsor had a one-bedroom apartment. He gave me the bedroom and he took the couch. That's the kind of sponsorship I had. He was 80 years old. How can I not be here doing what I'm doing when people did for me that? I could go on and on and on and tell you what people have done for me. And every now and then I have to inconvenience myself a little bit to help somebody. And you know, that's okay. My wife and my family understand. When I left John I went on to Phoenix, Arizona. And I was living with an AA guy. I was doing a little construction work as a laborer because that's what you do when you're new in recovery because you're unemployable. And I was going to meetings and I was sponsoring a bunch of guys and I was living at this guy's apartment and I was out by the pool one day and this girl dives in the water and I dove in after her. And I started talking to her about AA because I didn't know anything else. And I asked her. She was visiting from Michigan. Her mom and dad were waiting for their house to be built. And I asked her out on a date and she told me she was busy pretty much the whole time she was there so that probably wasn't going to happen and I was rejected. And now I knew what to do. I went to an AA meeting and I worked with the guys I was working with and I didn't take it personally. It was okay.
It was just, that's what it was. And I saw her at the pool a couple days later and she said my plans have changed. And my dad is squirky even for a baseball game and if you'd like to go to the baseball game I'd like you to be my guest. Now this is in August in Arizona. I mean it's already 90 in Arizona. I'm going home tomorrow. It'll be 90. I mean August. It was like 190. So I said I'd be happy to go to the game with you but if you'll go to dinner with me first. And she said sure I'd like to. And I picked her up in my black Ford Fairmont with no air conditioning in August. So we go out to dinner and she gets her fortune cookie and she opens it up and the cookie said something like this. It said, and she could tell you but I'm close. But it said you can trust the man you're with. His love is true. Four months later we were married. We just celebrated our 20th wedding anniversary in December. This is from a guy that came to you weighing 90 pounds. Carrying a cardboard box. No dreams left inside me. I have three beautiful children today. I have my own business and a wonderful home. And a guy out there doing my house, repairing the pool deck last week. It's like, wait a minute, my sponsor is seeing me get off that airplane carrying that box going this is unbelievable. See the script that God has written for us is so much better than the script that we could write for ourselves if we'll just get in line and let God do his thing. And they told me great things will happen for those who don't care who get the credit. And today I really honestly try to not take the credit for the
[01:05:00]
things in my life, the benefits. And when there are obstacles and challenges and things and we do have them, you know, that's a time for me to understand that it's a spiritual journey. And that it's okay that some of my tools need to be sharpened occasionally. That means I need to learn patience. I need to learn understanding and compassion for others. And you know if somebody sits in a meeting and they say something I don't like, you know I've got to just get over some of that. And realize I'm just part of. I don't have, it's not all about me. You know and it's okay today when I disagree with someone I just simply ask myself, I don't always do it immediately, okay. But I'll simply ask myself is it alright with the God of my understanding that that individual is where they're at right now on their spiritual journey. And every time the answer is always yes because this is a loving God. And as soon as I answer that yes I know that I'm trying to play God. And my book tells me I've got to stop doing that. So if it's alright with God it's alright with me. But I hope today that if you're sitting there and you're thinking, you know, this isn't working for me. That you'll get out of yourself and do something for someone else. Because that's when the magic occurs. Dr. Bob at his last meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous said let's not louse this thing up with Freudian complexes that might be interesting to the scientific mind but have little to do with the actual workings of Alcoholics Anonymous.
Let's keep this thing simple. If you boil Alcoholics Anonymous down or simmer it down to just two things. You'll have love and you'll have service. We all know what love is and service is that giving of ourselves unselfishly to others. Without expectation of return. And John said love is an unbiased attitude of goodwill toward everyone. And I said what does that mean? He said that means that you don't wish that guy get hit by a car Mike. And I said I can do that. See they lowered the bar so that I could reach it.
They didn't make me get up to where they were at. They came down and met me where I was at. And for that I'm grateful. And today when I stand at the door and I say hello to you it's because I want to meet you where you're at. And I want you to try to be where I'm at. You don't have to be. We can all do this together. This is a journey. We walk along together. Hand in hand. Supporting each other. And I'm grateful. And my sponsor is I got a great sponsor today Howard P. And Howard's probably spoke here and if he hasn't he probably should because he's a wonderful guy. But Howard always tells me that my life is unfolding in divine order. And I believe that he's right. And I try to stay focused on that. And Howard's really worked with me on meditation and increasing the amount of time that I discipline myself in that area to have that conscious relationship with a God of my understanding. But John's sponsor was a guy named Dick B. And Dick was sponsored well actually probably really closely by Bill W. And they were great friends. But Dick closed one of his talks and it went like this and said a bell is not a bell until we ring it.
And a song is not a song until we sing it. And love wasn't put in our hearts to stay. Love is only love when we give it away. And Alcoholics Anonymous is only AA when I'll give it away. Thank you for having me.