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Source: Mille F – Great Bend KS 10-1959 – Reel 0805-60B – Date Unknown.mp3 File: mille-f-great-bend-ks-10-1959-reel-0805-60b-date-unknown.mp3 Duration: 00:25:43
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Introducing Millie, speaking at the State Meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous at Great Bend, Kansas, October, 1959. And I now give you Millie from Ellsworth. I'm coming home this morning. Most of you boys and girls know that Sharon and I did live here for four and a half years. And it is with a real thrill that I'm back down here and blowing and going with AA. You know, Albert Schweitzer said that, in speaking of his beloved Africa, pardon me for talking about Africa so much, but one's mouth is full of what one is drowned in.
I hope we all drown. My name is Millie F., and I'm an alcoholic. I am also a native Missourian, a housewife, an Episcopalian, and a Democrat. Now, when we moved to Kansas, I came to Kansas as a bride to Colby in 1948. You can well see that I was definitely in the minority. I couldn't do anything about this business of being born in Missouri. I was a brand-new housewife. Western Kansas is a missionary area for my church.
It's a district. It isn't even a diocese. I knew of only one other woman, alcoholic, our friend Kay. I believe west of Topeka. I don't know where Highway 81 is, Kay. I had never met her. So there we were in the minority all the way through. Well, things have changed considerably. It's been our privilege to watch the AA group's mushroom in Western Kansas. Our nearest group from Colby was Hayes, too.
And it looks as if our Episcopal church is going to be a diocese one of these days. And need I say anything about the Democrats? But for the grace of a power greater than myself, whom I choose to call God, I don't know what may have happened to me. I always think perhaps one of three places I would be this lovely October morning rather than here with you. Permanently committed to some institution in my grave or dead drunk someplace, someone out looking for me, which was my usual pattern.
And I am grateful to be here. But the most important person in this room this morning are not those of us who have been privileged to know about AA a little longer, but the man or the woman who is here perhaps tending first, second, or third meeting, seeking a new way of life. Now, those of us who have been privileged to be associated with this wonderful group a little longer, thank God that you are here.
You are our lifeblood. And if you were not here, we wouldn't be here either. I have talked in Kansas so many times that I do not feel it necessary to qualify myself as an alcoholic. Briefly, I was 24 years old when I took my first drink. I was 34 years old when I took my last drink. Some would say that is a very short period of time to be on the old merry-go-round. But take my word for it, it was a stormy time.
I know the tortures of the damned. I know them all too well, and I hope I never forget.
[00:05:00]
I have been in and out of more private hospitals and sanitariums than Carter has pills, and you know Mr. Carter has quite a few. I know what it is to stay awake night after night. Well, my story isn't much different from any of the rest of them, maybe a little different locale. But it was just that sort of thing that I had hit a mental bottom. I never lost a job over my drinking, and I had always worked, always.
I did not find AA. AA found me. Found me in a private sanitarium. Bankrupt in every department of my life. I had tried everything else, so I thought to myself, why not try AA? I have since learned that we do not try AA. AA has been tried and found not wanting. To you new people, I want to tell you just a few of the things that have helped me over these last few years. The program is so varied that each has his own interpretation.
There are, I'm sure, as many interpretations as there are members. We take what we can use, but be sure that we use it. Now, I could find no way to approach AA other than with humility. And there again, I thought humility was a milk toast, you know, someone who bowed and scraped. I learned differently. My favorite definition of humility is teachability. Teachability. And if we're willing to listen and learn and be taught, there is a happy way of life here for us.
AA is a simple program, a paradox. I never say that it was easy because I only know what it was for me, but it was not easy for me. It is a program of the heart and not of the head. When love is the general of our hearts, there is peace and contentment. And love and hate cannot coexist in the heart. Mr. Bob, you know, I think it was in his last speech in Cleveland about the last public words he uttered was, keep the program simple and love one another.
AA teaches us a way of life, but it doesn't solve all of our problems. It didn't solve all of mine. It did help me and does help me to better cope with my problems. I still have them. I always expect to have them. But I sincerely believe that life would be rather dull if we didn't have something to challenge us once in a while. AA teaches us the true meaning and appreciation of fellowship and faith and service.
And as far as I'm personally concerned, those words, even the words were not in my vocabulary, must last action upon them. Fellowship is a wonderful thing, but it cannot stand alone over a long period of time. So we must have faith. And to me, faith is nothing more or less than betting my life on God. And believe me, that is a pat hand. Faith is enthusiasm in action. You show me an AA member who is enthused about his group or the new man or woman who is coming in or the project at hand, and I'll show you the man who has a great deal of faith.
But there again, faith is not the whole story.
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So we must be ready to serve. You know, God divided man into men that we could help each other. And indeed, we can test our devotion to God by our devotion to one another. In this program, we have learned that what we give away, we keep. And what we keep, indeed, we lose it. AA has nothing to sell, absolutely nothing. But we do have lots to give away if the individual wants to accept it. AA has given me all that I have and all that I ever hoped to have.
And it's done it. You have done it through your example and by relating to me your experiences, not only of your drinking story, but how you worked the program. AA has given me the tools to work with, such as the Big Book, the Twelve Steps, the Twelve Traditions, and the Third Legacy. I like to call some of these means, ways and means of getting along in the world my guideposts. You know, a guidepost is a deal, a fork in the road with a board across it that gives information and directions.
And when I came into this program, I needed a lot of information and a lot of guided direction. But it was up to me to try to follow what I was given. I'd like to share just a couple or three of these with you. They are… I don't know that I am naming them in order of importance to me, but they are what helped me the most when I was new. You know, AA is like the Bible. It is perpetual, and we can never hope to know it all, ever.
But we can study and learn. Guidepost number one. Take it easy. Mark Twain tells us that you can't throw a habit out of the window. You must coax it down the stairs a step at a time. It seems to me that by the same token, we cannot embrace all the 12 steps in just one grand swoop. Take it easy. Rather, we study and we listen and we learn and we put them into practice a step at a time until we have a workable knowledge of all of them.
Those of you who were privileged to hear Hank last night will remember he gave us a workable knowledge of the 12 steps. They're all written in the past tense, assuming that we have taken action on them. Now, I have never been able to understand the person who insists that he has never gotten beyond the first step. We admitted we were powerless over alcohol, that our lives had become unmanageable. That is step number one.
Now, personally, I had taken that step long before I knew there was an AA. I had made the admission, how many times have I put a bottle of whiskey on my dresser and shook my fist at it and said, someday you're going to kill me? But until that day, isn't that admitting? And as far as my life being unmanageable, well, that's all in the record book. It was there for all to see. So my problem was accepting these facts and then setting about my business, trying to do something about it.
Nor have I ever understood the person who says he is a two-stepper. A two-stepper. The fellow who admits he is an alcoholic. The Fellow Who Admits He Is an Alcoholic and Then Goes Out and Tries to Carry the Message.
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Now the twelfth step very clearly states that having had a spiritual awakening as a result of these steps, plural, we tried to carry the message to alcoholics and to practice these principles in all our affairs. It seems to me that if a spiritual awakening is a result of these steps, it can come only through action on all twelve of the steps. And I don't know how one can carry the message if we don't know what it is. Sure, we can tell our drinking stories and we must at times at least tell parts to let the individual know that we understand.
But you know the other fellow has a drinking story too and what at least I was interested in is what can I do about it. I've got one, same as you have. I want to know what to do about it. In practicing the first and the twelfth step only reminds me of somebody trying to build a house, pours the foundation and then tries to put a roof on it without anything in between. That's where I feel about it. And we sure can't give away something that we don't have and it takes that in-between to get that roof up there. And if we don't know what the principles are, how are we going to practice them in all our affairs? And I mean all our affairs, in our home and in our community, in our business and so forth. Now all this doesn't come easily but that's a few thoughts on taking it easy that helped me. The best way I know how to take it easy is my guidepost number two, which is live a day at a time. That was the most wonderful relief to me to learn that today was the only day that I was responsible for. If there is one thing above all others that Christianity teaches us, it's to live in the present. It isn't anything new at all, my friends. The Lord's Prayer, for instance, give us this day our daily bread. It doesn't say one word about tomorrow, next week, or next year.
This day. Now we all think we're pretty intelligent people, pretty smart, but I don't think there is a man or woman in this room smart enough to carry the remorse of yesterday and the hopes of tomorrow in his heart and still do a good job of living today. You know our future is determined not so much by planning tomorrow but by action today. And time gives us, or life gives us, only time and space. It's up to us to fill it. Time is the one element that we all share equally. No one has any more than the other. It is God-given and what we do with it concerns others. A day at a time.
Well, now, how do we begin this day? Well, personally, each morning I like to turn my will and my life over to the care of God as I understand Him. You know, when the sun comes up each morning, we are reborn. Therefore, in being reborn each day, it is necessary that we affirm our faith and turn our will and our life over to the care of God a day at a time. The fundamental basis of AA is a belief in some power greater than ourselves, and let's not water that down. It
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can be anything you want it to be, your own conception. We have two mediums of communication with that power greater than ourselves. Prayer and meditation. Prayer, to me, is talking to God. Meditation is listening to God. And you know I know something that I've learned? I don't learn very much if I do all the talking. We've got to do some listening. And while we're praying and while we're meditating, let's not forget to forgive ourselves. That was one of the hardest things I had to learn to do, was to forgive myself for what happened yesterday. But I finally reasoned it out that if I didn't do it, I couldn't expect God to, nor could I expect my fellow man to. You know, there's only one creature that never stumbles, and that's a worm. Now, these guideposts were not handed to me while I sat at home in my rocking chair. You didn't get them to me that way. I found them at the post number three, which is attending meetings. We were talking about this only yesterday.
One of the thrills to me, then and now, was that when I step inside an AA meeting, it doesn't make a bit of difference who I think I am, who I am, or who I hope to be. I'm on an equal footing with other person in the room. That was a great thrill to me because I'd always been the underdog, don't you know? And I like being on an equal footing. I don't know of any better way to do twelve-step work than to attend meetings. We never know when we sit in a meeting, even though we don't say anything, how we're going to help someone else. And I don't know of any way to pay my debt to AA other than by attending meetings regularly. I hear now and then people say, oh, it's so repetitious. We hear the same thing over and over and over. So what? When we were drinking, didn't we do the same thing over and over and over? And if telling it over and over and over will help someone else, who are we to complain about that? I hear others say, well, I do not have time. You know, there are a lot of us when we get into AA, we get so busy doing things, this, that, the other thing, that suddenly we just cannot find time to get to our AA meetings. I look at it this way. If my doctor told me to be in his office at eight o'clock on Tuesday evening to get a shot that would prolong my life, you bet your bottom dollar I'd be there, wouldn't I? And so would you. So as far as I'm personally concerned, maybe it's because for so very long the group was my power greater than myself. You see, I could not believe in anything that I did not see, and I could see you people.
Regular attendance at meetings, to me, is very important. I pray that I'll never forget it. The longer I am privileged to be a member of AA, the less I know, and indeed the more inadequate I feel. But this I believe with all my heart. God loves alcoholics. He made an awful
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lot of us, and if God is for us, who could be against us? God bless you all. I don't really want to go, though it's late, I think, to go. I don't really want to go home.