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Source: 1985 Montreal International Convention – Multi Speakers – HOW IT WORKS How It Works – RS 06401.mp3 File: 1985-montreal-international-convention-multi-speakers-how-it-works-how-it-works-rs-06401.mp3 Duration: 01:11:57
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A Moment of Silence in Gratitude of the AA Recoveries of the Past Fifty Years. Please join with me in the Serenity Prayer. The Lord grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference. There may be some here who are not familiar with our traditions of personal anonymity at the public level. Our public relations policy is based on attraction rather than promotion.
We always maintain personal anonymity at the level of press, radio, and films. Thus, we respectfully ask that no AA member or that no AA speaker be identified by full name or photograph in published or broadcast reports of our meetings. The assurance of anonymity is essential in our effort to help other problem drinkers who may wish to share our recovery program with us. Our tradition of anonymity reminds us that AA principles come before personalities.
Also, just an announcement, tapes of this meeting will be available at the tape sales booth in the Convention Center. Today we have three speakers on the topic of how it works. And I'd like to say that I belong to the West End Group in St. John's, Newfoundland. It's certainly been a privilege and an honor. Thank you. A privilege and an honor to be able to chair this meeting here today. As you can probably tell, I am quite nervous.
And I've been nervous before and had the shakes before. But thank God I found you people in this wonderful program of AA. Since the 19th of February, 1975, I have not taken a drink thanks to this program. I'd like to say that this program does work because when I came here I was a hopeless drunk. As I said, I'm your chairman this morning. We do have three speakers. Would you please help me introduce Ralph G.
My name is Ralph and I'm an alcoholic. Grateful to God and AA for my sobriety today. I went to a meeting to hear a friend speak this morning. And afterwards I went to one of my favorite places, the meditation. And while I was sitting there, I thought of one of the things that I might like to tell you about if I can remember to do it. And as I was thinking about it, I thought your problem was you thought you knew something.
You thought you didn't know something you knew. And then I said to myself, Ralph, your real problem is you said as soon as you thought that, I know I don't know what I thought I knew. And then I said, in reality you really know what you thought you didn't know. And then I thought, anybody who thinks that way doesn't have to be drinking to be in a lot of trouble. I don't know either. I'm sure that we've all talked at one time or another about those unknown fears, about all those feelings.
And our subject today is how it works. And I'd like to tell you right now that the day I don't have, I can stand here right in front of you and tell you I don't have any fear. Unmitigated terror, yes. We have some fairly large meetings in Southern California, but it's truly an honor and I don't really feel worthy to be speaking to you today.
[00:05:05]
But I'm grateful for the opportunity nevertheless. I just love it here in Montreal, but being from my area, I've had to get used to certain things. I'm not used to seeing water and rivers. People walk around in the streets here at night. It's hard to believe. I'd like to talk a little bit about how it worked in the beginning for me and how it worked and has been working more recently. But I think I have to start by telling you that I had two strikes against me when I started out.
The first is that I have an unmitigated thirst. I was born thirsty. And the second is that I have seemed to lead my whole life, drunk and sober, with the motto that I'd never intended, which is anything worth doing is worth overdoing. And I've done that in just about every area of my life. So booze was no different. The only thing is that for me in the beginning, booze was an answer. I never really thought of it that way.
But that's the way I treated it, and that's the way I wanted to believe that it was. Once I got sober, I could see that very early in my drinking, I was already in trouble. But while I was drinking, I didn't want to believe that. And I didn't believe it. And I have a rather dull drunk-a-log and won't spend much time on it, but I did have a rather unusual situation. Because you see, not only do I have a drinking problem, but I had a wife who used to drink an awful lot.
And we'd have this thing going. I mean, we had a deal that you couldn't beat. I'm sure there are a few people in here that have heard of Al-Anon. And I'd come home and I'd be sick and hungover. And all I wanted really was a little hair of the dog and some dinner, and I wanted to then hit the couch and rest up for bed. And I'd get home, and that woman had been home from work for an hour already. And she was sitting there with a water glass.
You've heard about the martinis, but she'd take a water glass of bourbon and say, water over it. That was her bourbon and water. And I couldn't believe how drunk that woman was, and she'd say she only had one drink. And I'd give her hell. I really would. And then I'd get better, and the next night I'd come home, and I'd had a tough day. And she'd be cooking and feeling hungover and sick and trying to get dinner for the family.
And she'd say, let's eat, dear. And I'd say, no, I think I'd like to have a couple martinis before dinner. And can you believe that woman would just turn on me? She'd just give me what for, up one side and down the other. Because she knew I was a Dr. Pepper drinker. She didn't know if I was going to quit at ten, two, or four. And I didn't either. Because every night I'd say, I'm just going to have one or two.
Just going to have one or two. And you know, it wasn't the big things in my drinking. I think one of the nights that I remember most was a night when my two boys, who must have been around twelve and ten at that time, and I'd had one or two martinis, and they came up to me. And I had the booze out on the kitchen sink.
[00:10:03]
And they stood between me and the bottles, and they said, Dad, please don't have any more. And I guess I came as close to being honest that night as I possibly could. Because I had to look down at the tops of my shoes. I couldn't look them in the eye. And I said, leave me alone. I'm sick. And that was as close as I could get to wanting to be honest. And I had a friend that I drank an awful lot with, too. His name was Dave.
And Dave and I would meet and drink lunch at least once a week. We've been having the lunch part for over twenty-five years now. And one day a terrible thing happened. Dave picked me up for lunch, and he said, Ralph, I'm not going to drink with you today. And I said, why not, Dave? And he said, well, Ralph, I've joined Alcoholics Anonymous. And I told him the only thing I could tell him. I said, Dave, you're not an alcoholic. You drink just the same way I do.
But Dave explained to me that when we quit our drinking together, he'd go home and keep on drinking. And I thought, my God, we do drink the same way. And I never have claimed to understand women. One night I came home, and I did something unusual. I got drunk and decided I'd take my boys out bowling on a school night. And my wife got upset about it. And the next day, unbeknownst to me, in fact, that evening, she called Dave, and he wasn't home, and she left a message, and he called back the next day.
And she said, our drinking is out of control, and I can't do anything about him, but I can do something about me. And I'm not here to tell her story. But she joined Alcoholics Anonymous. And I was filled with resentment. She hadn't discussed it with me first. But I wasn't about to let that guy take my wife to a meeting. I mean, he was my best friend. And I knew that he was taking his wife with him.
But that didn't make any difference, so I went along. And our subject is how it works, and I'm here to tell you that it didn't work very well for me that night. The speaker was a guy, I can break his anonymity now, he passed, left us about a year ago. His name was Norm Alpin. He was one of the finest speakers in our Southern California area. And he was the speaker at that meeting that night. Norm was not only funny, but you had to listen very fast.
And they read Chapter 5, and they read the 12 Traditions, and I got not one thing out of that meeting. Not a single thing. Maybe if I hadn't sat out in the car, I don't know. Thank you. You know, for the benefit of those who may not be sober too long, I've been to other meetings, I'm sorry to say, where my body's been in the meeting, and my mind has been sitting out in the car. And when that happens, I don't get any more out of it today than I did then.
I have to not only bring the body, I have to bring the ears and the mind. I have to be willing. And it works that way for me today, just the same way that it did then. When I was first sober, I went to a men's stag, and there was a guy I'll never forget. He always sat in the same seat. It was on the left-hand side. It was right at the front, right at the corner of the tables that were in the U. And I came to that meeting.
And I came to that meeting, and I knew two things about those guys in that men's stag.
[00:15:04]
The first is that I wanted what they had, and the second was that they were nuts. Because, you see, I came to that meeting, and I said, our marriage is in shambles. It's not that we fight, we don't even care anymore, it's just gone totally down the tubes. And I don't know what to do. And a couple of guys at Cher, and then Frank raised his hand, and Frank said, we're not marriage counselors. But if you don't take the first drink, son, you won't get drunk.
And a couple of weeks later, I came back. And I said, I managed to con a bank into loaning me a couple thousand extra every year, and now I owe them $30,000. And now that I'm sober, I've taken an honest look at my business, and it's worth about five. And I don't know what I'm going to do. And a couple of guys shared, and then Frank raised his hand. And he said, we're not financial counselors. But if you don't take the first drink, son, you won't get drunk.
And the reason I knew those guys were nuts was because at the end of the meeting, they'd say, keep coming back. All the answers are here. You know what? They really are. They were in here. And I had to find them. And it was with your help that that was possible. And I had to find them. And I had to find them. And I had to find them. And I had to find them. And I had to find them. And it was with your help that that was possible.
I said I'd like to share something that happened to me recently, and I'd like to take… I don't know how long it's going to take, so I've never said this before. But I'd like to tell you about it. I'd like to share it with you. About two months, maybe a little more ago, we have a little question and answer meeting on Wednesday nights in Thousand Oaks. And for those of you who may not know the format of a meeting like that, in Southern California we do all this reading, I'm sure you've heard, and our meetings are an hour and a half.
And during that period and during the coffee break, we put questions in a basket. So especially newcomers can put them in anonymously and get answers. And one night there was a question asked, and I didn't try to answer it. Because something inside of me told me that I didn't know the answer. And the question was really a pretty simple one. The question was, what do I O-A-A? What do I O-A-A? And I don't remember exactly the responses that people gave who did respond.
But I do know that they started out by saying, I owe my life. And I know that I would have said, and I'm sure they said, my sobriety. And they talked about their peace. And they talked about learning how to live. But somehow it seemed to me that this was what we owed A-A for, not what we owed A-A. And so that question came popping back into my mind for weeks afterwards. And first I started to think about what might I O-A-A.
And then I came to a realization. And the realization was this, that I was thinking materially. That I was thinking in the same terms that the people out there sometimes operate on. I did this for you, now you do this for me. And I realized that that isn't the way I had received anything in A-A. That it had been given freely to me. And that I was expected to give it freely to you and to others. And I thought to myself, on a spiritual basis, and this was my second conclusion, which was also wrong, I think,
[00:20:01]
on a spiritual basis I don't O-A-A anything. Because if I am working this program and if I understand this program, I will do these things because that is what I have learned to do. That if I want what you have, I had to learn to do what you did. And that I would do them freely. And that I could not afford to say I O-ed. Because if I did, I would be putting Ralph up at the top of the heap again. And so I began to think in terms that maybe I did O.
In terms that maybe I did O. But it was better that I thought that I didn't. And I thought it lived with that for a week or two. And it kind of came around to the point where I said, that's nonsense. I know I O-A-A. How can I say I don't O-ed anything? And then I came to the realization of what I think is the true spiritual answer for me at least. And that is that I O-A-A the same things that I O-Ralph.
I owe it the willingness to love you, to love my God, and to love me. To love myself. And more than anything, I O-A-A and me. Gratefulness. Gratefulness. Gratitude to me is not simply something I say. It is an emotion that impels me to want to do. And if I say I'm grateful and then turn down an A-A request, I'm simply being a hypocrite, as I was when I drank. And so I have wanted to serve. And I have had the pleasure of seeing many, many others who have wanted to serve.
And I've found in having the opportunity to do that, that one of the biggest problems that I ran into, that I had to face, was the fact that I had to put principles before personalities when I was the personality. When what I wanted and what might make me personally popular were different from what I saw as what I needed to do. And so I have tried to be true to those principles as best I might. I'm not always right and never have been.
But I think that in doing that and respecting you when you do it, that we keep A-A strong. Because we're all here for one purpose and one purpose only. And that is to carry the message to the still-suffering alcoholic, whether he be a guy out there that's still drinking or one of us in this room today. Because after almost 14 years now, there are many days when I'm still one of the still-suffering alcoholics.
And I've found that you are too. But I think that what you have given me, what Dave began in my life, because Dave is now my sponsor and has been for all my period of sobriety, what he has given me, what you have given me, has led to a type of gratitude that I cannot express, that I will never be able to repay. Because every time I try, more comes back than I'm able to give.
[00:25:07]
I truly am grateful to be with you and have been grateful to have this opportunity to share with you. I love you very much. Thank you. Thank you very much, Ralph, for a beautiful message, the words of wisdom. It's a nice question to ask. What do I owe AA? Each and every one of us. I guess, like Ralph said, we do owe our lives, our sobriety. And it's only people like you and meetings like this that make this thing possible.
Our next speaker this morning, or this afternoon, I would like for you to help me join and ask Skip B. from Michigan to come forward. Thank you. Hi, everyone. I'm Skip Butterfield, and I am an alcoholic. And if I stay sober until this October, I will reach 20 years of sobriety. Thank you. It is, the man before me said, how it works is the big book. At first, I didn't like what, when I heard how it works read, because I didn't believe.
I didn't believe I was worth sobering up. I didn't believe it was possible for me to sober up when I got here. I thought I was too bad. And I heard a speaker talk, and then I knew there was a chance that I could sober up. And one of the things she talked on that night was how it worked. One of the things she talked on that night was how it worked. I had drank to the point when I got here, I had drank to the point where I couldn't stay sober one day.
And I had been on antabuse, and I couldn't stay sober for the first day to get back on my antabuse. And I knew that I would have to drink to the day I died. And I knew that I would have to drink to the day I died. And then they come along and they showed me that I didn't have to. It was not because I asked for the program. It's because I accidentally stopped into my cousin's house, and his father-in-law came in and had been sober for six whole weeks in AA.
And I have no idea what I asked him. But the next day I found myself in an AA meeting. I drank that night and the next day, and the following day I didn't have to drink, and I haven't had to drink since. I found that it takes a lot of hard work on the beginning. And then as I stayed sober, then I wanted this hard work to stay sober, because the things I was getting out of it. The first year I was in the program, I didn't miss a day of going to a meeting.
Because the old-timers in the program, I was very fortunate. When I came to the program, there was a lot of 10, 15-year people in there. And to me, that was a lifetime. And I listened to what them people said. And they told me, they said, Skip, if you go to a meeting every day and be honest, there's a guarantee you can stay sober. And I knew then they were crazy. Because I knew it was, because many, many times I had been sober for a period of time.
And then somebody would offer me a drink and it wouldn't take me but a minute to convince myself that I deserved it. And I thought this would happen again. But they showed me that it didn't have to if I didn't want it to. The 12 and 12 in the big book is, if I follow that the way that I understand it, and every time I go into it, I understand it different. Because as we grow, as I grow, I can understand it a little different, and I can get more out of it, and I can get more peace of mind.
And today, I'm happy to be sober. Today, I'm happy to be sober. When I got here, I used to tell them, uh, yeah, I'm glad I'm here today. I'm glad I'm sober, and I was lying like mad because I wasn't glad. I wanted a drink. I thought I needed it. But today, I can honestly say that I do not have a desire to drink. I have a thinking problem today that can think me back into a drink if I stay away from AA.
[00:30:23]
So I have to continuously, if I want to be happy and serene, I have to be to my AA meetings. This is, to me, what it, I have to do. And, uh, I owe AA my whole life. I owe AA, when AA asks me to do something, don't say, no, I can't do it, or no, I don't want to do it, no, I'm going someplace. I don't do that. I try. I don't always say I do everything they ask me because some things that I feel I'm not qualified to do, I will not do.
But if I'm possibly thinking I can possibly do it and not jeopardize myself in fear, I have great fears when I'm asked to do something. Am I going to do it good enough? And I was asked when I first came into the program to get into service, and that's been one of the biggest blessings to me, is the service of the program. And I'm still active in service. I'm still active in my meetings. And I feel that I owe AA the fact that I be to the meeting not only for myself, but for the support for the new man that comes in the door.
Because if there had been nobody in that first meeting that I went to, I would have gotten nothing out of it. Even though I was half in the bag when I got there, there was a lot of people there, and them people cared because for the first time in a long, long time, people had said, come on back, Skip, this is where it's at. Man, them people's crazy. Ain't nobody asked me to come back after I've been there once or twice. They don't ask me to come back. But these people shook my hand and said, come on back. And the first thing I thought of was, what do they want? I ain't got nothing.
And I had drank everything up. They didn't want anything. They wanted me to get sober. They wanted to share what they had found with me, and that's what I want to do today. I want to share what I found with the other people. And this is, for me, how it works, is continuously coming back and sharing with the new people, the people that's been around. What if they're new, young, or old? We can all share with one another, or I can all share with one another, and I can receive something.
I don't care if they've been in the program two days or 20 years. I can receive something from each and every one. Maybe not today, I won't. Maybe tomorrow, I will. And I found out that a lot of times that I've heard things and I didn't think that I could use them. But the time come in the right spot, I remembered back what I had heard, and I was able to use that and get out of that spot. I'm real grateful to have been asked if I was coming to the conference, and I told the delegate that I was, he said, would you be willing to have your name put in and see if you could be drawn for the speaker?
I said I would, and I went home and I told my friend over here, I told her, I said, I had a real honor. I was asked if I came to the, if they could put my name in. And then a little while later, come along, and I got a letter telling me I would be up here today. And this is the biggest honor, and this is worth all the time of being sober and all the problems I've had in my sobriety, to be able to come here and share with you people what it has done for me.
It has changed my life completely around, and for that, I'm grateful, and I'm grateful for you people, and it has been a pleasure being here and sharing with you. Thank you.
[00:35:18]
Thank you very much, Skip. In Skip's talk, he mentioned a key word that suddenly touches my heart, and that's the word service. Because for a long, long while, I came to AA meetings and I couldn't get sober. I mentioned in the beginning that I've been sober since 1975, but I failed to say that I was around AA for about five years prior to that, coming in and out and in and out. And for today, I'm very grateful that the doors of AA swings both ways. Each time I came back, no one questioned me as to why I went out. The handshake was always there.
And finally, in 1975, it was suggested to me to join a group and to get a sponsor. I can honestly say that it turned around my life. It helped me immensely. As I got sober a little while longer, it was suggested I get involved. Help out. And as our first speaker, Ralph, pointed out, if you're asked to do something, do it. I got involved helping out in the prisons. And I saw, in this past nine or ten years, so many people getting out of those prisons and becoming useful citizens, members of society again, getting back in the workforce, getting reunited with their families, all because of a little thing that I took part in.
I got involved at the group level as a GSR. I just wanted to go on and on and on, but then I read in the pamphlet that a group should rotate. And again, as Ralph said, we all want to stay here, and I hated to give it up. It was quite an honor for me to represent my group at a district meeting. And anyway, I went on and on until finally, this April, I represented Area 82 to delegate to the conference in New York.
That was quite a thrill, an opportunity to be there and see how AA works at that level. I'd like for you now, please, to help me welcome our third speaker, Kathy T. from Missouri. My name is Kathy, and I'm an alcoholic. You know, the person that submitted my name to make this speech, to my knowledge, has never heard me talk, so you have some idea. After I told him I would, I got this letter from New York, and it said that I was to speak on how it works. And I thought, well, that's easy. All I have to do is say, just fine, and sit down, you know.
Then I read farther down, and it said 20 to 25 minutes, and I thought, oh, Lord, I'll never do that. I can talk all day, but not in front of a group of people. Skip was talking about his sobriety, and Dave mentioned his, and so I guess maybe I ought to tell mine, although, you know, when I first came in, I knew this woman, they had seven years of sobriety at that time, and I thought, oh, wouldn't it be wonderful to have seven years of sobriety.
And then they said, it takes what it takes for us to get here. And then I thought, well, in order for me to have seven years of sobriety, then, I'd have to be seven years older, and I can't stand that, you know, so. I came in in 76, and to us from the States, the year 76 means quite a bit, and it sure made a big difference in my life, and I'm very glad of it. And on the 4th of July, well, we always celebrate our independence from England. If England remembers they ever had us, I doubt it. They probably said good riddance, and I can remember, we had a big celebration in St. Louis, you know.
[00:40:20]
I don't know if you know where St. Louis is. You go south for a few thousand miles, and then turn to your right, see. But I was down, I went down on the riverfront, that's the Mississippi River. That's the big father of water, you know. And I had already started celebrating, and they have these cobblestones down there, and I couldn't walk very good on even ground, you know, and I fell. And this friend of mine that was with me helped me up, and she said, do you think you might have a drinking problem? And I said, well, it sort of looks like it, doesn't it? And I hated her.
And I'd like to say that I came into AA the next day, but I didn't. The Chinese have a saying, I'm told, that says the beginning of wisdom is to learn to call things by their right name. And when I say I'm Kathy and I'm an alcoholic, that's it. So maybe I'm beginning to get a little wisdom. I think that I'm one of these people that I didn't really have to work at being an alcoholic. I think I was born one.
My great-great-grandfather got his start in Missouri by bringing whiskey down from Kentucky on a barge down the Ohio River and the Mississippi River, and he set up a store in the southern part of Missouri. So alcohol has played a prominent part in my family for many, many years. My father was an alcoholic. My mother was an alcoholic. My brother was an alcoholic, and then I came along. Not in that order, only in that order of getting sobriety. I don't know just when my father came into AA. He was living in Memphis. He and my mother had been separated for many years.
He was in Memphis and I lived in St. Louis, and the only thing I knew about AA was that you didn't drink for one day at a time, and they had a clubhouse in Memphis where he could go and play cards all night if he wanted to with other people that weren't drinking. Then in 1958, my brother came into AA, and he lived in Dallas, and that was great because, boy, he needed it, you know. But I didn't have a problem. I could quit any time I wanted to. I just didn't want to.
And I always, there towards the end, I always got a little amazed at how much I drank. I mean, that amazed me. You know, I think I'd buy a week's supply and here it was Election Day on a Tuesday and I'm out, you know. And it's hell being out on Election Day. I went to the store one night and they start selling booze after they close the election booths, and that's supposed to be at 7 o'clock. 7 o'clock came, they didn't start selling booze, and I'm pacing the aisles, you know.
Well, it turned out that this store had election facilities there, and they said, well, we're not going to start selling alcohol until after they finish counting the ballots. So I had to go to another store, you know. When I was drinking, I said I didn't care who knew that I drank. You know, what I did was my business. But I always went to all these different stores. But I always went to all these different stores, never the same two in a row, you know, because I didn't care who knew, you know.
[00:45:05]
I'd like to say that I came into AA willingly, gladly, with open arms, but I didn't. I came to one night in a car, I had a son on each side of me, and I said, where are we going? And he said, Mom, we're taking you to the hospital. I said, I don't need to go to the hospital, there's nothing wrong with me. And my son said, and while I was there I learned about Alcoholic Anonymous, more than just you didn't drink for one day.
I was introduced to meetings, and thank God I've been going ever since. The strange thing about being in the hospital is that my counselor there was in charge of a program, a seminar they were having for doctors and nurses on alcoholism. And she had to make all these posters to put around the hospital to advertise the thing. And so she had to make all these posters to put around the hospital to advertise the thing.
And so she had to make all these posters to put around the hospital to advertise the thing. And so she put me to work helping her. I could not spell the word alcoholic or alcoholism. Every time I'd make a new poster I'd have to look at the one previous to that to see how to spell the word. Say nothing admitting that I are one, you know. The treatment center I went to at that time did not give you copies of the big book.
I mean a lot of them later gave, charged you for them of course, but you got a copy of the big book when you left there. We had one in the room, and there were two people in this room. And I wouldn't touch that book. I didn't read the Gideon Bible, I still don't when I'm in a hotel room, you know. But when I got out of the treatment center I thought, well what am I going to do, you know. So I thought, well maybe I'll go get my hair fixed.
So, well if you go to a beauty parlor you're supposed to have something to read. And the only thing I could find to read was this copy of the big book that somebody had shoved up on me. So I took it with me, of course it took the cover off of it. So when I'm paying at the beauty parlor this woman says, what are you reading? And I'm thinking, what am I going to tell her, you know. And she reaches over and grabs this book out from under my arm.
And said, are you one of those? And I said, no. And then I said, yes, I guess I am. And to say it even now still gives me cold chills. Because I really believe that that was my moment of acceptance. And I've not had a compulsion to take a drink since then. So I think that along with the battle that we have to surrender to win, we have to accept this program. That is one of the main things that we have to do.
Then I feel like we should get a sponsor. And I was told a sponsor saves time. They keep running you around all the time, you know. Do this, do that. Or why didn't you? There's such a, it's a lifeline, you know. There's such a, it's a lifeline, you know. A sponsor is a lifeline. And I think it's so important. Then there's a telephone, you know. What would we do without the telephone? And I've often thought, you know, I don't think it was an accident that A.A. wasn't born until after the telephone was invented, you know.
Hello, Annie Clark. She told me she was coming, but this is the first time I've seen her. But, you know, I got a telephone call one time about 2 or 2.30 in the morning.
[00:50:04]
And this woman that was calling me was one of these people who was suffering from agoraphobia or something like that. And she was scared of her own shadow. And all of a sudden it dawned on me that she did not have a telephone. And I said, where are you calling from? And she'd gone down into the basement of this apartment house where she lived at 2 o'clock in the morning to use the telephone. And I thought, if she's done that, she's desperate, you know.
And I've never, ever had a call in the middle of the night that I wasn't able to go back to sleep, you know. Sometimes they talk too long, and so I just say, well, you had them call me and get me up in the morning and go to work. And so, some way it works. I'm not too swift the next day, but then I'm not anyway, you know. You know, I know a man who just passed away recently. He was in his middle thirties, maybe a little older.
He came in the program, and he didn't know how to read. And I don't, I probably, we couldn't count everybody in this room. We couldn't count all the people that this man had helped in the program. He was called George the Indian. And George believed in the Bible. And George believed in the Bible. And George believed in the basics. If it wasn't in the big book, or if it wasn't in 12 and 12, forget it, you know.
Because that's where it all was. And George tells how when he came in the program, his sponsor gave him a copy of how it works, you know, the plastic deal that they have at their meetings. And he said, when you get to a meeting, you follow this word for word as they're reading it. And George would get mad and tear it up, throw it away, and his sponsor would give him another one. George would get mad and throw that away, and his sponsor would give him another one, but he finally learned to read it.
And then he learned to read the big book. And then he learned to read the big book. So I think that when we keep our program right down to the basics, we don't need to fill it up, we don't need to complicate it. Because Lord, if there's a way, we'll do it. We have our literature, we have our tapes. I was at a meeting just the other night. This man says, I can't read. He said, I can't read a word. He says, but I've worn out four tapes on the big book.
He said, it's so great. He said, just to sit down in my easy chair and play those tapes and listen to it. And he probably knows more about the big book than most of us in this room today. So we don't have to know how to read. They say the language is of the heart anyway. And then they were talking about service work. I went to this meeting. And the guy says, they're having a GSR meeting Tuesday night. Be there.
I didn't know what it was. After I left there, I didn't know what it was. What a place, you know. Lord, I really must have wanted the program because this facility where it was at was bad enough, but they had it in the basement. And the basement was, over this was the saloon. You know, where else are you going to have AA functions? And even the wood, the floor was permeated with beer, you know, stale beer is all you could smell.
And cold. I didn't take my coat or my gloves off. And I couldn't figure out whether my rear end was colder or my feet were colder, you know. I didn't learn what a GSR was that night.
[00:55:00]
You know, I hear people say that they were elected to be GSRs, you know. I was elected. I was told to go there. But it did me good. It helped me. And I found out what service meant, the third legacy. Where would I be without it? I had a man this morning, you know. It still surprises me. I've been here a couple days now and anybody says, Kathy! Oh, somebody I know and there's no one I've ever seen before, you know.
Probably from Newfoundland or someplace, you know. And I've never been there. And so we talked for a few minutes and before he left, he said, has anyone told you today they love you? And I said, no. He said, well, I have now. And it reminded me, I went to this area assembly. Very annoyed with the chairman. Very annoyed. You know, I think one of the reasons God put me in AA was to straighten out this assembly.
I've been working on it. But this was about her third assembly of chairing, you know. And she hadn't started the meeting yet on time. And I made up my mind on the way up there that I was going to tell her about it. When it came GSR time, I was going to mention this. Damn it, she didn't start the meeting on time. So I wasn't going to be outdone, you know. So when it came my turn to say something, I congratulated her on starting the meeting on time.
And when we had a break, she came up to me and she said, Kathy, has anybody told you today they love you? I had to say no. And she said, well, I do. And I'm telling you now. So on the way home, I told those three men I'd ridden up there with the next time that they better tell me they love me, whether they meant it or not. It feels better that way. There was some other thing here I had down, but I don't even know where my notes are. Here they are.
I don't know how I could even begin to think of missing this one. How it works. It wouldn't work at all if we didn't have a higher power. Just would not work at all. And I guess I was in the program about three years when I heard this speaker. He had found his way down to Missouri from Nebraska. And he told about how he had been in the program for a few years and he still didn't have what he felt the other people had.
He didn't feel like he felt the way they looked. And so he kept asking. And they told him that these people that he thought had what he wanted all said that they got down on their knees to pray. And he told how his life had changed since he had done this. So I thought, well, if he can get on his knees, I can too. So I do. I get down on my knees in the morning. And I ask for sobriety. And at night I thank him.
On my knees. And if I don't do this now, I have a peculiar feeling about the whole thing, you know. I have a peculiar feeling about the whole thing, you know. And all I know is it works. It really works. It, um… Also, the slogans. Also the slogans, you know, I think the slogans are a big help. I bought one, I bought a bumper sticker one time, you know, and it said,
[01:00:02]
This too shall pass. Damn, I thought, I better not put that on my car, you know. I'm always being ridiculed for the way I drive anyway. I got a speeding ticket on the way home from a meeting one night, you know, and I was very annoyed with this. You know, I thought, here I've been trying to do what I'm supposed to do, I've been to an AA meeting, I took a couple people with me, took them home, I'm doing all these good things and here I get a speeding ticket, you know.
Then finally I thought, the reason you got that speeding ticket was because you were going over the speed limit. So, that sort of changed it a little bit, you know. I didn't feel like he was out to get me that night. God, that is. I got another bumper sticker, I have it on my car now. It says powerless and I like that. The other day we were having a luncheon for a co-worker and a couple of the men I worked with were riding in my car and they said, what's this powerless?
And I said, well, don't have power steering, don't have power brakes. But on the way up here, we drove up from Missouri. That's how I know you go south and turn right. And we kept watching for easy does it signs, you know, we liked that. We wanted to yell. I don't know why we didn't have a big piece of cardboard with Montreal on it so when we saw one, we could hold it up and let everybody know where we were going in case they weren't coming the same way.
But this program has meant so much to me. I've always been one of these people that flew off the handle and told everybody what I thought of them. Always took great pride in telling people what I thought of them, whether they liked it or not. Or even if they deserved it, you know. But I've calmed down a lot since then. I don't know, you know, even a lot of my workers have improved since I stopped drinking.
And this one gal that works with me, she had a CLC sign on her desk. And I said, what in the world is CLC? And she said, calm like Kathy. And I went back to my desk and I sat there and thought, a year ago nobody would have ever said that. You know, because one of my main jobs in this world was straightening everybody out. It was a lot of work. Never got any place, but I tried. So that's what the program has done for me.
That once in a while I have calm moments. And one of the things that I found out is it just ain't no big deal anymore other than coming to Montreal. It's a big deal and I love it. There's one prayer that I say every day that I like to read before I close. I always think I know it by heart, but I always get mixed up on where this line fits into that line. So I'm going to read it. Lord, make me an instrument of Thy peace.
Where there is hatred, let me sow love. Where there is doubt, faith. Where there is despair, hope. Where there is darkness, light.
[01:05:02]
And where there is sadness, joy. O Divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console. To understand as to be understood. To be loved as to love. For it is in giving that we receive. It is in pardoning that we are pardoned. And it is in dying that we are born to eternal life. Thank you. Applause Thank you very much, Cathy. C-L-C. I like that. Calm like Cathy. Well, I guess C-L-C, or C-L at least, fits a lot of us people.
Because I know when I came to A&M for a long, long while after I got sober, I was very, very short on tolerance. I'd fly off the handle at the least little thing. I thank God for the longtime member in our area, in my home group, because every time he was asked to speak at a discussion meeting or an open meeting, he'd always talk about his tolerance and how he cured it or helped solve it. So after a few years, I decided I had enough my old ways of flying off the handle and fighting with everybody.
So I decided to pay Johnny a visit. I dropped by his coffee shop. And I asked Johnny, I said, Johnny, how do you control your temper? Now you seem so calm. And he said, it's not easy. It's something that didn't come overnight. He said, try biting your tongue. So for a long, long time after, every day, many, many times a day, I was going around biting my tongue. And after a while, it gets pretty sore.
And I recall not days, but weeks, possibly months, and even a couple of years after, going to district meetings or assembly meetings, myself and Johnny stand up toe to toe. That's how bad my tolerance had gotten. But eventually, you know, I got the message. I guess my tongue couldn't take any more. And I don't think I can use those three letters, C-L-D. But I certainly have changed. I have calmed down quite a bit.
I don't lose my patience as often. You know, I try to say the surrender prayer many, many times. I think my worst area of now is shouting or bawling, whatever. It's my driving. You know, so many people make so many mistakes. I don't. But I'm sure in time I'll get over that too. We've come to the end of our meeting. I'd like to thank our three speakers. Ralph, Skip, and Kathy. I'd like for all of you, once again, on my behalf and our behalf, show a little appreciation to the three speakers.
Applause Thank you. I remember last September, I was to a regional forum in Sault Ste. Marie. It was around that time the registration forms came out for the big party. You know, and boy, it is a big party. You know, I knew it was going to be a lot of people, but no way could I envision what I've witnessed so far. I met a lot of old friends. I met a lot of new friends. And actually we're only starting now.
Myself and my wife and some friends of mine, we flew up here Wednesday morning. And finally we can get a little bit of rest by coming to a meeting and sitting down. But I guess like each and every one of you people, I'm looking forward to the big meeting tonight on Sunday morning.
[01:10:03]
This is going to be quite a sight to see 45,000 or 50,000 people. And here's some sharing. I ask all of you now, please, to stand and join with me in the Lord's Prayer. Let's close this meeting. I ask you all, please, to join hands. Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us.
And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. For thine is the kingdom, the power, and the glory, forever and ever. Amen. Hi, Dan. How are you doing, Dennis? All right. Did I miss something? You said there's a big meeting tonight also? Tonight? At the Olympic Park? Hi. Tonight at the Olympic Park? Yeah. It's the opening meeting. Hi. Oh, wow. Because I didn't even see that in the literature at all.
Oh, yeah. It's here. Hi, how are you doing? Great job. Thank you. I got a good friend in Prince Rupert from Newfoundland. He's sobered up in Newfoundland. Who's this? What's his name? His name is Leo. Leo Hines. He's sobered up 10 or 12 years ago. Oh, all right. Leo Hines. Yeah. Crazy Leo. I don't like crazy Leo. Yeah, he used to drive a motorcycle. Yeah, I know him. He just gave me his motorcycle.
I just bought a motorcycle. I was down at his house visiting him the other night. Is that right? Yeah. You're on.