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Source: 1985 Montreal International Convention – Unknown Speaker – BIG BOOK MARATHON – RS 06326.mp3 File: 1985-montreal-international-convention-unknown-speaker-big-book-marathon-rs-06326.mp3 Duration: 01:26:54
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Would you join me in a moment of silence. During this silence, would we take a little time to remember the people that have gone before us during this 50 years of the history of our program that have helped make it possible for our program to still be here when we came. God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.
I am a member of the fellowship of Alcoholics Anonymous, and because I have been willing through the 12 steps of this program to seek the God of my understanding, it hadn't been necessary for me to take a drink today, and I can guarantee you that that is a real miracle in my life. I would like to read you our preamble. Alcoholics Anonymous is a fellowship of men and women who share their experience, strength, and hope with each other that they may solve their common problem and help others to recover from alcoholism. The only requirement for membership is a desire to stop drinking. There are no dues or fees for AA membership. We are self-supporting for our own contributions.
AA is not allied with any sect, denomination, politics, organization, or institution, does not wish to engage in any controversy, neither endorses nor opposes any causes. Our primary purpose is to stay sober and help other alcoholics to achieve sobriety. For those of you who are not familiar with our tradition of anonymity, I would like to read it for you. There may be someone here who is not familiar with our tradition of personal anonymity at the public level. Our public relations policy is based on attraction rather than promotion. We need always maintain personal anonymity at the level of press, radio, TV, and films.
Thus, we respectfully ask that no AA speaker, or indeed any AA member, 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, and our tradition of anonymity reminds us that AA principles come before personalities. How many of you were out at the stadium last night? I have never, ever experienced anything like that before in my entire life. I have had the privilege of going in a lot of stadiums as a player and as a coach.
I sat there last night and a feeling just boiled up inside of me. I told Tony this morning, I said, you know, Tony, I believe we now have a fifth dimension, because it was just beyond anything. I'm not even going to try to take the time to explain it to you. We don't have it, and I couldn't do it anyway. The words are not within me. But it was just beautiful to hear the people that remarked and to be able to really have a deep, sincere, and grateful feeling for the people that have gone before and kept this program alive for 50 years with over a million people. It's just beyond anything that I could ever, ever have imagined or anyone else could have ever imagined 50 years ago.
This morning I have a real privilege of opening this program and introducing you to the lady that's going to talk to you this morning about something that's a very favorite subject of many of us. She's going to talk to you about our big book. I'm not going to tell you what she's going to say, but I do want to give you a little bit of a gist of the direction that she'll talk. I love the program of Alcoholics Anonymous today, and maybe in the next program that I have the privilege of talking, I'll say a little bit about the fact that I wasn't at our last international convention, and it was only, hell, 75 miles from where I live.
I was in the program of AA. I used the word in kind of lightly. I was hanging around it. But the meetings are great, and I love to go to meetings, and the conferences are just tremendous. I love conferences, and I love the dances and the bingos and the parties and the barbecues. I love all those things that we have, and the fellowship is just tremendous.
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But the one thing that we better not ever forget, and thank God they said a great deal about it out there last night when they talked about, you know, let us not forget from where we came. And, you know, the two guys that started this program sobered up, and they sobered up in a very definite manner with a very definite set of tools. And I wonder, you know, many times, you know, I didn't learn to sober up with those tools, and I didn't sober up. That's why I wasn't in New Orleans five years ago.
And I came back. I came back to this program, and I sobered up with those tools because of the big book studies that we have and Joe and Charlie. And because of those tools, I'm able to be here and share this tremendous recovery experience with you this weekend. And I want to introduce you to a lady that's going to tell you a whole lot more about that, and that's Ruth. And Ruth is from—let me say it one more time, Ruth. I can't say all these difficult words up here. Penitanguishing. And if you can't say that, just say penitang. Ruth K.
Thank you, Dan. I don't know about the rest of you, but I'm still on a high from last night. I thought the well was run dry, but there just may be a few drops left in it this morning. So I hope and pray that you'll bear with me through this. It has been my sincere prayer since I first received the phone call asking if I would do this that God have it in his plan for me to be worthy of the honor and the privilege of being asked to try and convey to you something about our beautiful big book.
And as I look back over my sobriety, I cannot feel anything but a tremendous amount of gratitude. And I noticed the theme of this conference is 50 years of gratitude. Well, I can give it 50 years of gratitude because I was born seven years before Bill and Bob met. Everything that I am and everything that I have today, I owe to you people, to Alcoholics Anonymous, and most of all, God. My name is Ruth Kowalski, and I thank God that I am an alcoholic. Hi, everyone.
When I look back over the years of my sobriety, I cannot help but think of from whence we came, of the miracle, the miracle behind my sobriety, the miracle behind all of your sobriety, and the miracle of how this beautiful program was started. This is a God-given program, and it is spiritual 100%. I have no doubts in my mind about that fact at all. And when I think, as it was mentioned at the meeting last night, of the very beginnings of Bill's comments regarding the beginnings, and in A.A. Comes of Age, and Bill talks about Dr. Jung and how he feels that this is probably all due to him.
There was a man from New York who had a problem with booze, and his family sent him to Switzerland, and he came under the care of that well-known psychiatrist, Dr. Carl Jung, and that was in 1932, according to this book. The man came back to New York, and he got drunk, and he went back again to Dr. Jung, and Dr. Jung told him that he would have to have a spiritual change, or there would have to be a complete change in his thinking and in his being.
It was referred to as deflation at death. And then when Carl finally did have this spiritual change, or spiritual awakening, he came back to New York and associated himself with the Oxford groups. And it was there that he met an old friend of his, and I suppose a drinking buddy, since we all were drinking buddies at one time or another, by the name of Ebby T.
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And he told this same story to Ebby, and Ebby was sober for a while. And then he remembered a drinking buddy of his by the name of Bill W., and it wasn't until 1935, or 1934 rather, that Ebby came into contact with Bill. And when I think of that miraculous beginning, when I think of how Bill, with his two trips to the town's hospital and his meeting with Dr. Silkworth, and Dr. Silkworth finally telling him that he had an allergy of the body which manifested itself by the phenomenon of craving that occurs when you take the first drink, and by the obsession of the mind that ensures that you will take another one.
Now Bill, of course, knew the problem then when he was told what was wrong with him. I don't know about you, but for a long time I didn't know what was wrong with me. I thought I was the only person in the whole world who was the way I was. Until I came and you people told me that what was really wrong with me was that I had a disease, a disease called alcoholism, and that this disease manifested itself in a threefold manner, physically, mentally, and spiritually.
And believe me, my friends, when I tell you that when I came to you, I came to you a nothing, with nothing, and everything that I have in this world today I owe to you, to Alcoholics Anonymous and most of all God. Even though Bill knew what the problem was, he still went out and he drank again. And on his second trip to Towns Hospital, he was pronounced incurable and hopeless by Dr. Silkworth, and he overheard Dr. Silkworth telling this to his wife Lois, that beautiful lady that we saw on the podium last night.
But he still went out and drank again. And that was in November of 1934. Bill was sitting in his kitchen, drinking this one day, when a knock came on the door, and here it was, his old friend, Ebbie T. And this is perhaps the very first 12-step call in Alcoholics Anonymous. Ebbie told Bill about the need for a power greater than himself, which was needed to overcome the power of alcohol. And he was also told that all he needed was a willingness to try to believe that there was a power greater than himself.
Now Bill had the solution from Ebbie, from Roland, from Carl Jung. Bill also had the problem from Dr. Silkworth, the physical allergy and the mental obsession. And when Bill asked Ebbie what had happened to him, and Ebbie replied, I've got religion, Bill was quite shocked, and I'm sure each of us would have been just as shocked as Bill was at that. But Bill decided that his gin would last longer than his preaching.
Ebbie told Bill that if he could have this spiritual experience, he would be able to stop drinking. And Bill was interested, but then again, he still continued to drink, until he ended up in a state where he could no longer drink. He still continued to drink, until he ended up in Towns Hospital again. This time when Bill got sober after the treatment that Dr. Silkworth gave him, he cried out, if there is a God, will you please show yourself?
And it is written in our books that it was at that moment that Bill had his vital spiritual experience. at His Vital Spiritual Experience.
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Shortly after that, Ebi came to visit his friend again. And Bill at this point was ready. So he asked Ebi, just exactly, what did he have to do? And Ebi told Bill in the hospital that first of all he had to admit he was licked. Then he had to get honest with himself. Then he had to talk it out with somebody else. He had to make restitution to the people that he had harmed. And he told him that he would have to give of himself without stint and with no demand for reward.
And he also told him that he would have to pray to whatever God he thought there was, even as an experiment. Now Bill had the problem. He knew what the problem was. Ebi had told him the solution and had given him the planned program of recovery. Bill left town's hospital and as we know, he never did drink again. And Bill passed away, I believe, in 1971. So he did have a long term of sobriety. Bill realized, of course, that he would have to try and pass this on.
And he tried many, many times over and over again in New York City to try and talk to these drunks. And as I heard Joe on the tape say, he was pulling these drunks off barstools, telling them, you've got to find God, you've got to find God. And of course, they would look at him as if he had two heads and wonder why he was being so foolish. Bill realized that he wasn't having too much success. So he went back to Dr. Silkworth.
And Dr. Silkworth told him that maybe he was going about this in the wrong way. That maybe instead of dwelling on his spiritual experience, that he should talk about what the problem really was. He should talk about the obsession of the mind that preceded the allergy of the body. Right after that, Bill was involved in a business trip to Akron. And as Lois said last night, he had very little money in his pocket when he went.
And we all know the story of Bill in the Mayflower Hotel. And anyone who has ever visited Akron will see the Mayflower Hotel. And how Bill felt that he had to do something. He was on edge. And he looked at the bar and he heard the noise and the voices and it was enticing. But he knew that he couldn't take a drink. And somehow, and I choose to call this the direction of a power greater than ourselves, that of a loving God, he was directed to the church directory.
And after making several phone calls, he came across someone who gave him Henry Seiberling's phone number. Now when he called Henrietta, Henrietta was overjoyed. Because you see, Henrietta had been going to the Oxford groups in Akron. And she also knew a man and his wife by the name of Bob Smith and Ann. And this man, Bob, was a doctor. And he had a problem drinking. He had a terrible problem. And for a long time, the Oxford groups had been trying very hard to help him.
And they were praying that somehow Bob would find some help. So when Bill's call came, I presume it was somewhat like an answer to that prayer, to Henrietta. And Henrietta invited him over for that Saturday night. Now this was the night before Mother's Day. And apparently when she phoned Bob or Ann and asked if they could come over that evening, Ann apologized and said, no, they were sorry they couldn't, that Bob was potted under the table.
Because apparently he had come home with a potted mum for Mother's Day. So they made the appointment for the next day.
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Well, when Bob sobered up and he was told this good news by his wife, Ann, he decided that he would only give this person 15 minutes or so. But when the two men met, their meeting lasted for several hours. And Bill told him what the problem really was. He told him about the allergy of the body. And he told him about the obsession of the mind. And he identified. And Bob listened. And that in itself is a miracle.
Can you imagine a well-known surgeon listening to someone like Bill, Bill Wilson, who was a bit of an entrepreneur, knew nothing about the medical profession. And he listened. Because you see, now Bob had the problem. He knew what the solution was. And he also had the planned program of recovery. It also says in our book, and I think this is somewhat of a miracle too, and I also see the hand and direction of a very loving God.
It says in our book, when Ebby visited Bill, that he identified with him. And that perhaps even though Ebby told him the same things that Dr. Silkworth had told him, that he really listened when Ebby spoke. Because he was talking the same kind of language he was. And he was able to identify. And I believe that same hand was present in the meeting of our two founders, the identification and the miracle that works between you and between me.
Dr. Bob did get sober. And then sometime later, as our books tell us, he went to a medical convention. And although Ann was very much against it, it was Bill who said, no, he has to learn to live in a world where booze is present. Let him go. But Bob didn't come back from that medical convention on schedule. And one day they received a phone call from Bob's nurse to explain that Bob had an operation to do and that he was in pretty bad shape.
So they picked him up, and on the way to the hospital, Bill reached in behind and gave him a bottle of beer. And that was to become Dr. Bob's last drink. Because Bill said, here, take this, and you'll be all right. Now, Bob didn't come straight home from the hospital that day. So again, there was a great deal of concern. And Bill himself was really worried that perhaps he had triggered that allergy and that obsession by giving Bob that bottle of beer.
Bob finally did come home. And here, this man had been going all over town making amends. He was so overjoyed with that which he had just received. And it looks like Bob was probably the first person that worked at living all of the steps in one day. See, I have a sponsor, a late sponsor. When old Bill passed away three years ago, he had 38 years. And he told me that I don't just work the steps. I have to work at living the steps each and every day of my life.
These two men realized, of course, that they, too, would have to remain sober and that they, too, would have to pass it on. One day, they received a phone call. I believe they received a phone call from the hospital. And they had a real live one there by the name of Dan, Dan Kay. And I understand he was an Irishman, a redheaded Irishman. So I can just see him when they said he had blackened the eyes of two nurses and that they were quite welcome to him if they wanted him.
Now, they went in there. They went in to see this man.
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And they told him three things. They told him what the problem was, the physical allergy and the mental obsession. They told him what the solution was, the finding of a power greater than ourselves and having a spiritual experience. And they also told him what the planned program of recovery was. At first, this man was very reluctant to listen because he had said he had had religion up to his eyeballs.
But when these two men identified with him, he listened. And he, too, was never to take another drink. They talked to more drunks in Akron and more drunks. And gradually, there was a small group. As Lois said in her talk last night, she did come down to Akron and visited with Bill. And I heard Bob Smith's tape as well. And he said they, at the time, thought that Lois was coming down to check up and see what kind of a bunch of peculiar people that Bill was getting himself involved in.
Shortly after that, Bill and Lois returned to New York. And Bill left behind him what we know today as the very first group of Alcoholics Anonymous. Now, when he went back to New York, Bill did what he had been doing in Akron. When he met a drunk, he told them three things. What is the problem? What is the solution? And what is the planned program of action? And one by one, new members started coming in.
First, there was Hank P, and then Fitz, and so on. And each time they spoke to a drunk, they were told what is the problem, what is the solution, and what is the planned program of action. Some men up in Cleveland heard about these strange groups of people down in Akron, these drunks that didn't drink anymore, and that there was a doctor down there that could fix drunks. So someone came down from Cleveland to find out what it was all about, and they got sober.
And they went back to Cleveland, and they in turn told each drunk they came across what is the problem, what is the solution, and what is the planned program of action. So now we have three groups. We have one in Akron, one in New York, and another group in Cleveland. In about the fall of 1937, Bill went back to Akron to visit Bob, and they were sitting around and supposed, just like you and I do when we get together, and hashing over what had happened in the last period of time.
And when they reviewed what had happened between 1935 and 1937 and started counting up heads, they realized that they had about 40, about 40 men who were sober by using, first of all, finding out what the problem is, what the solution is, and using the planned program of action. They got together with some of these, and I believe in that meeting in Akron, there was something around 17 or 18 of them.
And they realized that somehow, somehow, something had to be done to preserve this. And in AA Comes of Age, it says, when Dr. Bob and I realized on that day in 1937 that some two score of us had recovered from alcoholism, we at once asked ourselves, how can this experience be shared? How can the word be spread? You see, they were concerned about it.
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and I believe that is the hand of God acting in our fellowship and in our early beginning, that they cared about the people not yet recovered from this disease of alcoholism, all those hundreds of thousands of practicing drunks all over the world. How could the great chance that we had be brought to these people? This was a real concern to them. At the snail's pace we had been going, it was clear that most of them would never be reached.
And they had brilliant ideas. At first they thought, well, let's build hospitals. Let's hire missionaries, paid missionaries. And then somebody said, maybe we should write a book. And thank God they did. Somehow these people had to be reached, and somehow the hand of God was present when the decision came to write a book. Thank God the book was written, because if it weren't, not one of us would be in this room today.
Now this group of people, after the decision was made that the book should be written, this group of people told Bill. You see, they didn't have an author amongst the whole group of them, but they figured since Bill was in this thing the longest that he should be the one to write. And the book was to be the collective knowledge, experience, and wisdom of the first 40 people. The book was to be written in a textbook form, with the same information that the first 40 had to know in order to recover from alcoholism.
What is the problem? What is the solution? And what is the planned program of action? Here again, when I look back over the history of how this book was written, I see the hand of God. We know that Bill wrote the first two chapters and had it mimeographed, several hundred copies were distributed to people in various walks of life, members of the clergy and so on, to see what they thought of this book.
And in that story, in Bill's story, all 12 of the steps appear. To me this is a miracle, because we know, we know that the first four chapters were written, and then Bill pondered on how the fifth chapter should be written. And we all know that when he went back to his home, when he went back to his home, and he asked for help, within half an hour he had the fifth chapter written and the 12 steps. And yet those same 12 steps appear in Bill's own story, which he had written some time previously.
Why don't you choose your own conception of God? And it was only a matter of being willing to believe in a power greater than myself. Nothing more was required of me to make this beginning. That is step two. After Bill had this vital spiritual experience, he says, I humbly offered myself to God, as I then understood Him, to do with me as He would. I placed myself unreservedly under His care and direction.
I admitted for the first time that of myself I was nothing, but without Him, and that without Him I was lost. Now that is step three. I ruthlessly faced my sins and became willing to have my newfound friend take them away, root and branch,
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and I have not had a drink since. Steps four, six, and seven. My schoolmate friend visited me and I fully acquainted him with my problems and deficiencies. We made a list of people I had hurt or toward whom I had felt resentment. Step five. I expressed my willingness to approach these individuals, admitting my wrong. Never was I to be critical of them. I was to write all such matters to the utmost of my ability.
Steps eight and nine. I was to test my thinking on my new God consciousness within. Common sense would thus become uncommon sense. I was to sit quietly when in doubt, asking only for direction and strength to meet my problems, as He would have me. Step eleven. So you see, Bill had already written the twelve steps in his own story, but he didn't realize it at the time. I also think it is rather miraculous, and I see the hand of God again, when I read other books.
In Pass It On, as well as in another book entitled Bill W., there is a story of Bill receiving a visitor late at night in the old clubhouse in New York, and a custodian coming up to him and telling him that there was a derelict down there, and it was a cold November night, and I imagine it must have been snowing because this man, when he came upstairs, had his coat collar up and his hat pulled down.
And when the man removed his coat, Bill realized it was a Catholic priest. And this man introduced himself as Father Dowling. And in the book it will tell you that Father Dowling made this trip to meet the man who had written those twelve steps. And the reason why he wanted to meet this man who had written the twelve steps was because they so closely resembled the spiritual exercises of St. Ignatius, which was the spiritual exercise for the Jesuit order.
And Bill said, I did not know. Because we know that Bill was raised as a Unitarian. So how could he possibly have known what the exercises of Ignatius were all about? As we go through the book, and as we read the book from start to finish, and remember that in the front it says that we are the first one hundred, and this is to tell you precisely how we have recovered. That tells me something. See, if I want to find out what something is all about, or if I want to find out how to do something, I end up reading the directions.
And I also found out, now I'm quite sure there are a lot of parents out here, and if you were drinking like I was when some of your children were small, and you went through that horrendous experience on Christmas Eve trying to assemble children's toys when you half smashed, and then finally in utter frustration about four o'clock in the morning you decide that maybe I better read the directions, and maybe this thing will work.
So we learn the hard way, that we start at the beginning. Today when I try to put something together that I know nothing about, I'll read one line, and I do what that line tells me to do. And then I'll read the second line, and I will do what that second line tells me to do. And lo and behold, when I'm finished, it works out okay. The doctor's opinion and Bill's story, which is the first chapter, constitutes our first step.
So that Bill actually got the first step from Dr. Silkworth. What is the problem? The allergy and the obsession. The solution is to be found in the chapters entitled
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There Is a Solution, More About Alcoholism, and We Agnostics. Because you see, it is in chapter two, and you will find that this book is written in sequence. It is a very ordered sequence of events, that if followed as written, will produce the results that are promised. More About Alcoholism, and in that it tells us that what happens to us just before we take that first drink. And it's amazing, you know, how I can identify and how I can see myself so many times on each and every one of these pages.
And then, of course, in the chapter to the agnostics. And in the chapter to the agnostics, we find a simple way to cross the bridge from atheism or agnosticism to faith in a power greater than ourselves. And then we start to believe. Then, with decision, then action, we receive the results, and we know, and we will have faith. I like the story of the Wright brothers, when they were building their flying machine, and how first they themselves believed that they could do it, even though no one else did.
And then after they'd done it, they realized that the next one would fly, because they had the faith that it would make it fly. Faith is not seeing, it is believing. Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things unseen. And, you know, when I was first in AA, I was told by a very beautiful lady that if I could have as much faith as that which is contained in a mustard seed, all things were possible.
To me, the twelve steps are very much like what the golden rule was to us as children. And the faith that we have in God as we understand him today is like that childish faith that we once had as children. And all things are possible. In the planned program of action, where we get into step three in chapter five, it tells us that the point is that we be willing to grow along spiritual lines. Now, for a number of years, I have served as the GSR of the recovery group in the mental health center in Penetanguishene.
And for five years previously, I served as hospital's chairman for Western Ontario in the Northern part. Because of my association with the Problem Drinkers program in the mental health center, where there is a new batch of sickies coming in every three weeks, and that's twelve-step work on the production line, I realize how difficult it is for some people to grasp or to latch on to this spiritual, this word God.
And there are a couple of definitions which I have come across in my experience that I find has helped an awful lot of people. First of all, the word God. One old-timer said, Well, if you can't believe in God, believe in good orderly direction. Because, you see, that's what God is to me, good orderly direction. And then someone else said, guardian over drunks. And that's what God is to me. And I met a young lad who was a professed atheist at the time.
And he couldn't buy either one of those, so he turned it around and he spelled it backwards. D-O-G. Dog, man's best friend. And that's what God is to me. Man's Best Friend, and That's What God Is to Me, My Best Friend, My Constant Companion, My Confident, He Is Always With Me, It Is Never He, We Find That No One Need Have Difficulty
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With The Spirituality Of This Program, That It's Willingness, Honesty, And Open Mindedness That Are The Essentials, But They Are Indispensable, And I Found A Definition To This Word Spirituality Which I Have Found To Be Acceptable To Even The Most Doubting Of Anyone, And I Found It In A Grapevine And That's Why I Like To Use It When I Share With My Fellow Alcoholics At Meetings, It Was Written By A Very Famous Man By The Name Of Ashley Montague From His Book On Being Human, And It Says Spirituality Is Not Formal Religion, Spirituality Is Progress In Goodness, Essentially The Ability To Love And The Ability To Respond With Deepening Sensitivity To The World In Which We Live, Progress In Goodness, Our Steps Show Us How To Progress In Goodness, Without Shame, Without Fear, Without Avoidance, Without Rationalization And Most Of All Without Drinking, But Rather With Faith And Courage And Complete Honesty With Ourselves As Well As With Other People, Love, I Was Told That If I Could Get Rid Of My Own Lusting Ego And Start Being Concerned About Another Human Being I Would Then Learn The True Meaning Of The Word Love, Love Is The Energy That Gives Us The Power To Do God's Will And We Are The Instruments Through Which That Power Flows To Those In Need, Love Has Been Referred To As The Greatest Thing On Earth, And As Seen Through The Spectrum Of Wisdom That Was Paul's From Corinthians Contains Nine Very Common Everyday Ordinary Ingredients, Patience, Kindness, Generosity, Humility, Courtesy, Unselfishness, Good Temper, When We Get Into Steps Eight And Nine We Repair The Damage Of The Past By Lifting Those We Have Harmed And By Making Amends To Them Whenever Possible Except When To Do So Would Injure Them Or Others, And In The Promises On Page 83 And 84 We Can See Where We Have Had A Personality Change Sufficient To Recover From Alcoholism As A Result Of The First Nine Steps.
In Step Ten We Continue This Personality Change By Repeating Steps Four Through Nine On A Daily Basis, And It Is After Step Ten That We Enter What Is Sometimes Referred To As That Fourth Dimension. In Step Ten We Continue To Take This Personal Inventory By Repeating Steps Four Through Nine On A Daily Basis, And On Page 86, 87, And 88 I Find If Used On A Daily Basis Is What Will Set Me Up For The Day So That I Can Function And Know That I Do Have The Direction Of The God Of My Understanding, Because It Tells You What To Do When You Go To Bed At Night.
When We Retire At Night We Constructively Review Our Day. And Then In The Morning It Says On Awakening Let Us Think About The 24 Hours Ahead. We Consider Our Plans For The Day. Before We Begin We Ask God To Direct Our Thinking, Especially Asking That It Be Divorced From Self-Pity, Dishonest, And Self-Seeking Motives.
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Under These Conditions We Can Employ Our Mental Faculties With Assurance, For After All God Did Give Us Brains To Use. And When We Get Into The Seventh Chapter Working With Others, Having Had A Spiritual Awakening As The Result Of These Steps, One Through Eleven We Are Now Ready To Carry This Message To Others. In Chapter Seven We See The Proper Way In Which To Carry The Message. I Always Try To Read Chapter Seven Before I Make A Twelve Step Call, Because It Reviews My Whole Program For Me.
It Tells You In There That You Have To Talk About The Nature Of The Illness, Which Is The Problem, Talk About The Possible Means Of Recovery, The Solution, And Talk About The Action, The Planned Program Of Recovery. We Can See In Chapter Seven That Carrying The Message To Others Follows Exactly The Same Sequence As Which The Book Has Been Written, The Problem, The Solution, And The Planned Program Of Action.
Now There Have Been No Radical Changes In This Big Book Since Its First Printing In 1939. At That Time It Was Written For Low Bottom Drunks, And Practically All Of Them At That Time Were Men. But Then As Time Went On And More And More People Were Coming Into Our Fellowship, They Realized That There Was Something Missing. So The Second Edition Was Printed In 1952, Because The Numbers Of People Coming In Had Increased, The Age Had Dropped Of The People Who Were Coming In.
The Bottom Was Therefore Raised, And It Was Therefore Changed To Include New Stories With Deletion Of Some Of The Older Ones. And In The Third Edition, Which Was Printed In 1976, They Again Realized That The Age Of The Average Person Coming Into This Fellowship Was Going Down. Again, Women Were Coming In To The Point Where They Were Reaching Almost 30% Of Our Fellowship. So The Stories Once Again Were Changed, Some Were Deleted, And Some New Ones Were Added.
But The Most Significant Thing About All Of These Three Editions Is The Fact That There Has Been Absolutely No Change, No Change Whatsoever In The First 164 Pages Of This Book. What We Use Today Is Exactly The Same As What Was Used By The First 100 When This Book Was Written. Our Book Is Meant To Be Suggestive Only. We Realize That We Know Only A Little. God Will Constantly Disclose More To You And More To Us.
Ask Him In Your Morning Meditation What You Can Do Each Day For The Man Who Is Still Sick. The Answers Will Come If Your Own House Is In Order. But Obviously You Cannot Transmit Something That You Haven't Got. See To It That Your Relationship With Him Is Right. The Great Events Will Come To Pass For You And For Countless Others. This Is The Great Fact For Us. Abandon Yourself To God As You Understand God, Steps 1, 2, And 3.
Admit Your Faults To Him And To Your Fellows, Steps 4, 5, 6, And 7. Clear Away The Wreckage Of The Past. Give Freely Of What You Find And Join Us. And We Will Be With You In The Fellowship Of The Spirit. And You Will Surely Meet Some Of Us As You Trudge The Happy Road To Destiny. May God Bless You And Keep You Until Then. I Sincerely Hope That In Some Small Way I May Have Been Able To Perhaps Interest Someone Who Hasn't Had The Interest In This Big Book That Maybe You May Have Now, Or That I Have Helped Someone At Least Have A Little More Hope.
Thank You Very Much.
[00:55:00]
Thank you very much, Ruth, it was really good, and I really enjoyed it, and I can sit here and listen to this over and over, and I have this week, and I learn something every time I listen, even to the history, or to the, of course, program of action and our problem and the solution to our problem. You know, this is what so many of us are missing, and this is what so many people back home are missing.
And the reason they're missing it is because we're not learning it ourselves so that we can take it to them. And this is what our responsibility is. You know, the thing that Ruth read that meant as much to me as anything she did was the last page, the 164th page. You know, I ask in your morning meditation, what can you do for the man who's still suffering? You know, that's my job, that's my responsibility.
What can I do for the man who's still suffering? You know, and it says, the answer will come if your own house is in order. What am I doing to get my own house in order? What have I done? You know, do I have an order in my house at all about this program? It's talking about this program, the order of my house and this program, you know. And you know, if I don't have my own house in order, I don't have a message to carry.
And I have that responsibility. I don't have but two responsibilities. You know, my primary purpose is in the preamble, and it says it's to stay sober and to help other alcoholics achieve sobriety. And if I don't have a message to carry, how am I going to help another alcoholic achieve sobriety? Think about that. Think about that. What do I have to carry? What have I been doing? What can I go home and do?
There's a lot we can go home and do. There's a lot we can go home and do. We could go home and put ourselves in the book and put our book in our program and put our book in our meetings. You know, I think as a guy who's trying to learn to sponsor some guy's family, I'm getting that opportunity. I think the first and the best and the greatest responsibility I have to these people is to help them learn what is this program of action and how to apply this program of action to their lives and begin to live it so that they can begin to live sober.
And where am I going to get this message except out of our big book? You know, I love meetings. I said that before. I love the fellowship. I love the bingos. You know, I love all the bullshit that goes on in these meetings. You know, I really do. But you know, I also love being sober, and I love staying sober, and I love living sober. And hell, I never would have learned it if it hadn't been for big book studies, if it hadn't have been for two guys from Arkansas bringing the message to me.
I never would have gotten sober. Not really, not sober. Dry? Yeah. Charlie's got the answer to that. To hell, if you want to get sober, you know, if you want to get dry, just go out on the street and slap the hell out of some cop. You'll get sober. That's a guarantee. You'll get sober. But you know, that's not what we're talking about. And we know when we see the words sober and sobriety over and over in our big book of Alcoholics Anonymous, we know that's not what we're talking about.
We're not talking about being bored of alcohol. Sure, that's a miracle in our lives today. That's a big miracle in our lives today. Sure it is. Because that's the beginning. That's what starts everything else. I'm going to stop right now because we don't have a great deal of time. We do have about 30 minutes left, very close to that. And I know that we're bound to have some questions or some comments or just whatever you have to offer.
We have two mics in the center aisle. If you'll just take yourself to either of those two mics and introduce yourself and make your remarks. Thank you. Hi. My name is Ed McConnell. And I'm from Los Angeles. And I'm a lawyer. And I'm a lawyer. And I'm a lawyer. And I'm a lawyer. And I'm a lawyer. And I'm a lawyer. And I'm a lawyer. And I'm a lawyer. And I'm a lawyer. And I'm a lawyer. And I'm a lawyer.
I just love what you were talking about there, Danny, of what are we going to do. I like that word bullshit. I used it a lot and I hear a lot of it. I get sick and tired of hearing that around this program. I get sick and tired of hearing that around this program. I was around here for 27 years and that's all I did was shoot the shit. And you know I came in and one old-timer from Port Huron, he told me
[01:00:05]
every time I seen him I was either coming in or I was going out to get drunk. And he just got disgusted with it. He got me in the church one night and boy does he take hide off me. He called me every phony so-and-so you could lay your tongue on. He said, you want to get anything out of this program, McConnell? He says, and you go home tonight, he said, you get down on your knees and humble yourself before God.
You know I didn't want to do that, I didn't believe in that, but I done it. You know things started looking up for me. Down a few more years and a couple years ago my friend and my sponsor Pinky, he said there's a big book seminar in Florida, he said, let's go to it. I didn't have any money so I borrowed $500 off my brother-in-law. Haven't paid him back since and I've been to four cinemas. He says, you don't have to pay it back, you should have got a thousand, he said, if it changed you like that.
But you know I went to hear Joe, Charlie and all the rest of that Paul Revere group. You know I learned more there in four days than I did in 37 years around the program. That I understood, I could never understand the big book. I guess the reason for that, I was in the fifth grade, they wouldn't let me be principal, so I left. But you know we came back, I think the second seminar, I never made that one, but Pinky and Charlie came back from there.
And they came over to see me the next afternoon and they said, what about getting a big book workshop going? You know within an hour we'd have a place rented. We'd also have some old Wess' workshop group books. And you know we've got a beautiful group going today on the 13th of June, we had our first anniversary of that meeting. There's a lot of these old timers around this program, you know, you talk to them about it and they say, well what do you need that shit for?
Boy I could just take the teeth out of them. But you know this, just what you said Danny, we've got to spread this message. And there's a lot of young guys around here, the old guys don't seem to want to listen. But if you ever see one of them big book seminars, get to it, because that's where you learn. Get a set of tapes. You know I got them tapes through the mail, I listened to them for about 8 hours that day and I cried for 8 hours that day.
And here's one guy, he didn't believe in crying, it didn't matter a shit what went on. But I tell you, this is where you learn, this is the most beautiful thing I've ever seen. Boy that big book, that is my Bible today. If you're telling me something isn't in that book, you better go, because I'm not going to listen anyway. But that's what that book means to me. And there's several of us here, I've seen quite a few here that's been to them seminars.
And there's going to be a hell of a lot more of them coming as far as I'm concerned. We're having one in September. Charlie and Joe, all that Paul Revere group are going to be there, the same as what's in Pompano Beach. And if you want to learn about this big book, that's where the hell you learn, it's the only place I ever learned. I go to a lot of discussion meetings, I don't today, but I did. And you ask people around, that's got 25, 30 years, ask them where the first and second step is in the big book.
They don't know. They'd say, where is it? I wouldn't tell them. Let them find out. But this is the most beautiful thing I've ever been asked, thank you. Thank you. I'm Dick, I'm an alcoholic. From Melrose, Mass. When I first came around, that big book was the scariest thing I ever, ever… In fact, when I saw this advertised in the booklet, I thought we were going to come here and rewrite the thing.
To fit our own personalities. Because if you remember when you first came around, like I did, if you were anything like me, a lot of mental editing. I took a lot of lines in between lines and words out that I didn't like, and there were a lot of words. Because it's a different principle of living from where you came from. Such a contrast. But I think what the best thing was with me, was I was able, the fellows that scooped me, as we say in Boston, and brought me around to the meetings, they had read the book.
If you can't read, if you have a newcomer that can't read it too well, hook them up with somebody that has read it. That was very important to me. Because for the first time in my life, 25 years of chaotic drinking, and living that lifestyle, this book provided the…
[01:05:00]
My life was like a ship without a rudder. Always. I did all my planning, all my life conceiving on a barstool. It didn't work out. It was like a ship without a rudder, and this book finally provided the rudder. Thank you. Hello everybody, my name's Margaret and I'm an alcoholic. And I'm from Sydney, Australia, and my home group is the Neutral Bay Big Book Group. I guess that's why I came to this meeting today, but I originally joined that group in Sydney.
We're a bit backward in Australia. We still have a lot of… The majority of our meetings are identification meetings. I call them story time meetings. And I was 18 months sober, and I went off to live in London, England for six months, and I really got quite accustomed to discussion groups. And it got the old brain cogs working over, and I guess I learned a little bit. And when I came back to Sydney, I just sort of got fed up with hearing, you know, I drank this, I did this, I did that, and not much emphasis on recovery.
So I started going to the Big Book Group. And I started going because I never ever read the big book. And I found that by going just for about five years that everything I need to know is in the big book. And I still basically don't read the big book unless I go to my meeting. And every time I go, something is revealed to me that I didn't see in the previous time that we read it out. And I guess what it is is that the fog is lifting, and I'm able to see more in myself that I couldn't see before.
It's been pretty slow for me, I can tell you. You know, I'm glad there's no exam to pass and talk about the stories that you hear about people's progress. Well, you know, I couldn't claim any wonderful pace at all. But by going to the big book on a fairly regular basis, I say fairly regular because I'm involved in the travel industry and I can't go every week. You know, I've got to go and earn my living.
But by going on a fairly regular basis, I have learned what this program is all about because I need more now. You know, it's all very well for people to say to me in the beginning, just go to meetings and don't pick up that first drink. That's very applicable in the beginning. But as time goes by, you don't do that. You need a little bit more. It's what Ruth's saying. You've got to find that program for the plan of action.
And it's all written there in the big book. And I guess I'll just keep going to the big book group. But slowly, I have to add that, you know, the changes are happening not only around the world but in Australia. And as more people come in, new people come in, younger people come in, new groups start up, recovery groups, steps groups, discussion groups, and it's all there for a purpose. And funnily enough, even at our big book group on a Tuesday night, we have about 200 meetings, I think, in Sydney a week.
So on Wednesday night, we only get about 15 people at our big book meeting. I've had people come in and say they're looking for the AA meeting. And we say, yes, here we are. And they say, is this a big group, you know, is this a discussion group or something? And we say, is this a big, no, we say it's a big book group. And they say, oh, no, we want a proper AA meeting. So we're sort of trying to spread the word that the big book group is a way of learning what's written in the big book.
And I've certainly reaped the benefits. And if there is someone here today who hasn't sort of done that before, we'll give it a go because it is worthwhile. My name's Eddie. I'm an alcoholic and a drug addict. Hi, Eddie. Hi. And I'm a member of Dedham Village Group in Massachusetts. And the thing that I got out of this woman sharing with us this morning was I feel a lot of the things that she talked about in my own recovery, and it feels good to be in agreement with something and feel like you're in one accord instead of looking to split hairs over, you know, concepts or whatever because you're not there yet and it's a bunch of vague baloney.
You know what I mean? Because when I came in the program in 69 in Florida, in West Palm, I can remember for almost three years feeling like wanting the big book to be revised to the 60s, you know,
[01:10:04]
because we don't even talk the same way that they talked in 35, you know. And all I know is I wasn't ready to stop drinking for those three years. And when I was finally ready to stop drinking, I remembered a feeling that I wouldn't want one word in the big book changed, okay? And I know that a lot of times you might be by yourself when God's, you know, doing a healing job on you and revealing what the big book is really trying to convey to you.
Because a lot of times, you know, I went out on a limb and I wasn't really, you know, received well because of my, you know, concepts that I had about the big book. And I'm just grateful to be at a place where most people could be in, you know, agreement with something and you really know that God's behind this whole thing when you see tangible evidence of that happening in people's lives, not only your own, because if I just, you know, went through my sober experience just feeling like all this stuff was only happening to me, I wouldn't have tangible evidence that that stuff in the big book is true.
It would be remote to me. And I've seen these principles and the things that it talks about, you know, in the promises and all of these things happen to other people before it happened to me. Then I've experienced it happening to me and I've even experienced it where today I'm not too intimidated by, you know, people that say, well, you know, spooked a newcomer talking about all this heavy stuff. And I say, well, man, you know, Bill Wilson and Dr. Bob didn't run around worrying about spooking a newcomer talking about God and all this other stuff.
You know what I mean? And if I had to worry about spooking a newcomer, this is something I just came into like in the past couple of months too, that you may as well omit chapter 11 then because that talks about a vision for us down the road. That's not about, you know, today's sobriety. That's about all about what's in store for us down the road in recovery. And I have to see through the newcomer not only to keep my memory green of what I thought like and felt like at one time in my recovery, but I need the newcomer as a barometer to see where my progression and recovery has come from too.
Thank you. Hi, everybody. I'm John and I'm a happy recovering alcoholic. All right, John. You know, we talk a lot about the big book and we discuss a lot about the language used and so on and so forth, change words. But I think there's one thing that is most important to remember. I agree very much with what Ruth said about the similarity between the big book and the exercises of St. Ignatius. I just had a Master's in St. Ignatius exercises and really when I read the big book, it's the same thing.
Besides that, I'm a Catholic priest, so it has… which is where I've learned to find my God with the big book as well. But one thing that I'd like to share today is, you know, I just come back from Jerusalem and while I was in Jerusalem, I went to an AA meeting there and the big book was blue, had the same thing, except it had a whole different writing. That touched my heart. One thing that touched my heart too is that the light of the big book was just so fantastic there.
There were some Muslims, there were some Jews, there were some Christians, and there were other people of other beliefs. And there was one thing, the big book was so evident there, is that altogether, either it would be Arabs, there were Arabs there, there were Jews, there were Israelites. Americans, Canadian born, living in America, it was amazing, there was one reality that was so strong, very evident for all of us, that spoke so hard, the basis of our spiritual,
[01:15:05]
the spirituality of our program, that we were all one drink away from being a drunk, from being dead, take a man on the back mic, my name is Leroy Tittle, I'm an alcoholic, I'm grateful to be here at all these big book, discussions of the big book, and to inspire me again, to get back in the big book, you know there's such a thing as becoming a complacent with this program after you're sober five years, three years, and then you think, boy I got her down pretty good, and you give me enthusiasm again Ruth, I've heard a lot of speakers, I was down there taping all the meetings yesterday, and they asked, I think God wanted me to be here, to hear you people, you have a great understanding of that big book, and all the speakers that get up afterwards, it's wonderful to hear this, the big book is a text, I thought when I come in, when I was granted the privilege of coming to AA, after all the suffering I went through, 30 years of drinking, they said it's a text, and I thought by God this is a better than college, this is a way to live, and I didn't have it before, principles and values to live by, I wasn't a virtuous person, Walter Haig, he says, no one has a, no one has a hangout, has a, I can't remember what Haig said, but this, I like the idea of getting back into the book, using it as a, as solving what is the problem, what's the solution, what I have to do to correct my life, I have discovered that I don't worry too much about a drink anymore, and I have to learn how to live, I ask God to steer me through the day, every day, in the morning, I do it on my knees, and I think of a night, now apparently he wants me to be here, to hear this great enthusiasm for the big book, it seems like a return to it, I'm happy to hear it, I was afraid of a great change in AA, I thought what are we going to leave for the people coming to AA, is it going to be as good as what they give me, we need the very best, the alcoholics need the very best, and we're receiving it right here today, God's doing this, I think he gives the power, the power to set this thing down to Bill Wilson, and he could have given to anybody else, but I gotta give credit to God for this program, you people made it possible because God works through people, my mother laying dying in the hospital, two years after they got to the program of cancer, and I was angry at God, and she said Leroy, you go and thank those people for getting you sober, she prayed all those years that I would become sober, and I thank you people, I didn't know you then, but you helped, you're part of the strength of my strength in AA, God bless you, thank you all. My name is Mike Fahy, I'm an alcoholic, you know I need to read the big book a lot, I need to study the big book, because I'm not so smart, you know before I got the big book I tried damn what Charlie says about beating the cop, and that wasn't spiritual at all, I had to get something else. I just have one thing to say Ruth, I want to thank you, I really enjoyed this this morning, I could close my eyes, and I could feel through your talk, that I'm the child that I really am, in relationship to my father, my higher power, and you said that you prayed to God that you could carry this message this morning, and I think he very well answered your prayers, thank you very much.
Hi, I'm an alcoholic, my name is Jennifer, and I just wanted to say a quick thank you to all the old timers that were around, even though they kicked me around and said, oh you're too young, you haven't suffered enough, and all that jazz, I'm so glad that they told me all the things that were in the book, when I asked the questions, and I'm really grateful for people like Ruth, because she was there, and I heard from her over and over again, acceptance is the answer to all your problems, and I'm really grateful that that was in there,
[01:20:07]
and that I got this from all the old timers, and keep it up, if you've got new people coming around, give it to them, you know, full barrel, I really needed it then, I still need it now, and thanks, I go to a big book meeting every Saturday morning, so this is kind of great for me, because I'm missing it this week, thanks. Good to see you Jennifer, and I love you. Morning, my name is John, I'm an alcoholic, member of the big book in London, Ontario, I just wanted to share quickly, I was telling Ruth about it before the meeting, share quickly, just an experience that happened this morning, I walked in the lobby of the hotel, this gentleman sitting right here, asked me where are the ABC's?
Do you realize what room we're in? Salon ABC, another quick, and it will be quick, an experience I had on trying to rewrite something that I changed in my big book, and I call it the wrong man to try and change it, you see, I'm an alcoholic, and I like to go to the top when I want something changed. I found a drunken dentist from Dallas, and walked up to David A., and said my big book has Bob's story entitled Chapter 12, you see, I thought it was kind of neat to have 12 steps, 12 traditions, 12 concepts, and 12 promises, and my big book had 12 chapters.
David said simply, you can't, and I said why not, I think it's kind of neat, he said the only way that Bob could be talked into having a story in the big book is that it wasn't really part of the big book, that's why Bob's story is not Chapter 12. I came to learn, and I came after alcohol beat me down on my knees, and I came back, I like the bottom line of what's on the cover, the jacket of the third edition, you see, I came back at least teachable, and that book's the basic text for Alcoholics Anonymous.
Thank you guys for being, and gals, for being my teachers, these are my classrooms, and there's my textbook, God love you. My name is Wayne Lindemans, I'm from Chetak, Wisconsin, and thank you all for being here, I'm going to bend your ear a little bit. The big book is special to me, I look at that thing there, it's kind of appropriate that it sits on the podium, because the way I see it, is that I may be the only big book someone reads, and if that's the case, I'm responsible for what's inside that.
And I want the right message to be put across in this attraction rather than promotion program. When I came into this program, I had to reach out through bars, there was no people, there was just a book. And I got my program from reading this book. Everything I have, I owe to this fellowship, and the co-founders, and Bill for writing that book. Without it, I would be dead right now. When I reached out, I had it planned how to hang myself, where the camera couldn't see me, and where I could die.
Because the weight of all my guilt, and the weight of just not being able to live a good life, not being able to accept my human faults as being appropriate, that other people have these faults, I didn't know that, nobody told me. And in the big book, I found that there were a great many people like me. And I read that book, and I got sober. I got out of jail, and I found groove. And for me, that book did mean life.
Without it, I would have hung myself within an hour. So, everything I owe, I owe to AA. Everything I have, from that point on, I have to be willing to give it up. If someone really, truly would benefit by it.
[01:25:02]
Everything I have, I give. And I give it freely. Freely, it was given to me. I'll pass. I'm an alcoholic, my name is Wes. Hi, Wes. Hi, friends. I'm from Toronto, and I'm just overwhelmed to be here. But I'm something else besides an alcoholic, or as well as an alcoholic. I'm a great procrastinator. I have made many, many determinations to get into this big book seriously and totally. And I've made stabs at it, here, there, and everywhere.
And when I get to the big book, it's because I'm backed into a corner, and there's only one way out. And that big book is the one way out. I've been kicking around about this seminar coming up. I've spoken to Ruth about it, and I said, yes, I'm going to be there. And then, it goes out of my hands. I'm going to be there. I'm going to be there. I'm going to be there. I'm going to be there. I'm going to be there.
It's in my mind, and I haven't filled the registration out. I have it at home. I think this has tipped the scales to the fact that, yes, I'm going to be there. There's not much else I can say, except you people, this program, and my God, are allowing me to live, for the first time, free, to make a decision that I can live with. All I can say is, thank you.