Holly M. – Big Book Study – The Metaphysical Hernia of Advanced Approaches – 1975

Our next speaker, I know you love her. Her name is Holly Martin from Ann Arbor, Michigan. Holly? Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. My name is Holli Martin, and I'm an alcoholic. I am very happy, extremely grateful to be here, very grateful. I think I would have hijacked Jonathan Segal to get here. I wanted to come so badly. And I certainly do not want to spend my few precious moments standing here taking the time to qualify for this program. for the simple reason is that there is nothing wrong with you when you first come here. There will be if you stay long enough, that is for sure. I want to tell you more or less what the program has done for me and what it means to me. Anything less than that is what Shakespeare says, a tale told by an idiot full of sound and fury signifying nothing. You see, I don't need to stand here all evening To tell you that I know what it means To wake up at six o'clock The clock says six And you don't know what six it means You know You don't want to wake up You don' t know whether it's six in the evening Or six in morning And you're scared to ask anybody Because they might say to you Are you just now coming in Or what are you getting up so early for So you just lay there You'd like a drink of water but you're scared to get up and get it. You finally have to go to the bathroom and you're afraid to go so you suffer at both ends. You just lay there. I know what it means to take things that you love to the pawn shop and get rid of them. Oh, you swear you'll never do this again. I had a watch that stayed in the pawn shops so much it wouldn't run on a Jewish holiday. You know? I know what it means to insult your gut. I know the insanity of that morning drink when you wake up and you or you haven't even been asleep yet. And you want to drink so bad. And every time you take one, your stomach says, I said, don't send that mess down here. And it sends it right back up again. and you send another down and your stomach says you heard what I said your mind finally refuses to cooperate and says I don't care what you do and finally you send one down and it stays and then you have the insanity to say oh my gracious I finally got one to stay down and you're real happy about it and that is the insanity of insulting your intestines you know this went on with me for a number of years more years than I care to really talk about. So finally one night, sitting in my kitchen, I heard a story come on over the radio. It was called The Glass Crutch. I did not turn the story on, or the radio on rather, to this particular station because when you're in the stage that I was in at that particular time, you don't need to turn the radio on for anything. You hear voices all the time anyway. It doesn't make any difference. But this story came on and it was about a woman that had a drinking problem. And this is a story that haunted me down through the years, six or seven years before I finally picked up that phone. All I can remember about this story was about a woman who had a drink problem and said if you ever need our number we'll be the first number in the book we ever need our help rather well i thought i don't need these people if there's anything wrong with holly i can straighten it out myself and wine was straightening me out each and every day but this story haunting me and haunting me so finally that day came the clock on the wall had said to me many times instead of tick-tock tick-tack it had said the the glass crutch, the glass crutch. Many times walking down the street, the heel plates on my shoes would beat out the words the glass crunch. Finally one day sitting there with this glass in my hand trying to read the newspaper, it seemed as if every word on that paper said the glass crutch so finally I said my Lord what is this and as my eyes left that newspaper and fell on my hand it dawned on me holly you can't even read the newspaper without the last credit. Finally, I did call. But you know, I was a little dubious about it. If someone had told me they'd stayed sober six weeks, I could have believed that. If they said they stayed sober 6 months, uh-uh, I don't think so. If they said 6 years, I said, oh, they got to be lying. I knew that. People didn't stay sober 6 years. That I knew. But do you know, kind as my sponsors were to me, they were very exacting. And I hated all of them, all four of them. I hated them. And one of the things that made me hate them so badly was one of them constantly read that who me to me. She'd look at me and she'd say, just answer yes to three, dear, and you're in. Just answer yes for three. And I thought this old bitty must be getting 50 cents a year, you know, or something like that. And I thought there was the stupidest question that I'd ever heard in my life. You know, is drinking cloudy in your reputation? Well, I thought if you've been in the fog 27 years, how do you know whether it's cloudy or not? What difference does it make? And then she would read the other one over and say, do you seek a lower environment while drinking. I thought, no, I do not seek a lower environment while drinking. I merely created a lower environment while drinking. And the craziest question of all class, any alcohol? Do you prefer to drink alone? If I'm buying it, yes. If you're buying it know. I thought that those were about the silliest questions that any human being could ask another. You see, I felt about these women, and one of them was a man, he's around here somewhere. But then, nevertheless, I felt about these women, I was scared of them. And I didn't want them to go—well, I thought about them like most men feel about their wives. I wish you'd go away and leave me alone, but don't go so far. I can't find you if I need you, you know. That's the way I felt without them, you see. But anyhow, it seems I can remember one of them telling me, and she constantly told me, Holly, you're going to have to change your attitude. That's all that's wrong with you. You're going to have to CHANGE YOUR ATTITUDE." Well, I thought that there was nothing wrong with my attitude because everybody that I'd ever met in my life's attitude was wrong except mine. Even before coming in, people used to say the stupidest thing that was their attitude. They used to said, you need help with your drink. And I thought, I don't need no help with my drink and I can do it all myself. I don' t need anybody to help me. That was the attitude that I had. But finally, coming meeting after meeting the most important thing that there is in my life today, other than trying to help another alcoholic, I found a set of attitudes. The attitude, the most beautiful attitude that has ever been given to this world. And I liken those beatitudes with these wonderful 12 steps that we have. And when I think of that first step where we admit that we're powerless over alcohol and our lives have become unmanageable, I identify that with the beautiful beatitude that tells me, blessed are the poor in spirit, that I am really blessed because I can admit that I'm powerless over asshole, Blessed because no more arrogance, that I have become teachable. Poor in spirit doesn't mean what... Because no more arrogant, that i have become teachable, poor in spirit doesn't mean what i thought it meant, that I must cringe and that I must crawl. It meant that I must become teachable, and this is exactly what it meant to me. And then I looked on a little further in a change of attitude, and there was another beautiful attitude that told me this. Blessed are they that mourn, for they shall be comforted. Now if you don't like the word mourn you simply don't have to use it. You can use the word yearn. Blessed are they that yearn, For they shall be comforted. And I identified that beautiful beatitude with the second step that tells me I came to believe in a power greater than myself that could restore me to sanity. How many times have I sat there in that kitchen of mine or on some bar stool, and did I not yearn for a better way of life? Did I not mourn? How many times did I pick up this bottle or this glass and say to myself, is this all there is in life for me, God? Were we not yearning and mourning for a better way of life. All of a sudden, sometimes we find the second step as we say, well, you know, I can't buy that. Well, my friends, anytime you so much as buy a can of beer, you're buying a power greater than yourself or you wouldn't be buying it, you Know? Anytime I pick up that shot glass, that's a power greater than me. And oh, how long I yearn for a better way of life. And this yearning and yearning of mine, I realized, had I not sat there—you see, man's adversity is God's opportunity—had I not set there yearning for a better way of life, tonight I wouldn't be here with you, my dear ones, that is for sure. And then I looked at the third step, blessed are meek, for they shall inherit the earth. And I identified that with the third steps, where we made a decision to turn our will and our lives over which is the care of God. And I thought meekness, oh no, uh-uh. You know, after all, meeknes, that's chicken. And finally it dawned on me it's better to be the chicken than what comes out of the end of the chicken. Let's be a little meek, my friend, you know. That's what I was meek. And meek is, my friends, I found out, was not weakness. It was simply strength that is harnessed. Because you and I have a great deal of strength. But always it's used in the wrong way. and here it was sink harnessed by the grace of God then I looked at inventory my friends long not right away but it took a little time and I identified that that fourth step inventory where we made a searching and filleth moral inventory of ourselves and I identified that with a beautiful beatitude a different kind of attitude blessed are they that hunger and thirst after righteousness for they shall be filled now if you don't like the word righteousness, don't let it scare you to death. It simply means right thinking. Blessed are they that hunger and thirst after right thinking, for they shall be filled. But anything, my friends, that is to be filled must first be emptied up. It has to be empted out. It's simply like a tooth, you know, that has, that it decays. Regardless of how much filling you put into the tooth, unless the decay is cleaned out, my friend, the filling is not going to stay. And how many times don't you and I have the same problems over and over because we haven't got rid of the decay that was there, you know? And many times I think of this fourth step in relationship with the story of the prodigal son. Here was a young boy, here was a boy that had to be emptied out, you see? You see, he had reached that stage in life when he wound up in that pig pen, the kind of mental, physical, and spiritual pig pen that Holly wound up then. And there's a book of books where all of these twelve steps came out of it. It says, and no man gave him nothing. Did you ever reach that stage? Did you reach that stage of your life when no man gave you anything? Nothing. When you went anywhere you went, somebody said, here comes Holly, hide the whiskey. You know, you'd reach that point in life. And here's where we find our boy. You know, here's where we all find ourselves. And no man gave him nothing. Can't you feel that emptiness up there? That loneliness when no man gives him nothing? And then the book of books goes on to tell me, and he finally came to himself. And that's when I took an inventory, when I finally came for myself. And like the prodigal son, I wanted to call home, even if I'd never been there, because I finally became to myself. But I realized like him, I had to be emptied up of something. The first thing that I had to be empty up of like him was my pride. I'm sure in my mind's eye I can see him as he laid there in that pig pen. Oh yes, it would be very easy to get up and say, well I think I'm going on home, you know taking everybody and everything for granted. But oh no, he had a conscience like you and I have. He had to think about this thing. He had the courage to come to himself. He realized I've got to be emptied up of my pride like I realized I had to be emptied out of my pride before anything could take the place of it you know this pride that says well you know I'm in a mess but I don't want to admit it I hadto be empted out of that kind of pride you know I hadtobeemptiedupofmy resentment in this inventory of mine I'm very sure that the prodigal son might have said as he laid there in his pig pen well youknow my father's servants are living better than I am And he could have laid there and resented them. But oh no, he had to be emptied up. How many times don't you and I have this old ugly resentment that we have to be emptied of both? Well, so-and-so is staying sober, you know. And he hasn't got near what I've got, but he's staying sober. You know, and we resent the living daylights out of him because he's staying sober and you figure, well, what's he doing sober? I hate him because He's sober. How can he do it? He don't have what I have. You know, he ought to be good. He's very glad that he don't have what you have, you know. So like that boy, I had to be emptied up of my resentment. I had the prodigal son have said, well, I'll just go on back home and I'll tell him, you know, I don't want to live this way. I was just living this way for kicks. But you know, like Tim, I could not come to anyone and say, well you know I don t have have to live this way. I'm just doing, I just drink wine for kicks. You ain't never heard of nobody puking for kicks, have you? Never in your life, you know. I had to be emptied up of all of this phoniness, the phoniness of mind. I have to be empty up of my self-pity, the kind of pity that would make me think, I can't understand how come everybody else can go out and get drunk and have a good time, and I go out, and take two drinks, and get drunk, and tomorrow night I might go out and drink everybody under the table, you know. But see, I had learned that alcohol was cunning, baffling, and powerful, you know, and it allowed no room for self-pity because I was one individual and somebody else. And they had told me, don't compare, identify, you know. And I had to be emptied up of feelings. Well, you know, if I get bored, I know exactly what to do, you you know, because when we get bored, we all know that I can only stand just so much of this. Bored. How many times haven't you and I heard someone say, well, you know? I had trouble because I got bored. Well, they told me in AA that action is the magic word, not boredom. And if I stayed active, I wouldn't be bored. And to me, that's silly. I got to get drunk because I'm bored? If you got constipated, you wouldn't go out and buy a stick of dynamite, would you? No, it's just as simple. This just wouldn't happen, you know. And I realized that this self-pity of mine that I could entertain for so long, you know, would only, along with self- pity, had to go with self knowledge, everything that I thought that I knew so much about. It had to go along with all of the self-sufficiency that I had because I I realized that all of these things, my friend, would only elude to self-delusion. And then I realized, of all things, the thing that haunts most of us day and night is those awful fears that we had. And I had to be emptied up of these fears, this fear of rejection that many times we can have. Well, if I don't drink, I won't be accepted. In other words, I've got to kill myself on installment plans to get along with people, you know? Because if I Don't Drink, where will I go? What will I do? And I had to be emptied up of this fear of not being accepted, that I wouldn't be rejected. But the very simple reason is I knew that I had to start somewhere and I had must take my chances and it had to start with me. And then I began to think, you know, after all of this emptying up process that the prodigal son had to go through, that he went through, that he put himself through because he took an inventory, you And then I thought, you know, what am I going to do about this amends bit? Because this is one of the things that I feel the last thing to leave a man or a woman and the first thing to which he's restored to is his ego. What am I doing to do? What amI going to make amends? Well, you now, maybe there's some way that I can skirt around it. But, you knoW, there was a step there that told me about amends. There were two of them that toldme about amens. And there was one change of attitude, you kow. It says to me, blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called children of God. So I knew then that I was going to have to make amends and I was going to start somewhere and that was going to have to start with me. That was the beginning of it right then and there, starting them men with me, say. Because I realized in order to be a peacemaker, if I did not live with peace with myself, peace with anybody else would be sheer hypocrisy so that too my friends had to start with me and then my friends I began to feel well you know after all if I keep on this way you know how we can talk to ourselves when we get along I'm going to be ridiculed people are going to make fun of me you know we can feel that from time to time not when we're around our buddies but when we by ourselves. How do I know if I start this amends bit? I won't be ridiculed. But then there was a change of attitude there as I looked at that tenth step that told me to continue to take an inventory. There was a tenth step, and I looked at it, continue to make a personal inventory. And I identified that, my friends, when I thought of the ridicule that I might have to face, that blessed are they that are persecuted for righteousness' sake, for right thinking. But you know, my friends, I realized the one thing. Blessed are they that are persecuted for right thinking. I realized that there was nobody on the face of this earth that could ever persecute me the way that that wine bottle had persecuted me. I knew that regardless of where I went and regards to whatever situation that I might find myself in, that nothing on earth could ever persecute me the way that I had—of the things that I have done to myself. And I realized that one thing, that as long as I tried one day at a time and your arms were around me and his eyes were upon me, that I could stand tall and say with Paul, I fought the good fight. I finished my course. I kept the faith. God bless you. Thank you, Holly. We have one more speaker. He, too, is a good friend of mine. And I won't take any of his time. Thank you, Holly. I didn't have to use any lights on you. You saved me some energy with my fingers. If you wonder why some of us do not laugh at things that are funny when you hear them out there, it's because the speakers are turned out that way and we miss it back here. I just thought I'd try to explain that to you in case you thought we were all frozen faces up here. The last speaker, and a very dear friend of mine, is from Riverside, Illinois. That's the suburb of Chicago, I think. Paul Martin. Thank you so much for telling me that I'm trying to get the right way to speak a lot of American language. It doesn't tell me anything. Thank you, Bill. Good evening. My name is Paul Martin. I'm a young alcoholic in an old container. Hi. It's been a long night and I'm going to talk fast and short. Alcoholism is a disease. AA is my answer. And I'm grateful to be here and be sober. This is the biggest crowd I've seen since the last time Corrigal had a fur coat sale. Next month, on August 15th, I'll have 28 years of sobriety in A.A., and I mention that only because I'm bragging. Somebody has said that an old-timer in A.'A. is a guy who's sober so long he's afraid the new man might throw up on him. Now, I don't know if that's true or not, but I know that this is where I belong, and I'm going to have to keep working. I have many good friends sitting here this evening, and I'm grateful for your friendship. As I'm thankful for the chance to be here, I'm Grateful to my old friend, the round square from Winnipeg, Tom Breen, who gave me some hair grow a while back. He used it for six months. I only grew one hair, but it weighed eight pounds. Years ago when Tom was drinking, he went out on a trip one time on a ship, and the ship sank and there was a sailor rowing around in a rowboat and he was going around and grabbing all of the people in the water by the hair and he'd pull them into the boat and they'd row up alongside of another one and pull them under the boat. He rowed up alongside where Breen was bobbing up and down in the river and he looked for a few minutes and he whacked him over the head with an oar and he says, go back down and come upright. I grew up in a little town down in southern Georgia. The town was so dull that if you took LSD, you'd have had visions of Lawrence Welk. When I was very young, I figured out that alcohol was going to change my life. I used to put Vitalis on my head. I should have drunk that too. I was the only kid in the third grade that looked like he was going home. He was going back to school on the GI Bill. But I found that when I drank the right amount, alcohol changed my life, and it really did. And I went back and drank and drank, and my life changed, and finally it changed so much that I wound up here with you. I'm grateful for many things, and one of them is that I don't have to take those gagging exercises in the morning anymore. I have no nostalgia for anything that comes with booze. I am very grateful that alcohol ran me in the way, A. I'm very grateful that I found this way of living and I'm grateful that gradually and slowly maybe I'm learning to stop trying to be smarter than I actually am. It's been a number of years after I sobered up as a retarded mystic. I was confused by the simplicity in this program. I read everything I could find on advanced approaches. I finally realized that what had happened was I developed a metaphysical hernia. I strained myself spiritually, and I went back and I took some more looks at this program. I began to figure out that how it works means that this is how it works. Yeah, it took me a while. Page 562 in the big book, it says, I get everything I need, and Alcoholics Anonymous, everything I need I get. And when I get what I need I invariably find that this was just what I wanted all the time. And this was my experience and it is my experience day after day. The only things I know about living I've learned from you people in AA. I drank my way through high school, played all the sports, I was a mediocre student. I wanted to be middleweight champion of the world, and I would have been, but I had a bad handicap. I couldn't whip anybody. World War II came around. I went into service, finally became a pilot after I had been through the flight training program about as long as you could be in it without falling out of it. I had an unique war record. I destroyed two aircraft in World War III, and both of them belonged to the United States Navy. A friend of mine pointed out that if I'd gotten three more, I would have been a Japanese ace. 1945, I wound up in a Navy hospital with pneumonia which went into DTs. That ain't funny when it's happening to you, buddy. I was 23. I Was 25 When I Came Into AA. It Makes me 53 now, you're probably surprised to find I'm that old. But I am getting to be too old to take yes for an answer. But, I didn't learn anything in the hospital. I was in there four weeks. I got drunk nine out of the last ten nights I was a patient in the hospital. We had two other drunks in the room where I was. One of them was a pilot in the photo squadron. He was brought in at 2.30 in the morning, drunk. He'd been swimming, cut his big toe open on a piece of submerged metal and he came in with a young lady that we assumed was his wife. The next day his wife showed up and it was somebody else. The rest of the time I was in the hospital, his wife and his girlfriend came in to visit him and they never met. I just figured that proves that if you live right, the Lord will take care of you. After I'd been in AA a few years, I met a man who said he was celebrating two years of sobriety. He said, when I came in this program I had a drinking problem and a marriage problem. AA straightened out my drinking problem. My sponsor ran off with my wife which straightened out my marriage problem so this program will work if you let it. And it... I guess somebody else had the same experience. It was then that I began to have a spiritual awakening. I got out of the service in World War II. I wound up at the air station in Norfolk. I came back to Chicago in December 8, 1945. I got separated from the Air Force up at Great Lakes Naval Station in Waukegan. I traveled for three days and three nights and got home to Oak Park where I was living which is about 50 miles away. And I decided I better do something about my drinking but after the first of the year and I went up to Milwaukee to have a few drinks over New Year's and I was drunk for three days drank myself sober on New Yearís morning and I came back on the train and I had one of those paralyzing hangovers somebody would have said hello it would have taken me 30 minutes to think of an answer and I knew I had to do something because Iíd wound up with what had to be the worst looking woman in the Middle West she looked like the centerfold in dog world she looked like a million dollars and the only reason I say that is because I've never seen a million dollars and she looked likes something I never saw before I came into AA and I saw those 20 questions they said do you seek lower companions when you drink I said buddy you bet and I began to realize I not only sought them, I had become a lower companion. But I decided to go on the wagon and I did a little boxing. I can't tell you I was going to make a comeback because I'd never been anywhere. But I got in shape and I had a few fights and got my nose broken. And mid-February, a friend of mine and I went up to Glenview to fly at the air station and the field closed in with a snowstorm and we went into Chicago to have a few drinks. And he passed out and I started to take him home. He lived in a place called St. Charles, which is about 35 miles west of Chicago. And I drove out North Avenue and I asked for directions and saloons along the way. I'd buy a bottle of beer and I'd get back in the car and I drank the beer. And about the time that was gone, I had forgotten the direction. Then I'd got another bottle of bear. Now walked into one of these places. There was a large dog on the floor and I said hi and the dog bit me on the leg. And I didn't think anything of that. Finally got my friend home. and a couple of days later, I went to see the doctor because my nose had been broken somewhere that evening. And I accidentally mentioned that I'd been bitten by this dog. He said, you find that dog. So I went back to these saloons and I said, did you have a dog that bit me the other night? They said no. So I had to take rabies shots for two weeks. Just to be on the safe side, I made out a list of people to bite in case they didn't work. And I began to try to find answers in reading And I read a book by a New York psychiatrist, Charles Spencer Coles. And he said we become alcoholics because we have too much pressure on our brains. He said this makes us compulsive drinkers and gives us very bad personalities. And I qualified on both points. He said the answer is you make a spinal tap and it relieves the pressure. You're no longer a compulsive Drinker and you have a beautiful personality. Well, I knew there was a lot of pressure in my brain because all my hair was flying out. So I wrote him and asked him If anybody around Chicago could tap my head for me And he said no So I bought another book And I got Rabbi Liebman's Peace of Mind And I thought what a magnificent volume And then somebody told me he committed suicide So I got rid of that I got Dorothea Brandy's Wake Up and Live And that inspired me She said act as if it's impossible to fail And then one day I tried that with the dry heaves and I read everything I could find seal and peel and link and think and they all had one thing in common they didn't do anything for me I finally called AA in August of 1947 and I went to my first meeting and I haven't had a drink since can you imagine that like I started going to these meetings at two handicaps in the AA. I come from a long line of Lutheran ministers. By the time I came on the program, I was a fallen-away atheist. In spite of that, I believe in God today. But I had too much religious education and too much secular education. I got educated way beyond my intelligence. And this has continually gotten in the way of my AA growth. I was very grateful when I started to go to these meetings that I found that nobody in AA argued about whose higher power was higher. The way I'd been brought up, they said, if you don't believe this way, son, you're going to be a participant in an eternal marshmallow roast and you're liable to be one of the marshmallows. And that made quite an impression on me. But I started working these steps, and I heard that you worked the first nine steps once, and then you worked 10, 11, and 12, and i did that for quite a while. Then I heard there were benefits in reworking all of these steps periodically. And I thought, well, why don't you try it? And I began redoing every one of these step with some frequency, And I found there's a far, a great difference between taking a periodic spot check inventory in step 10 and taking a thorough written inventory in four and then talking to another person thoroughly and honestly about myself and periodically relisting my defects of character and asking God to take them away and checking over my amends. And I began to see that everything I need is here, that all I have to do is follow these directions. I don't have to be smart. I don'T have to develop my personality. All I have to do is work these steps as you have shown me because everything I know about AA I've learned from you and I've learned very slowly and I try to follow the directions today. I belong to a step group the Riverside Tuesday Night Young People's Group. We don't let anybody in there over 95 five. We take a step every week, one through twelve, and when we get to twelve, we go back through one. You know, in that group, everybody is working these steps on a lifetime assignment, I believe, so that we're not talking about the fourth step we took years ago. We're talking about fresh work in this program, and it's a totally different thing. And I find that just by following these directions, I do get everything I need. But I know that I have to stay with you because it's from you people that I've learned these things that have transformed my life, very often in spite of myself. If I were in a plane flying at 30,000 feet that caught on fire and somebody rushed up to me with a parachute and he said, put this on, go through that escape hatch, pull the ripcord and save your life, what do you suppose I would do? Would I say let's discuss the philosophical implications of this situation? Or would I say nobody's going to tell me what to do? Or would I go through the hatch without a chute hollering, this is an individual program? You know what I'd do? I'd follow the directions and hope the chute worked. As he used to say in the paratroopers, that don't mean a thing if you don't pull that string. About a year and a half ago, I was doing an article on alcoholism and I called a friend of mine who's research professor of psychology at the University of Illinois, Obert Maurer. He knows a great deal about Alcoholics Anonymous and he's a great admirer of our program. And I said, Overt, what do you think of psychotherapy for the sober alcoholic in AA? And he said if the alcoholic will use the 12 steps and develop the possibilities of fellowship within this program, this will be far more effective than any psychotherapy I know anything about. And what he witnesses to are three fundamental points. Number one, AA enables drunks to stay sober. Number two, the 12 steps are specifically designed to deal with what's wrong with you and me when we don't drink. And number three, AA does this far better than anything else on the scene today. If I want to get a reading on the benefits of counseling or therapy, it's useful for me to remember that AA is where the clergymen come to find God's help to stay silver, and it's where the psychologists and psychiatrists come to find the kind of group therapy that will bring sobriety and order to their lives. If the quality of my life is not what it should be, the best place for me to go for counseling or therapy is to the big book or an AA member who has done enough continuing work with these steps to understand that how it works means that this is how it worked. Being here is a tremendous experience for me. I was at the dance last night. and I didn't play any gavotte, so I didn' t do too well. You know, I looked at all these people, and I thought, my God, what good fortune you and I have to be in touch with this tremendous thing that started with those amateurs in 1935, 40 years ago. And that's what the AA message is, a message from one amateur to another amateur. By all means, let's be friendly with our friends. But in the process, let us never forget what really helps alcoholics and what really helped alcoholics is this fellowship and continuing persistent work with every one of these 12 steps. Because the longer I am in AA, the more I find that everything I need is here. And when I work with a drunk, all I try to do is help him to experience what I continue to find by using every one of these 12 steps, by working these 12 sets. I don't try to function as a counselor or a therapist or a spiritual guide, but simply as one beggar telling another beggar where there is bread. everything is here and the message is summed up in the promises on page 82 and 83 here's what you and I have available if we'll just do this work you know it's sometimes said that if you want to hide anything from an AA member the best place to put it is in the big book and I'm afraid that might be true but here's what you or I have if we work these steps we're going to know a new freedom and a new happiness We will not regret the past or wish to shut the door on it. We will comprehend the word serenity, and we will know peace. No matter how far down the scale we have gone, we will see how our experience can benefit others. That feeling of uselessness and self-pity will disappear. We will lose interest in selfish things and gain interest in our fellows. Self-seeking will slip away. Our whole attitude and outlook upon life will change fear of people and of economic insecurity will leave us. We will intuitively know how to handle situations which used to baffle us. We will suddenly realize that God is doing for us what we could not do for ourselves. I'm grateful to be here with all of you. It's a tremendous opportunity for me to recommit myself to these 12 steps and these principles and this fellowship as the finest place for an alcoholic to go to find everything that he needs to live, not just soberly, but to live with the meaning and the freedom and the joy that all of us search for. And where does it start? Let it begin with me. Thank you very much. Thank you, Paul. This has been more or less the typical AA meeting of the Denver Friday night group. For those of you who may be new and have been brought to this large convention, for those ofyou who are non-alcoholics or non-Alanons or non Alateens, what we do here is to try to tell a little bit about what we were like before, what we liked when we drank, and the recovery. And this is what you have heard. and you have seen pretty much of a cross-section here. You have seen police from Canada who had a lot of trouble with alcohol and then got sober and then there's the fur business selling furs in July. And you saw Holly and heard Holly from Michigan and she just informed me she's a grandmother. I knew she was a housewife but this is the distaffed side of the female side that we have because this is a disease that cuts across sections and it affects males and females and it effects all people in all walks of life and then you heard Paul who by his own words has educated far beyond his mental capacity Don't let him fool you. I have read some of his articles, and they are tremendous. He is in the marketing and communications field, whatever that means, but that's what he has on his card. But you have seen and heard the trouble that he had in his wonderful recovery. Now, I did tell you my name was Bill Coogan in the beginning, and I didn't tell you from where I came. And if you look on the program, they are using the postal, whatever you call it, like you see CA meaning California. But that sounds like what people who do not come from Boston think we say when we say car, they think we stay car. And you see TX for Texas, and TX is tix, and that's something that gets in dogs under their skin and cats and things. And you see Massachusetts, M.A., and that's Marl, and that is what I used to call my mother. And that is which you will see in the program as Bill C., M. A. Well, I come... My office is in Boston, Massachusetts, and I am living in Catawment, which is on the Cape, and that ist 5,275 feet lower than Denver. on my wife's tag it has Falmouth she also lives in Catawba with me but just to point out one little thing and say just a couple of things because I said I would take a few minutes at the end as you have heard three people from from three walks of life and I am an attorney in Boston and I would like to stop a rumor that I have heard here because I met a lot of people from different places I had been since I had been in Alcoholics Anonymous and throughout this country and Canada. And they said, I heard you retired. Well, number one, I'm too damn young to retire. And number two, I can't afford it. And number three, it used to be when people went to live in the Cape that they were going down there to retire, but not anymore. It's to get away from the smog and the fog and the air is lovely and clean down there. But I had a lot of trouble with alcohol. I didn't start drinking until after I had graduated from college, law school, was in the Navy and was getting out. And it was on a doctor's advice that I drank. And I'm not going through anything about my drinking. I had a lot of trouble and I wound up 18 years ago sleeping on the Boston Common and standing in lines at missions and begging and borrowing and stealing. And I went to jail for non-support. And I was in hospitals. And all these things I say not because I'm proud of it, but to show what alcohol did to me and why I am so grateful for all the people that are here, for all the people who came before me and all those that have come since. But more particularly to two people who are no longer with us. Certainly Bill W., Bill Wilson, whom I did know when I was a delegate and served in the Board of Trustees. I am so grateful that he met Ebi and Ebi came to his house and poor Ebi, dear Ebi passed away in 1966. To him I am grateful for what he brought to Bill and to Dr. Bill Salford, Bill Griff, for what he did in keeping Bill and taking care of him in the town's hospital in New York. To him I am very grateful. And to Dr Bob, who had his last drink in June of 1935. And at that time, when Bill was there and had been with him for some time, and when Dr. Bob came back after being at that AMA convention, how Bill went with him, sat with him all that night, and went with them that day while Dr. Bobs performed an operation and he gave him one bottle of beer. And that was the last drink that Bob, that Dr. Barb had. And when those two came together, this beautiful fellowship that we have was formed. And without it, I would be dead. And for this I am, I know. I am so positive of it. I'm so grateful to others too. Certainly Sister Ignatia, who helped so much. Sam Shoemaker, Henry Thiebaud. All three, Sister Ignacia, Henry Thibaud, and Evie died in that year of 1966, and certainly the Burns Smiths, also with whom I became, I believe, a friend, because he too was on the Board of Trustees at the time I was, and he had been of service long before that. Without these people coming before me and becoming free for many of you, what would we have? How many of us would be alive? how can I help but say thank you to all of IAA all of you lovely people who came up here carrying the flag from your various countries what a beautiful, beautiful sight that was as the spotlights were on you and your flag and I was kidding when I said about Ireland alone I meant it for all of us for all you this program through two people starting out 40 years ago, has spread through 90, I believe 91 countries. And starting from two people, it is now estimated at being very close to one million. And this can only be a guess how fantastic that is. To all of you people, I say thank you for returning me to society, being able to go back to my profession, being able to stand on my own two feet and look anybody in the eye and not be afraid anymore for giving me back my self-respect. We will close this meeting in the usual manner but a little differently because we have a charming trustee who is also from the state of Massachusetts only. She's from the western part of the state and she is the General Service trustee United States. Margaret, would you lead us in the Lord's prayer? one of the most beautiful parts of all of the AA meetings I've ever attended has been when we sober alcoholics have joined our hearts and our voices in the Lord's prayer and tonight when we end this largest of all meetings of Alcoholics Anonymous, I hope that all of us will remember our founders, Bill and Dr. Bob. And tonight, as we gather from all over the world and as we say the Lord's Prayer in all different languages but with the same voice, I help that we can remember that we now are the founders of what A.A. is to become, and I hope we can pledge tonight through these words to let it begin with me. 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 and the power and the glory forever and ever Amen Thank you.