Making AA Itself My Higher Power — the Sentence in Step 2 That Saved My A*s – Tinsley E.

About This Speaker Tape

Tinsley, sober since May 3, 1999, tells his story at his home group, the NAVA Club in Atlanta. Born at Piedmont Hospital in 1957 to Emory students, he grew up silver-spoon — prep school coat-and-tie with short pants (his friend called it his Angus Young period), straight-A student, glee club president. At 15 someone handed him a malt liquor at a party and he had arrived. He remembers that first beer with perfect clarity; he can't remember his first Coca-Cola. Alcohol became the solution to feeling different, then a friend, then a constant companion, then a ruler, then a tyrant.

He honed his drinking at Emory Oxford, tapping kegs out of his 1974 Dodge creeper van, noticing his friends would quit at 2 a.m. and go to Waffle House — unthinkable to him. He rode The Beatles on Ed Sullivan into the music business, buying the lie that Hendrix and Hemingway needed the bottle to be great. The consequences came: perforated ulcer, no insurance, parents flying out to get him, divorce, lost gigs. Everybody was mad at him, including the dope man, who told him to go to AA. He drifted in and out of this very room from 1990 to 1999 — an ocean of half measures — even buying a breathalyzer so he could drive home drunk. It said he was drunk every night.

He came back in May 1999 in tears with the gift of desperation. A man hung around after a meeting and talked to him from experience instead of lecturing. His sponsor gave him five things: meetings, a sponsor of his own gender, the twelve steps in order, learn to pray, work with others. The sentence that saved him was in the 12 and 12 on Step 2 — you can make AA itself your higher power. Sixty people with a plan to stay sober is a higher power of one.

He walks the steps plainly: 1-2-3 got him sober, 4-9 is the quality of his sobriety, 10-11-12 keeps him sober. He has never relapsed while holding a service position. AA delivers everything alcohol promised and failed to deliver — the ease, the comfort, the laughter. When he complained meetings were boring, someone said, AA's not boring. You are. The biggest miracle is not that he doesn't drink — it's that he doesn't want to.

Topics

Timestamps

• 1:30 Tinsley takes the podium, gives May 3, 1999 sobriety date, says NAVA is his home group, tells the Sarasota couple joke — I'm talking to the wine
• 4:00 Born Piedmont Hospital 1957 to Emory students, silver-spoon upbringing, prep school coat and tie with short pants — his Angus Young period
• 7:30 First beer at 15 — malt liquor at a party — remembers it with perfect clarity, can't remember his first Coca-Cola, feels he'd arrived
• 10:00 Emory Oxford keg parties in the creeper van — notices friends quit at 2 a.m. for Waffle House, his first glimpse of the allergy
• 16:00 The consequences roll in — perforated ulcer, parents flying out, divorce, lost work, drinking because he hates himself and hating himself because he drinks
• 20:00 1990 to 1999 as an ocean of half measures — the breathalyzer story, decided cars were the problem, not alcohol
• 24:00 May 1999 — arrives in tears, a man hangs around and talks from experience instead of lecturing — the student was ready and the teacher appeared
• 28:00 The five things from his sponsor — meetings, same-gender sponsor, steps in order, learn to pray, work with others
• 32:00 Step 2 — the one sentence in the 12 and 12 that saved his ass — you can make AA itself your higher power, sixty is a higher power of one
• 42:00 AA's not boring, you are — closes on fun in recovery and the biggest miracle being that he doesn't want to drink