Put ‘I’ Into Every Tradition and They Stop Being Group Rules and Start Running Your Life – Vannoy S.

About This Speaker Tape

Vannoy Shaw, a longtime Al-Anon member whose first meeting was February 7, 1969, shares her passionate defense of the Al-Anon traditions at the Cornhusker Roundup in Omaha, Nebraska. She opens with warmhearted humor about her name — pointing out that removing the V leaves "annoy" — and recounts the contrast between her warm first visit to the conference and the disorganized pickup on her return trip. She describes how Al-Anon saved her life, gave her dignity, hope, and a Higher Power of her understanding, and how two sober AA members brought her to her first meeting.

Vannoy walks through several traditions using vivid personal stories. She tells of the "Al-Anon War" — her attempt to combine two groups' treasuries to buy literature, which erupted into political chaos and ultimately revealed the treasurer was stealing money to buy alcohol. She describes being subjected to a hostile "intervention" by group owners who resented her presence, and how that group later nearly voted itself out of existence. Each story illustrates principles of unity, trusted servants versus group ownership, and letting Higher Power work through the group conscience.

Her most controversial stance concerns outside affiliations. She argues forcefully that the Adult Children of Alcoholics movement and treatment-center language — terms like "codependent" and "dysfunctional family" — are fragmenting Al-Anon and pulling members away from the fellowship's solution. She also expresses sadness that Al-Anon groups now must vote on whether they can reference the Big Book of Alcoholics Anonymous, when AA so generously gave Al-Anon its steps and traditions.

Vannoy closes with her favorite tradition — that each family group has but one purpose: to help families of alcoholics. She transforms it into a personal mission statement using the "I" form, describing how working the twelve steps gave her the spiritual experience to sit with a mother watching her child die of alcoholism and offer real hope, not just professional advice. Her conviction is absolute: she knows the solution because she has lived it, and she will do whatever is necessary to keep Al-Anon what it was meant to be.

Topics

Timestamps

• 0:00 Vannoy introduces herself with humor about her name — take the V off and you get Annoy
• 3:00 Describes how Al-Anon changed everything — gave her dignity, hope, and a Higher Power of her understanding
• 6:00 Family in recovery — sober husband, sober daughter, two sons who relapsed after brief sobriety
• 10:00 Early Al-Anon fellowship — 12-step calls, sitting in kitchens with wives while husbands drank, phone conversations that lasted hours
• 16:00 Wesley Parrish at Midland, Texas conference — putting I into the traditions and transforming their meaning
• 20:00 The Al-Anon War — attempt to combine two treasuries erupts into group-wide political battle, exposes embezzling treasurer
• 28:00 Group ownership — the hostile intervention by five group owners in a private home, and that group's eventual near-collapse
• 35:00 Controversial stance on Adult Children of Alcoholics movement fragmenting Al-Anon fellowship
• 42:00 Sadness over having to vote on whether Al-Anon can reference the Big Book that AA generously gave them
• 48:00 Favorite tradition — each family group has but one purpose — transformed into personal mission to help mothers of alcoholics