The Art of Unbinding Each Other from Alcoholism – Lorna K.

This tape was produced in the spirit of AA's 12th step to carry the message. Members of the fellowship should bear in mind AA's 11th tradition regarding anonymity at the level of press, TV and films and the use of this tape. Anonymity to this extent is actually the practice of genuine humility. We assure that humility expressed by anonymity is the greatest safeguard that AA could ever have. My name is Ed and I'm a very grateful member of Alcoholics Anonymous. And considering these past experiences that we've all had, September the 11th of this year, something comes to mind and it's in our 12 and 12. And it says almost any experienced AA will report how his affairs have taken remarkable and unexpected turns for the better as he has tried to improve his conscious contact with God. He will also report that out of every season of grief or suffering when the hand of God feels heavy or even unjust, New lessons for living will be learned. New resources of courage will be uncovered. And finally, inescapably, the conviction will come that God does move in a mysterious way his wonders to perform. On September the 11th, we all witnessed the collapse of the geometrical center of the world economy, the World Trade Center. And as I'm watching this, I said, wow, I was just overwhelmed. I really can't put it into words. And then I reached out to the speaker who lives in Los Angeles. Now, Los Angeles is on the other side of the country and requires you to fly. As we all know, the air traffic system was put to an absolute standstill. So after long deliberations with the committee and conversations with Mary M., who was going to be our speaker, we figured we'd get a sufficient substitute. originally when we formulated this fourth annual unit of breakfast which is going to feature our first woman speaker we chose this person who lives in New York City and I finally got a hold of her and she said, I'm not on the speaker circuit anymore I want to take a break and out of all of my salesmanship and out all of all my efforts it's called We Just Let It Go and I had an inspirational thought when Mary said she couldn't be here and that inspirational thought gave us this speaker back and her name is Lorna and I'd like to have you all welcome Lorna Good morning everybody, my name is Lorna and I'm an alcoholic. And I just want to get this out the way that you know beforehand because I just think there's somehow in these days it's sort of sacrilegious to speak without mentioning what has happened. And you know Jim and I were just talking at the table and it's appropriate that we mention it and we're going to be talking about it again and again and again, and it's very appropriate. Something huge has happened to us and you know I think there's a tendency for us to constantly, I've heard in meetings sort of push it away and I don't want to talk about that and we've talked about it for three days and I'm overwhelmed and it appropriate to speak about it. And, you know, the things that are important I want to minimize and the things which are unimportant I always want to be dramatic about. And I want to say I'm a New Yorker. I live in Manhattan. There's no place else on earth I'd rather be than in New York. And you know I have nothing profound to say about what's happened. I've I've got no great words of wisdom or anything. I just have a bleeding heart, as all America has. And, you know, I've been touched by people that have passed. And, I don't think there's one New Yorker that doesn't know someone. But I always remember, you now, when being in an upstairs bedroom in my house in England and putting on a black velvet suit and thinking to myself, I am dressing for my mother's funeral and really sort of stopping and saying, now Lorna, be aware of this moment in your life that you are dressing for your mother's funerals. It's a big moment. And then I thought to myself you know, I'm sad, I' m really upset the mother's passing is a big deal in one's life But I'm glad that I'm dressing for her funeral and she's not dressing for mine. And there comes a kind of a responsibility about being an adult. And, you know, a great spiritual teacher said, blessed are those that mourn. And we mourn those that have passed in such a brutal and sudden way. but maybe we get the chance to take on that pain, and they are released. And so it gives me a chance. AA has taught me to do service, and we do service on many different levels, and maybe I can have pain so that they don't have to. And I have to think that all those people that have been released in the World Trade Center are on to it into another dimension, into something totally different. And we all know that there are quite a few members of Alcoholics Anonymous already we know have passed and they pass sober. And so that's what I want to say about that and I also just want to say that, you know, another great spiritual teacher said that hatred will never cease by hatred but by love alone will hatred cease. This is an eternal law And you know love, I think we put love, I know often I do in this sort of hallmark context like lovey fuzzy feelings and you know oh I feel loving or I don't and you know love I realize is not a feeling always it's a decision and And it's radical. And, you know, sometimes you are not particularly lovable and you are irritating and you're not doing it my way. And, um, you Know, and I, it's a job. It's not easy. You know, we get this feeling that, oh, well, I should be this and I should be that and I should be the other way and at times like this particularly it's we're called upon to do something very radical and we in Alcoholics Anonymous have a very big calling you know I've felt very impotent over the last few days because I naturally like everyone else I volunteered and but they didn't need art auctioneers at the rescue site you know and so there was nothing I could really do and but Ed called me and and actually what had happened was I think that Mary was trying to get go to get here and I was able to say that tell her not to bother because even if she can get here it's going to be a mess at airports. And I will change my mind about not speaking, and I will come. And please, it's my pleasure and my duty and responsibility and my honor to be asked. And I want to, you know, this thing of that we do a great job by just being in AA and staying sober through this and being such a power. And I've always held this story because it's so perfect. On Wednesday morning after, Wednesday morning, September the 12th, I was at my morning meeting. It's a very early morning meeting and we sit around in a circle. It's big meeting and Wednesday morning it was particularly large and of course it went around the room and everyone was sharing about the events that had happened in less than 24 hours beforehand and people were just like devastated and there were guys there that had gotten out, there were people that had seen the planes going in and people were in this devastation. And it came around three-quarters of the way around the room and this girl had 22 days sober and she put and she it was her turn to speak and she said you know my name's so-and-so and I'm an alcoholic and she said, and I'm having terrible problems with my relationship. And it was like you know thousands of people have been slaughtered in lower Manhattan and she was like in her relationship and suddenly it was It's like this woman is under the rubble of self-centeredness and the steel beams of inward and alcoholism and the horror of it all. And it was like a breath of fresh air. It was like, she needs help! You know? I mean, you know? have to rescue her, you know. And it just sort of woke us all up about what we're all about. This is our mission, you know, and we have tools. We don't have gas masks and cutters and gloves and things like that but we have the greatest tool. We know how to raise the dead. You know we can't... I know how to raise the dead and you know how to raise, the dead. I know How to raise The Dead because I have the words of eternal life. I Know How to Say. I KNOW how you feel. This is what happened to me and this is what I did. And I know that it unbinds people, you know when Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead he said Lazarus come forth and the guy came forth and then he said unbinding him and that's what we do with each other You know, we unbind each other from the slavery and the bonds of alcoholism. And, you know, when someone walks through the door or I walk through the door and I said, but you don't understand, I don't really have alcoholism and it's not really my drinking because I don' t drink very much, you understand, but it's my marriage and it' s my job and it's my this, and it is my that, and its my height, and my weight, and the fact that I smoke cigarettes, and that's really my problem. And you said yeah, yeah, yeah, but this is what happened to us, and you were able to see me fully. You were able see me not the wretch that I was walking through the doors, but what I could become of the possibilities of myself. And they say that one of the highest forms of spiritual life is to remind another creature of its beauty. And that's what we do in here, we remind each other of how beautiful we really are. And you know all my life I was followed by talk of when I was a little girl they'd say, what that girl needs is a firm hand and you know you're really too much. You're just too much and I came into Alcoholics Anonymous and you didn't use those words to me. You didn't give me the firm hand you gave me the everlasting arms and you didn't say to me, you know something you're too much. You said why don't you try becoming more of what you really are and let go of what your not. And just I think every meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous has to have a story and I think the qualification is the healing part of AA. And I really, you know, they say that I'm a long time sober but I'm not really, but anyway I have lots of opinions. Alcoholics Anonymous does not but I have lot and I think that a meeting that doesn't have a qualification is somehow missing the essential ingredient of the meeting because we're about telling each other our stories and it's by our stories and our personal relationships that we are healed. It's by your stripes I am healed and by your wounds I am sealed and I need to, you know, it's that storytelling and I always am amazed when these people get up and they tell their story and they say, oh well, you knows, most of you have heard my story like we remember and, you know, the self-centeredness of thinking that, you know, I remember details of your story. I don't. And we like to hear the story over and over again. I mean how many people have said to me, oh talk about the maid's uniform or talk about this or do tell that again and we're like children if any of you have children and you've read them the same story over and over, but mommy you missed the bit about where the mouse did this or where she said that. And you know it's insane if you read the children's stories to them and if you miss something. And we like to hear the story and it's the story that's very healing. And my story is that I came into the program in the summer of 1976 and I had very little grasp on the fact that I drank. I could not see that I drank at all actually, I could hardly see that alcohol passed my lips and I always am so amused when people are talking about fifth steps and they say well I don't want to do a fifth step because I don' t want you to know who I am, I don''t really want to reveal who I am. Honey you know we saw you coming ten blocks away you know I mean we know who you are. Don't worry about it. Sit down. And I, you know, the reason we don't want to do fifth steps, I think, I don't want to find out who I am. I don' t want to find that I'm ordinary. You know? God forbid that I am ordinary. Actually, don't expect this to be a succinct story, it isn't. I just talk ad lib. The thing actually that one of the things that propelled me to stop smoking cigarettes I was a very chronic smoker and I'd seen all sorts of movies about lung cancer I'd had a mother-in-law that died a hideous death of lung cancer I mean I knew all about it but that didn't make any difference but one a guy sat down next to me once, and he said to me, oh Lord you smell bad. And I didn't mind dying, I just didn't want to smell bad, you know. And you can't frighten an alcoholic. You just can't frightened them. And you can,t you couldn't have said to, me you know something if you don't stop drinking you're going to die. Yeah yeah yeah yeah but then what? You know is that all? I'm gonna die? Well that's nothing. But I grasped very fast that if I didn't stick with you, I was going to have a very shabby ordinary second-rate life. and I certainly did not want to be ordinary. I didn't mind, you know, I didn't mine dying but I wanted to have an extraordinary death, you know, ordinary was not in my thing and I think it's something that's given to me. I often am amazed at alcoholics when they talk I mean there's eight million stories in the Naked City this is just one of them, and they say you know I'm really trying to get the middle line I'm trying to be you know whatever it is balanced or something like that. I don't have that quality. I always say you no I didn't drop acid because I wanted an ordinary day. I've never been interested really in the... I've always been fascinated with the extraordinary and the hugeness and the big picture and all that. And I think it's something that's given to me, and it's some thing that Alcoholics Anonymous fulfills. Alcoholics Anonymous is always bigger, and Alcoholics Anonymous says that you can have an extraordinary life. You can be extraordinarily kind. You can be extraordinarily compassionate. You can listen. You, all those qualities that you want, you can have in the extreme and I'd like to be extraordinarily loving. I really would. You know, I don't want to be mediocrely loving. They say, often alcoholics will say, you know, it was read in the How It Works that we are, what is that thing about we're not perfect but we strive for perfection? We are not, that's it, thank you. We are not saints. But people will say, oh well I don't like perfection and I'm not wanting to be perfect. Well I hope the dentist isn't looking in my teeth saying, well you don't mind if I don't like perfection, do you? And you don't mind if i put this drill into your gums. And you know we don't go to the ballet to see the ballerina fall flat on her face and we like perfection. We long for perfection and Alcoholics Anonymous gives us that, gives me the opportunity to strive for that. So all those qualities that I am are not supposed to be squashed in here, not supposed be pushed down and sort of subjugated. They're supposed to be like a fine racehorse trained and groomed so that it can run without hurting itself. And I find that people have a lot of pain in AA because they're trying to make themselves into something that they're not, and they think that all their thirst and all their passion is somehow wrong. Anyway I had this thirst and passion and I came in to AA and I had my thirst and passion had driven me into a wall and I come in smashed, absolutely smashed but I didn't realize I was smashed. I had a very good job, I was in the public eye I'm the first woman art auctioneer in America and I worked for one of the major art auction houses and my life on the outside as you've often heard it was sort of getting better and better and inside was going downhill and downhill and it wasn't until I came into AA that my story was revealed to me. I didn't walk into Alcoholics Anonymous because I thought to myself, you know, I should really nip along to AA because my life is not in divine right order. I was absolutely brought in here. And the last week of my drinking was, I'd had a girlfriend staying with me overnight and she was from out of town and she'd stayed with me and then she got up in the morning and she was leaving, and I couldn't wait to get rid of her. And finally she left, and I went downstairs to the local bodega, and I bought a container of Tropicana, and I poured the Tropicano into a jug like this, and I poured in the vodka, and I made myself a carafe of vodka and orange juice, and I poured myself a tumbler full, and I drank it, the whole thing, write down and I can remember this vodka hitting my empty stomach and all the feelings of the vodka coming up and hitting my soul and my soul went oh you know that feels right and we can keep them at bay just one more day we can keep it going one more day. And I had a date with a guy for brunch that day, and my marriage was over. I got in the shower, and I could not release the glass from my hand. I was holding the glass, soaping myself up and holding the class out of the spray. I could not release it, but the vodka felt so good in my system. And I remember thinking to myself very clearly, this is like a dividing line in my drinking, I can remember thinking to my self, This is a morning drink! You are drinking in the morning. And there's an old Chinese saying that says, the beginning of wisdom is to call something by its correct name. Now I've had drinks in the morning many, many times but I called it brunch or I called it toasting the bride or I call it summertime. I had lived in Spain for a little while and I was drinking, and I had cognac in my coffee every morning and I called it continental. And I never called it drinking in the morning. And this I looked at and I saw my God you know I am drinking, this is a morning drink! And then the thought raced behind that moment of clarity and maybe that moment of healing. And it said, oh Lorna, the sort of woman you are, the mind of you, the kind of job you have to hold down, you know you're a little different from the rest. Why do you always torture yourself? Why do you make things so difficult and hard for yourself? Why don't you do this every morning? It would be so helpful to give yourself that. So with that thought actually I got in the shower and I started showering and I couldn't let go of the glass, and I think God looked out from heaven and went, oh this one you know, she needs help. And I had brunch with this guy I was dating, and this fellow I was taking a part of my story as I was stating him, and i had decided that I was going to marry him. The fact that he hadn't asked me or mentioned it did not occur to me. It was not a problem and I decided I wanted to marry him because he had the one thing in the world I wanted and it wasn't great love of me, it wasn t gentlemanly behavior, it It wasn't fine manners or a noble spirit or anything like that. He had a maid, and I was desperate for the maid. I wanted someone to lay my clothes out at night. I wanted Someone to run my bath. I wanted someone to brush my hair and to put my food on the table because I was far too busy, you know, just busy, busy, bussy. And I just couldn't get it together to do all that. And as I told you, I was smoking very heavily and any chair you sat down in his apartment, you sat in, right beside the chair was a little table and it had a silver container of loose cigarettes, an ashtray and a lighter that worked. And I was always looking for one or all three of those things, so I was willing to let this fellow touch the sacred temple in order to get to the maid. And you know, in some circles they call that prostitution. So on one night, I tell this because this is a typical woman's story and it's you know a lot of women have stories of not so much drunken but that feeling of sleaziness and like oh my god I didn't, did I? And I stayed with him one Saturday night. Stayed at his apartment and we'd had, we've been intimate with each other, you know we'd had intimacies and what did I know about intimacy? I mean it was sort of like coffee bagels and intercourse. I mean it was you know it was all on the same level and just as exciting as that too. I stayed with him on this Saturday night and I got up the following morning and I'm in his den, in his library or whatever you call it and I am wearing his dressing gown reading the New York Times while he is on the phone right there with me with another woman making a date for that afternoon. And you know, I can say what a sleazy fellow he was and I can talk about what a low-class chap he was but I was there and that's what I was attracting into my life. And we can tell what we are by what we attract into our lives and who is attracted to us. And you know, am I attracting violence? Am I attracting people that are angry at me? Maybe I'm angry. And anyway, that was not the end of the relationship. As you can say, you know we have a long way to go down from that. As I always say, low self-esteem when I came into the program was something I aimed for and so I had was having lunch with the same particular fellow that time after the shower and I had brunch with him and it was a disaster and I left and I remember sitting on the steps of the Metropolitan Museum of Art and I don't know if any of you have been into New York and you can picture the Met it's a you know great big building and a flight of stairs coming down, wide steps. And it was summertime and loads of people were sitting on the steps and they were with friends and there were tourists and people were selling hot dogs and soft drinks and life was going on. It was a fabulous, fabulous summer day. And I was sitting there all by myself and I could see it. I was sitting in the middle of it and I could not feel it I was so gone I was so dead and it's not that I was drunk it's just that I was not there and I had nothing to do the some wasn't going to set for a long time I didn't want to go to the movies I was totally alone and I thought you know I'll go to a meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous I'd been going to AA for a few months, my husband who had finally walked out the door which I thought was the most fascinating thing he'd ever done, you know I was still trying to get him back in some way. I mean I was wanting to marry this other fellow but I wanted to try and get this husband of mine back. I guess I wanted to torture him some more and I had started to go to meetings of Alcoholics Anonymous because someone told me that my husband drank, you know and that anyway I had gone to meetings and I remember my first meeting actually of AA was in Lenox Hill in New York and I remember sitting there and this fellow getting up on a stage it was and he said my name's Joe and I'm an alcoholic and I can remember thinking to myself well good god there's some things you keep to yourself Do you know? I mean, we don't all want to know. But I remember being riveted by his story and I think that that is the common denominator and that is the thing that qualifies me as an alcoholic. That I want to come to these rooms and listen to stories about people attempting suicide, vomiting, crawling on bathroom floors, losing their jobs, destroying their lives. And then I want to come back and listen it again. There's something the matter with me. Do you know that I find that interesting? And not only do I find it interesting but I want to get on the phone and talk about it some more, I want to go to coffee shops and talk about it. And I've been doing it for 25 years and I still find it interesting. So you know I'm sick. And so I don't think it's a matter of whether one hides bottles or how much one drinks or what the drink does or anything like that. I think if you like coming to these rooms and you find these stories interesting, welcome. and stay. So it's a great privilege to have ears, to hear this stuff. Anyway so I went to this AA meeting that afternoon and a woman spoke and she told my story up to where I was at that moment and then she went on for another 15 years and I could see that she was me and I was her and that and suddenly it dawned on me my god it's alcohol and I drink I drink and the I went I ran away out of that meeting onto Lexington Avenue and I went into a bar and I knocked back another vodka and orange juice and I remember drinking the whole night long. And I couldn't get drunk and I couldn t get sober, and the following day I woke up and I went to an AA meeting and I walked in and I said, I'm here for myself. And but just because I came into AA didn't mean to say that I had all knowledge and all wisdom and all understanding of the disease and that I had it. I mean when I first came in, you know, I was given the grace of coming through the curtain. I was given the grace of the curtain parting and seeing and going through. That's why I just want to say, you know, if you think of going out, the thing that terrifies me about picking up a drink is that the film moves along on the conveyor belt. And there might not be that perfect alignment again where the sprockets are all lined up and that picture is in perfect focus for me to shoot through into another dimension. It might never have that same kind of element again, and that terrifies me. I mean we know that people have gone out and they've come to meetings, but they're not necessarily back. And there's some thing happens in the universe I feel when everything is lined up and there's an opening through to another dimension. And every one of us in this room has experienced that. And if I go out again I don't know whenever that whole, when that door will ever open again for me. So it terrifies me to go out and not necessarily because I have a great spiritual life or a great foundation or or great integrity or anything like that, it's really greed that keeps me here because I know that something is going on in here and I don't want you getting something I'm not getting, so I keep coming back. Anyway I walked into the meeting the following day as I said and I you know I was in this new country but I didn't understand and the thinking sort of went like this in the early days. I thought one part you know when I first used to speak I used to finish speaking and I used to think to myself, good God the next time I speak I must get my story straight. And there's no getting it straight because I see it differently all the time, I feel it differently, I experience differently, my hopes and dreams change all the times. Anyway, when I first came in I remember thinking to myself that you looked at me and you whispered among yourselves, thank God Lorna has arrived. Thank God Lorne is among us because she adds great tone and class to AA. And we now at last as a movement can hold our heads up high because she has joined our ranks and she will lead us on to glory and we can break the bonds of anonymity and be there because she gives us credence and authority. Meanwhile what was happening was you were patting me on the back, you know how you do, and you were saying, you keep coming back, You're in the right place. And I didn't know what it was that betrayed to that I was new. I didn't know why, how you could tell straight off that I was new and maybe it was something to do with the fact that I was wearing the same dress for the last three months and I had very long hair and I wore, and this hair drove me insane. I was so manic about my hair and I wanted a hairstyle forever you know I wanted my hair done and I would so I wore it in braids across the top of my head very tight it wasn't you know like Heidi with little wisps coming out or anything like that it was like mrs. Danvers at the top of the staircase it was like brutally tight and you know pulled my eyes back and everything but I could I could keep it up for three and four days at a time that way I didn't have to keep taking it down and actually last night I was at a meeting in New York and I sat next to a woman and she said hi Lorna she said I'm Linda and she said remember the braids and I was only 31 you know so I was but I looked much older than I do now at 56. That stops you all worrying now about that and so the and so and also you know I had other dresses to wear but I couldn't be bothered to put another outfit together it was just too much to decide but what shoes and what this, and I just, I was too busy, just too, too busy. And I was, I wore gobs and gobs of makeup. I had coal, you know, K-O-H-L, black coal around my eyes, like football players wear, you Know, and um, I thought I looked fetching, but um, you know, I look more like a badger or something, and I wore this, they tell me I have large eyes, but I wore these coals because I thought that you couldn't see, it's a wonder I didn't have arrows on my face saying, eyes this way, you know? And I was festooned with jewelry. I had jewelry all over the place and I just say that I am so eternally grateful that I came into AA before the fashion of tattooing and piercing came out because I know I would have had the Last Supper put on my chest and you know a piercing, a little piercing in my navel or my ear or my nose would certainly not have done. You know I would have had a plate put in my lower lip or something you know. I would, I would've had to have had something a little extra and so I'm very very grateful God really, I was born and came in at the perfect time. Anyway so I was in AA and mixed with this feeling of I add great tone and class to AA, was also the feeling of oh my god I hope they don't kick me out. You know I hope they didn't ask me how to make a martini or how do you you know what's the alcoholic content of something or the other because I heard that you were members. You talked about the fact that you were members of Alcoholics Anonymous and I thought well you know there's some initiation. They're going to take me off and ask me, there's going to be some guys with you know little praying hands woven into their ties and a little praying hand cufflinks or something and they're going to be the ones that asked me about being a member and do I really want to join and I didn't know what I was gonna say you know I didn' think I would drank very much and I was so terrified but I was all a mixture you know. I came in an August and the winter was coming on and I couldn't wear a coat like everyone else of course, I had to wear a cloak. And I would sweep into the meetings as the preamble was being read and the ash trays were bouncing on the chairs and my sponsors be going. And I remember going into one meeting called Rhinelander once and some guy was reading the preamble and he said, all right, he said we'll all wait till Warner gets settled. I just, I guess I felt like I was disappearing and if I didn't make a big show you might sit on me or something you might not know that I was there. And spiritually, I did feel like I was disappearing. Anyway, to shoot this along, I just want to tell one story about my sponsor that most people talk about. It seems to be the kudos that if you have a sponsor that's brutal or bad-mannered or speaks roughly to you, that that's somehow right. Well, I didn't have that kind of a sponsor and I'm so glad I didn t. but those sponsors have their place too. But my sponsor never talked to me about my drinking. I think she thought, you know, this one has no idea that she drank. So she just talked tome about the high road. She just kept on talking to me about the highway. And she said to me things like this. She said, Lorna, if you stay with us and do as we suggest, you'll be able to develop a life that will be like having a quiver of golden arrows on your back. And when you come into a situation in life that you're not sure how to handle, you'll being able to reach back, select the perfect arrow, put it in your bow, and hit bullseye every time. And that concept was so intoxicating to me I never hit bullseye. I mean, no, I was always wrong. You know, alcoholics are always whining and saying, you know, I never felt like I fit in. Well, we don't. You know. And our behavior is totally inappropriate. And then we whine and say, well, I didn't feel like I'd fit in And, you know, I was the sort that would be wearing plunging necklines at funerals and no one ever said anything to me about my drinking. They just said things to me like, shh, or do you mind? Or that was very spiteful what you just said. Things like that. And so the idea of being appropriate and being right in the world was so wonderful for me. And that's what grabbed me. And I was tired of a second-rate life. I knew there was something about my life that was very shabby. And I didn't want to be shabmy. I wanted to aim for the high road. And so that's the thing that kept me coming. And it wasn't until I was about two years sober that my whole story, my story really started getting revealed to me in a big way. I realized, well, maybe that wasn't falling asleep at the dinner table. Maybe that was passing out, you know, and maybe that happened because I drank. Maybe, you know, the battles with my husband were about drinking. Maybe my marriage disintegrated with my drinking. And, you know, when I came in the program, I thought, well, I'd gone through a bad patch. Now I feel like I've been going through that bad patch since I was four, you know? And as I got more sober, I could see that the alcoholism went back further and further and further. And now I believe that I should have been taken from the delivery room to a meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous, you that um and i believe really i've often said this that i think actually that i was coming down the assembly line of heaven this time and god saw me as i passed by to enter into this world and he said you he said i have longed for you through countless lifetimes i have loved you and wanted so much you to turn and love me. And this time, you're going to be mine. And as I went past, he stamped me alcoholic. So I don't think I had a chance. And I think actually, I think I was given the greatest chance I think that so anyway I'm in AA you know life is happening to me and life is rolling along and I have my first five years and I get sponsees and I'm on an intense spiritual path. When I was about ten months sober I got introduced to the life of Christ I am raised Catholic but you know, if you raise Catholic, you never hear about Jesus. You just hear about the Pope and all that. And so, but I got introduced to that and I was fascinated with this guy. I thought, well, here's someone that really put their money where their mouth was. And I just got very intensely involved in that life. So I went off on a really intense spiritual path. And I've done all sorts of things anyway, you know. And nine years rolled on and ten years rolled on and, you know, I had buried my father and I had lost jobs and had jobs and things that happened and changed. And when I was 11 years sober, my mother passed away and life happened. And then when I was 15 years sober I went through the worst pain I have ever known. I went through hell. And I don't think it really matters what it is that promotes that hell, but I just want to talk about that for a while because, you know, I want to talk about the story of the prodigal son. There, a lot of you know the story and it said that the young man went off into a far country and he squandered all that he had and the country went into a great famine and he came to his senses. He'd asked his father for half of his inheritance and he'd just gone off and squandered it all. And he came to his sense and he said, you know, in my father's house, even the servants are eating well, I will go back and say to my father, you now, Father, I have sinned against you and all that and I'm no longer worthy to be called your son but treat me as one of your hired servants. So he's on the road back home and he's going through the speech, you know, I'm going to say this, and then when he says that, then I'm gonna say this. And it says, and when he was a far way off, his father saw him. And running to him, the father didn't stand on the porch saying, well here comes that rotten son of a bitch, you now, I'm really gonna give it to him when he comes out oh now you know I told him no good would come of this so the father runs towards him and the son starts talking and he's saying you know father I have sinned against heaven against you and the father's like you know bring bring the cloak and put it around him bring the ring and put on his finger that which is lost is found and my son has returned to me and he comes in and the father makes a feast for him but I think the most interesting part of the story is the elder's son the elder son was out in the fields and the elder sun came back and he said to one of the servants what is all the noise going on and the servant said your brother has returned home and your father has killed the fatted calf for him and the eldest son is like doesn't want to go in and he won't go into the party and he says, son please come in and he goes, I've been with you all this time I've never disobeyed you I've done it right and you've never killed the fatted calf that I could have with my friends and this wastrel son of yours, he says to him this son of your's goes away and you kill the fatted calf and make a big fuss over him and the father says, son you are with me always and all that I have is yours but we should rejoice because this son of mine that was lost is found. And the story never goes on to tell you what happened, whether there was reconciliation. But I identify with that older son very much. You know, and at 15 and in my teen years of sobriety, it's very easy to look at, hell, I've done it right. I've sponsored all these people. I've led meetings, I've spoken, I cleaned ashtrays, I put out chairs. My relationship is falling apart. My job is on the rocks. This has happened to me. Where's mine? What's happening? Why do I feel so terrible? Why? I've read the big book from cover to cover and what's happening to me. And it just seems that for me, you know, a lot of resentment and upsetness and bewilderment raised its head when I was in my teens. And this thing, the pain of trying to be like everyone else, the pain OF trying to fit in, the PAIN of, you KNOW, I have this, why isn't it satisfying to me. Why can't I be content with the fact that I'm sober? You know, people would say, aren't you grateful you're sober today? I mean, get some gratitude. And I couldn't get there. And I think, you know, I was talking to Ed before the meeting. I think that the teenage years are very, very difficult in sobriety. And i feel that a lot of people have a great, great struggle through teenage years. And there comes a time when it feels very bleak and they're getting theirs and what's in it for me? I've done all this work and what'S in it for me and is this what my life is all about? You know, I often say, they said to me when I came in, you know, life is going to be beyond your wildest dreams. Well, I certainly could have thought of something far wilder than this, you now. It's not beyond my wildest dreams. And I just want to say for myself, people often say, you know, that pain lasted four years. I went through that and I tried everything. I know how to get out of pain. You work with newcomers. You get away from yourself. You pray. You meditate. You chair meetings. You do all that sort of thing. And I realized that I was very spiritually arrogant. I thought, I know the formula for this I know what to do This is what you do I had reduced Alcoholics Anonymous and my spiritual life To a formula I'd reduced it to this is the way you do it So really, God was gone I had the tools, I knew what to doing God is out of the picture I wasn't relaxing back into the everlasting arms anymore and even on a spiritual level and the spiritual is the biggest trap because it's like well I'm doing all this stuff spiritually why do I still feel murderous and you know I was very friendly with Mother Teresa and I've worked in India many times and in this period I even went off to India to work I thought well you know alcoholics aren't doing it for me let me work with the lepers and even the lepers were looking better off than me. Do you know, I had imploded into myself. I couldn't get out and mother was very sweet to me. She put me up in the orphanage. She knew I was just a mess and anyway, she visited New York a little while after that and we met up with each other and she asked me, she said, how are you doing? How is it going for you? and I said mother it's hell it's absolute hell and she looked at me and she said oh, she said how God must love you she said and he wants to be very intimate with you but he is a jealous lover and he is burning out of your soul everything unlike himself and I said well gee that's swell mother but um you know I wish he'd stop kissing me quite so passionately here and um and I realized I think then that I just it was another level of surrender and I really can't tell you I can never people always say to me how did you get out of that pain I have no idea I did not get out Of that pain God came into the desert and brought me out and it wasn't done till it was done and believe me I tried everything I worked with the lepers I went off to all sorts of countries I fasted for 40 days I sat in silent meditation for 3 months you name it, I did it and one day I was with some friends in a kitchen someone's kitchen and we were making dinner and I heard something I hadn't heard for years and it was the sound of myself laughing and that great thing, but you know the one thing, God stripped everything away from me but the one things that was not stripped was smart feet and my feet brought me to meetings and I sat in meetings and I screamed and I cried and I carried on and people would nudge each other and say how long does she have? 17 years? 18 years? well I certainly don't want what she's got And, you know, and people will often say, and there wasn't anyone on the face of the earth that didn't know that I was in pain. You know, I mean, the East Coast, the West Coast, in Bombay, in Calcutta, Cairo. And one woman came up to me once in New York and she said, Lorna, I'm so sick to death of you and your pain. She said, I was going through a lot and I was sitting in London and someone came upto me and said, how's Lorna and her pain? I have no idea how long I've spoken for because I forgot to look at my watch when I got up here but anyway, thank you so much I'll end the story with this, I mean I could go on talking forever here but I want to tell something that happened to me in the last few years and it was a great thing in line with Beyond Our Wildest Dreams I asked Ed to mention it but he didn't mention it because I feel a little weird about mentioning it but it's part of my story and we all, whatever happens to us but anyway, I wrote a book and it's all about myself it's absolutely fascinating And so, riveting. And anyway, a lot of it is to do with my spiritual journey. And a lotof it isto do withmy relationship with Mother Teresa. And so I wrote this book. And when Mother died, I was called by the missionaries of charity, her sisters, to ask if, because they started her cause for canonization very fast. and they asked me if I would submit copies of my personal letters from her to the tribunal. So, I was thrilled to death to do that. I was just so happy and it was an honor to do that and then I had been corresponding and I'd actually gone to see a woman that was a hermit in the desert in New Mexico, and she had gotten a hold of a copy of my book, and we started a correspondence. And she wrote and said, Lorna, I am praying that you are called as a witness to Mother Teresa's canonization. And I thought to myself, this poor old dear out in the dessert, you know, the sun has gotten to her. I mean, mother and I were close, but that's a whole different stratosphere. But I then heard that the Vatican had requested my book, and I had this English friend that's at Cockney, and he said, well, that's it, isn't it? He said, the Pope's probably in bed at night, you know, drinking his cocoa and reading your book. And I had the vision of the Pope with there's a little nightcap on you, flipping through the pages looking for the juicy bits. And so anyway, one day I came home from somewhere and in my mailbox was a letter from the tribunal and it was asking me to present myself to give my testimony for the sanctification of Mother Teresa of Calcutta. And I appeared and did this, and it was a great, great honor. And, you know, I'm a witness to a saint. And what was so phenomenal about the whole process, I think, was that you know, I realized at 23 years when it talks about being beyond one's wildest dreams, this little voice whispered to me, Lorna it is beyond your tacky wild dreams your wild dreams are all about money, men and mansions you know it is in another dimension honey and it has taken me beyond my wild dream. This is my wildest dream. I could never in my wildEST dream have thought that I would be asked to do this. I'm one of many. I'm a tiny, tiny cog in a big wheel, but it has caused me so much joy and pride and pleasure to be able to do this. And it's all about someone else. It's not about my canonization, however. And that's what it is, you know, for us here. that thing that happens, that our joy and our greatest joy comes out of not my ownership of things but my giving and my sharing and my joy in your joy. My sharing in your enjoy. I realize that those are the things that have given me the greatest pleasure now in these last years. It's that. And I have one thing and one thing only that cannot be taken away from me. And the reason I know that it's mine, that it is only mine, that it really is mine is because it can't be taken way from me You can take away my home, my family, you can take way my possessions, you can takeaway my reputation, you can takeaways my body, my heart, my spleen, my very life. You can takeaway from me because they are not mine. The only thing you cannot take away from me and the thing that's truly mine is my experience. And it's my experience which raises the dead. And it' s my experience that' s the benefit of mankind. So, you know, we come to these meetings and we sit on these chairs and we drink the coffee and we think we're moseying along. and we are, we're moseying along in our little ways and doing what we do, taking the kids to school washing the dishes, making sure the place is tidy coming to meetings, listening to a sponsee, doing all the things but those little things are about a huge, huge picture and we support each other in a phenomenal way and people often say to me you know, you're a long time sober you don't have to go to so many meetings And, you know, maybe I don't need to go to so many meetings. But maybe someone else needs me to go to so Many Meetings. Maybe there's some woman in Vermont that's 40 miles away from a meeting and can't get to it. I don' t know. But, you know, it's a great, great privilege. And it's not about me getting something out of the meeting. It's about me just being in a meeting and supporting it all as a whole. And I don't know who I'm supporting. I might not be supporting the person that's sitting next to me. It's the community of us all. And, you know, I feel very, very shaken and it's been a very strange kind of a talk this morning because underlying it all is the hum of us, us all wounded in a different way. and I want to thank you all so much for going to meetings I want to thank you for putting money in the basket for getting the alcohol out of your house for doing all the things that you do to support us all for doing service for arranging things like this because if you weren't here and going to meeting I'd have nowhere to go and I'd still be sitting on those steps of the Metropolitan, so thank you for your sobriety. Thank you. Thank you.