Trembling Hands, Grounded from Flying, and the Marine Corps Made Me an Air Traffic Controller 🤦 – Sandy B.

Good evening, everybody. My name is Sandy B., and I'm an alcoholic. How are you doing?
Hi, Sandy!
It's a pleasure for us to be here, and I'm delighted to have the opportunity to see this place.
I just had no idea this little garden spot existed up here, and we're taking back some wonderful memories.
I came into Alcoholics Anonymous a little over 20 years ago,
and when I went to my first meeting, I had been sober six hours.
And I didn't like my first meeting,
because I saw something, a fatal flaw in Alcoholics Anonymous right during my first meeting.
No drinking.
And I looked back, and I said,
I wasn't planning on staying sober and all of that,
but I always like to start my talk out by saying,
I have not been drunk since that first meeting.
Oh, I didn't mean to applaud.
That wasn't the point I was making, but that's all right.
I owe it all to not drinking.
That's the point I want to make.
For the benefit of anybody new,
the, uh...
Getting drunk is caused by drinking.
And that is, uh, you know, that's real bad news and good news.
And yet, if just not drinking was the entire program,
um, I know that I probably wouldn't have, uh, stuck around that long.
But I think Alcoholics Anonymous, and I say this for the benefit of anybody new,
what I think the promise here is,
that we can do this together.
That we can stay sober and happy at the same time.
Uh, if sobriety was miserable,
I don't know how long I could have lasted,
because I can only endure sobriety for just so long,
and then something is going to have to give.
And early on, I heard something that has stuck with me,
uh, the years that I've been in,
and that is that if you're in AA and you're not happy,
you're doing it wrong.
And the reason that's such a powerful statement is,
it puts all the responsibility on your shoulders,
where it belongs.
It puts it right on the person who has to do the changing,
which is me.
And while that may be a tough principle to swallow,
it is certainly one that, in my judgment, offers a great deal of hope.
Because if the only thing that's standing between me and the promises of the program,
serenity, happiness, whatever you want to call it,
is something that I can change,
then that is a great deal of hope.
And I think that's what the program offers.
It teaches me to shift the perspective from laying the blame and responsibility
on everything that's screwed up in my world,
out on someone else,
and zeroes it in on me.
And that means that I do not have to wait for someone else to straighten out
before I can get happy.
Because I'm not able to wait an awful long time.
And you know, for some unknown reason,
the old ideas I brought in here to AA taught me that.
And that was the perspective I had.
I looked at the world in terms of fairness.
And I kept a little scorecard.
And I was a great inventory taker.
And I kept track of when things were going fair for me
and when things weren't going fair for me.
And I reported to anyone who would listen how things were going.
And I thought that that was my primary job.
I thought that's what sharing was all about.
Was reporting to someone in charge when things weren't right.
And it could be my mother,
or in the Marine Corps I would try to report to some colonel.
And it'd punch me.
But I mean, I was reporting that things weren't going right.
And I guess I figured that my primary function was that of a briefing officer.
If you could just explain yourself in sufficient detail,
you had done your share.
And I came in here and found that that just wasn't the deal at all.
That what I was offered was a whole new plan for living.
And I suppose that's what I feel like talking about here tonight.
If I had to describe how I feel tonight, I would say,
did you ever have the thought go through your head,
wouldn't it be nice to know what I know now and start all over?
Did you ever have that feeling?
Oh boy.
I'd like to be able to start all over knowing what I know now.
And I honestly feel that's exactly,
if I were to share to you what's going on inside of my head tonight,
I would tell you that I have that feeling of starting all over knowing what I know now.
Nancy and I got married about six months ago.
It's a whole new start for us.
I feel like,
if we even start a family,
that's okay.
I already got kids that are already grown.
I did a lousy job.
Maybe I can do a great job this time.
I got a job change.
I just made a decision about a month ago
to make a complete change in jobs and I start Tuesday.
And I'm going back and a whole new deal.
This year has been very good financially.
It's been one of these things where my friend,
Hal Marley,
back in Washington,
calls me up on a regular basis and he says,
Sandy,
if there's anybody in Alcoholics Anonymous
who ought to tell himself that things are going indeed well,
it is you.
And I'm going,
you know,
Hal,
you're absolutely right.
There's,
if I shared,
you know,
my optimism and my outlook on things,
it would be extremely positive.
Can you turn the mic up just a little?
Up?
Up towards your mouth.
Oh, okay.
Is that a little better?
Oh, all right.
I apologize.
I didn't realize that wasn't coming out.
Anyway, the,
I forgot where I was.
Oh, Hal Marley, yes.
Okay.
About five years ago,
I had a similar call from Hal.
And this is part of the program I wanted to talk about
before I get into what I had planned.
I just,
I've had some things I've never shared at a meeting
because they've been fairly recent
and I just feel I could get it done here tonight,
so I'll go ahead and do it.
But I guess about five years ago,
Hal called me up
and was sharing the same kind of thing.
He's sort of my alter ego back in Washington.
Everybody should have somebody like that
who takes your inventory on a daily basis
and lets you know how you're doing.
And he had called me up and
my wife at that time and I
had just bought a house on Capitol Hill.
I had just sort of come out of near bankruptcy
and had gotten a new job and,
you know, you're sitting at 15 years sobriety.
I was relating to Bob earlier
when he was talking that there's these various peaks
that we seem to pass.
And he said,
and it seemed that about 14 or 12,
somewhere in there,
I was going through bankruptcy
and sobriety didn't seem right at the time.
It seemed like,
why isn't the program working right?
And anyway,
at this point in time,
I had gotten promoted
and was doing rather well.
There were two incomes
and so we had bought this house
and were entertaining
and it was a nice life.
And I remember talking about
how it felt.
And a couple years later,
I was called in and there was a discussion
and my wife informed me that she was leaving
and there was somebody else
and it was all over
and this was the end of the deal.
And the next morning,
Hal called me up
and he said,
Sandy,
have you counted all the things
you can be grateful for today?
And I remember holding the phone out
and I thought what I had heard yesterday
was outrageous,
but that particular phone call
seemed even more outrageous.
But I want to share with you
the power of that phone call
because I suppose that
during those next couple of months,
that's as much pain
as I have felt in sobriety.
And I wanted relief from it.
And that phone call
focused me on something
that I just hadn't,
I don't think I would have gone to
on my own,
which is why I think
we need each other so much,
especially when we encounter moments
that appear unfair,
that seem extremely painful
and indeed something like that
is supposed to be painful.
And the answer to it
lay in prayer.
And so I will tell you
how prayer works
in situations like that
because statistically
there could be four or five people
in this room
who are in similar types
of painful situations.
And so I'll share with you
what I think prayer had to do
with that particular pain.
I probably in the course
of the first 24 hours
said six thousand Our Fathers
with no results.
So I called Hal
and I said,
this isn't working.
And he said,
keep doing it.
And so I would imagine
during the first week
I came in close to sixty-five thousand
Our Fathers.
It was just a steady mumbling
of, you know,
and it would alternate
between whining
and groveling
and hysteria
and sobbing
and racking
and it was just
Our Father in heaven
I'll be like
Why am I doing this?
It isn't working.
And you know as
the time went on
the pain was excruciating
for the proper amount of time
for something like that.
But at no time
during this particular incident
did it occur to me
that there was another answer.
There is tremendous solace
in realizing
when we get to Alcoholics Anonymous
that we've been given the game plan
and that my responsibility
is to just continue doing it.
And I will share with you
that after a couple of weeks
I recall one evening
experiencing a break
in that pain
and probably feeling
the greatest peace of mind
I've ever had in this program
however brief it may have been.
It was just a moment of realizing
where I knew deep down in my heart
that contrary to all of my feelings
and all of these pains
and all of this mental exercise
I was going through
I had the feeling
that I have had
in AA I would say
the last 10 years
that fundamentally
everything is just fine.
That fundamentally
I'm going along
in just the right direction
and everything is going to work out
and when it does
afterwards
when you get on the other side
you will look back
you will understand it
and you will be glad
that it happened.
And I stand here tonight
and I can tell you
I'm delighted that happened.
I can tell you that
I've been taken out of a position
of relative happiness
and placed in one
that is many times more happy.
I could tell you
if I went back
to my early years in the program
or back to the drinking years
that is not how I would have
shared this story with you.
I have a hunch
I would have had a different perspective
on what happened.
And I would have had a lot more
opinions on what happened
and what we ought to do
as a gang.
And I just wanted to get that out
because sobriety
is not a plan
to ensure a certain result
but rather
a plan and a power
to enable us
to have a happy sobriety
no matter what comes our way.
That to me
is what Alcoholics Anonymous
is all about.
The ability to stay on course
through the good weather
and the bad weather.
When I had been sober
about two years
I went to a meeting every night
and I came into AA
in the Marine Corps
and I was a jet pilot
and it was a very exciting career
that I had going.
They called it a career
I called it a hobby.
It was something that I was able
to give about four hours a day to
and my alcoholism
was my full time job
and that was requiring
a great deal more attention.
But at any rate
when I came into
Alcoholics Anonymous
I had been grounded from flying
I had had seizures
and been locked up in a nut ward
and was let out of the nut ward
after about six months.
The Marine Corps had to make a decision
about what to do
with a former pilot
who they were not letting fly anymore
who had gotten in such bad shape
that his hands were trembling
and his voice quavered all the time
and so to show that I wasn't the only one
suffering from a lack of sanity
I will share with you
that the Marine Corps decided
to make me an air traffic controller.
So I became an air traffic controller
and eventually I got into
Alcoholics Anonymous
I didn't kill anybody
bring them around in bad weather
and so on.
But I did go to a meeting every night
for the first year
and at the end of that time
I was the captain in the Marine Corps
and I was eligible for promotion
and this is a very crucial rank
to achieve a major
because then you are guaranteed
to continue your career
it's sort of a very pivotal point
and you get two shots at it.
So my first year of sobriety
the list comes out
and neither my sponsor
or myself is on it.
So we experienced a
this is a non-Jewish term
but they call it a Passover.
So we talked to each other
and we said well that's because
the Marine Corps doesn't understand alcoholism
but wait till next year
we're both doing wonderful jobs
I'm sure that they will be enlightened
and we will get this all straightened out.
So I went to meetings every night
for another year
and was getting very good marks at work
and so on down
mainly because I was showing up
and my brain was working
and life was quite a bit different
and the following year
he got promoted
and I didn't
and he gave me a pep talk
about how I would enjoy civilian life
wouldn't have to wear these uniforms anymore
and in spite of his pep talk
I had a resentment
but I didn't show up.
I didn't share resentments very well
in those early years
because I didn't want to look bad
you know what I mean
I didn't want anybody to know
the program wasn't working
so you pretend you don't have any resentments
and you walk around telling everybody
whenever they ask you
how are things going
you go great
even if you're thinking of murder
at the time
you just go
great, great, great
sobriety is great
and then at home at night
I would beat up a couple of my kids
and you know
get dressed for a meeting
and then go to the meeting
and if I was leading
I would lead on humility
or some topic like that
give you a very good discussion
of the program
and the wonders of it
and how happy my life had become
in spite of this temporary setback
but deep in my heart
was a rage
that was becoming an inferno
and I was not going to share that
with anybody
so the months went by
and all of a sudden
it was a reality
and I'm out
and I hadn't even looked for a job
and so I had to hustle up a quick sales job
I was selling copiers
I didn't even know how to sell
it was just out of the blue
six kids
I'm trying to feed everybody
no money
and I started feeling
that the program was unfair
this was a very strong feeling that I had
this program was unfair
because there was another guy in our group
who just inherited a lot of money
and in my judgement
his program wasn't half as good as mine
and I remember focusing in on
unfair sobriety
unfair
and
I didn't tell anybody
I didn't tell anybody about this.
I didn't want to get somebody else drunk by ruining to them
that AA was not what it was cracked up to be.
I would keep that my own secret.
But as far as I was concerned, it was a rather big failure.
And the more I focused in on that
and started devoting more of my attention to this injustice,
the bigger it got.
But I found if you want to really mess around with a resentment,
don't share it. Keep it to yourself.
Go up in your room, lock the door, take the phone off the hook,
and it's like putting yeast in bread, you know,
and putting it in the oven.
I mean, in a matter of a few hours, it went right past the Holocaust.
In terms of a world in justice.
And so this is how I was seeing things.
And that was the way I was brought up.
That's the perspective I brought to AA.
That is the perspective that is so necessary to change
in order to see the promises of the program,
in order to see justice in the world,
in order to see the kindness in people.
The perspective had to change.
But it wasn't changed.
It was changed at that moment in time.
But I always like to share this.
It was, and I started a direct communication with God.
And I would let him know about every hour
how I felt, how this was threatening my sobriety,
how I'd probably be drunk soon.
And it would be his fault.
Because after all, I'm the one who went to the meeting every day.
I went to the meeting every day.
I didn't drink.
And it was supposed to get better.
And it was terrible.
And it was, mostly it was unfair.
That was the key word, unfair.
And somewhere in the middle of this discourse with God,
I was reading the Washington Post,
and back near the end there was a short paragraph
about a team of Marine officers.
And as I read about it, it was the one I was on.
It was an instructor.
It was an instruction team that traveled around to other service schools
and made a two-day presentation all about the future of the Marine Corps.
And my job was, I was the operations officer for that team.
And it had just flown into a mountain in Denver, Colorado,
killing everyone on the team.
And, of course, it became apparent to me that if I had had my way
and had gotten promoted, I would have been on that plane.
Right?
So there was a short period of relief.
And there was immediately followed by a period of embarrassment
because I knew that God knew I was reading this article.
At the same time, you know, that...
Thank you.
And I said something like,
Well, Jesus Christ, if you had just told me...
I wouldn't...
So I guess that was lesson number one
in perspective changing.
That I recall in my sobriety.
That was a very significant development.
And I look back and there's a funny thing
about the significant perspective altering
that has occurred in my sobriety.
I don't know about anybody else's sobriety.
All of them have occurred during intense pain.
Now, maybe some of you are intellectually curious.
And you get your act straightened out voluntarily.
This has not been the case with me.
I will have to tell you that.
I would like to claim credit for this.
And I share this for the benefit of anybody who is new.
You know, if you're brand new
and you really haven't asked any questions
and you're just in the midst of this crowd
and you hear speakers coming up
and we're talking about,
then I decided to do an inventory
and then I decided meditation
and then I decided I wanted to get closer to God
and then I decided I wanted to become a Christian.
I wanted to become the best possible person I could become.
You could be sitting there going,
I've never felt like that in my life.
I must be in the wrong crowd.
I must be uniquely awful.
So what you're missing,
I think in the computer world,
they call it a modem.
And what I need to do,
is serve as a translator for you
so that you understand our AA jargon
when you hear us talking about
and then I decided to take a fourth step.
They're way ahead of me.
When you hear a speaker say
and then I decided to take a fourth step,
what it was really meant by that statement is,
they're a thousand steps out of your tears
for me.
But we're not done here,
and we're not coming in at four yet.
I'm gonna make them take four more steps.
I know I don't have enough,
while I'm going on from here.
I'm gonna tell you one thing.
I'm taking a four-step.
But we get the four-step route back and out
and then we're gonna take a
then my sponsor said,
he'd break my leg,
if I didn't take a four-step.
That's...
there's a chapter in the big book
to the agnostic
I think it's a great chapter
I don't know what
I was talking to Clancy before
he said what are you talking about
I said chapter in the big book
about the agnostic
because I have some funny memories
about that chapter
and I don't know
maybe there's some new people
you have the same type thing
early on
I had this big sponsor
he was the marine
when he came to my house
he filled the door
if you know what I mean
and I had made the call
to intergroup
and then I got a drink
to stay down
after I made the call
my problem was
I couldn't get any booze
to stay down
I thought I was going to die
so I called AA
with an emergency
so they got a hold of this guy
down at the Quantico Marine Base
and he's on his way over
and now I've got some vodka
to stay down
so I called him back
because I didn't want to waste
their resources
and they said
two ladies on his way
and I'm going
oh god
I've got to get rid of this guy
and he just filled the door frame
and came in
and he just stood there
and he just went
hi my name is Bill
this is a 12 step call
I talk you listen
we're in deep trouble here
so this guy
get in the car
that was the basic message
I remember going
well Bill
I won't be able
to do
get in the car
and I'm going
no
why don't you leave
some literature
and I'll look it over
get in the car
right now
you know
so
for a long time
I thought that was
AA's first step
get in the car
the second step
the second step
was sit in the front row
and I'm going
that was incurable rows
sit there
don't talk
but soon
he had us go into a meeting
every night
and soon
it was big book time
and he said
have you got a big book yet
and all of a sudden
I said
you're all about the big book
and I knew he was serious
and I knew
that this was
there was no way
of getting around it
so I did
I don't know if any
I'm sure other people
have done it
I got a big book
immediately
and then I took it home
that night
and I opened it
you know
about nine o'clock in the morning
nine different places
then I messed some pages up
you know what I mean
folded them around
I took some coffee
and slotted it around
then I underlined some pages
and in twenty minutes
that book looked like
it had been around for years
you know what I mean
the guy had really worked
but I didn't read one word
I did not read one word
I'm not one of these guys
who got the big book
and digested it
you know
I just went
that's enough of that
I'm going to read
I don't want to get
into this thing too far
these people are fanatics
I saw through
the day at a time thing
immediately
there were
don't give me that stuff
you're only staying sober today
there's people up here
that are never planning
on drinking again
don't give me that
day at a time stuff
I'm just staying sober today
I'm going
ha ha ha ha ha
I don't want to get
why does that cake say
five years
you know how you are
so I said
I don't want to get brainwashed
what if they develop
a cure to alcoholism
you know
I want to keep my
options open
, keep your options open
you cannot move
but you got your options open
you can't go anywhere
you must remain stationary
if you keep your options open
and that's what I did
but anyway I had a big book
and I do remember
looking at the index
and there was a chapter
or flipping through it
maybe I saw the title on the top
the agnostic
now I'm one of these people
who like to think that
people who lots of times
can tell what's in there
without reading it
isn't that nice
certain of us in the program
were gifted this way
ha ha ha ha
I think they call it
contempt prior to investigation
you know
somebody suggests
we do the steps
and we say
no I've already read them
they wouldn't work for me
ha ha ha ha
you know
you know
you know
you know
you know
you know
you know
you know
you know
you know
you know
you know
you know
you know
you know
so I knew what was in
the chapter to the agnostic
without reading it
it was the chapter
that told
agnostics
how to stay sober
and then the rest
of the morons
did the steps
and did all the rest
of the program
so I knew eventually
I would fit in
the chapter to the agnostic
if I read it
and there came a time
and if you're new
and you think
that's what that chapter says
that's the contents
of that chapter
I call it the Jack Benny chapter
now the reason I call it that is
because there is a choice
that is
well in the first place
I'll tell you if you want a brief summary of the chapter
I can give it to you in about four words
three words
chapter to the agnostic says
change your mind
that's chapter to the agnostic
but anyway
it lays out
a rather interesting dilemma
I think we're always faced with dilemmas
here in
Alcoholics Anonymous
and we heard a pretty good discussion of that earlier
but this is
one that I always
connect back to Jack Benny
who I used to talk
about this in Washington and a bunch of young people
came up later on and said what was so funny
about that
and I realized they didn't know who Jack Benny was
and
and
and
and
and
and
and
and
and
and
and
and
and
and
and
and
and
and
and
and
and
and
and
and
and
and
and
and
and
for those of you that may not know
he was quite a great comedian
and his
renowned
character
was that of being very cheap
and tight with money
and probably the funniest radio show
that he ever did
had this little bit in it
where Jack Benny's walking down the hallway
all you can hear is the footstep
click click click click click
and all of a sudden
a voice comes out and goes
stick em up
your money
or your life
life
and then starts the silence
ten seconds
fifteen seconds
there's this silence
and the radio audience laughter starts building
and it's still nothing
you know it goes on almost forever
forever
and finally the guy with the gun says
well
and Benny says
I'm thinking
laughter
and you sit
and you howl at someone who would be in that position
where they would be going,
God, I don't know whether to give my money away or get blown away.
And there is a discussion in the chapter of the agnostic
and I think Bill has a marvelous sense of humor
and I find it all through the big book, the 12 and 12,
but there's a little couple of sentences in there
where he says,
for the alcoholic to choose between living a life
based on spiritual principles
or dying an alcoholic death
is not always an easy choice.
And that's what step two or the chapter of the agnostic
is all about.
You know, you come in and you get the rug yanked out from under you
and if you're new and you've seen this first step
about being powerless over alcohol,
I remember coming up against that one
and you better watch out if you admit you're powerless over alcohol
because that's a dangerous position intellectually to get yourself in.
Because if you admit you're powerless over alcohol,
you can't learn your way out of that.
You are...
You are...
You can only be helped out of that.
You must find a power.
And so powerless is a rather big word
and it's sort of the key to our program
that that's the fundamental nature of our problem.
I can't learn about alcoholism.
I can't learn all valuable insights
and have them fix me.
They can help me,
but I still don't have the power
to put into practice all of the things that I've learned.
My problem was powerlessness.
And so when we take an alcoholic
and we educate them all about alcoholism,
then we have a person who is lying on the floor drunk
but knows precisely why.
But they're still drunk every day
because the problem was not that they didn't know anything about alcoholism.
The problem was powerless over alcohol.
So our dilemma was powerlessness
and that was what mine was.
And I didn't want to admit it.
I did not want to surrender.
I was afraid to.
I couldn't surrender.
What would take over if I surrendered?
I didn't believe in a God.
I had heard of one from the nuns
that so many of us had as children.
And I had abandoned that one
as punishing and frightening and so on down.
But those were childish ideas
and they should have been replaced with grown-up ideas
except as an alcoholic.
I had an alternative to growing up.
It was called vodka.
Why go through the pain of growing up
when you can drink?
Drink three, you are a grown-up.
You intuitively know how to handle situations
that used to baffle you.
You know?
It was like you activated the system.
It gave us a different perspective.
It showed me.
So there really were 14 promises of vodka.
And they all worked just like the promises in the big book.
So I can relate to the higher power of vodka
just as much as I can the higher power I found in AA.
The difference is vodka didn't love me.
That was the problem.
It worked, but it just didn't have my best interests at heart.
But the program works very similar in my life to that feeling I had with alcohol.
I had great faith in alcohol.
I didn't even actually have to drink alcohol to have it work.
Just knowing my, if I could look out the window and see my car in the parking lot,
just knowing the vodka was there in the glove compartment would calm my body down.
It wasn't even in my system, just knowing it was there.
Sometimes when we get sober, we have a $50 bill hidden in our wallet, just in case.
You've got to cover yourself, right? What if there is no God?
Or worse than that, what if there is a God and it's really true, you are the one person he doesn't like?
And you know, all those frightening questions,
the only way to,
you know, get them answered, is to go find out.
Is to go ask.
And the only way to go ask is to come up against this dilemma that I was talking about.
To live a life on spiritual principles or to die an alcoholic, that's not always an easy choice to make.
And I think what helps us make it is our disease.
I've looked back on it and the disease is what gave me the perspective that I had to choose,
the life based on spiritual principles.
My impression of AA's first step goes something like this.
You come into the AA program, they take you up on top of a parachute tower,
and throw you off without a chute.
And about three feet from the cement deck, a big hand comes out and goes,
and grabs you just before you hit.
It says, excuse me, we're conducting a survey.
Do you believe in God?
That's the time to ask.
And you know, if you're new here, God and higher power and so on down in AA,
it isn't that AA has a God.
I don't think AA demonstrates a particular God.
As a matter of fact, it says higher power of your choice, of your understanding.
God is you.
God is you.
God is you.
I don't understand him.
So it's up to me to figure out this God.
But what AA does, as far as I'm concerned, without any shadow of a doubt,
it teaches me the need for one.
That's what I learned early on.
It says, you don't believe in God?
I said, no, I don't.
You're in deep trouble.
A non-alcoholic, they might be able to get away with it.
You?
Let's explain alcoholism.
And then I'm up on the tower, they throw me off, and they're going, well, how about now?
And I go, well.
Well?
Because you see, three feet from the cement, even a macho marine doesn't look bad changing his mind there, right?
So if you're worried about your ego, you go, hey, anybody would change their mind here.
And that's what our first step is for.
Help you change your mind.
We explain the true nature of the situation.
We pull the rope.
We pull the rug out from under.
And you find that there you are, firmly planted in mid-air,
with no invisible means of support, as they say.
And the choice then can become a little easier.
And I think that's what's so beautiful.
Because of my illness, because of the desperate nature of the situation,
I made a decision I never would have made had I had other circumstances in my life.
And my decision was, okay.
What's this spiritual crap?
You know what I mean?
That was the thing.
And I like to share that with new people.
It wasn't, I saw the brilliant enlightenment of this program.
I saw the desperate situation I was in and really saw for the first time,
there wasn't any other choice.
And so, by default, rather than by virtue,
I was hustled down the middle-of-the-road path,
the broad highway that Bill writes about,
our 12 steps of Alcoholics Anonymous,
kicking and screaming and swearing they don't work,
and just the standard recovery that all of us have.
Just marching along.
And what I'm sharing with you tonight is,
I am so glad that that happened to me,
that sometimes I like to take credit for it.
I like to stand up here, you know,
and just go, God, it's been great.
Being in these steps and doing this.
And I was always doing them against my better judgment.
You know what I mean?
As I wrap this up, I'm going to share with you
some incidents to show you what I'm talking about.
There's a, when John Lennon died,
in Time Magazine, they had one of his songs printed.
And due to drinking or being the wrong age or whatever,
I never really listened to anything the Beatles did.
So I couldn't have even told you one of their songs.
But I was very into this at this moment in time.
And I remember reading this,
and this particular song was Watching the Wheels Go By.
And the particular line that caught my eye was,
there's no problems, only solutions.
There's no problems, only solutions.
There's no problems, only solutions. There's no problems, only solutions.
There's no problems, only solutions.
There's no problems, only solutions.
And what happens, let me tell you if you knew why this is so valuable.
And what happens, let me tell you if you knew why this is so valuable.
In Alcoholics Anonymous, in my judgment,
we don't ever figure out our alcoholism.
We never understand it.
We don't learn about it.
As a matter of fact, we sort of put that over here.
We just don't drink.
And we work on other things.
And when we work on these other things,
like inventory and amends and prayer and meditation,
and then we look back at our alcoholism,
we find it's been removed.
It isn't there bothering us on a daily basis.
We have a daily reprieve contingent on our spiritual condition.
As long as we're into working the solution,
the problems that aren't ours to worry about in the first place
get taken care of some other way.
Alcoholism, drinking, just doesn't come up in my mind
as something I have to fight.
I don't fight off drinking.
But if I stop working the solution, I'm sure I would.
It's as if a higher power said,
Sandy, you work this, I'll take care of the alcoholism.
Okay, that's a deal.
So I work it, he takes care of the alcoholism.
Just holds it over here.
I go months at a time.
I never think about drinking.
If I stop working the solution to a particular situation,
and you decide this is the situation that the steps don't cover.
And about that time, the higher power says,
You want it back? You got it.
And this is not, you know, I say up here,
ha ha ha ha, kind of in a humorous way,
but this is real.
I mean, over the years,
and it's not me that decides that the program is the answer.
It is you.
When I'm in great pain, my brain is telling me,
there has to be some other answer.
There has to be some other solution.
And so when I'm at meetings, and I'm sharing,
and I'm the type of person who at discussion meetings,
I very rarely am I going to raise my hand when the leader says,
Does anybody have a problem?
Because I don't want anybody to think a guy with 15 years sobriety has a problem.
Might ruin some newcomer's opinion of Alcoholics Anonymous,
and for their sake, I'll stay screwed up.
Right?
That's advanced humility, right?
But occasionally the situation can be so horrible,
the resentment so deep, the pain so intense,
you've got your hand up.
And I had my hand up that time.
I told you about getting thrown out of the Marine Corps.
And I've been sober about two years.
I went to a meeting every night,
and the leader says at the discussion meeting out in Manassas, Virginia,
He said, Anybody got a topic tonight?
And I got my hand up.
I said, Yeah, I'm getting thrown out of the Marine Corps.
I've got all these kids.
I don't have a job.
I don't know what I'm going to do.
It's totally unfair.
I said, Okay, let's discuss Sandy's problem tonight.
Being thrown out of the Marine Corps.
I called on the first guy.
He said, Thrown out of the Marine Corps?
Have you tried the serenity prayer?
Called on the next guy.
He said, Thrown out of the Marine Corps.
How about the prayer of St. Francis?
Make me a channel of thy peace.
That's what I'd do.
Thrown out of the Marine Corps,
I'd use the prayer of St. Francis.
Next guy said, You've got to get into action.
I'd find a new person and work with them.
Into action.
Get a new person and work with them.
I never went back to that group.
On the way home, I tried to have an open mind.
I said to myself, Part of the blame must lie with me.
I obviously didn't explain the problem correctly.
They never would have said what they did.
Six or seven years later, I had another situation.
Terrible divorce situation.
Family moving out.
All the kids.
One of the terrible things.
I was in so much pain.
I had my hand up.
I said, I want to discuss the divorce.
I'm losing the kid and the father.
All my possessions.
They called on the first guy.
He said, Oh, divorce.
Have you tried the serenity prayer?
Have you tried the serenity prayer?
Next guy said, Have you tried the prayer of St. Francis?
Make me a channel of thy peace.
That's what I'd do.
The prayer of St. Francis.
Make me a channel of thy peace.
And the next guy said, No.
I'd go get some new people.
Into action.
Get involved with somebody else.
Get out of yourself.
Forget that.
Go over and help somebody else.
And five years later, I was sharing a little bit.
I was in the real estate business in the money market.
Dried up.
There was no mortgage money.
And I'm going bankrupt and everything.
And so, I had my hand up again.
I think I was...
I wanted to discuss bankruptcy and employment.
You know what I mean?
I'm going through bankruptcy.
I'm very talented.
You know, a little free advertising.
The topic that night was being broke.
Money.
Bucks.
Money.
Money.
Money.
Money.
That was the topic.
First guy.
Have you tried the serenity prayer?
I was hoping for would you like a small loan.
Serenity prayer.
Prayer of St. Francis.
Get out there and work with some new people.
You know.
So, what do we got here?
We got a universal answer.
A universal answer.
And that shouldn't be surprising to alcoholics.
We had it before we got here.
Did you have a specific drink that you used for drinking?
Did you have a specific drink that you used for different problems?
So, I guess for me, if I were to share with anybody who is new, is you're on to it.
This is it.
All you got to do is get better at it.
All you got to do is just get better at it.
I really believe that when they say that those who scoff at problems,
those who scoff at prayer haven't prayed enough.
The thing about sticking with it,
the thing about just realizing that your own higher power,
your own relationship with a higher power is the permanent answer.
It can never let you down.
It removes a lot of debate.
It removes a lot of the decision making process.
It is what faith is all about.
It's not designed to cause certain results.
It's designed to turn out a great product.
It's designed to produce what Chuck Chamberlain used to talk about,
the ultimate product of Alcoholics Anonymous to become a child of God.
Thank you very much.
Thank you very much.