Uncovering Discovering Discarding — the Whole Program Is an Inside Job – Chuck C.

About This Speaker Tape

Chuck C. from Laguna Beach celebrates his 32nd AA birthday at the 1978 Midwinter Conference in Winston-Salem, speaking at age 75 with the voice of a classic old-timer who has made peace with everything. He tells how he drank for 25 years on a personal code, became a periodic the last ten years, and stayed physically sober between drinks trying to beat alcoholism as a personal weakness. The Friday before Christmas 1945, his boss — instead of firing him — handed him a $3,000 bonus to take the pressure off, and Chuck got drunk on the way home for the first time ever.

He came to in mid-January 1946 with nothing left: his wife of 20 years was divorcing him, his kids wouldn't come home when he was around, his mother-in-law was watching him crucify her only daughter, and his boss had sent word that if he stepped foot in the plant again he'd go through a picked-out window that didn't open. For the first time in his life he accepted it all exactly as it was and decided he had to stay sober, not to save any of it, but just to rub out as much of the record as he could before he died. He remembered his wife had left Jack Alexander's Post article open on his chair, found his way to a Beverly Hills Veterans Affairs Hall, and a man trotted over and said, "Take off your hat and coat, you're in the right place."

Chuck frames the program as uncovering, discovering, and discarding — an inside job, not anything added from outside. He walks through the discoveries in six-month increments: that he was sober, that he had a family living like kittens, that his desk was getting cleaned up, that his own state of being was better than anything he'd dreamed of, and finally that he was never alone because he had a Higher Power of his very own. He insists no alcoholic gets sober on principles or profundity — only on the spirit of AA, which spells L-O-V-E.

He preaches that grace is a free gift you cannot earn, that the two great needs of the individual are to love and to be loved, and that love is action — doing something for someone without a price tag. He tells on himself about self-confidence ("I was born with enough for everybody west of the Mississippi"), pokes fun at related-disorder experts and government-funded pig studies, and closes with the creed: either the Higher Power is sufficient unto all my needs or He is not, and the only way to find out is to act as if He is and prove it.

Topics

Timestamps

• 0:00 Introduction as friend from Laguna Beach — Chuck C. opens with 32nd AA birthday, 11,688 days of gratitude
• 4:30 The periodic drinker — sober between every two drinks for 10 years, couldn't stand crucifying wife and kids so had to drink to get rid of the hurt
• 10:15 Friday before Christmas 1945 — boss gives him $3,000 bonus to take the pressure off instead of firing him, and he gets drunk on the way home for the first time
• 15:00 Mid-January 1946 comes to — accepts his life exactly as it is for the first time, wife divorcing him, kids gone, boss ready to throw him through the window
• 20:30 Wife had left Jack Alexander's Post article on his chair — he calls around for days until a Beverly Hills doctor gives him a number
• 26:00 First meeting at Veterans Affairs Hall, Wilshire and Santa Monica — turns to leave thinking he's in the wrong room, a man trots over: 'Take off your hat and coat, you're in the right place'
• 34:00 No alcoholic gets sober on intellectual knowledge — only on the spirit of AA, which spells L-O-V-E, pokes fun at government-funded pig and rat studies
• 42:00 The discoveries in six-month increments — sober, had a family living like kittens, business good, own state of being better than anything he'd dreamed, finally never alone
• 52:00 Grace is a free gift you cannot earn — Bill Wilson at Towns Hospital yelling 'Let there be a Higher Power, reveal yourself to me now'
• 60:00 Closing creed — either the Higher Power is sufficient unto all my needs or He is not, act as if He is and prove it, love is action without a price tag