Clancy I. - AA Speakers - Is AA ONLY for alcoholics NEW 2014 - THE M2 THE ROCK SHOW - Michael Molthan

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:09):
My name is Clancy was London. I'm an alcoholic and
you just don't know how good it is to be
a Norwegian Lutheran coming home from California, all those Catholics
and Episcopanions and Presbyterians and other losers. Oh, I'm very

(00:32):
glad to be here today, safe and sane and sober,
as I like to say, and I want to I'm
here kind of not as a lecturer to lecture you
on the singlest of purpose, but to explain a little
bit about what was just read for us. You know,
most of us are familiar with the singalist of purpose.
We hear about it a lot, and people around the
world wonder why we get it so involved in it

(00:54):
because you know, there are so many people who have
so many problems that would be helped by our program.
And do we make such a big fuss that you
have to be an alcoholic to be an alcoholics anonymous
and such a singular approach, And it really goes back
to the history of AA really, and once you hear
about it, I think you'll understand it. Most of us

(01:15):
are familiar with the story of alcoholism being untreatable for
many years, for like four thousand and then this guy,
rich guy went to Europe and went to this doctor's
office in Switzerland and there for a year, and the
doctor said, I think you're okay now, And he sent
him home and got as far as Paris and got drunk.

(01:38):
They came back and he refused to let him back
in the hospital. They said, why, doctor Young. He didn't
mean any harm. He just got drank too much, he said,
I realized I misdiagnosed his case. I thought he had
deep psychological problems I could help him with. But I
see now that he is what is known as a
chronic alcoholic, and to the best of my knowledge, there's
no effective treatment for that condition the world at any christ.

(02:02):
That was just nineteen thirty one, not very long ago.
And so he came home and he on the way home,
I guess this time he surrendered to the fact that
he was helpless and hopeless and on the ship and
he got home and he he decided to stay sober.
He wrote later, I wanted to stay sober as long
as I could, so when I died drunk, my parents
will have a pleasant memory of me. And he really

(02:25):
meant it, because nobody stayed sober and someone told him
about the Oxford Group. We hear that a lot about
AA about the Oxford Group. A lot of people don't know,
but the Oxford Group is in the late nineteen ten,
about nineteen eight, a Lutheran minister, I'm happy to say,

(02:45):
in Pennsylvania felt that there was too much lackness in
the church. People were not dedicated enough. At one time,
he'd be willing to be crucified for the faith that
you couldn't even get to come to church where it reigned,
you know, just arable. And so he started an organization
called the First Century Christian Association with some determination, and

(03:08):
he didn't get many people joining up. You can bet
on that I don't think I want to be crucified
this year, Reverend. I'll talk to him. But after the
Second World after the First World War, he went to
Europe and tried to talk it up in Europe and
got nothing but rejection. But of all places, the students
at Oxford University, we thought it was just wonderful, isn't

(03:30):
this grand? And they all get involved in it, just
so much so that it changed the name of the
organization to the Oxford Group. And he came back in
the late nineteen twenties, and now he had the Oxford
Group ageus to approval with him, and pretty soon Oxford
groups formed all over America, but not in the way
he had created it. It turned out to be better

(03:52):
type people meeting in one another's homes and discussing how
they could enhance their spirituality. And so he heard about
the Oxford Group, this guy that had gone to New Switzerland,
so he decided to go there and see if that help,
and he got caught up with it, was loved it,
and after a while he went up to Vermont on

(04:12):
vacation and found another childhood friend of his, this Ebbe,
who was about to be sent to the penitentiary. He
talked to the judge and said, judge, let me bring
him back to New York and put him in the
Oxford maybe they'll help him. So the judge said okay,
and so Ebbie became in the Oxford Group. And Ebbie
didn't really like the Oxford Group, but it's better than
Vermont Penitentiary, so he stayed here and he uh. After

(04:37):
a few months of being in the Oxford Group, one
day Roland came by Ebbie and said, well, time for
your identification said, what the hell is that? He said,
after we're doing well, we try to find someone in
the community and testify to him what we found. And
Abbie said, I don't want to do that. That's embarrassing.
He said, you want to go back to Vermont. No,

(04:58):
I believe I'll testify. And so he thought, who could
I testify to? And he wants you a bunch of names.
He remembered another childhood friend of his here was a
bigger mooch than he was. And he thought, that drunken fool.
He won't remember it if I tell him. So he
called up Bill Wilson in Brooklyn, and our book talks
about Bill talks about coming to the door, and there's Ebbie, sober,

(05:21):
clean cut, He said, Gebby, he looked great, what are
you wu up to? So I found religion. That ended
Bill's interest in the conversation. And I heard Ebbie talk
about this at the International Convention in nineteen sixty. He
went a little further than Bill does the book. He
they sat down at the table and he tried to
tell Bill about the Oxford Group. And Bill drank as

(05:43):
fast as he could. That's very great, that's really good heavy,
and he left him, and something else happened. Ebbie came
back in about three days, and he had the Oxford
group closer with him. Howeverse Wilson won't tell you a
little bit about text I don't know, and Bill, true

(06:05):
to the code, got drunker than ever. And now's the
end of that. Well, the following November nineteen thirty four,
thereabouts late nineteen forty three forty four, Bill got thinking
about that, you know that goofy Ebbi meant well, but
he's a goof, But he meant well, I should have

(06:25):
been nicer to him. So he decided to go over
where Ebbie was staying in the Mission on Broadway in
New York in Manhattan. I'll go over there and apologize
to him. So he went over there in early November
of nineteen thirty four, got drunk on the way just
to build up his strength, and got to the mission.
Ebbe wasn't there, but he gave a short sermon to
everyone just to help him, then staggered out down the street,

(06:50):
and a day or two later he was back in
the hospital again, but this time was kind of an
unusual trip back to the hospital because this time he
was dying and the doctor called up his wife and said,
missus Wilson, I'm sorry to tell you this, but I
don't think your husband has another of one of these
drunks in and if he doesn't stop drinking after this one,
I'm afraid he's going to die. There's nothing we can do.

(07:13):
And Lois was upset. She called up Abby at the mission,
said can you go up and see Bill. He's maybe dying,
And so Ebbie took a few friends and went up
to the hospital tried to talk to Bill. You know, Bill,
all you have to do is find a power greater
than yourself. I don't want to be here of that
religious crap. Okay. They went home and Bill laid there

(07:33):
and went to sleep, apparently, and woke up at midnight
and his heart was pounding, and he knew he was
going to die, and he shouted, if there's a god there,
shurey yourself, he said. All of a sudden, the lights
went on in the room, like somebody threw a switch,
and there was some wind blowing through closed windows. I'm

(07:55):
having a psychiatric breakdown. My god, I'm going crazy. But
he felt good and he laid there for a while.
Pretty soon the lights went out, and the wind stopped blowing,
and he went to sleep and slept well, first time
in a long time. In the morning, he told the doctor,
I said, doctor, I guess I had a psychiatric breakdown.

(08:17):
The doctor looked him in the eye and said, I
don't know what happened to you, Bill, but you're a
different person. Whatever you found last night, hang on to it.
So he hung on to it, and he associated with Ebbie.
Ebby said, I must not heard, so we're going over.
Enjoyed the Oxford Group and the interesting big is he

(08:38):
thought he had a mission to help drunkards like himself
stay sober, and he went to Oxford Group meetings every day,
and on his way he'd pick up some street drunk
and bring him in. These nice people say, I believe

(09:01):
you're vombiting on my shoes, sir, And he tried to
help them, and he take him home and one of
them committed suicide in his living room. I mean, he's
just if he had no place to go and take
him to his house and talk to him. Now, for
six months of this, one morning he got up and
he went up to get a cup of coffee and

(09:22):
the guy he had brought home the night before had
disappeared and taken the coffee pot to sell for wine, apparently.
And he looked to his wife, who was getting ready
for work, and she had been a chat little society
ladi in her day. Now it's a little old before
her time, and salt and pepper hair, putting on these
dowdy clothes and sweated with a patch on the sleeve.

(09:45):
And she had to go to work so she could
pay the rent, so Bill could go to the Oxford
group and bring home these drunks. And he had a
terrible feeling of remorse. He said, Lois, I'm so sorry.
I thought that sure, that experience, it was something to
do with God wanted me to help drunks, but apparently not.
I've been working for drunks for six months now and

(10:08):
not one person stayed sober. And I'm done doing it now.
I'm gonna get a job tomorrow and shovel and crap,
but I'll get you out of that damn apartment department
store where you're working. And right there your life and
mind hung by a thread about that big and she
said something that changed the course of history. I had

(10:29):
lunch with her maybe twenty years ago, thirty years ago
up in Connecticut, and I said, Lois, how did you
ever think that answer? You saved all of our lives.
I don't know, you seemed obvious to me. He said,
not one person that stayed sober, And she said you did. Said,
oh yeah, let's get one thing straight. I'm not like

(11:00):
these other speakers. You've heard this is the sign for applause,
and this is for muffled sobs. Anyway, so he uh,
he said, oh yeah, that's why a lot of old

(11:22):
timers don't have much hair in front. You just go
through life. Oh yeah, oh yeah. But he knew something
was wrong, so we went down to the doctor at
the hospital that he'd been in with. The doctor noom, Well,
he said, not. You know, I've stayed someer since us
here last. But it's been almost half a year, and
I've been trying to help people drums and I can't

(11:44):
help him. I talk to him, I take him home,
I work with him. Now I'm stay sober. The doctor said,
what are you telling the Bill? He said, I'm trying
to train them to have a spiritual experience. So you
got a long way to go, Bill, that everybody happened
in this world, he said, I wish I could advice,
but I don't know any advice. We have no answer.
We take guys like you in, we tell you to

(12:05):
talk to you, you get sober, go home. A month later,
you're drunk again. Everybody we work with nobody stays sober
out of here, yet we give it our best. I
have no I wish I had a solution for you,
a mill, but I don't. There's one thing that I thought,
maybe I have thought about, and it seems kind of strange. Man.

(12:27):
You know, alcoholics are people who seem to be encased
in a clear, see through shield. But that shield prevents
anything getting in, any information, any knowledge, any advice, and
that shield is composed of But you don't understand. My

(12:51):
case is different, and no one ever seems to be
able to get through that shield. I can't. He said,
you know, maybe if she should tell these drugs that
you used to be a drunk too, and that you understand.
I don't understand the feelings, but you must understand how
good it feels to drink and how bad it feels
to not drink, and explain that you know how they feel.

(13:13):
Maybe that would help them. And Bill said, I don't
conceivably see how that could happen, that would help any
way for them to know I'm a drunk when I'm
talking to him. And so he went home no answer,
kept this dumb thing the doctor had said. And he
found a letter offering him a job about this company
an Akron, that made rubber machine tool tools. And they said,

(13:38):
you know, Bill, you're staying sober and understand you clean
up for about half a year. Now we're going to
deal at in Achron. We got got to get those proxies.
Go out there and get those proxies, and we'll make
you president of the company and you'll be on Easy
Street for the rest of your life. And God was
he elated. Went to Akron and deal blew up in

(14:00):
about three days. Nothing to do with him. But he
was the loser. And on the Saturday morning in May,
like today, he stood in the lobby of the hotel,
looked in his pocket, had a ten dollars bill. He
can either pay his hotel build or buy a train
ticket home. He didn't want to go home, because you

(14:22):
have to go home to admit failure again. Lois, nothing's
ever going to get better. He didn't want to tell
that nobody likes to go home after the've been If
you're going to leave, sit in the back. For Christ's sake,
I didn't notice. I don't judge. There's my picture. And

(14:53):
he stood that. I stood there, maybe thirty forty years ago,
trying to recreate the feelings he must have had. He
stood there and it felt so bad, did want to
go home, had no place to go. And over here
was the little door, and over the door was a
little curved neon sign that said cocktails. And he heard

(15:16):
the jukebox coming out the door, and you heard the
clinking glasses and the laughter of girls. And he had
an idea. Do you know what it was? What a
surprising attitude. If I just had a couple of drinks,
I could think of an answer. And he started to go.
And every step he took was the diminishing of this crowd,

(15:37):
I'll tell you. And then out of the corner of
his eye he saw a cross on the float wall.
Some maybe he's picketing you people right there, I don't know.
He saw some telephones on the wall, young people. There
used to be telephones on the wall, and they were

(16:05):
black and ugly, and you couldn't call her up on them. Yeah,
but he remembered he'd promised to call it in his
friends in New York. You'd call to somebody in the
Oxford group before he did anything drastic. So we went

(16:26):
over there. In the small towns hotels, they used to
have a list of all the major churches and the
ministers and then their phone numbers, so whatever big faith
you and you could call them. And he just took
them from the top. Go to the first number, called it.
I said, hello, I'm a Billis. I'm a Rumhount from
New York. I have to talk to somebody asked for you.

(16:47):
And the man said, I'm sorry, sir, I don't know
what you're talking about, but I'm trying to write a sermon.
Please don't bother me and hung up. And he called
the second number and there's no answer. And he called
the third number and there was no answer. And he
called the fourth number, and the man said, I wish

(17:08):
I could help you, but I don't know. They woe
in the OxT Sorry, and how about would you help?
Here's what I would do if I were him, I
would have said, well, I did what I said I would,
but damn it, it just makes you feel worse. He started
to turn away, and you know it's the last name,
Walter Tunk. He thought, what kind of a day would

(17:30):
it be if I weren't rejected by Walter Tunk? So
he called Walter Tunk. And Walter Tuck turned out to
be the only man in Akron who could have helped
him one of the many, many miracles that keeps his
place going. He said, funny you should call. I got
a push to a wealthy pusher on West Akron who

(17:53):
was telling me just yesterday that in their Oxford group
they have a doctor who this week admitted he was
a drunkard and they couldn't he could stop himself, and
they've all been praying for him incessantly, but he stills drunk.
He said, let me see what I could do. Maybe
I can call find out how you maybe you can
get in touch with him. So he called the wealthy pression,

(18:14):
gave her Bill Wilson's number, and the phone booth the
wealthy prishoner called missus Smith and said, missus Smith, and
she called and this is another miracle cot And the
phone rang and rang and rang and rang, and as

(18:34):
she hung it up, she heard a voice say, hello,
I'm sorry, I was out in the yard. Just that
half a second saved our life. And she told Missus
Smith that there was this man from New York who
wanted to talk to maybe her husband. Missus Smith said,
I'd love to have somebody talk to him, but he's
laying drunk on the floor. He can't get up today.

(18:55):
Maybe tomorrow can we And this woman said, all right,
why don't you bring your husband out to my house
tomorrow and I'll get this man from New York to
come out. Maybe we can put him together and maybe help.
And so the wealthy personer called Bill back at the hotel,
and he was about ready to believe he'd been waiting
there if nothing ever happens, he was about to go butt.

(19:16):
She got a hold of him and explained him how
he could take the street car out to her home
the next day. And then she called missus Smith and said,
why didn't you come on my home at such a
two o'clock in the afternoon, for example, and maybe we'd
have a white to eat and the guys together, And
so that happened. The next day was turned out to
be Mother's Day nineteen thirty five, and at the International

(19:40):
Convention in New Orleans, in about nineteen eighty. At the
last meeting, the leadership said, we have a special guest
brothers today, a special guest. Unle you know this, you
doctor Bob's son, young Bob Smith. Nobody ever heard that
he'd had a son before me. Yeah, hollered and cheered,
and it turned out he was an Allen. But we

(20:05):
liked him anyway. But he got to be a good
friend of mine over the years, and he went around
and talked a lot, a lot of him. I'm sure
a lot of you people have heard young Bob Smith talk.
But one of his great moments was describing that ride
out to the Pershoner's house on the morning of the

(20:26):
Mother's Day because his father was too hungover to drive.
He was sixteen, so he had a drive and his
sister sat in the right front seat and his mother
and father sat in the back, and all the way
out here his mother said, Man, I'm not going out
to get I can't stand another lecture about my dream.
I'm not going to listen anymore. But by drinking, I
do it that I spoiled Mother's Day for you. But

(20:46):
I damned if I'm gonna listen anymore. I can't stand
any more lectures. I'm all the way out there. When
they got out there, these two guys they all sat down,
had a bite to eat, and these two guys drifted
off into a room for their ten minutes. And we're
there for four hours and came out and the doctor
said to his wife, my god, Ann, that's the first

(21:08):
man I ever talked to who seems to know how
I feel and what a drink does for me and
what happens to me when I tried to go on
the way, and he said, my god, I thought I
was the only one in the world. He said, Bill,
could you could you possibly stay over for a few
days and talk to me? And Bill thought, let's see,

(21:29):
I have no way to get out of town. Yes,
I can stay over. So they talked for almost two
weeks about the Oxford Movement and how to enhance their
spiritual growth and how they could find the love through
Jesus of the God that would help them both. And
near the end of the second week, the doctor said

(21:49):
to Bill, Bill, I haven't felt better in my life now.
This weekend, the American Medical Association convention is over in
Newton in New Jersey, Atlantic City, and I was there
last year and I was so drunk. They really killed
me and made me feel terrible. But I want to
go there this year and show them what I'm really liking,
show them what the Oxford Group has done for me.

(22:11):
Used to hear my wife and kids, and I'll be
home Tuesday morning. So Tuesday morning came, and early in
the morning the phone rang. Missus Smith answered the phone,
and the boy said, hello, this is the doctor's secretary.
I'm so nurse. I'm so sorry to call you. But
they carried him off the train this morning so drunk
he couldn't walk, and the station ager know that I

(22:33):
worked for him, so he called me. The cab driver
and I have him on the floor of his office
here and he's crying. He's so sorry, but he's terribly drunk.
What should I do? And Missus Smith said, well, just
keep him there and mister Wilson and I will be
down to pick him up and take him home. So
they went down and got this crying, sad drunk and
brought them home. I know very few things in my

(22:54):
experience that I hate worse than crying drunks. She's very
nasty bunch. You just want to say, and I'll be sorry, Boom,
but they wouldn't be like me. They took him home
and put him to bed, and so much for the

(23:19):
grand experiment of the Oxford Group. And Thursday morning he
sat up there. What day is it? He says, Thursday, Bob.
He said, oh my god, oh my god, I've got
to do a cancer surgery today, and I can't possibly
do it. Look at my hand. I can't hold a knife.
My god, they'll take my license. I've postpone this damn

(23:39):
operation twice now. And so they got him up, and
his wife and Bill, and they bathed him and got
him a dressed, and his new friend Bill got him
some beer to steady his hands so he could hold
a knife, and away he went. So I'll be home
about four o'clock and about two o'clock. He shall be

(24:00):
home about two o'clock. And away he went. And two
o'clock came, but they waited for him. Didn't come. Three
o'clock didn't come, four o'clock didn't come. Five o'clock. Son
of a bitch, must be drunk again. Six o'clock the
door shrew himself. There was Bob Sober. Where are you, ben, Bob?

(24:23):
He said, well, now I'm doing that surgery. Suddenly struck
me in the Oxtrad group, they want you to make
amends to people you've harmed, and I never thought that'd
apply to doctors, but I realized I'm a human being
first in a doctor. Second, I've been all over Actrid
making amends to people, and I feel wonderful. That was
June tenth, nineteen thirty five, and they called that the

(24:43):
birthday of Alcoholics anonymous, but they didn't know it was
the birthday of alcohol They're just two drunken pukes hanging
on together. But they realized one thing, sitting and talking

(25:06):
about salvation had not kept doctor Bob sober nor any
of the people that Bill called on in New York.
Bill happened to be the one who stayed sober because
he was the one doing the calling on apparently, so
they realized it's something to do with try to help others.
Maybe that maybe that must be it. And they knew
that maybe they should help drunkards. And Bill said, you'd

(25:30):
only been in the hospital up here, that we might
call on Bob, and Bob's O no, I called called
up this nurse six or he had been he had
been on the staff there and had been removed because
of his drinking. But now I called a nurse he
knew well, doctor sister in Natia, and she said, well, yes,
let me see what I can do, because at that
time you could not get the hospital as a drunk.

(25:50):
You had have plumbing problems, something terribly involved, and drunks
would not be allowed in. She said. But this man
is also a drunker. I know that, sister, she said,
And let me talk to his wife and see if
I can maybe arrange for you too to go meet him.

(26:10):
And I heard that man in the bed talk later,
but ten years later. Bill Dee was his name. He said,
I was laying in that hospital in akron Oisle and
my wife came and said, two men want to talk
to me about drinking. And I said, absolutely not. I'm

(26:31):
sick of all the lectures I've got here. Anybody drinking,
don't bring anybody around here. I refuse to do it.
But my wife was a rather strong woman, so I
talked to them, two fellas, and they never talked about
my drinking once, not once. They talked about their drinking

(26:53):
and how it made him feel, and why they had
to drink, and how they felt and they didn't drink.
I thought, my god, I'm not the only one. My God,
I'm not the only one. And I stuck with him.
Fellasn't been with him ever since. He became number three
in the chain. And they wandered around Acro trying to
get people to find him, taking the Octra group and
then talks about drinking and kind of a sidebar. Here

(27:19):
there's a young guy, Ernie. He got joined up with them.
But you're only twenty nine earlier. You can't be an alcoholic.
You're too young. But god, you should drink like one,
so you could come along with us. But he came
along with him, and they are silly little crests. And
Ernie fell in love with Doctor Bob's daughter and brought

(27:41):
us our first relationship. I don't know a word that
sends a shiver down a sponsor spine like that word.
I want to talk you about my new relationship. I know.
I thought the last one was it, but when I

(28:01):
saw Margaret walking out of Detox this morning, I just knew.
But they got married. It was really a wonderful thing,
not like your usual AA relationships. He left me in

(28:23):
the side of a bitch and took my money. Ah,
they got married. That happened in my family. My youngest daughter, Susan,
who some of you know, married a guy five years
sober that I sponsored. I thought it was a puke.
I was against the marriage, but I have a group
of daughters, all who know much more than I do.

(28:45):
So they said, be quiet, Daddy will take care of it.
So they got married. And I want to tell you
the absolute epitome of mixed emotions. It's watching your daughter
go down the aisle to marry a man step you've heard.

(29:11):
You can't really say anything because you're bound by the
sacredness of the confessional, but you can give little hints
let me know if he ever brings a sheep home. Well, anyway,

(29:31):
these two got married and they said to Ernie, now
you're a new husband, and your new husband, I want
you to stay home. Don't come around this and not ross. No,
the actually group don't know nothing. Just stay home and
take care of your wife. Down have a nice hot
So that he did and got drunk. They couldn't imagine
why he got sobered in about fifty years later, and

(29:55):
they turned her against AA for the next fifty years
because they didn't realize you had to keep doing it
kind of to get out of self. But they uh
eventually got a few people in the Oxford group, and
then the Oxford group kind of got cross with them
cause this little group they called him a drunk squad
or the alcoholic squad, kept talking about drinking instead of Jesus,

(30:19):
and so they asked him to leave. And they left.
Fact that there was a letter written by t Henry
Williams to them saying, well, you think you're trying to
do a good job, but we don't know what it is.
That's not our job. Our job is to help people's souls.
And about forty years later we wrote an other letter
saying I'm very sorry I wrote that letter. I didn't
know what you were doing. But those of Bill Winson,

(30:42):
New York, and they doctor Bob started an a meeting
of the King's School in Acrid and that ran for
years and years, and little by little, list they just
had discovered the secret of alcoholics anonymous, although they didn't
really know it, but they discovered one thing. You try.
The purpose of AA is to get through that wall,

(31:04):
that invisible wall. But my case is different. And they
discovered that, and that's why they said we have. In fact,
when Bill wrote the Twelve Steps in the first rendition
of it, in the fifth tradition, the only requirement for
membership is a desire to help people. And as members said, no,

(31:27):
not people build alcoholics. We don't have any more help
for people to anybody else, but we have help for alcoholics.
And so they changed the word to alcoholics, and they
gradually grew and became something nice. In fact, over the years,
it's kind of odd they discovered that identification is the

(31:50):
magic thing that makes AA work. There's many groups that
have all the good words we have, and all the
pretty words and all the things, but we're the only
one that has the identification to get through that wall
doing to go down. I'm pretty worries if they're bouncing
off the outside and the UH. In fact, in Los
Angeles interesting nineteen fifty six, a guy named Willis Jim

(32:14):
Willis UH was a gambler and also the alcoholic, and
he was bringing his gambler friends to the meetings try
to help them. We do want to come to these meetings.
These old juicer s talk. We're not drunken bumbs like
they are. For Christ's sake, Jim so he wrote to
New York and got permission to use the twelve steps

(32:36):
outside of a first one ever, and he founded Gamblers
Anonymous and just changed the word alcoholic gamblers so when
the men came to the meetings they could identify with
what that guy was talking about. And they became the
biggest and largest and most successful of the non AA groups.
And then some two guys in the North Hollywood clubhouse

(33:00):
to help narcotics addicts stay sober clean, and they wouldn't
listen to anybody, so they got permission used the twelve
Steps and founded Narcotics Anonymous. Then a few months later
out in the West part of town, in the wealthy
part of town, some cocaine addicts couldn't get their fellow
cocaine addicts sober in AA, so they got the permission

(33:23):
to form Cocaine Anonymous, and mid Wiltshire some women got
together to form Overeaters Anonymous. They are the first, They
are the big four of non AA groups, and they
were all created so that some goof could identify with
what the speaker was talking about. And I never really

(33:43):
understood it well, I was about two years sober. I've
been slipping for years now, I was two years sober.
All of a sudden, God, I was doing good and
still had no front teeth. They had been kicked out
in the Phoenix jail, but I was. I wasn't hitting
as continents quite as cleanly as them, I know. But
I was talking at the club one day on the

(34:06):
sickness of alcoholic emotions, not the recovery from them. I
hadn't got to that point yet, but I knew about
the emotions. I talked about it. This kind of plump
woman came up in presis. I've never heard anyone describe
those emotions before. I think I have those emotions too, said,
would you mind coming speaking to my group? Is called
overreaders anonymous over the Christ the King Church on Olympic Boulevard.

(34:30):
I don't know. I weighed about one hundred and thirty pounds.
I would gaunt give them something to shit for. And
I was over there and spoke of their goods. About
eight fat women sitting around the room. But I gave
him a wonderful talk on the emotions. They albow and

(34:54):
I sat down and I thought, boy, I really helped them.
Then they had a little sharing session, and I couldn't
believe what I was hearing welling over here. Her son
had just turned ten A couple of days before that.
She sent her husband down to the military academy in
Long Beach, where he was. She got the cake ready

(35:15):
for them, took a taste to make sure it was good,
took another taste, another taste. By the time I got back,
she'd eaten the whole cake. I didn't say anythings, I'm
too nice a guy, But I want to say, just
have a piece of cake for Christ's sake and stop.
What are you doing? Well went back there talking about it.

(35:37):
She was crazed for ice cream. She didn't felt empowered enough.
She had allowed of ice cream. She couldn't wait for
her husband to go to work in the morning. The
search and so she's getting down to get some right aid,
to get some more ice cream, and she just feels strength.
Searching into her body got to be a problem for
it to hide all the cases containers. And I didn't
say things, I'm too nice a guy. I want to say, no, wonder,

(36:00):
you're fat. For Christ's sake, that's what happens to eat
all that ice cream. The woman over here was my champion,
though she ate till she couldn't eat anymore, and then
she put her finger down the throat and vomited it
up so she could eat some more. And I didn't
say anything because I'm a nice guy, and I wanted
to say, don't bother shaking hands with me after the meeting.

(36:26):
I can see doing that for drinking, but not eating you.
I've done it for drinking a lot. My god, Saturday
afternoon sun still up. Shit? Now what was the difference.
I haven't got a good brain, but I didn't identify it.
It was just all foreign behavior to me. That's what

(36:49):
you got to remember when you try to describe it.
You wonder why your family can't understand alcoholism because they
don't identify with it. They cannot. They try to, but
you know, even your mother will saying, you mean, you
can't even have a glass of wine at Christmas. No.

(37:09):
I have an aunt who used to say to me
when I was about ten years solo. She'd said, are
you still going to those meetings? Haven't you learned how
to stay sober yet? And I couldn't think of an answer.
I finally thought of an answer, because she was very religious,
said are you still going to church? Haven't you learned

(37:30):
about Jesus yet straight now, she never asked me any
more questions about that, in fact coming to me, she
never talked to me again, now that I think about it,
that was okay. You'll notice the other speakers up here

(37:52):
drinking out of bottled water. My host sees that I
have a cup of coffee cream sugared and saucered and blue.
Ode thank them. That's you. You, thank you. But the
whole point of all this operation is this. Somehow or

(38:14):
other it has been. We've over the years learned that
we have to carry the message of identification. Some years ago,
nineteen sixty three, that was about four or five years sober,

(38:34):
and I had a job and they sent me to
New York to do something or other, and I had
a morning free. I'm going to go over and talk
to Bill Wilson, which i'd heard him talk at the
International Convention in nineteen sixty. Incidentally, I should say another
thing in nineteen sixty that story about Sister in Nasha.
I heard Sister in Nation tell that story at the

(38:57):
and I went up pass forwards. I was just very impressed.
Got it, here's a voice, and I shook hands with it.
I gave her a kiss on the cheek, and oh,
maybe that's wrong, and I think I said, I'm sorry,
maybe I should have kissed you on the cheek, and
I think she said, as long as you don't get

(39:18):
in the habit. I can't remember himself. That's a long
time ago. I can't remember every word. Sixty years ago,
for fright, when I went over to see Bill Wilson
and on the office on forty fourth Street, and the
girl said, oh, he's booked up for three weeks in advance,

(39:40):
all day, every day. I can get you in three weeks.
I said, well, I won't be here never mind. So
I'm to the archives and I was looking for small
pictures and stuff and very fascinating and here comes Bill Wilson.
So you, the young man, want to talk to me.
I said, yes, sir. He said, well, my eleven o'clock
didn't show up, clanion. So I sat and talked to

(40:01):
Bill Wilson for an hour, and you know what he said,
I don't remember. I was more concerned what he thought
about me than what he was saying. The other thing
I remember him saying is that I said to him

(40:21):
last week and our rupe los angeles, Bill were doing
going through working with others in the book, and you
talk about how you identify with him and how to
make him feel like you've identify with them, but you
never once make him suggest taking him to a meeting.
Don't you people ever take people to meetings? He said,
young man, When I wrote that there were no meetings,

(40:42):
send a shiver down my spine. Just think of that.
Have to work with the guy all week, take him
to a religious meeting where they say, I want to
hear this crap, or go get drunk. And that's how
they grew very slowly to find me. The Oxford group
got rid of him against their will and made the
be Alcoholics Anonymous, which saved us. All you people already trained, well,

(41:13):
I'll say that you anticipate that I'm going to smooth
my hair. But the history of alcoholics Anonymous all you know.
You can find aa stuff in any lot of books.
There's all of our words and spiritual behavior and all
these sorts of things. And somebody sends out a copy

(41:35):
of all the books doctor Bob had on his bookcase
of religious books. Never they don't even remember. He couldn't
get sober. He just had a bunch of religious books.
But finally, what makes us different is that you and I,
if the situation is right, I can get through that

(41:57):
wall and explain to you things said. If I'm from
the outside justom falling off, the doctor says, here's what
you ought to do. Thanks doc. I really appreciate that.
Thanks a lot. I really understand that. But people like
us can get through that wall and say, my god,
maybe you understand. Wouldn't that be something I know? I

(42:21):
slipped for ten years. I'll tell you something, Ebbie. You
know it never could stay sober. Bills sponsor in nineteen
fifty three, just came up with done a terrible drunk,
and Bill sent him to Dallas. There was a guy
there named Circe, and Circe was famous all over for
helping slippers. And he went down there and he kept

(42:42):
Ebbie sober. And Ebbie stayed sober for seven years. And
Bill was so thrilled he had him talk at the
nineteen sixty International Convention. Time he ever talked to the Commntional.
And I sat there and listened to him. I was thrilled.
And Bill get up and said, I'd like to introduce
my sponsor Abby and trying to put your note of

(43:03):
official approval on him, and he gave a good talk.
Then he went back to Texas. But he never could
quite stand to take advice from a guy he'd helped
Bill apparently, and he was just irate, he said, those
jerks in Los Angeles, they gave him much more attention
than they gave me, and I'm his sponsor. He never

(43:25):
seemed to realize he didn't stay sober, and he brooded
about that for about six months, then got drunk again,
and Bill had him down to Texas and take him home,
put him an assisted living home in New York, where
he died. But it's just an amazing thing of all
people who should have stayed sob should have been abby.

(43:45):
And there's a great school of thought that feel rollered.
The guy once see doctor Jung that he died drunk.
Years later he wouldn't go to AA. He wouldn't go
near AA, And whether he did or not makes no difference.
But there's a lesson to be learned here that somehow
we have to get through that wall, because we get

(44:06):
trapped on that wall, we're alone and lonely. One of
the great curses is that when you are like that.
Everybody around you turns into a jerk little by little
un til you get so sick of all the jerks
you have to drink to stand it, and you say,
why does you drink? It's a sad thing about everybody
in this room, somewhere along the line has seen the

(44:28):
face of someone who loves them saying, oh, how could you?
You promised and look at you now. The children are
so upset. How could you do that? You promised, You
put your hand on the Bible and promised, and now
you're drunk. And you know the answer to that is

(44:51):
leave me alone, because I don't know either. Get off
my back, screw you. I'm getting out of here. It's
a sad and say why does anybody act like that?
We don't know, but that's the way we act. And
so what we got to remember is you and I
have been blessed with a blessing that's never been given

(45:12):
to psychiatrists or doctors, or ministers or priests or anybody else.
A way to get through that wall where maybe we
can help them understand that they're not alone. Because the
purpose of AA always to remember. This was mentioned briefly
by the speakers after the Young Lady from the Grapevine.

(45:33):
Alcoholics Anonymous is exactly the same in Minneapolis today as
it was in Akron, Ohio, nineteen thirty five. It is
always the same, and we have to be part of it.
One alcoholic talking to another alcoholic to help him lower
his feelings of being different, at least enough so that

(45:56):
he will take an action he does not yet believe in.
And when that moment comes, that's the ember of sobriety,
and you're gonna blow on it. And you try to
surround yourself by people going in the same direction and
stay away from scoffers and sneerers, and eventually you keep
doing the things they pretty sure you get a little fired, okay,
you don't need to, and eventually you stay sober. It's

(46:20):
easy to stay sober. I've been sober. I've noticed last
night I was the longest in the room. I stood
up and I was getting tired. But I you know,
I said, how do you stay sober fifty five years?
I'll tell you the secret, but come on wrong time

(46:43):
stop that. They won't take me if I'm overtime. But
I'll tell you how you stay sober. You go to meetings,
you try to help people if they can. Some it's
the irony of aea. The ones you really want to

(47:05):
stay sober, don't stay sober, the ones that you wish
didn't do. It's the damnedest thing you ever saw. But
you take credit for all of them. Anyway. You stay sober,
and you try to help people, and you try to
do the things you learned in your first few months.

(47:28):
I think the secret of alcoholics I was will is
teach them. I was teaching newcomers this for your first
few months. Here's all you have to know. Do what
you said you would do. Be where you said you
would be when you said you would be there. Don't
take out your hostility on people who can't answer back waiters,
new waitresses, subordinates. And on days you're having a bad day,

(47:49):
shut your mouth because without even being aware of it,
you can cut people the ribbons. You just keep your
mouth fro it and say come on, midnight, come on,
and pretty soon you've been so for a long time,
and it's worth every second of it. Thank you.

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Clancy I. - AA Speakers - Is AA ONLY for alcoholics NEW 2014

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}Clancy I. - AA Speakers - Is AA ONLY for alcoholics NEW 2014