Clarence S. from Casselberry, FL – Glenarden, MD 8/9/1981

(0:00 – 0:10)
Well, good afternoon everyone. I’m Clarence Snyder, and I’m the last one on my feet
here. I happen to have better than 43 years.
(0:18 – 0:41)
Some people, when they meet me, they’re rather shocked. They tell us over 43 years
and they expect to find an old man in a wheelchair with a hot, hot water bottle on his lap
and a nurse in attendance. But I’ll tell you the truth, I get younger every year, and it’s
great.
(0:43 – 1:05)
While we’re all here together, I was looking at this sign back here, and I was quite
impressed with it. And I was trying to figure out what that four was up there, so I just
deduced that I’m allowed to speak for four hours today. So get comfortable.
(1:08 – 1:29)
Today I would like to speak to you about alcoholics, alcoholism, and a few more things
that have to do with it. You know, alcoholics are a breed of cats all their own. Everyone
cannot be an alcoholic.
(1:30 – 2:16)
A lot of people just could never make it, no matter how hard they try, because they’re
not put together properly. And we are exceptional people, and don’t you ever forget it.
You know, one of the first things that I ever have to do when I’m working with a person
who’s in despair is to try to sell this person the idea that he really is something, and he’s
something special, because he’s always felt he’s been talked down to, he’s been cussed,
he’s been disgust, he’s been thrown in, he’s been thrown out, and everyone’s been
telling him what a loser he is.
(2:17 – 2:27)
And we are not. Alcoholics, as a class, are different than people. Let me put it that way.
(2:27 – 2:47)
All those civilians out there have things that they should be proud of, of course, but the
alcoholic has something beyond what they have. I’ve looked at this for a long time, and I
found out that the alcoholic is different than people. His characteristics are different.
(2:48 – 3:08)
I don’t say that some civilians don’t have some of these characteristics, but they don’t
have them all. An alcoholic, to me, I’ve never met one worthy of the name that was not a
high-strung individual. I’ve never met one who was not very impulsive.
(3:10 – 3:18)
He can never wait for tomorrow for anything. He has to have it done yesterday. He’s not
a deep thinker.
(3:19 – 3:29)
Sometimes you walk in these AA groups, you find this sign, Think. That’s an insult. If we
could think, we wouldn’t come here.
(3:31 – 3:40)
We don’t think, we emote. We are emotional people. We never do anything until we feel
a certain way.
(3:40 – 3:53)
When we hurt badly enough, we’ll take this program on. Until that time comes, all the
king’s horses are not going to do anything about it. We have to come down and hit that
bottom, whatever our bottom is, and we have to hurt.
(3:54 – 4:06)
It’s not by any mental decision or mental acrobatics that we get into this program and
progress in it. It’s by how we feel. So we are emotional people.
(4:07 – 4:12)
I’ve never met one that was not lonely. He’s alone in a crowd. He’s lonesome in a crowd.
(4:14 – 4:26)
I’ve never met one that was not a very sensitive person. He’s always going around
looking for someone to hurt his feelings. This is the Alki.
(4:27 – 4:43)
I’ve never met one that didn’t have what these bright psychiatrists refer to as an
inferiority complex. We don’t have a really belief in what we are. We feel we are inferior,
and we’re not.
(4:43 – 4:53)
Believe me. I’ve never met an alcoholic that wasn’t the greatest liar in the world. He lies,
he lies for practice.
(4:54 – 5:08)
He lies when he don’t have to. Well, that’s a defensive mechanism we’ve had all of our
life. If we ever told the truth on ourselves during our drinking career, we’d have never
arrived here, believe me.
(5:08 – 5:19)
So lying brought us here. I’ve never met one who was not full of self-justification. An
alcoholic can justify anything.
(5:20 – 5:31)
It was never my fault that I got in this mess. There was always some bunch of
circumstances that came up, and some other person got me into this deal. It was never
my fault.
(5:31 – 5:39)
So I always find self-justification. The alcoholic has a terrific imagination. Terrific.
(5:40 – 6:09)
It knows no bounds. How could we survive in the shape that we got into? I remember
when I was on the bum. I was a member of a very clannish family, and this family, my
wife, my first wife, and she always had three or four of her sisters and brother and her
old lady there at my house, and they used to have family conferences, but I was never
invited at these conferences.
(6:09 – 6:26)
I was usually the subject of the discussion. And these conferences always went along the
lines of whether they’re going to throw me out of my own house again or let me back in.
Well, this bunch finally had, they thought they had the problem solved.
(6:28 – 6:41)
My wife’s brother had a big tractor-trailer outfit, and he hauled merchandise from
Cleveland to New York and back. And they got the idea that, it’s just a good idea. It is
good thinking.
(6:41 – 6:45)
It was no emotion. This is thinking. This is what thinking will do to you.
(6:46 – 7:19)
They thought that if they, if my brother-in-law would take me on and teach me to drive
this truck, I would, two things would be accomplished. He could ride herd on me and see
that I didn’t drink, and also I would be doing something worthwhile as far as work and
income was concerned, because I’d been between jobs for several years at that time. So
the thinking was good, but it didn’t work out like most thinking, because when it comes
to thinking with alcohol, it’s a loss.
(7:20 – 7:38)
I got away from him on the way to New York, and I don’t have to tell you what happened,
but he got, he took me into New York City and threw me out and told me this is the end
of the line, and don’t ever come back to Cleveland. You’ll never come back to your home
again. You’re done.
(7:39 – 7:51)
Now this was in wintertime, and I didn’t have any clothes. They had been sold long since,
any clothes that were anywhere decent. I had no overcoat even.
(7:52 – 8:12)
So he dumped me there, and there I am without any money, and I know nobody but
another sister of his out in Yonkers. I made it out to her house, but she threw me out too
and took me back to the downtown where he’d throw me out, and she did likewise. I only
tell you this story for a reason.
(8:12 – 8:30)
It has a big impact on how I got here. I existed in New York City for a long time. I can’t
tell you how long, but I know the calendar went around because it was winter again
when I left, and let me say this.
(8:31 – 8:43)
I existed there, and I never had to pay any room rent. I never had to buy a meal, and I
never had to buy any clothes. Now you talk about a rummy’s imagination.
(8:44 – 8:59)
You figure that one out. And I didn’t eat in these missions either. I tried that once, and
believe me, kids don’t ever do it because if they’re like they used to be, I can remember
this mission food.
(8:59 – 9:42)
These bakeries would get buns and bread and rolls back that they couldn’t sell, and
they’d hand them to some mission, and they’d sit there, and all you smell in a mission is
bug juice, and they spray this stuff all around and on everybody that comes in, and
naturally this food gets the bug juice smell and odor, and the juice itself permeates the
buns and biscuits and so forth, and they sit there for days, and if they can’t, no one eats
them, they take them down to another mission. This is why I’m against eating in
missions. But I ate good food when I ate, and I didn’t eat too much.
(9:42 – 9:56)
Food wasn’t my long suit, but you have to have some to exist. But I’m not going to tell
you how I did all this, but I did it. But it takes the imagination and the ingenuity and the
brass of a rummy to do this.
(9:57 – 10:16)
I was sleeping. I slept in these trucks. These men would drive there, they would leave
their tractor there, and they’d want to go in and get a cheap room where they had a bath
and they could have a night on the tom before they got to load back to wherever they
were going, and they wanted someone to watch these tractors, so I became a
watchman.
(10:17 – 10:31)
So I would sleep in these tractors, a nice, clean, warm place to sleep, and they paid me
for this. Fifty cents a night I got paid. In those days, I was drinking rail.
(10:32 – 10:48)
I bought my booze in a wallpaper store or a hardware store, and I paid seven cents a pint
for it. Now, at fifty cents a day, you can’t drink that much, and I’m saving money. I’m
becoming a capitalist.
(10:50 – 11:08)
When I left New York, I had some money in my pocket because I never spent any for
anything. Now, only a rummy can do these things, you know? So I’m talking about the
imagination of a rummy. These characteristics we have do something for us.
(11:09 – 11:33)
I have noticed over the years that alcoholics are tops in their line, whatever they’re
doing. If they’re a mechanic, if they’re a salesman, if they’re a teacher, a doctor, a
lawyer, an Indian chief, or what have you, you’ll always find the alcoholic is in the top
ten. He’s ahead of everyone.
(11:34 – 11:50)
I’ve always noticed that an alcoholic, I’ve come to this conclusion years ago, that an
alcoholic, the real alcoholic, I’m not talking about the stupid drunk. There are a lot of
drunks that are not alcoholics, but every alcoholic is a drunk. There’s a distinction there.
(11:50 – 12:13)
A lot of these drunks can quit drinking tomorrow or today if they get a new hobby, but
the alcoholic can’t do that. But I’ve found that alcoholics can operate on about 40% of
their efficiency and beat the socks off of other people that are operating on 80% of
theirs, and they’ll do it every time. I know this, and I’ve seen it.
(12:14 – 12:38)
I had to go in a different line of work when I came into this fellowship because I was
blackballed in my old one, and I didn’t want to go into it anyway, and I became a
salesman. I’d never sold anything in my life before I got here, and I got a job selling
automobiles, and let me tell you something. I know nothing about selling, and I was a top
salesman in three months’ time.
(12:38 – 12:47)
I was selling as many cars as the rest of these guys put together. Now, only a rummy can
do this. I don’t claim to be any different than you are.
(12:47 – 12:53)
We can do it. I worked with salesmen. I’ve seen them, and I’ve trained men.
(12:54 – 13:14)
I’ve been sales managers a couple outfits, and those alcoholics are the best buddy
salesmen you can get. They have that imagination, the ingenuity, and the brass, and
believe it, any person sitting here as a rummy can accomplish anything. There’s nothing
beyond our reach, really.
(13:15 – 13:29)
So much for the rummy. What is alcoholism? This is something that’s so widely
misunderstood and has been for centuries. Alcoholism is probably the oldest malady that
afflicts the human race.
(13:30 – 13:41)
You’ll read about alcoholism in ancient history. You’ll read about it in mythology, and
you’ll read about it in the Bible. There’s a lot of good rummy stories in the Bible.
(13:42 – 14:00)
I don’t know if any of you people here read the Bible, but if you don’t, get into it, and
you’ll read some great stories about some of your compatriots there and our ancestors.
Boy rummies. You don’t have to go any further than the first book of the Bible to meet
the first rummy.
(14:01 – 14:12)
You’ll read in Genesis the story of old Noah and the ark. Boy, he was one of us. That old
boy.
(14:12 – 14:26)
Nobody would pull a stunt that he did or stand up and accept this order that he got
unless he was a rummy. He would never take such a challenge. God told him what he
wanted to do.
(14:26 – 14:30)
Just picture this fellow. Just look at this fellow. He’s your neighbor.
(14:31 – 14:37)
God told him that the world had gotten in such a shape. It’s gotten about like it is today.
Everything going downhill.
(14:37 – 14:49)
Everybody morally irresponsible. God couldn’t do the change, so he decided to wipe the
whole bloody thing out and start all over again. But he wanted seed to start again.
(14:50 – 15:02)
So he goes to his friend Noah who was a God-fearing man, and he says, Noah, my friend,
I want you to do something for me. He said, Yes, Lord, anything. See, he got his head in
it right away.
(15:03 – 15:16)
He said, I want you to build a big boat, an ark. He gave him the dimensions, and he told
him what he wants to do with this. And he said, I want you to put two of everything living
in there and your family.
(15:17 – 15:32)
He says, Because I’m going to flood this world out and wipe everything off and start all
over again. Well, Noah starts to work on this ark. He got his kids and his family sawing
logs and cutting boards and hammering away.
(15:32 – 15:44)
And the neighbors come by and say, What are you doing, Noah? I’m building a big boat.
You’re building a boat? You’re out in the middle of a desert? They know. All Noah has had
it.
(15:44 – 15:56)
He’s playing with a short deck. But they laugh at all Noah and go on their way, but he
and the family keep going. They finally get the boat done, and they do as the Lord told
them to do, fill it up.
(15:57 – 16:08)
And it rained, and it rained for 40 days and 40 nights. And that boat starts to come up,
and it starts floating away. And it floated for several months.
(16:09 – 16:22)
And finally it came to rest on top of a mountain there. And the water receded, and the
ground came up. What was the first thing our friend Noah did? Just look at this boy.
(16:22 – 16:27)
You’ll recognize this. He runs out there. He plants a vineyard.
(16:27 – 16:37)
He raises some grapes. He made some wine, and he got drunk. He had his mind on this
all the time.
(16:37 – 16:53)
He’s in that boat. Well, that’s… You know, there’s some great stories about guys like…
guys and gals like us in the Bible. I like that story of the two boys, the prodigal son.
(16:54 – 16:58)
I like this story. Get this one. Here’s these two boys.
(16:59 – 17:03)
They’re on a boat. They’re working for their father on a farm. They’re Jewish people.
(17:04 – 17:12)
And the farmer has a big spread there. He has all kinds of cows and goats and sheep,
but he don’t have any hogs. He has all the rest of this stuff.
(17:12 – 17:26)
Big spread. And he has these two boys, and they’re out there working the farm. Well, in
Jewish tradition, when the father dies, the boys are supposed to inherit the estate and
get their share of it, you know.
(17:28 – 17:33)
Well, this one kid, he works. He’s an avid worker. He’s always out there working.
(17:33 – 17:51)
He does more than is expected of him. He’s the Al-Anon kid. But the other guy, the
young one, guess who, he isn’t happy with this working for his father and waiting for his
father to die to get all this loot.
(17:51 – 17:59)
So he keeps bothering his father all the time, and he wants his share of the loot right
now. That’s a rummy, right now. Not tomorrow.
(18:00 – 18:09)
He wants it yesterday. So he keeps bugging his father and bugging his father for his
share till the father can’t take it anymore. He says, Okay, here it is.
(18:09 – 18:25)
You take your share and be gone. And boy, he was be gone. What does it say in the good
book where he went? It says he went into a far country and he squandered his substance
in riotous living.
(18:25 – 18:46)
Did you ever hear of a thing like that? He squandered, he blew the whole bundle. Yeah,
he had a time. And what happened to this kid? He’s way out in this far country, far, far
from home, and a famine sets in.
(18:46 – 18:51)
Oh boy. And he’s in a strange country. There’s nothing to eat.
(18:51 – 18:58)
He can’t find any work. And he finally, finally he did get a job. Now remember, this kid’s a
Jew.
(18:59 – 19:15)
So what job did he get? He got a job on a hog farm tending a bunch of hogs. This is
great, see? So did he eat what the hogs ate? Not by a jugful. He ate what of the husks of
the hogs.
(19:15 – 19:31)
He ate what the hogs wouldn’t eat. See, that’s what he got to eat. I’d say this kid pretty
well hit his bottom, wouldn’t you say? So finally, he says, here’s what it says next in the
good book.
(19:32 – 19:39)
He says, he came to himself. This is exactly what you and I had to do. We came to
ourselves.
(19:40 – 19:52)
And he says, I starve. My father has much, and his servants eat well. Then he said this,
this is important, because we had to do the same thing, every one of us.
(19:52 – 20:17)
He says, I will arise and go to my father and tell him I am unworthy and I will work as one
of his servants. See? So he got off his duff and we had to do the same thing and he
moved. And he started back that long, torturous trip home and he was sick, he was
hungry, he was whipped, completely beaten.
(20:18 – 20:34)
But he went back to throw himself on the mercy of his father. Now what did his father
do? Did he throw him out? No. It says, he saw him coming far down the road and he ran
to his son and he fell on his neck and kissed him.
(20:35 – 20:43)
He says, my son who is dead is alive. He says, put a ring on his finger, shoes on his feet,
a cloak on his back. My son has returned.
(20:44 – 20:48)
Let us make merry. Let us have a party. Let us kill the fatted cat and have a feast.
(20:49 – 20:56)
My son has come home. He was dead and he’s alive. Great story of the forgiveness in
the second life.
(20:58 – 21:25)
Now, meantime, they’re having this party and boy, they’re having music and they’re
dancing and having a great old time up at the house. Meantime, this Al-Anon kid, he’s
still out there working like he should, you know. And he hears all this ruckus up at the
house and a servant came by and says, hey, what’s all that ruckus going on, all that
music and everything up at the house? He says, haven’t you heard? He says, heard
what? He says, your brother came home.
(21:25 – 21:33)
He says, oh, he got dirty no good. So he drops his tools and went up and confronted his
father. Now, this is a very human thing.
(21:34 – 21:53)
He goes into his dad, his father and says, father, I have been a good son to you. I’ve
always done more than you asked. He says, my brother here, this no good brother, goes
out and blows everything on a wildlife and he comes here home and you have a party for
him yet.
(21:54 – 22:09)
He says, you’ve never had a party for me. Now, isn’t that human? So the father had to
straighten him out on why this was. This is a great story of the coming to your father and
getting the forgiveness.
(22:10 – 22:20)
And you and I all had to do this in our own way. AA showed us how to do this. We were
lost as bad as that kid was.
(22:20 – 22:28)
Every one of us or we wouldn’t be here tonight. See? Oh, there’s great stories in the
Bible. There’s rummy stories, they get me.
(22:28 – 22:40)
That kid, there’s one more rummy story I want to tell you. Since this is Sunday, we can
have Sunday school lesson. The story of the Good Samaritan.
(22:40 – 22:50)
Now, this is a rummy story that beats them all. Here is this dude lying out there
alongside of a road. He’s stripped naked.
(22:50 – 23:08)
He’s all beat up and bleeding. He’s half dead, see? And along comes this priest and he
sees him lying there and this priest is a man of the world and he’s seen this kind of thing
before. You know what happened to this dude? He got drunk and he got rolled.
(23:08 – 23:23)
That’s what happened to him. I don’t know if any of you ever got rolled, but he did. So
this priest recognizes the earmarks of this thing and so he looks at him and he says
same thing that people are saying today.
(23:24 – 23:30)
He says, a dirty, stinking, drunken bum. He got himself in that shape. Let him get himself
out of it the best way he can.
(23:30 – 23:45)
So he passed by on this other side and left the guy lying there in all his misery. Along
comes this Levite and he saw this fella and he’s also a man of the world and he repeated
what the priest did. Turned over there and went on the other side.
(23:45 – 23:50)
It’s none of my affair. I won’t get involved, he said. This getting involved.
(23:50 – 24:02)
People never got involved so he wouldn’t do it. So then along comes this Samaritan fella.
Well, the Samaritans were not the chosen people at that page.
(24:02 – 24:08)
But this fella was a traveling salesman. Now I’ll prove that to you. He’s a traveling
salesman.
(24:09 – 24:15)
So he’s coming along on his form of conveyance. It certainly wasn’t a Chevrolet. It was
probably a mule.
(24:16 – 24:31)
And he sees this fella lying there and what did he do? Did he pass him by? No. He got
down off of his form of conveyance and he ministered to him. It tells you plainly in the
Bible he gave him some wine.
(24:31 – 24:41)
He not only gave it to him he rubbed it in his wounds. He gave him the medicine he
needed. That guy was a rummy that did this service.
(24:41 – 24:59)
That was the first 12-step call on record. So what? Did he still even lay there? No. He
picked this bird up and put him on his form of conveyance and he took him to the
Holiday Inn.
(24:59 – 25:05)
Well, he took him to an inn anyway. That’s what it says in the Bible. And here’s how I
know they’re all rummies.
(25:06 – 25:22)
He says to this innkeeper, he says, Here, Mr. Innkeeper, take care of this fellow and here
is some money. You see, he gave the money to the innkeeper, not the rummy. He says,
And if there be any more due I will pay you on the next time I come by.
(25:22 – 25:37)
So that means he’s a traveling salesman making that territory as simple as that. So
there’s a rummy story and it’s as true then as it is today. We find them lying there by the
road today in various means in different ways.
(25:38 – 25:48)
But everybody we find is lying there as hopeless as that guy was and as helpless. So we
are the people. You know they talk about the Jews being the chosen people.
(25:49 – 25:57)
I think we are the chosen people. You know, a Jew is a chosen people. He may be, but if
he’s a rummy, he’s chosen twice.
(25:59 – 26:16)
But we are, we have something that other people do not have. And you and I have a
responsibility and we have a ministry. And our responsibility in ministry is to work with
other people whom we can work with.
(26:16 – 26:27)
And that’s the alcoholics. There’s a lot of other people that fix all these other people that
have all kinds of things wrong with them. But this is Alcoholics Anonymous that we’re in
and it says that on the book.
(26:28 – 26:35)
This is not Fatso Anonymous. This is not Dopes Anonymous. This is not Gamblers
Anonymous.
(26:35 – 26:45)
This is not Nose Pickers Anonymous. This is Alcoholics Anonymous. And these are the
people that we are to put our effort with.
(26:45 – 27:00)
And we have a talent to help these people where other people don’t. Alcoholism has an
old, old malady. And only in about the last 40 years has there been a solution found for
the alcoholic.
(27:02 – 27:20)
All through these centuries alcoholics have stumbled across the face of this earth. And
they’ve existed and died in alcoholism and in misery and in many instances they carried
their own family and friends down with them. The alcoholic that down all through those
years only had two options.
(27:21 – 27:36)
The alcoholic could go crazy or die or both. A little over 40 years ago this plan of ours
came along through the grace of God. And now the alcoholic has a third option.
(27:37 – 27:52)
He can go crazy, he can die, or he can get well. And the very evidence of all these
people have been standing up here one year, two years, 30, 40, 36 and 40 and what
have you here. That’s evidence that this thing works.
(27:52 – 28:08)
There never was anything like this before. I have a book at home it’s about this thick. A
big book that was printed back in the 1800s on the history of alcoholism and what
people tried to do down through the years to try to modify people’s drinking.
(28:09 – 28:17)
Nothing ever worked. Now you want to think about that and remember that. You and I
have put something on us.
(28:18 – 28:27)
But so much for that. The alcoholics are very smart people. They’re sharp.
(28:27 – 28:34)
They’re not deep thinkers but they’ll do something. They act. You know these people are
a different kind of people in this world.
(28:35 – 28:44)
And a lot of people have to study everything before they do it. Alcoholics never do that.
You just put a prophecy they’ll do something.
(28:45 – 28:50)
But don’t waste time thinking about it. Do it. So we do.
(28:52 – 28:58)
So people have not understood what alcoholism is. A lot of people think it’s a matter of
taste. It’s not taste at all.
(28:59 – 29:13)
In fact most rummies I know never liked the taste of booze. I didn’t drink for the taste
because if you think so you try some of that seven cents a pint stuff that I used to drink.
You have to learn how to drink that.
(29:14 – 29:32)
You have to get educated into it. I know when I first drank rail I had to take what they
call an itchy bitch they called it. You put salt on your hand lick the salt drink this stuff
and lick it right quick and you don’t feel it going down.
(29:32 – 29:41)
And it has a good chance of staying down if you do that. If you don’t you’re in trouble. So
that’s how you learn how to drink that stuff.
(29:42 – 29:51)
So it’s not a matter of taste. If it’s just a matter of taste we could all have quit drinking a
long time ago. We could cultivate a taste for something different like apples or bananas.
(29:52 – 30:04)
I don’t know who wants to eat 40 apples a day but we could cultivate a taste much
better than some of this ruck that we’ve drank. And other people talk about it as it’s a
habit. It’s not a habit.
(30:05 – 30:21)
We might have it as a habit pattern but if it were a habit it would have been simple.
Because there’s no habit we have that we cannot break. With a little will power a little
persuasion a little this and that a person can stop any habit.
(30:22 – 30:41)
This habit of smoking that most people indulge in so vociferously. If a doctor came along
and told you that if you didn’t quit smoking you’d be dead in 30 days you, there isn’t a
person sitting here that wouldn’t quit in 3 days and have it over with. That’s a strong
habit.
(30:41 – 30:46)
It’s a tough one and it hurts to quit. And we’re afraid of that hurt. We don’t like to hurt.
(30:46 – 30:50)
So we won’t quit. Okay. It’s not a habit.
(30:51 – 30:57)
Drinking to an alcoholic is an obsession. And that’s something entirely different. That
controls us.
(30:58 – 31:17)
When I was a drinking alcoholic I would never do anything engage in anything without
first considering the liquor situation. Didn’t make any difference if I was going to a party,
a funeral, a wedding, a business conference, a vacation or what have you. First I had to
consider the liquor situation.
(31:17 – 31:30)
Is there going to be booze there? How much and how quick can I get it? No booze, no
Clarence. I had a very simple life. Now that’s something entirely different than a habit or
a taste.
(31:32 – 31:45)
The only way I’ve ever felt is through this program. It takes care of our obsession
because it changes us inside. This is a life changing program.
(31:46 – 32:13)
Now, I get around AA could deal with different places and I hear an awful lot of gaff
about this program. And I don’t know where some people get some of this stuff that they
recite at meetings. And you’ll listen to some of these mental acrobatics going around in
some of these meetings where they’re discussing things.
(32:13 – 32:24)
They have discussion groups. And they’re all discussing something they don’t know what
they’re talking about. And it makes for a good hour, but you don’t get anywhere.
(32:26 – 32:35)
We have a formula for getting well. We are sick people. And this is a terminal illness.
(32:36 – 32:42)
Now, let me give you an example. Supposing you get sick. You feel rotten.
(32:44 – 32:51)
The silent one came home the other day with a big belly ache. He felt real bad. I never
saw him without busting off about something.
(32:51 – 33:02)
He got so sick he couldn’t talk. You wouldn’t want to put that on the calendar. Well, we
are here.
(33:03 – 33:08)
Alcoholism is a terminal illness. It will kill you. And you’ve seen it happen to people.
(33:09 – 33:18)
And don’t kid me that you haven’t. If you’ve been around roomies long enough, you’ve
seen some of them die and die at some horrible deaths, really. It is a killer.
(33:19 – 33:26)
They talk about TB being a killer and cancer. So is alcoholism. Now, suppose you feel
real bad someday.
(33:27 – 33:46)
You have that belly ache like he had and you don’t know what’s wrong. So you go to the
doctor and he looks you over and taps you here and taps you there and takes a picture
here and he pulls your tongue out and he shakes his head and says I can’t go any
further. I’m going to have to put you in the hospital and give you a real going over.
(33:47 – 34:00)
So he puts you in the hospital and you’re laying in that hospital and the doctors have a
union, you know. You don’t get one, you get a whole bevy of them out there when you
get in the hospital. I’ve had a lot of experience in the last couple years with my wife in
the hospital.
(34:00 – 34:18)
So I know, I’ve been getting bills from doctors I never saw or heard of. Anyway, they get
to work on you and they tap you and they turn you upside down and they make you
jump up and down. They do all kinds of things and each one has his thing that he puts to
you.
(34:19 – 34:40)
And you get all these things done and you’re laying there wondering what’s going to
happen. So after a couple days you’re lying in that bed and your doctor finally comes in
and you say well doc, what about it? What have I got? Tell me the news and what do I
have to do? And he has that long face this time. He’s not happy and this bothers me too.
(34:40 – 34:48)
This bothers a person. So he shakes his head like this. What’s the matter doc? He says I
don’t like to tell you this.
(34:49 – 35:03)
But he says you have a terminal illness. Terminal? Terminal? Terminal means the end,
don’t it? Yeah. He says you mean I’m going to die? Yes, you’re going to die.
(35:04 – 35:09)
Oh doc, I’m too young to die. I have family responsibilities. I have a job.
(35:09 – 35:12)
I have this. I have that. I just can’t do it.
(35:12 – 35:33)
I can’t die. Isn’t there something you can do now? Well, he says I tell you, you have this
terminal illness but I will give you a prescription and if you take this medicine the way I
give it to you, you have a chance of adding some time on to your life. Oh boy, are you
ever relieved.
(35:33 – 35:37)
You don’t have to die right now. You can put that off again. This is that procrastination
again.
(35:40 – 35:46)
I don’t have to die now. I’ve got another, I’ve got to leave here. I’m getting free time.
(35:47 – 36:10)
He says give me that prescription doc. So he sits down and writes out this stuff, this
hand scratching that’s peculiar to doctors and he hands you this prescription and says
now you go to the drug store here and have the druggist fill this prescription as I have it
here and you take it and you have a chance of living for some time yet. Oh, are you
relieved.
(36:10 – 36:30)
You grab that prescription and you start off with the drugstore. As soon as you get out of
the doctor’s office, you look at it. Now you’ve been in school and you have some smarts
so you start reading this stuff and you start deciphering these things that the doctors put
on there and you can read and understand what these ingredients are in there.
(36:31 – 36:46)
So you have twelve ingredients there and you look them down, you’re looking, this one’s
alright, this one’s alright, then you get down to one here. Oh, that stuff is sour and I don’t
like sour stuff. I’m a sweet kid.
(36:46 – 37:01)
So I put that, pile that away in the blubber up here. I get down here a little ways, there’s
another thing down here. I get down there and this ingredient here, every time I take
that stuff it makes me itch.
(37:01 – 37:08)
I’m allergic to it. I scratch it all the time. And I don’t like to scratch in public so I put that
in my blubber.
(37:09 – 37:32)
And I go on down further a ways here and there’s another thing down here that every
time I take that it gives me gas and I keep burping all the time and I don’t like to burp in
people’s faces. So I file that one away up here in the blubber. So I get down to the
drugstore and I hand, I say to this druggist, Mr. Druggist, I have a terminal illness.
(37:33 – 37:44)
He says, that’s too bad. I say, my doctor gave me a prescription. He says, if you fill it for
me I’ll have a chance of adding some time onto my life.
(37:44 – 37:50)
Will you fill it for me please? He says, I will be glad to do it. Give me the prescription. So
you have the prescription.
(37:50 – 37:53)
Wait a minute, doc. So you take it back. You don’t give it to him.
(37:54 – 38:06)
I say, listen, Mr. Druggist, this item down here, this sour stuff, I don’t like sour stuff. I’m a
sweet kid. Will you just leave that out please? He looks at you.
(38:06 – 38:14)
You mean that? Yeah. And this thing down here always gives me the itch. I’m allergic to
it.
(38:14 – 38:26)
Will you leave that one out too? Then he takes a second good look at you. He says, you
really mean that? Yeah. And this one down here, oh this stuff down here gives me gas.
(38:27 – 38:42)
And I burp all the time. He says, will you leave that out too? He said, really, do you mean
this? Yes, I mean it. So he leaves this out and he fills the prescription according to your
orders.
(38:43 – 39:14)
Do you think you’re going to get well? And that doctor just got through telling you, if you
take this the way he gives it to you, you’re going to get well. Well, do you know
something, kids? We come to AA and we have a prescription with 12 different
ingredients. And the way some people take this one out because it’s sour, and this one
because it itches, and this one because it’s something else, and they start to make up
their own program.
(39:15 – 39:29)
Do you think they’re going to get well? That’s why we have all the problem with these
nitwits. They are prescribing for themselves. We have a foolproof program except for the
damn fools.
(39:30 – 39:40)
We have a foolproof program. Now, let’s talk about this program. Because this is what
we live by.
(39:40 – 39:53)
Remember, kids, when I came here, we didn’t have this program. So if I speak with
authority about this, believe me, I probably have a pretty good right to do it. Because I
was in when this program was put together.
(39:54 – 40:09)
We took the six steps of the Oxford group and expanded them into 12 steps. We figured
out that if rummies can screw up six steps, they can screw up 12, much better. So we
have 12, which makes it very easy for us.
(40:10 – 40:15)
But do you know, people don’t do this. They just won’t do it. A lot of people won’t.
(40:16 – 40:24)
And they have to pay for it, too, believe me. Now, listen to what this is. Our program is
divided into four phases.
(40:25 – 40:38)
The first phase of our program is the first step. That’s the phase of admission. I admitted
that I was powerless over alcohol and that my life had become unmanageable.
(40:39 – 41:02)
Do you know something that I noticed in AA? Many, many people read the first part of
that step and they never see the second part. The first part says that I’m powerless over
alcohol. So forever and a day these monkeys are talking about alcohol and drinking and
not drinking and drinking some more.
(41:03 – 41:19)
And, you know, there’s 200 steps or 200 words in our 12 steps. Alcohol is mentioned
once and nothing is ever said about alcohol again after that. But that second part of the
step is the most important.
(41:20 – 41:28)
The fact that we’re alcoholics is what gets us here. This is our ticket in here. But here,
now, how do we get well? Not by drinking alcohol.
(41:28 – 41:44)
So we get rid of that alcohol. Now, how do we do it? The second thing, second part of
that step says my life is unmanageable. Well, if my life is unmanageable, it has been
year after year, I’d better hire a manager.
(41:44 – 41:51)
I can’t manage it myself. I’m powerless and my life’s unmanageable. So I hire a
manager.
(41:51 – 42:06)
The second step says this. It says, I came to believe, I came to believe that a power
greater than myself could restore me to sanity. Some of these brethren start to get a
little itchy when you talk about sanity.
(42:06 – 42:15)
Believe me, kids, if you’re not nuts, you don’t belong here. This is the greatest collection
of nuts in the world. So be proud of it.
(42:15 – 42:23)
Everybody can’t be this nuts. Some people here have papers to prove it. You ain’t got
them.
(42:23 – 42:43)
All right. So it says, I came to believe that a power greater than myself could restore me
to sanity. How did I come to believe this? I didn’t believe this when I arrived here, but
when these few men who had preceded me down in Akron came and told me their
stories.
(42:43 – 42:50)
These are all older men than I was. I was only 35 years old then. These men were 10, 15,
20 years older than I was.
(42:50 – 43:04)
And they told me the stories of their lives, what happened to them through booze. And,
man, they’d been through it, see? The power of example of those men. They told me this
power would help them and it would help me if I’d accept it.
(43:04 – 43:17)
That’s as simple as it was. So the power of example of these people who preceded me
was what gave me the courage to accept this power. So the third step is where we start
the ball rolling.
(43:18 – 43:27)
It says in that third step, I made a decision. Now that’s something for a rummy to do.
We’re the most indecisive people in the world.
(43:28 – 43:38)
I made a decision. What was this momentous decision? Think of this. To turn my will and
my life over to the care of God.
(43:39 – 43:53)
Hey, that’s a big order, kid. Now if I don’t hurt badly enough, I’m not about to do that. I
should turn my will and my life over to this creature way out in the blue yonder that’s
way beyond where I can even see him.
(43:53 – 44:08)
It’s just imagination. And here’s this guy. I’m afraid of him anyway because I always had
a picture of God being some guy sitting up there with a long white beard and a long
white nightgown sitting there writing dirty things in a book about me.
(44:08 – 44:17)
That was my conception of him. I should turn my will and life over to a character like
that? I had mission in the first step. Then we have submission.
(44:17 – 44:35)
This is where I submit myself completely to God. The fourth step, I said we made a
searching and fearless, moral, innocent party of ourselves. I don’t think there’s any
alcoholic worthy of the name that has the capacity to do that by himself.
(44:36 – 44:51)
I find in working and talking and meeting people all through the years that most people
in AA get hung up on the third or fourth step or both of them. They never get to them.
They never do them.
(44:53 – 45:08)
And they misunderstand step four. You know, in the later years, these last years, we are
placed in this fellowship changes, our ministry changes. When I started out, I was all the
big promoter.
(45:08 – 45:17)
I promoted everything. I started the first AA group in the world and got all the
advertising and all the publicity and all the abuse. And I still get it.
(45:19 – 45:31)
I have a lot of friends, however, and I have a lot of enemies, but I have a lot of friends
and I’m thankful. I’m thankful for my enemies, the poor buggers. Well, anyway, they
have to be and we have to have a difference of opinion.
(45:31 – 45:46)
I know that. But this fourth step, what I do now, I get people coming to my home from all
over the country. I don’t get them from where I live because they think I’m a jerk down
there.
(45:47 – 46:08)
A prophet is without honor in his own hometown. I read that in the Bible and I so believe
it. So, anyway, these people here about some knockdown in Castleberry, Florida that has
some clandestine way of fixing drunks and they’ve been in AA and they’ve been in and
out of AA and what have you.
(46:08 – 46:18)
Some of these people have been dry for some years and some of them haven’t. They’ve
been in and out and they’re miserable. They know they’re not getting anything out of
this life.
(46:19 – 46:48)
So they call me and they want to come down and see me. Well, I try to qualify them on
the telephone to save them a trip because I won’t mess with every person that comes to
my house or calls me because I know the futility of it. I have a qualification before I’ll
work with anyone anymore that comes to my home and here it is.
(46:48 – 46:53)
It’s very simple. I have to know you’re an alcoholic. You have to know it.
(46:53 – 47:00)
You have to admit it. That’s first. The second thing I ask the fellow or gal what you want
to do about it.
(47:01 – 47:17)
Well, you know, there’s some people that don’t want to do a bloody thing about it. They
want to live like a pig the rest of their life. Really, that’s what it amounts to or they think
they can run things themselves yet and eventually they’ll become a pig then they’ll wake
up and we’ll make a lamb out of them for the economy.
(47:18 – 47:28)
Anyway, I ask them what they want to do and they tell me they want to quit. Well, that’s
fine. A lot of people will quit but I’ll quit for them.
(47:30 – 48:00)
So the next question I ask is the one that puts them in a spin and believe me I get some
funny answers to this one. I say that what are you willing to do to quit drinking forever?
Well, boy, you know forever is a long time and some doughhead that hasn’t had sobriety
for a week in his life if you tell him about forever he gets he gets it upsets him. But I only
want one answer and he must tell me he’s willing to do anything.
(48:01 – 48:21)
Where do I get the authority for that? I didn’t make this up it’s in the book. It says in our
fifth chapter and you have it read in probably every meeting you attend it says if you
want what we have and are willing to go to any lengths to get it you are now ready to
take certain steps. Now that’s as plain as a nose on your face.
(48:22 – 48:35)
That’s a qualification. Now if this bird doesn’t tell me that he’s willing to go to any
lengths I have nothing for him. You see, he’s coming to see me to get what I have I don’t
want what he has I’m not looking for him.
(48:36 – 48:45)
So if he wants what I have I’ll give it to him on my terms. Period. And nobody else’s.
(48:45 – 48:55)
So I’ll sit down and it takes me two days to take this person through this twelve step
program. Two days. I take him through the first seven steps the first day.
(48:56 – 49:09)
Then I give him a bunch of papers to write on tell him to go to his room that night and
write down everything about restitution that he has to attend to. Alright. The first seven
steps.
(49:12 – 49:34)
On this fourth step this is where people get hung up. Girls especially come to my place
and they have a whole sheaf of papers that they have they have written out how they’ve
worked themselves into a sweat day after day writing all this garbage that they’ve ever
done during their life. And they bring it to me all about their bed crawling all this crap.
(49:34 – 49:42)
I’m not interested in that. That isn’t what the fourth step calls for at all. I don’t know how
they remember all these things.
(49:46 – 49:52)
Really. I existed too many too long in blackouts. I couldn’t remember anything.
(49:52 – 50:09)
Some of the most interesting things I ever did someone told me about. So, that isn’t
what this step calls for. It says, Amid a searching and fearless moral inventory I have 20
questions I ask them about their moral makeup.
(50:10 – 50:31)
About resentments and hates and all this sort of thing and lying and cheating and
stealing all these different things. And I have a sheet of paper I have it written out on the
paper these things and then as they tell me they have this they have resentments or
they have this and I check it. Well, usually most people have 10 or 12 of these nefarious
things in their character.
(50:32 – 50:50)
I’ve only met one person in my life that had all 20 of them. And this guy believe this or
not this guy I must tell you about it just to show you. This fellow came down from
Tennessee to see me and he was a vice president of a big manufacturing company up
there.
(50:52 – 51:07)
He had a $65,000 a year job plus bonuses and all the stuff that goes with it. He was a big
shot and well educated he was a man of letters. And he’d been in AA 11 years dry and
the most miserable creature you ever want to meet.
(51:08 – 51:17)
He was dry but he was miserable. And he came down and he had all 20 of the questions.
He had every moral deficiency there was.
(51:18 – 51:32)
And I says to him boy, you’re the worst screwed up bird I ever met. And he admitted he
was. Well that fellow after two days he went back to Tennessee and he’s a different man
a different person.
(51:33 – 51:49)
I’ve got some beautiful letters from him over the months since he’s been here. So it
finally got through to him but it took that guy 11 years for someone to tell him what this
program is. What in the world kind of AA did they have up that way? You know? We need
teachers in this thing.
(51:50 – 51:56)
I met I had one girl down from South Carolina one time. She had 20 she had 19 of them.
She almost made a perfect score.
(51:57 – 52:08)
Oh she was a bird. But that’s what we’re looking for what we have to remove from
ourselves. These moral deficiencies.
(52:08 – 52:25)
So then it says I admitted to God to ourselves and to another human being what did we
admit? The exact nature of our wrongs not the wrongs themselves the exact nature of
our wrongs. That is what this is all about. This is where people get messed up on that
fourth step.
(52:26 – 52:38)
They think it’s the details that they have the transgressions it’s not at all. It’s the nature
of them. Alright it’s next step says we were entirely ready.
(52:38 – 52:54)
Did you get that word entirely ready? Alcoholics are extremists they never do anything
by half way measures. When we work we work hard we play we play hard when we drink
we make a career out of it. This is the arami everything in extreme.
(52:56 – 53:12)
here we’re entirely ready ready for what? Can I remove this? No. I admitted that right off
the bat that I’m helpless. So I’m entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of
character because all of them too all.
(53:13 – 53:24)
See it’s all or nothing at all with arami. There’s some defects of character I prefer to
keep. They’re fun things but our program does not give us that option.
(53:25 – 53:48)
This is all or nothing at all if you want the best out of this program. Okay So I’m entirely
ready so then since I’m ready what do I do about it? I’ve hired this manager back in step
3 so I humbly asked him to remove my shortcomings. So we do this on our knees just
like we did in step 3 around our knees.
(53:48 – 54:08)
We do this in step 7 and we enumerate and mention every one of those defects the
person has and ask God to remove those and he removes them like that. Get this now
this might sound a little strange to a lot of people around here. This is what a nut does
after 43 years.
(54:08 – 54:16)
I’ve been doing this for several years. I can only go on results. I don’t go this isn’t this
isn’t a lot of talk.
(54:16 – 54:32)
I show the results what happens to people. So he humbly asked him after a person takes
the 7th step I tell him every one of them this same thing. I said now you are the cleanest
person in the world.
(54:34 – 54:44)
You haven’t had a chance to do anything else yet. Right now you are clean. And I said
you know when you were born there’s been a record of everything you ever did.
(54:44 – 55:00)
I like to put it like a tape recorder. So when you’re born a tape recorder starts to record
everything in your life good bad and otherwise. After that 7th step you’ve asked all this
stuff to be removed that tape is erased.
(55:00 – 55:04)
You know how to erase the tape. We all know how to do that. So your tape is erased.
(55:05 – 55:10)
You’re starting clean. Now you’re going to keep it clean. That’s our job to keep it clean.
(55:11 – 55:34)
All of this stuff up to the 7th step is getting ourselves prepared for this. So now our life is
clean and we learn how to keep it clean. Now in order not to have a lot of things jump in
front of us that we stumble over due to past situations that we’ve had we have the 8th
and 9th step that’s the 3rd phase of our program is restitution.
(55:35 – 55:47)
So we have admission submission and restitution. So I give them a list some papers to
write down and I tell them who to put on that list. You’ve got to tell them everything.
(55:47 – 56:05)
I mean they’ll an alcoholic he’ll go over his head like an airship he’s dreaming of
something else when you talk to him. I tell them you write down there any apologies you
owe your mothers, fathers, sisters brothers, grandpa, grandma aunts, uncles your
neighbors and so forth. I name them out the people you work with the people you do
business with the people you’ve gypped.
(56:06 – 56:23)
Put it down there on that paper and bring it to me in the morning. So they bring it in and
I look the paper over and I tell them what to do in every instance. Now obviously there
are some people we can’t make restitution to they’re dead or they’re moved out of our
orbit we don’t know where they are.
(56:24 – 56:35)
And it’s impossible to make apologies or anything to those people. So what do we do in a
case like that? That’s what we have a manager for. Let George do it let him do it.
(56:35 – 56:47)
Ask him to take care of that for us and he’ll do it. So we get our skirts clean without
hurting anyone else. So we start off in a clean life after our nine steps of restitution now
we learn how to live.
(56:48 – 57:11)
After we have taken nine steps now get this this may shock you a little bit after we have
taken nine steps forget them they’re done you never have to mess with them anymore.
The only time you ever have to mess with those steps is when you’re trying to explain
them to someone like I’m trying to do now and you have to know what they’re all about.
So you don’t have to use them anymore you’ve done them.
(57:11 – 57:28)
You don’t eat your breakfast twice you don’t take these steps twice you do them once.
Every time you take one of these steps something happens to you and it prepares you
for something it prepares you for the last three steps. I live on the last three I don’t have
to worry myself about twelve steps.
(57:28 – 57:45)
I hear people in AA say I’m having an awful time on step three step five step six you’re
having an awful time how long have you been around here? Oh I’ve been around here
four years. Boy you’ve never been into it at all yet. See this is a big problem.
(57:45 – 57:52)
Let’s get with it kids. This is the prescription that we have don’t stumble and just take
part of it. Alright.
(57:54 – 58:06)
After this restitution I tell them what to do and some of these people have some things
to do that they sure don’t want to do. I had the same thing but not as bad as some of
them I’ve met since then. Oh boy.
(58:06 – 58:11)
Well anyway they do it. So their life is clean. You live on three steps.
(58:12 – 58:23)
Don’t you have to live on twelve anymore three. And that’s the last three steps is what I
call construction steps. This is where we construct our life.
(58:24 – 58:42)
We live our life there. The tenth step is another step that has to do with inventory but it
has nothing whatever to do with step four. Step four says we took a searching fearless
moral inventory but it doesn’t say that in this tenth step.
(58:43 – 59:01)
It says I continued see there’s a continuance I continue to take personal inventory that’s
entirely different than a moral inventory and it says something else and when I was
wrong I promptly admitted it. Boy that’s a sucker for you. To get an alcoholic to admit
anything is doing something.
(59:02 – 59:14)
But to admit we’re wrong to forget it. We never admit anything it might we wouldn’t
admit it’s raining outside it might involve us in something. Go to court I don’t suppose
any of you ever been in court.
(59:17 – 59:23)
First thing is don’t admit anything. Lie. Do anything but don’t admit it.
(59:23 – 59:31)
Well here we’re admitting things. This is a new deal for us. So I continue to take personal
inventory.
(59:32 – 59:56)
What does that mean? Let me put it I have to have a very simple program because I’m
not smart enough to have a complicated program so I have to keep it simple. So here I’ll
tell you how I do my tenth step. At night when I’m finished with my day I’m in bed Grace
and I always have a prayer time together and I have one by myself and she has one by
herself.
(59:57 – 1:00:24)
After this is concluded I lay there in bed and I think about my day. Where have I been
today? What have I done? Who have I met? What has transpired? Have I done anything
good today? Have I done anything bright? If so I give myself a pat on the back and say
boy you get a medal for that one. On the other hand maybe I have insulted you or hurt
you or hurt your feelings and I haven’t been anything but kind to you.
(1:00:25 – 1:00:43)
I have to go take care of that right away. It says we have to do it promptly, immediately
if not sooner. Why? If we let those things go on it’s easier to do it the next time and the
next time those things will start building up on us.
(1:00:44 – 1:01:01)
It’s the little things in our life that make or break us, not the big things. How many big
things ever happened to you anyway in a lifetime? Did you ever figure out how many big
things happened to you? You can count them on your fingers and have a few fingers left
over. Let’s check them out.
(1:01:02 – 1:01:14)
First of all you’re born, that’s a big event because you had nothing to do but come out
and let out a yell when you got here. But that was important that you got here. Well,
maybe you had the advantage of a good education.
(1:01:15 – 1:01:28)
Well, I’d consider that a very important thing. Well, maybe you were successful in
business or your profession or whatever you’re in and you got advancements. I’d
consider that very important.
(1:01:29 – 1:01:38)
Every time you get married it’s a big deal. It’s a love of a lifetime. Big deals.
(1:01:39 – 1:01:49)
Have a family, that’s very important. See, you’ve still got some fingers left. Well, you go
along and you die.
(1:01:50 – 1:02:13)
Well, what happens when you die? Well, some friends and relatives come and they
express their condolences to your family and there’s some tears shed, a little bellowing
going on. And you have a service and they take you out to the cemetery and they plant
you there. They fill up that hole, put the grass over it.
(1:02:14 – 1:02:23)
And they all leave, people leave and the world goes on. See? The world goes on. And the
wind is blowing across that grass up in that lonely grave.
(1:02:24 – 1:02:31)
And you’re down in that hole. That’s the end there, see, as far as we know. But there’s
something else.
(1:02:31 – 1:02:46)
We’re going somewhere else. Those old bones are down there but where are we headed
when we when that old ghost leaves us? See? That’s what you gotta think about. I am
very much convinced we are only here on a journey.
(1:02:47 – 1:02:55)
And we’re here preparing for something else. And we have choices that we can make.
We can wind up in one of two places.
(1:02:56 – 1:03:07)
And it’s awful easy to wind up in the wrong place. Because an awful lot of people have
given us opportunities to do that. And it takes some moral courage.
(1:03:07 – 1:03:21)
And it takes some backing. And it takes some sticking together of our society here to
avoid a lot of this stuff. You and I should associate with people who are going someplace.
(1:03:22 – 1:04:25)
You ask people, go to church tomorrow and ask somebody, are you going to go to
heaven when you die? You’re not going to go to You’re not going to go to You’re not
going to go to heaven. heaven. You’re not going to go to heaven.
(1:04:26 – 1:06:12)
You’re not going to go to You’re not going to go to You’re to go to heaven. You’re not
going to go to heaven. You’re not going to go to to go to town threw me out where her
brother had.
Well, sometime later she had the doctor over, the doctor was a family friend and they
got to talking about drinking and she related the story of my visit there at her home and
what a nice guy I used to be, her favorite brother-in-law and what a no good, stinking,
dirty, drunken bum I am now. Listen to this, now remember this is way back, probably 45
years ago, this doctor said to her, he says, you know that’s odd, he said I had a brotherin-law who was a lush here in New York and he met some strange cult of people down at
Calvary House in New York and since he met this strange cult he don’t drink anymore
and he runs all over New York trying to fix drunks and he brings them home and they
smash up his furniture and all that sort of thing. He says and there’s a doctor, a medical
doctor, a doctor Robert Smith down in Akron, Ohio who also belongs to this strange cult
and he spends all of his time fixing drunks down there in Akron.
(1:06:13 – 1:07:52)
Now Akron is only 35-40 miles from Cleveland. He says if your brother-in-law ever gets
back to Cleveland maybe he can get down to Akron and see this doctor and this doctor
can fix him. We used to call it fixing in those days.
Now of course I don’t know this is going on and I’m in New York a long time but the
homing instinct gets us, you know we go home, why we’re not welcome where we go
anyway. One trucker took me as far as the area and another one took me into the
outskirts of Cleveland where I lived and I tried to get in the house and I didn’t make it,
Dorothy wouldn’t let me in. But Virginia had written Dorothy a bout this doctor Smith in
Akron who spent all his time fixing drunks and she asked me if I would like to go down
and meet him.
Well I see that I’m not getting a house and I can transact my business in Akron just as
well as I can in Cleveland. So she put me in her car and took me on to the depot and she
bought me a one-way bus ticket to Akron and goodbye. And that’s how I met my
sponsor.
Now get this, you tell me what this is. I’m a bum, I’m alone, I know nobody in New York
but this gal and her family and this man in New York she was talking about was Bill
Wilson and the doctor in Akron was Dr. Bob, the two guys who were credited with
starting this whole ball of wax and the ball of wax hadn’t even started yet, forget that.
Now if that isn’t a miracle you give me another word for it.
(1:07:53 – 1:08:46)
So I believe in miracles, I think every one of us is a miracle. Well I finally met my sponsor
and this is how I got here. Now, let’s get back to this program.
I continue to take personal inventory and I told you how I do this and this is every night
and I don’t fail in this, it’s become a habit. I don’t think I go to sleep unless I check my
day out today, really. Alright, then the 11th step, listen to this one.
Here’s one for you, lots of words in this. It says we’re seeking something, it says I sought
through prayer and meditation to improve my conscious contact with God, praying only
for knowledge of his will for me and the power to carry that out. It says I’m seeking
something through prayer and meditation.
(1:08:47 – 1:09:07)
Now what is prayer and what is meditation? It’s very simple, prayer is talking to my new
manager, meditation is listening to him. The good Lord gave me two ears and one
mouth, that ought to suggest something to us. We all do a lot of talking but we are a
little bit short on the listening bit.
(1:09:09 – 1:10:02)
So it says I’m seeking through talking to him and listening to him, what am I seeking? To
improve my conscious contact with him. Now what does that mean pray tell? Well that
means that I have to know and sell myself the idea and keep selling myself the idea that
he’s right here, he’s as close to me as Frank is here, I can talk to him, I can listen to him,
I can feel what he does, I can get my orders from him. He isn’t way up here in the blue
yarn or beyond my reach.
Do you remember when those astronauts landed on the moon? Remember what the first
thing they did when they got up there? They talked to him on the moon and you and I
are down here talking to him down here, that’s how long ways apart, but he’s there and
he’s here, he’s everywhere. Don’t ever forget that, when things get tough with you, he’s
always there. If he was there at that moon I don’t think he’d get too far away from us
here.
(1:10:03 – 1:10:54)
Okay? Alright. I sought through prayer and meditation to improve my conscious contact.
Now it tells me what I’m praying for.
You ask most dodos in AA what they pray for every day. They say, oh I pray for sobriety.
Don’t ever do that.
If you ever go through these steps don’t ever pray for sobriety. You have sobriety,
thanking for it, that’s enough. You’ve got it.
You’ve got other things to pray for and other people to pray for. Spend your time doing
that, get acquainted with him, he will help in anything you ask him. A young man came
here to me a while ago before the meeting and asked me to pray for his sister who is
terminally ill tonight when I have my prayer time, which I’ll do.
(1:10:55 – 1:11:11)
And this is what we’re supposed to do, you and I. We have powers that we don’t realize.
We have power that we don’t realize. Let’s use it.
Don’t abuse it. Don’t let’s waste it. This is the message I want to bring to you.
(1:11:12 – 1:11:28)
Now it says I’m praying only for knowledge of his will for me and the power to carry it
out. What do you want me to do boss? What’s your will for me today? I’m your boy, send
me, tell me what to do and put me there. Put the person in front of me that I’m supposed
to be working with.
(1:11:29 – 1:11:42)
Do whatever you have for me, I’ll do it and give me the power to do it. I am a firm
believer that he’ll never put anything on me that he won’t give me the power to execute.
And it tells me that in the good book.
(1:11:43 – 1:11:50)
I always say if it isn’t in the big book or the good book, it ain’t. But forget it. That’s what I
live by.
(1:11:51 – 1:12:04)
So I ask for his direction and his strength and what he wants me to do and where. He’ll
send me. I’ve had some of the rarest experiences over my life.
(1:12:05 – 1:12:15)
Where I have a day all planned that I’m going to do this, that and the other thing. And
I’m going to be in such and such a place at such and such a time. I’m going to be at 9th
and H street at 11 o’clock.
(1:12:15 – 1:12:26)
And I find myself at 11 o’clock on 199th and Z street someplace. Why? Why? I didn’t plan
that. I had other plans.
(1:12:26 – 1:12:32)
But he had plans. So he had me out there. And I look back and retrospect on these
occurrences.
(1:12:33 – 1:12:41)
And I can always see that there was a real reason for it. And there was something had to
be done. Well, I’ve been sold this idea.
(1:12:42 – 1:12:53)
I believe I get sold on this more every day. This didn’t happen to me overnight. I’ve had a
lot of years to watch this work and to get believing all this myself.
(1:12:54 – 1:13:04)
But I think it’s paid off for me. And if you can get what I have experienced, I just want to
share it with you. So, now the 12 step.
(1:13:04 – 1:13:11)
Listen to this one. This is one that, I’m telling you, people really clown around on this
one. They’re always talking about 12 stepping.
(1:13:12 – 1:13:25)
What does it mean? What’s a 12 step mean? It says something happened to us. It says
having had a spiritual experience as the result of these steps. Not because we go to
meetings.
(1:13:26 – 1:13:32)
Not because we read the book. It’s because having had a spiritual experience. We had a
change.
(1:13:32 – 1:13:41)
That’s that change we had. Having had a spiritual experience as the result of taking
these steps. Because we took these steps, it changes us entirely.
(1:13:41 – 1:13:50)
We’re different people. I had a fellow give me something one day, one night at a meeting
when I was very young. In this fellowship.
(1:13:50 – 1:13:57)
It was still the Oxford Movement. This old boy, Bill Van Horn. He was a great, big, rough,
tough guy.
(1:13:57 – 1:14:12)
And I was half scared of this guy. Doc, this fellow had some kind of little pension he got
once a month. And every time he got this money, he was a disaster down there in Akron
and Kent where he lived.
(1:14:13 – 1:14:21)
And he had a peculiar hobby. He used to like to fight policemen. Well, that’s a losing
game, kids.
(1:14:21 – 1:14:28)
Don’t get involved in that. But he did. And they wrapped him so many times in those
clubs of theirs.
(1:14:28 – 1:14:41)
His family finally thought, well, for the good of him and the community, they probated
him and put him in a funny farm out at the Maslin State Insane Asylum. Maslin, Ohio. And
they threw the pee away on him.
(1:14:42 – 1:14:55)
Well, Doc Smith, my sponsor, got him out of there and put him in the old Oxford group.
Put him in his group. And this guy, for some unknown reason, he took an awful shine to
me.
(1:14:56 – 1:15:04)
Every time I came down there, he’d get me in a corner and talk to me. And he was a
moose. This guy was towering over me like this, you know.
(1:15:05 – 1:15:19)
And I was half scared of this bird. I really was, knowing that he came out of this funny
farm. And what he used to do, he used to get me behind T. Henry’s library table, T.
Henry’s home there where we had our meetings, and he would talk and talk, and I
couldn’t get away from him.
(1:15:20 – 1:15:35)
So one night he said this to me, and he did something that had a great effect on the
change of my life. Really, I’ll never forget it. He says to me, Clarence, I’m going to give
you the answer to this whole ball of wax.
(1:15:35 – 1:15:39)
He says, I’m going to give you something. I want you to read it. I want you to memorize
it.
(1:15:39 – 1:15:52)
I don’t want you to ever forget it. This is how they gave us suggestions in those days. So
he takes his billfold out and he starts unloading this billfold, all this debris he had in
there.
(1:15:52 – 1:16:06)
He had all kinds of cards and pictures and stuff, no money, but everything else. And he’s
unloading it on the table, and he finally comes to where he wants, and he finds it, and he
hands it to me. And I look at it, and lo and behold, it’s a Bible verse.
(1:16:07 – 1:16:23)
And I look at that Bible verse, and I look at this big gorilla in front of me, and I thought,
hey, maybe they did let him out too soon, you know. I was pretty new then. But I did
what Bill told me to do, and it has become perhaps my favorite verse in the good books.
(1:16:23 – 1:16:44)
I have a number of them, but I think this is my favorite one. It’s from the 2 Corinthians,
the 5th chapter, and the 17th verse, which you heard mentioned a while ago. It reads
this way, Therefore, if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature.
(1:16:44 – 1:16:54)
Old things are passed away. Behold, all things are become new. If any man be in Christ,
he is a new creature.
(1:16:54 – 1:17:03)
Old things are passed away. All things are become new. Isn’t that our experience? All
that garbage, all that stuff is gone.
(1:17:03 – 1:17:09)
That’s behind us. Don’t ever go back and pick it up anymore. Everything is new.
(1:17:09 – 1:17:15)
You have a new life. I sit there and look at you folks sitting out here. You’re all dressed
up.
(1:17:15 – 1:17:19)
You’ve got your ears washed, your faces washed. You’re clean. You smell good.
(1:17:19 – 1:17:40)
And what do you think this bunch looked like a few years ago? I mean, just consider. The
guy or the gal you’re sitting next to, you’d move over. This is a change.
(1:17:40 – 1:17:44)
We’re new creatures. We’re new. That old stuff’s gone.
(1:17:45 – 1:17:50)
It’s past. Everything’s new. We have so much to look forward to.
(1:17:52 – 1:18:01)
Well, that’s our program. We had this spiritual awakening, this change, this spiritual
experience. We’re different people.
(1:18:02 – 1:18:32)
You know, I look around at things today, and I watch what’s going on in this world, and I
see one thing that disturbs me, and I think one of our greatest sins today is that we’re
inclined to deify man, humanize God, and minimize sin. Think about that. Deify man.
(1:18:32 – 1:18:39)
Set some guy up as an example. Worship him or something. Humanize God.
(1:18:40 – 1:18:45)
He’s my buddy. God’s my buddy. God’s not your buddy.
(1:18:45 – 1:18:56)
He’s your father. And this thing of minimizing sin. Today, so many people say, well, if it
feels good, do it.
(1:18:59 – 1:19:13)
No, there’s moral laws. They’re the same today as they were many years ago. Because
people don’t want to obey them or go along with them, that doesn’t change the fact that
they’re still there.
(1:19:13 – 1:19:23)
I’ll tell you a little story. I’m not much for telling stories, but I like this story about Moses.
You know, the Jews, they were an erratic bunch.
(1:19:24 – 1:19:32)
And they never did anything God told them to do. They always rebelled. They wandered
40 years in the wilderness.
(1:19:33 – 1:19:36)
He gave them food. Their shoes never wore out. Their clothes never wore out.
(1:19:36 – 1:19:50)
Forty years they’re wandering around there to get to the promised land, and they never
made it because they wouldn’t obey. Well, they got to so far, and Moses decided to leave
them. He thought he had them in pretty good order.
(1:19:51 – 1:20:07)
So he left them for quite a while, and he went up to talk to God and get some orders
from Him. So, in the meantime, when he went, believe me, they had a ball. They took all
their jewelry and mellowed it up and made a golden calf.
(1:20:07 – 1:20:14)
And they were this and sleeping with that and that and so on. It was great, you know.
Some fun.
(1:20:15 – 1:20:40)
So when he came down with those tablets in his hands and he sees what’s going on
down there, he got so disgusted, he threw them on the ground and broke them. See?
Well, Moses finally got these people under control again, and he thought they would be
alright for a while, so he went back up to get some new tablets. So he went up and he
finally came back with the two tablets.
(1:20:41 – 1:21:00)
He called them all together. He says, Folks, he says I have some good news and I have
some bad news. He says, The good news is I’ve got them cut down to ten now.
(1:21:02 – 1:21:11)
But the bad news, adultery is still in it. So there you are. Now that’s been going on a long
time.
(1:21:14 – 1:21:24)
As far as I’m concerned, we must reach up to God, not try to bring him down to our level.
That’s the big thing people are trying to do today. That’s too bad.
(1:21:26 – 1:21:36)
Well, we have to learn some things. That’s what we come here for. You know, God deals
with us not in groups, but one by one.
(1:21:36 – 1:21:46)
This is the greatest one by one situation there is. Groups are great. We should be here to
meet together and share.
(1:21:47 – 1:21:55)
But after all is said and done, it’s a one on one situation. That’s what AA is all about. You
know, I find this.
(1:21:55 – 1:22:11)
Vast numbers of people are practical atheists. They intellectually believe there’s a God,
but they can’t get it into their heads. They can’t believe that God will take a hand in their
affairs personally.
(1:22:12 – 1:22:17)
They always think it’s somebody else. God takes a hand in our affairs. We better believe
it.
(1:22:18 – 1:22:32)
And we better depend on it, and we better ask him to and back him up. He has
something for all of us to do, you know. But we hear so much stuff, so much propaganda
about this new morality and all this crap.
(1:22:34 – 1:22:40)
There’s nothing new about this. People were that way right when the Jews were headed
for the Promised Land. There’s nothing new.
(1:22:41 – 1:22:50)
But people think this is a new morality. It’s the same old crap. But there’s the same rules
that are supposed to be followed also.
(1:22:51 – 1:23:13)
You know, we hear all this stuff, and they keep dinging at us. That propaganda makes
mindless sheep out of us. Don’t listen.
Don’t believe everything you hear. That’s what we got noodles for, and we’re supposed
to use them. So you and I have to do something, right, wrong, or otherwise.
(1:23:14 – 1:23:28)
I always say that the men who try to do something and fail are infinitely better off than
those who do nothing and succeed. Remember that. So you and I are supposed to be
busy and do things.
(1:23:28 – 1:23:41)
We’re servants. Now, people will… I get a lot of criticism for what I believe. That’s their
business that they want to criticize me.
(1:23:41 – 1:24:01)
But I found out this over the years that minds of moderate caliber ordinarily condemn
everything which is beyond their range. And if they can’t absorb it, they’re going to
condemn it. So this is tough.
(1:24:02 – 1:24:12)
But that’s the way the cookies crumble. We have to stand for something. If we don’t
stand for something, we’re very apt to fall for most anything.
(1:24:13 – 1:24:24)
And there’s a lot of people trying to make us fall for stuff. And we’re going to have to
stand and stand fast. I don’t like to say these things about AA.
(1:24:25 – 1:24:38)
I’ve been to a lot of places in AA, around this country and out of this country. And I’ve
seen it. And I see how a lot of it is getting so watered down.
(1:24:39 – 1:24:50)
And people are not sticking to these real principles of love and service that we’re
supposed to stick by. They get all infused with a lot of propaganda. They get dressed up.
(1:24:50 – 1:24:59)
They get a few bucks in their pocket. And they start getting more than independent
again. I will always be dependent upon my father.
(1:25:00 – 1:25:16)
And he has promised me certain things. He says my father has good things and he wants
to share them with me. See, this program, as Frank mentioned a while ago, emanates
from the Sermon on the Mount and the Book of James.
(1:25:17 – 1:25:27)
If you want to know where this program came from, read the 5th, 6th, 7th chapter of
Matthew and study it over and over. You’ll see the whole program in there. The Book of
James is a healing ministry.
(1:25:27 – 1:25:35)
It tells us what to do when we’re sick. And we’re sick people. And it tells us this also, that
faith without works is dead.
(1:25:37 – 1:25:46)
People say, well, I don’t have any faith. How do you get it? Everyone has faith. We’re all
given a measure of faith.
(1:25:47 – 1:25:59)
It’s up to us to get that strength in us. And the more we seek after things that we should
be seeking after, the stronger that’s going to be. That’s why we have these last three
steps.
(1:25:59 – 1:26:06)
We have our conversation with our manager every night. That’s what strengthens our
faith. We keep selling ourselves this is the right idea.
(1:26:06 – 1:26:15)
And he’s the one to follow. See, people say, oh, you’re talking religion. I’m not talking
religion at all.
(1:26:15 – 1:26:21)
I’m talking about spirituality. We don’t need religion. We need redemption.
(1:26:23 – 1:26:35)
That’s what we need. Absolutely. So I know this, that if I do what I’m supposed to do, I’ll
be taken care of.
(1:26:35 – 1:26:54)
And I’ve proven that in my own life. I came here with nothing, less than nothing. When I
went to my first meeting, I walked into that millionaire’s home in Akron, Ohio with a
meeting for health, and I didn’t have an overcoat, and this was in February, there was
zero weather.
(1:26:56 – 1:27:07)
And I had on one black shoe and one brown shoe. That was my wardrobe. Since that
time, I now have several suits.
(1:27:08 – 1:27:12)
I have a place to live. I have a good home life. I have a lot of friends.
(1:27:12 – 1:27:18)
I have a lot of enemies. God bless them all. But I have a good life.
(1:27:19 – 1:27:27)
I have a life that I’ve been undreamed of way back there. But it’s impossible that these
things could ever happen to me.