The 10th Sponsorship Conference in Seattle, WA

my name is Clint units lead I'm an alcoholic

very glad to be here glad to be at this affair glad to enjoy the weekend very much

hi

someone asked me earlier this evening who is up at the

corn Husker round up go please go

to

tell one of my experiences that I told there they thought it was symbolic and beautiful so I'll tell you

three weeks ago I was in Cincinnati with take a break thank you

and I was in the airport as well to the washroom was waiting for

I sent the stall and guy said the next all next week

I just said you're

doing what you doing bathrooms

and this voice seventy seven next all hi there

so that's odd

can be meeting me

you should version invoices what are you doing today

as well really puts any business of yours I'm going to go Renee's convention what is

and ten years this week and I thank you

and it's kind of a pause

voices we could have some fun tonight

you know I'm an old man what is this and I

I would really appreciate your offer but I really don't want to bother anymore I've got other things my mind

your voice is are you sure you don't really have some fun

I said look no damage just what if you do just go there and you let me do I'm doing just forget it

and britian the voice said

I'll have to call you back to some of which the next move keeps talking

I've been doing a lot of heart aches in my life

but this is this is

very good speakers this weekend those of you who just came in late to miss a good speakers last night did give the very good talk and this morning you can I gave an excellent talk very proud of or not group with

because something came up I had to miss the Alan on speaker but I will listen to her talk next week on tape and I will

if I find any errors of logic I will call and tomorrow and tomorrow morning of course pay you were we had our next speaker three is a pleasure to be of these folks because I know if you're going to say kind of super close with them but they all start with the basic facts of eight and they're all Activo

in sponsorship which what we're here for

you know there there should be three different types of alcoholics and no over the years we've all various types there's a type of alcoholic apparently who drinks involuntary supervises it is an alcoholic but something drastic happens or they have a death in the family or economically challenged and lose their job or something terrible happens they're threatened some out and they said they realize the nature of their problem they quit and they never drink again and is it or to these people around is also type of all calls received to get physically addictive as well as emotionally addictive and they have to be withdrawn these are the people the treatment centers were originally designed for to physically remove them off alcohol little by little and finally there often each step of the way they say look you're doing your family look for doing your home really does your job by the time they get off they are very quick that's why so many companies system supported your employees going to treatment centers to get to that point where they realize the nature of the problem

and then there's another type of alcoholic

received for all intents and purposes a regular alcoholic in something terrible happens or threatened or let down the family other economically challenged or something dreadful happens

and they realize the nature of their problem and they quit

and sooner or later always begin to drink again

there's another type of much the same type brought off what treatment centers and learn the nature of the problem and swear that they will not do this again and sooner or later

they always started again

and these are the people to baffled scientists and doctors and religious people in and families and everybody for ever because there's no reason they should start it again and nobody could understand why they do it and sometimes the people involved I have no idea why they did it was just such an amazing thing you don't bill Wilson wrote our book

he didn't really know that very is types of alcoholics she I suppose you sense them as much as we do

but that's why again and again or will he describes alcoholics of our time he doesn't tell the other techs are but alcoholism R. type and R. type for the people who seem to have a great deal of

great deal of frustration that we bring to people around us and situations around just because the matter what happens just would we get people's hopes up we go again I don't suppose anybody this room west and seen that look of terrible pain accusation sadness and someone's face when they look at junior is but you promised you promised

and makes you feel awful bad and this never should you accept it makes you feel better soon okay get away from me and leave me alone got talent because you feel so bad and you have no explanation what do you tell

and that's the sort of problem that faces people like us me of the we're the people who

most of us as we've been said the estimated today in America was more surprised than any place in the history of the world

there's never anything like this we are the heart beat American

and

right I live in the west coast in the southern California and up here a little bit too but southern California is kind of the heart beat a very eight

the New World apparently there's more steps over alcoholics partly in southern California New York Illinois combined

a lot of people still think

Akron's the heartbeat of A. A. Akron has the same relationship to a is that Bethlehem has to Christianity

something nice happened there once but not for a long

and all the sobriety and everything available still estimated about ninety five percent of alcoholic still die drunk American or is it a direct result of drinking and they may call it something else a lot of cases but why would this be it's it's so unnecessary is so absolutely necessary and that's what we have to go through the nature of the damn problem why is this necessary I've been reading it's kind of a hobby over the years

I I've been reading up I started working in a medical corporation about two years over and I kept reading some the first ads for treatment of alcoholism but they offer to the doctors and medical journals something called Libya was really gonna make the difference of the it did make a difference I mean I'm all groggy before they drank various explanations of alcoholism over the years and I it's nice to said that medicine just about not just about caught up with a just almost after all these years finally got to a point where we've been since nineteen thirty nine

hi this is book is kind of interesting because you read by a guy who did not have to write it today you would joke about that subject was saying that the book was divinely inspired he felt that I feel is divinely inspired because the guy who wrote it did not have to write it you know they they say it's a miracle and that's a difficult word because it uses the word miracle very cheaply I will try yourself goofed up process

I got up early this morning to five thirty

I don't of the eastern star and there was a sudden coming up

it was a miracle

god has given me another day

you get up early tomorrow I have another one you

Americans have to be something that are not explainable but I'm not easily actually

and I do have to and that's that's why this book you know a lot of books been written but this book is we would buy guide

and who you know background in psychology back most of the people struggling with drunk again there were no sales over very few people staying sober was having what he wrote that book he said we're group over a hundred men and women stay sober years later he

he confessed shame faced with is only seventy nine as far as you know but it's not a hundred would sound better that's you know we all know that

but he

why would they call this book a miracle you know I know what your new

hi this is what I was you know if you're when you're do you think well he was sober three years twenty road

my god you should don't have to write a book when you're three years old

hang around here for three years

it would seem that way until you get three three years and you realize that don't know quite enough to write a book

five years over you just got to be nice to people three years over so going to meetings Jimmy keeping up world

by the time you're ten years over you hate to send people three years somebody get your coffee

is that two creams you want sugar

by the time you're twenty years over you hate to have people three years sober unattended on your property

this loser three years over had not held

just like my

I'm going to faster if you spring to figure

I would've I've only invited back you every ten years

Jesus

but he was struck by failures losers and and he wrote this book for the worst motives you try to sell the three sets of hospitals and he wrote this book and they do think it's a miracle because it's trees more alcoholic lives in the last sixty two years sixty three years all other therapies combined in the history of mankind change more alcoholic life does that's it zero and that's in explainable and yet with all of that going forward it's still you're still fine surrounded by people die from alcoholism if this is a regular meeting of eight hours that is exactly recommended because most people go more and bought involved to come here but a number of people in this room will die drunk

not because a doesn't work maybe maybe maybe you I don't know my member my sponsor told me that you don't really say you'll guard drugs yeah yeah yeah

but later he got mad at ease up to them and got drunk and died he you can best be right because this is unnecessary how are you feeling any given moment is talking about the maintenance of our spiritual condition

and who nobody can print nobody could really

tell how they're going to maintain their spiritual connection it was a person who can guarantee me how you're going to feel when you wake up tomorrow morning to wake up grouchy perhaps we or whatever it might be because we're human beings SO

at why would this be and I would really be the articles what alcoholism and that the final session of

I'm certainly struggling a few years ago

that's the most

that is all the things I read that the most absolutely right description is Irving I read a hundred times and heard it read a hundred times at thirty just stupid that's the first chapter first couple pages of chapter three that is really the description of alcoholism at least as far as we're concerned better than anybody from Baltimore type I know some new people here tonight

you may look round of diverse bunch you have

different colors and sizes and shapes and ages and stages of disintegration and

I didn't mean to hurt your feelings

I'm just kidding

she's my favorite

and what you have in common with these people well you don't have a whole lot of I'll tell you that you don't have a whole lot common to double look at

but there is

because a lot of things they don't even have in common with themselves

I don't know what that means is that

I must listen to my tape sometimes you read me

but one thing I remember after somewhat begin to realize it zero in on one of the great things as there is a small thing that just says you know one thing if you're an alcoholic one thing you've done that I've done that we've all done alcoholic somewhere along the line you are voluntarily or involuntarily accepted the obsession

that's somehow some day you will control and enjoy your drinking

and it says the persistence of this in new business domination

many pursuit through the gate seven seventy been centered through the gates into insanity and death why would people have to accept

that's one of the hallmarks of our type of alcoholic

and this goes on to say that

we we have occasional brief recoveries

followed all was fire still worse relapse and if we hadn't been none of us would be here would still be in our brief recovery

which followed by still relapse and then it gets to a point that I I've always enjoyed that phrase it because it just just such well written freeze

until you get to a point to the full and in concrete ansible demoralization

right for for that so that's how dressed these people get they just get that way but that is what it means at all I don't think that's the way you feel after you're sober again

and now you have to explain why and you can't and you are pitifully in and comprehensively demoralized

and it goes on to give a little funny paragraph sometimes people laugh at it but it really is kind of Texas I look at that paragraph and it matches my life to larger I'm sure yours is nothing different about this

things we have done to control and enjoy our drinking changing from one kind of drinking to another

this this eight Scott for brandy what could be anything

drinking beer only preserved on that last

thank you only at home try that drinking never at home try that

she wore off try that

I did not accept a voluntary committed to an asylum but I accepted an involuntary and I was pissed about it

if you ever see anybody commit suicide before my god

rid reach schedule letter sure I did that I mean god

what's that M. as possible every fox book

every step of the world read that baby you know

I don't understand it but it's really just

rebel against my head

I read philosophy but it the end of that paragraph there's a party says we could increase the list audience would like to I mean we can increase this list and definitely we certainly could because we all have our own wasted we were going to stop we're going to find a way to stop it wouldn't stop for my kids are gonna stop for the job I go to stop because my life is in the end really intend to stop and never once you realize that the quester controlled joy and enjoy my drinking for people like me is impossible

because I can drink and control it

but I can't then I can enjoy

they just do that for a little while hello this is

that I drink and enjoy it but that I don't control it

but I always it's always just beyond the rest just good if I get I'm looking for an answer looking for an answer

and and people like us or just

lost

and people come to a all over the country and don't last a diabetic I'll bet you go to the top of the membership of areas worldwide maybe two million well but there's got to be twenty million people have come to a

and that's and most of them stay

we say in our book rarely ever seen person fail they what we shopped with thoroughly followed our path but nobody ever hardly anybody stays long enough to follow our path that's the problem

and so we are caught in this big

problem why is this and people all over the country are upset and worried and lost and get broken

which is why I suppose

we have a sponsorship conference

so it was read tonight so you aren't afraid of sponsorship people come you're afraid of sponsorship I did once upon a time

come to realize that sponsorship is what is probably the greatest help through that morass of misunderstandings in doubt because that only do you have to learn things here but you have to have somebody be helping you well you only learn the things you already know when you come here that are wrong

and that's the beautiful part I mean I usually give people advice for ever known they can't even get through I know but I I know better now are you and they made a terrible

in my life hi your

they drew my work today I do something that probably none of you do

Tuesday morning again I'll go to work after Labor Day and I'll get out of my car downtown

and I'll step over bodies of men and women dying from alcoholism and drug addiction

and so modeled also hello I'll go to my office work all day and tomorrow night so step four of the bodies of dying men and women to get to my car

and go up by the ocean

and this

you think it would be a terrible thing

but it really isn't terrible anymore used to be terrible is it more

nothing is terrible if you're used to it

nothing is

wonderful after used to it

yeah that's that's a hard thing to remember we've joked about that sometime soon the new coverage will call up and say that the magic words it just makes sponsors go crazy

I want to talk to you about my new relationship

now if you're smart you'll have a home machine on your desk you put the phone

yes they see these great things like I know I thought the last one was was just put this one I tell you my god when I saw her walking out of the detox I just got a very mature reaction but sometimes I find myself going

Hey caps probably bad news L. isn't going to be wonderful very long

but yes it is we we were having lunch today and we reach for the salt our fingers

I swear to god

and you have to tell the bad news that's it

it's just

it changes

three years from now is that in the event one of the million the true relationship last the end of the year

and then if you even get merry and maybe three years ago I would bundle

maybe two little tikes crawling on the floor

and you'll be sitting at the table with the girl you love

we have a large

rich for the salt your fingers to type and you say it was a god damn

nothing is wonderful I can be grand love I suppose love gets deeper and richer in some situations thanks but that seems to be infatuation does less terrible the isosceles server you see these people dying in front of me what but so well and you put a blanket over one take remote and

if you're really terrible but it is I've been watching out for twenty eight years and I used to live that's said Walker there myself

no why would I try to help these people

and I used to I used to that's a great thing I used to pick him up and take him up and straighten it out and get jobs and do things and they'd be on the sidewalk again four or five days later and they didn't know why and I didn't know why

one day suddenly realized

welcome I hope these people why is it I tell the truth show me the way out they won't they don't they're not getting it

to send your request my price slip year after year after year after year after year after year after year after year after year after year

the worst years of my life came what good people were trying to help me

that went bad use they were trying to help me with that for the years that I was really disintegrating and good people tried to help me

and I

the last day I drank standing on the street corner of Los Angeles my front teeth checked out and everything gone

dying on the street or so I've got to send me

but if you're driving what if you have a good day for ten years I want to go back to admit you don't call if you do something with it but if you don't you don't understand

my I'm not really an alcoholic

not really I know there's something wrong with something wrong we just a little boy or something missing in me and I don't know what it is but people seem to recognize it when I get close to

and I I can put on a good front sometimes I can Kerry it off a little while but the imperfections and flaws show up pretty soon people are close to me and I don't seem to get along with people I have real difficulty sustaining one to one relationships I thought about that later too that's WA think about

if you have trouble just any one to one relationship secure now Holly

and I did learn just left us over well by being the big piece it together by working with others

is this when you don't have much self worth or self acceptance and you're in a relationship with someone

you must get your self worth from them

you must get your acceptance from them they must give you your self worth and so all I really ask your people that I'm close to in a one to one relationship and I don't even know I'm doing it but I do it again and done it again again again all I ask of you is that you treat me special all the time

and no matter how much somebody loves you no one's going to treat your special all the time

yeah after a while before the March of acceptance is they don't treat you quite a special just hi how are you

I guess they don't they don't like me anymore well

I never liked them anyway that I think about

but as soon as the slightest lowering of that

glad to see you nonsense and I know that our relationship is over and probably just starting to build it up and wonderful please rise I'm going to I'm gonna cut you off before you cut me off you've heard my feelings

and little by little all these problems they were there all the time in every situation but they were a lot I look back over my life I suppose the number one you motion I can remember my life I've had a lot all the emotions you everybody else that but my number one emotion was hurt feelings

she makes somebody is always hurting my feelings not accepting we're not or patronizing me to this day I have difficulty with people patronizing me and I've tried to overcome but I don't show it now

but I still have a little difficulty and you know what you're working for people sometimes they patronize you

and if you want to eat next week you just smile

but thinking someday I'll get you the best

what is that like he used to be

that's one of the things that I've had to deal with my life

Western District Court and I was dying I would bet my life I was not they'll call again did best my life I was an alcoholic and I had no idea because that would be my last morning drinking until now because if I there was no reason to stop drinking I stopped drinking for good reception operative from drug drug in jail without my son died they couldn't find me and I I feel so bad about repair the next few days I committed suicide they put me in a sense out and things like that and I've quit jobs with drinking for a lot of good reasons why right

I don't know how to explain to people the reason I know I'm not an alcoholic is that alcohol is not really my problem is when I drink

provider hard standard people is that when I don't drink it's gets worse sometimes

the one thing I could always build all the years I went to a a

I did learn how to stay sober and would would now call it was if you're a new graduate wonderful what's there now call it I'll tell you what it is we don't know what it is people driving by here knows what it is there are people who have trouble with alcohol they have don't have a very well become day gets over and they feel better

if you ever see speaker meeting in your town

and you go to a speaker we do once a week at least I'll guarantee you you will hear the next fifty two weeks you'll hear the same story we're not seeing the same story because of the different backgrounds and interpretations and theories and concepts of the impressive thing that will be in every talk is this I used to drink well I was terrible I can beat us over three to buy act and now I'm feeling better

everything else is background

and I do part of that I can always accept right I can top drinking stars anybody I've had a kind of a bizarre personality right start drinking I'm kind of frightened and quiet personality when I was sober one rescue I

I've I'm a psychiatrist told me I was

this is because I've been repressed by the Norwegian Lutheran church

I'm glad to be in Seattle was or so people understand this second talking those Catholics in New York

sure there's

very few pockets of Norwegian Lutherans we've ever trusted the ones out here because they moved to a warm climate

three four years ago talking in Oslo Norway

and it just got to where my grandparents my grandfather came from the eighteen eighties around good problem solving

and and I remember that story how he and his three brothers came to America and with the whole wave of Norwegian immigration they all settled you know to get with that damn climates in just to get to find it American they all settled in Wisconsin Minnesota

North Dakota South Dakota

spent the next fifty years saying uses just cold here

two weeks clings to the Washington

so what you wanted to get webbed feet or whatever

all right he's I've every thank you and I seem right to me you said you were refresh so that was a repressed United north repressed I just tested always with a jerk so if you live but as you point out what what do you drink you you kind of break close you're free

yeah S. that's reduction

during the spring of twenty resting officer a couple times

check the god damn car

what I did in order just right now and you could even put a finger on top for a sober well try to describe it is this I got sober

and what happens to be I'm like I could talk prehistoric your doctors are trying to reach I would be in jail because of our work been different prices exotic things I've done bizarre things no talk about Hey I'm I did talk about a I've been a New York October eight San Francisco or Los Angeles or a special sessions but Chicago or Milwaukee or Minneapolis or Dallas role pasal cities I've lived to tell you the regional differences among about a

but the problem I have with it is this unlike alcoholics

is when I get sober and clean up my act that's what my life is painful

and how do you explain that so nobody around you start you how wonderful it is and I can do it for a while some time driving very is residual my boy died I did quite a bit quite a while but most of that was a few days or maybe weeks I really this better start ranking what happens is this one right

sooner or later somebody sneaks into my bedroom in the middle of the night and porches invisible spring my god

the next morning when I get up they start to type that

then little by little comes here ability

and the rest of this the

I don't choose to be patronized tell me about my drinking I don't let's just hope crap with the

the book put it so well restaurants discontent can't really put any better now that's weird but do and eventually I get to

I get in tower to get across to get tired I get sick of all this crap and I learned when I was fifteen years old on a ship in the Pacific Ocean

that a few drinks because the only thing I know that cuts that feeling quickly

and I just I stopped it would be best for you I drink I don't drink because I'm a drinker

I drink because I have a feeling that's anybody

if I for your motions if I if I was in describing the eight members hearing at rest but thinking my god that's you're talking about meat gravy emotional problems

they know that people like me I wish my problem was alcohol abuse alcoholics and gold return to god and live comfortably over after

what do you do it or just or something wrong inside or something not thank you

there's bad thoughts and bad feelings and bad

just you know you're bad in your

bad sometimes it just things go to hell in a few drinks and I have a few drinks I can go from being a bad nothing into a lot of times whatever I want to be

I could be a

B. I can tell people I've Barstow people right but I am actually not brand but all but I believe I am that for a while

this is great and I could do things I feel I don't feel ability second comfortable

you know and they they talk about that crazy phenomenons of creating

no one has ever been able to describe the phenomenon was crazy but I have a I have my own theory on it

J. may Cher

are you ready

she just gave me the signal

my experience is I think that for people like me to read about you but right right I get up there and I get on a I would a different mode or just a different result

and pretty soon starts to fade and I have to instinctively keep drinking the hold that to me is that crazy I got a hold it would be weird but holding up feeling the trouble is if you do if you get drunk

but for a while you're holding that it

and there may be a reason later if you become physically addicted to Cedric I have to keep that reason but I mean the psychological addiction we use that I'm trying to hold that being trying to hold out a

and sometimes I get sick from it before I want to write if you go to the washroom my finger down my throat throw up so I can get back and get that entry is

and I don't explain to people if you give me a way to get that edge I will never do you

if you find me a way to fill these holes that are inside of me and all the words won't change it I'll be glad to do it

and all the pretty words return to god you say god exists I am damned

I don't know but anybody else would like to pursue it you give me their mind still there twelve a little better we not see Stiller ninety

in my church hi Sam I was twelve I knew I was a bad boy the

and then when you break two or three commandments you just instinctively know you're in trouble if you break more than that you're

forget about all right give me a

number of W. member thank you I've broken all ten commandments

you know what to

there better not be a god if there's a god I know what I'm gonna do because the people I'm I'm sober through god's grace I guess that means god goes a missus you too can stay sober you can get your bad you too can you three can

because there's people sitting on both sides we can't stay sober but this crisis with god's grace well that was god's grace got for me

if god's grace exists in this at some point you have to depend on for sobriety I did

nothing I will do or say can drink I want to say one thing the postscript that I after a sober while I realize I didn't saturated I had not broken all ten commandments

I've never coveted my neighbor's manservant

that's right trying to find myself I do all about a a standing on the street corner in Los Angeles for the rain falling in my teeth checked out my clothes gone my family gone my career gone I could not probably the worst feeling of all you lose your bad you lose your career that's over bad after you is the feeling I'm sure some people in this room ahead when you suddenly find yourself standing someplace and there is no family directions

there's no place you could go back to say you're sorry nope there's nobody who tears anymore as far as I know you're just you can die right there and just be able to say how how much support we about

now what that's the worst feeling I know your standard you watch yourself report your own sleeve and nobody cares

one of the world would I be sober numbers over a long time and

in Seattle this sponsorship conference and I think about that this morning a little bit

I said that was good thank all you would beings I get

tired and

heavy laden weary and heavy laden subject just wild and set my own head that pretty particular reason but I sometimes think well goodbye written down maybe I'm just so bad but I was having breakfast this morning was five people here that I sponsored we sat and laughed and talked for a while it was in

and I thought to myself well that's something I've done I've helped five people you know

somebody else might help you better than I did but I at least I was acting as an agent home the world regular that situation the first place

and it it boils down in my life to absolutely the sponsorship

I didn't want to sponsor I didn't seek one I didn't want right but most of the morning the rain was falling I walked

I two eight club I thought I could maybe hustle some

yourself good when I was doing well what tapes are you give people money that maybe should give you a little money and I what is a club and I've been in there before drunk and they we're glad to see me that was mad to see that one I hung around the club and that

at night there was a meeting right about four pounds a cake and then they had a meeting about gratitude I was hooked it back up

I just try to stay out of the rain really and after that we went home when I

I went to the manager about sort of a different my new cover looking make my move I

I have no basis day and I'm a newcomer and I don't know what to do

I love your store are about a hundred and twenty six pounds but then I was just gone six I believe you

Hey guys I got the good news for you can kind of Joe Quinn listed forty nine mark in the parking lot last summer just remember you can sleep with that

the band are

yeah good idea

Mr Miliband Carter's Kohl's out my mouth is bleeding again I've been open so the scabs is just hideous as I went back in the club in the morning is Sunday morning I was spiritual meeting at today we'll take a listen and talk about god or Jesus or somebody who's after being a try to

I looked all afternoon run that problem would save my life that they really I found a little room in the back I was wandering around looking maybe some got some money in a fun little room in the back there's a little dusty black and white television there and I turned it on and the damn thing worked

and I spent the afternoon watching pro football game that saved my life and just get my mind off of me for three hours I guess not that there's another meeting right to work eight two seven abandoned cars run for days I

I remember thinking

maybe did

I really thought I might be dead because

primary password I was told it would happen I would go to hell

you're dead wrong this ourselves hot ball of fire and it was

it's going to cold rain and

people talk to me but eight eight read

and just run

are you

I got the floor up to run to every

January

I tell you our standard hierarchy of speakers

yeah all the good speakers in January down in Florida Texas

all southern conference and I'm up through

very soon

the north your club has a date with my CI fu to measure the exciting moments that is a

and I seem

in the morning I have a local speaker that I get to talk to me the history of a or the traditions or something that they have a luncheon the afternoon this question after reading over the fifteen of thirty answers questions from the little people

you're really off the wall and taking awhile to think of an answer but I've discovered over the years but I have a natural facility when thinking about the answer to weave a tapestry of verbal B. S. you know just