The Northern Plains Group of Alcoholics Anonymous in Fargo, ND

Good evening. My name is Jeff Van Laningham, and I'm an alcoholic. Hi, Jeff. Due to God a in sponsorship, my sobriety date is March 16, 1992. Applaud yourselves.

Thank you Kenny for asking me to be here tonight. I appreciate it. I, I thought you were gonna share, a different story, Kelvin, at the start of your intro, where a few months ago you'd called me and interrupted me in an important activity I was doing with my wife and But I finished and answered the phone, so, hung my hat on that excuse. I could've gone, but the phone. We're about spirituality here and, it's kind of a daunting task to have to follow, killer midgets and golf, cart chases.

I was becoming intimidated the more I listen to our 10 minute speakers, suddenly God Almighty. I what the hell? And I can top it. I really can. I can top it.

My Mexican jail story blows them both away, but, my sponsor won't allow me to share it from the podium, so I'm handcuffed. But I will say this, is that if you're ever in Mexico and then fortunately you're drunk, it's not a good idea to get into negotiations with people, for their services when you don't know the difference between dollars and pesos. They get touchy about that. I wanna share something before I start. Last night at BCG, my home group, Buffalo City Group in Jamestown, we had a birthday, and it's as much NPG's birthday as it is BCGs.

And I just quickly wanna share, Jim g had 5 years yesterday, And and the reason I say it's special is, Jim was one of the original members of this group and, and people think he followed me to Jamestown. Poor Jim catches that all the time. That's not true. I actually followed him. I like hanging around Jim.

It makes me feel better about myself and, God, you know, things just don't seem that bad after talking with Jim. But the thing about it is is, all kidding aside, I mean, 5 years ago, Jim was was truly hopeless and was truly bankrupt in all areas of his life. I mean, physical, spiritual, mental, and he'd had several different attempts in in AA and in sobriety and and had failed again and again and again, and the most time he'd ever been able to put together had been four and a half years. And I remember him saying to me when he was couple months sober and we're just starting the book, he said, you know, I don't know that I'll ever be comfortable unless I can hit 5 years. 5 years to him was a magic mark.

So last night, Jim finally hit that mark and I congratulate you, Jim, and I know he thanks this group because this was his home group for 3 of those years. So enough about Jim. Interesting for me, I I don't know that I've ever mentioned this or not, but I had my last drink just a couple blocks away from here. And I did the bulk of my drinking just a couple blocks away from here down at Morehead State when I was, attempting to find a way to become comfortable in a world I didn't know how. And the only thing that I had an answer for, for the way I felt was alcohol.

And even though I knew it was killing me, I continue to do it again and again with this insane idea will somehow be different. I will find a way to get it under control or to manage it or to be okay. I left, Morehead in 1992 to go to treatment and I was just lost. I just I didn't know what had happened to me. I didn't know how I'd ended up in the situation I was in, and I was just perplexed and baffled, and really deep down inside I was scared.

I was scared that there really was no hope for me and that I was destined to die a miserable lonely death and in the process hurt and or let down all of the people that were close to me. That's really what I thought when I drove out of here, 11 plus years ago. And, what brought me to that point was I grew up as I'm sure you hear often here at this meeting. I grew up feeling like something was wrong. I grew up feeling like there's something missing in me and I don't know what it is.

I can't quite put my finger on it. I don't know if it's the people I hang out with. I don't know if it's the environment I grew up in. Maybe it's I should participate in this or I should not participate in this, but whatever it is, I was looking for a way to fix it. And it seems to me if I look back, you know, people talk about their childhood a lot.

I'm not gonna go on. I don't like childhoods when I listen to people talk. Quite honestly, it's like that's boring. You know, I wanna hear drinking stories. I wanna hear midgets beating me up, and and I wanna hear about recovery and and, you know, I envy people.

There's people that I know that that can do it. They can talk about their childhood, make it beautiful, and, you know, I grew up in small town USA and every fall the leaves turn a crisp golden brown and they flutter to the earth like an angel missing one wing. What the hell? You know, I don't have insights like that. I just know when leaves start falling I'm gonna have to rake and, but something's missing in me.

I don't know what it is. I feel inadequate. I don't like myself very well. I have a perception problem. I'm sensitive.

I'm self centered. I'm all these different things, and I'm looking for a way to fix it. And my childhood was characterized by brief periods of recovery followed still by worse relapse. You know, I joined something and get a little high. I mean, this feels good.

People know my name here and I'm hanging out in the cub scouts, and then I'd make a mistake or I do something that would embarrass me and I quit that never to return. Because I wanna be the best at whatever I do, and I don't wanna put any work nor effort into it. So I've got this track record of just really being a quitter and, I remember somebody called me that in school in time. I was totally offended by him, but, it was true. It's like I just quit everything.

I looked at it as I was active in things, new things, but really what it was was I was looking for the next thing that maybe I fit in here. Maybe it's band, maybe it's sports, maybe it's her, maybe it's the school, maybe it's whatever. I found the answer as most of us in this room did when I was 15, it was alcohol. I mean alcohol for me is is, it's truly the magic elixir. I mean it allows me to do things, to be things, to say things, to be comfortable that nothing else could, and I'm not gonna bash drinking.

I had a lot of good times when I drink. I mean I really truly like the person that I became when I was drinking even when consequences started to set in. Hell, trouble for me, getting in trouble and paying some consequences was not a big deal. I didn't mind that. I thought it was cool to have my name in the paper for minor in consumption.

I cut it out and hung it on my wall for God's sakes. My mom wasn't too thrilled with that, but I didn't mind it. I like who I become. I like the fact that I for once in my life feel comfortable. I'm comfortable doing what I'm doing.

I'm comfortable with where my life is going. I'm comfortable hanging out with the people I I'm with right now. I don't feel intimidated by people. I don't loft and look at girls and think, I just wish I could find someone like that. None of that stuff goes through my head.

Now, yes, I drink too much sometimes and I start to act a little bizarrely sometimes, and I do stupid things and people think that I'm doing, you know, I have a drinking problem and they come out of the woodwork and they say thing, you know, you God, Jeff, couldn't you cool it? Couldn't you taper down? Why would you want to? Why would you really want to? I don't really ever remember wanting to taper down.

I just wanted to get drunk and not be an idiot. I have no ambition to social drink, never have, don't understand it, You know, take the cap off the bottle and throw it away because we're not gonna need it again. Notice I didn't say cork, by the way. I wasn't drinking with Bolti. Yeah.

That'll do. I love you. Yeah. I had a lot of people ask me, it's coming up on a year since I moved from Fargo, and a lot of people have asked me, you know, what's it like to be back and so on and so forth. And the truth of the matter is it's bittersweet.

On one hand, I'm happy to come back and I'm happy to see people and good friends and but I'm it's laced with sadness. I mean, I miss this group. I miss the people. I miss my friend, Chad. I miss you know, we had a little taste of what we used to do.

We got in an argument on, was it Friday? We actually got into an argument over who had the bigger ego on speaking except it wasn't, no, I do. It was I do. Chad, like, no, I do. I mean, that's the kind of arguments we have, you know, who's sicker?

Because for some reason in a, that's a badge of honor. Apparently, if you're sicker than other people that somehow gains respect. Thank God. Anyway, I'm drinking and and, trying to fix what's wrong with me. And cut make a long story short, a failed botched suicide attempt which would have been successful had my coordination not been off, because I would have taken the sleeping pills.

It just so happens I grab vitamin c and, went to a hospital and was committed to treatment and Alcoholics Anonymous. And that was here in Morehead and I started coming to Alcoholics Anonymous. And the bottom line is I didn't like it. I didn't like it. I did not come in and see smiling faces and people dressed up and thank God I want this.

I came in, I don't know what the hell these people are all about, but I know they didn't drink like me. I know they don't suffer like me. I know they haven't, you know, they don't have the mind like me and you gotta understand what it's like. I mean, it's when I get sober that things start to become increasingly uncomfortable. I have such a terrible perception problem that if someone's talking and it goes on today, if someone's talking, you know, in an a or coffee or something and somebody may say, you know, it's important to be honest.

You know what I mean, Jeff? I mean, my perception immediately is like, what the hell does that mean? Why you're single in me? I'm honest. Goddamn it, you know.

And, self centered by nature, I sit at a meeting and listen to a speaker identify with and, you know, I listen to Clancy, and I think, oh, my God. That's me. And I look around the room because I know everybody else is thinking, oh, my God. That's Jeff, you know. And I argue with I'm not selfish and self centered, that's the definition of it, you know.

I used to say, I don't think about myself all the time. I spend a lot of time thinking about what you think of me, you know. Oh, that is selfishness? Oh, okay. Well then, peg me down.

Went to treatment and, I didn't see anything that I really wanted because a life of sobriety to me looks so bleak and so hopeless and so mundane and stupid that I didn't want it, and I honestly remember thinking to myself, yeah, alcohol is gonna shave some time off my lifespan. I know that. I know that. I can see it. I don't care because really the life I have isn't worth saving.

The life I have isn't worth living, and at least I get a little bit of relief when I'm drinking. Because what counselors didn't understand, what family didn't understand, what friends didn't understand is that I get more and more uncomfortable the more sober I am. The more sober I am I'm at midnight and I'm up pacing the floor with regrets about my life, regrets about yesterday, worries about tomorrow, totally missing out on today. That's how I get sober. At 2 AM I'm crying myself to sleep with a pillow over my head to try and muffle it so my roommates don't hear me.

Sober. Now imagine if I can fix all that like that. Imagine if I can go out and just have a few beers, good intentions because I've always had good intentions, and fix all of that. You know, it becomes difficult to quit, but pain is a good motivator for me and, like any of us, I was just beaten down by alcoholism to the point where I just couldn't take it anymore, and I came back into Alcoholics Anonymous via treatment again, a little bit more open minded. And I started going to AA and I think the thing that you can gain out of AA and I hope someone gains it tonight because I think any meeting that's done well, there's 2 things that can take place.

The first is identification. When I sat in meetings of Alcoholics Anonymous for the first time and shut my mouth and actually listened for a little bit instead blabbing what I thought I knew, I identified with people in ways I didn't know I would. I identified with the way they drank at first, and I drank like that. I drank with that guy. Then I started to listen to him and talking about the emotions that predicated drinking.

I think, god, I felt like that too. I did that. I thought about that, you know, and I started to identify. And the second thing that I got from Alcoholics Anonymous early on was hope. These people are just like me except they seem to be living a better way of life.

Maybe maybe if I do what they did, I could gain a little bit of that life too. Maybe I could find a way to just be comfortable in my own skin. Maybe I could find a way to look in the mirror and not be absolutely repulsed by what I see. Hope and identification, the 2 things I think you need to get out of Alcoholics Anonymous. The 2 things that I got that have kept me coming back for the last as I said, since March 16, 92.

So I sat in meetings of Alcoholics Anonymous and I listened to people. And one of the things you're gonna hear a lot, especially at this group is a sponsor. Get a sponsor. Sponsor. My God, by the way, I've been gone so long somebody came up to me after at the before the meeting.

So, hey, you're new here. Welcome. You should get a sponsor. I will, Tyler. I knew the day would come.

I knew it. And you know why that happened because that's what this meeting is based on. That's what people do here. You know, we we talked to I'm gonna talk about in a minute, but we talk a lot about, you know, all the different things and all these different aspects of alcoholics anonymous, but what it really boils down to is one alcoholic working with another. Bill Wilson believed that there was an intermittent need to be helpful from one alcoholic to another and if you think about it, even if you look back when we're drinking, there is.

I can remember it seems to me it's always drunks that help out other drunks at parties. Contrary to popular belief, it's not the Al Anon's. They can't handle us. They bolt. But think about it.

I've been at parties before and, alcohol frees me up and it allows me to do certain things and I can remember standing up, you know, drunk getting the whole party's attention. Excuse me everybody, I have a few things I wanna tell you about what I think about you. And, it's always drunks that come to your aid. Woah, woah, woah, woah, he's drunk. You know, it's always alcoholics that come.

It's always drunks who offer to drive you home, Who are drunker than you, I might add. I'll drive. By the way, I have no idea what made me think of this. I was at a party one time where some people thought they'd be cute. I was drunk and probably on other things and I came stumbling back in and I said, I think my car is gone.

Well, I just I went out the wrong door, but everybody thought they'd be cute and funny and and, tell me that it had been stolen. Oh, stolen, Joe. I'm snickering and stuff. Why is this drunk and idiotic? I believed him.

I'm like, oh my god. There's a lot of illegal substances going on at this party, but I I called the police, you know, I'm a it dawned on me what I'd done. I told her, hey, cops will be here in a minute, everybody. Don't where are you going? So I'm an Alcoholics Anonymous, and AA doesn't work the way I would like it to.

It takes a while, you know. If AA was instantaneous, we'd all be here, but it takes a while and I don't like doing things that produce results 6 months down the road. If I wanna do that, I'd get in shape. I don't wanna do that. I don't wanna do that.

I'm waiting for him to come out with a pill and get up. Hey, look at me. It's my mentality. Quicker, easier, softer way, I'm there. Sign me up.

Whatever the cost. And so we got a sponsor, and the sponsor is gonna What they're gonna do here is they're gonna butt into your life and they're gonna get involved and they're gonna say things that sometimes hurt your feelings and they're gonna point out how your perceptions maybe are little off sometimes and they're gonna tell you to do things like, why don't you try spending less than you make? Instead of running out buying a car stereo, here's an idea. Why don't you pay your rent this month? Really?

You know, they're gonna do things like that. They're gonna get and insist that you go to meetings. They're gonna insist you show up early and insist you stay up late, and they're gonna save your life, because that's been my experience. My first sponsors here tonight, I drove down with them and and, you know, saved my life, Scott b. And I forever will be grateful.

And that's what he did. Got in my face, was mean to me, hurt my feelings. But I think if you like your sponsor all the time, they're not helping you. If you have somebody walking around with my sponsor is a swell guy, that sponsor is probably not helping them because there's been times I've plotted Scott's death. Not recently, Scott.

Anyway, and so you take these series of actions. One of the biggest ones I think, I you know, I don't have time to talk about them all, but we have the 12 steps and we have get jobs in the group and and be active and and answer the phone and take a commitment at your group and do it and all these different things. But I think if you layer it down the most important thing that we can do is what you did tonight to me, is we can pass on what's been given to us even if it doesn't make sense to us. Get a sponsor. Why?

I I don't know. That's what everybody says around here, you know. Alright. Good. That's why most people in this room got a sponsor because everybody was running around butting in.

Do you got a sponsor yet? Yes. Alright. I do. I think working with alcoholics is by far the most important thing we can do here and I think it's important that as you go along not to become so successful that you don't have time for it.

I've had periods in my life where I thought, well, I better cut back on the AA actions now. I got a lot of stuff going on, lot of stuff and I do. I have a lot of stuff that I didn't have when I got here. None more important than my service work here. None more important than the responsibility I have that wherever at hand reaches out for help I have an obligation to be there.

Answering the phone during fun time, For me at least. Thank you and good night. And the reason I have an obligation to do that is because I have a powerful example I have to try and live up to. Not only through Scott, but through my current sponsor, Brucey, who's more active than me, who sponsors more people than me, who's more knowledgeable than me, and I'm like a little puppy in his wake just trying to catch up, and it's kept me on a good path. One thing I wanna mention, I've been involved and for the most part active in Alcoholics Anonymous all through my sobriety, and I had the misconception that everything should get wonderful if I'm active in Alcoholics Anonymous.

Why do bad things happen to people who are trying to do better in AA and just self righteous as all hell? And I was under the impression life would get wonderful. That's not what anyone ever told me. They said you'll feel good inside, you'll feel clean inside, good things will happen, but most importantly is you will learn how to deal with life on life's terms and not have to take a drink, and that's what my experience has been. My experience has not been one of these flowery success stories where I got a sponsor and I started doing things and then I got a wonderful job and met her and, all these great things happen.

It's been a series of ups and downs. I look at my progress in Alcoholics Anonymous, we talk about trudging the road and it's kinda like walking uphill, walking up a sand hill, you know, just trudge, trudge, but if you stop you start sliding back down. You don't stand there and enjoy the view. It's a continuum action needed for me, continually plotting forward. And I've dealt with, unemployment.

I've dealt with death. I've dealt with, just my own head when it gets goofy at times. All these different things that have come at me. I've also had some tremendous joy in my life. I've I've gotten married in sobriety.

I've had several decent careers, not all ended by me. Kids, you know, I wanted to have kids and I've had that happen and, it's been a journey and it's been a ride and, it's been a wonderful one, and I have been privileged to to be a part of it. I've been privileged as it I just I think back to leaving Fargo, you know, when I was drinking here. I can't believe I'm standing here tonight, not just here speaking, but just I'm I'm a member of Alcoholics Anonymous. I have finally I've been looking for what's wrong with me and what could possibly help me for so long, and I finally found it.

I used to keep a journal when I was drinking, but all my good just total diary of a madman, and, all these goofy thoughts and there's, but, you know, a 100 hers in there and and, different things and nobody likes me and but the last entry I have in that journal is I said, my name is Jeff, and I finally found what's wrong with me. I'm an alcoholic, and I've never written it again because a new chapter in my life opened up, one that's been infinitely better than anything I could have hoped for. As I said, you know, bad things happen and I talked about missing the group, and I'm not bad. I like Jamestown and I'm comfortable there, and I've been sober long enough to recognize that God's gonna take me places and it's my job to do the actions to get comfortable. That's just it.

And AA actions work in Jamestown, in Pheasant, North Dakota, in Fargo, North Dakota, in Los Angeles, California, wherever it may be, but I remember there's such a special thing here, such a special bond, and such a special closeness, and people care about each other here. People really genuinely care about each other. That's one of the greatest gifts I think I've ever been getting, because I've been so self absorbed, so into my own world, so worried about I'll get mine first and then maybe if there's something left over you can have a little, that I've learned how to become a decent person here. I got called a few years ago, 3 years ago actually. My mom had had some pain in her abdomen, and she was a hypochondriac, and I didn't think anything of it.

And I got a call, a couple of days later, and someone said, this looks like it's serious. You better you better get up here. And I don't know about you, but I'm a mama's boy by nature. I always have been. And, I went up and, it was like 10 in the morning.

The doctor came in and, you know, y'all better sit down. And, they told us that my mom had liver cancer. And when something like that happens, it, it's just like the world slows down and it just sends you into a spiral of shock. It's just like, what's going on here? This isn't people like me, my mom doesn't get sick.

I don't win the lottery and I don't lose my mother to cancer. That just doesn't happen to people like me. That happens to other people, but it was reality and, I was walking around in the hallway praying for God to give me the strength that needed to do what I'm supposed to do. And I was worried, I'm crack because I make everything about me. Everything becomes about me, and I don't know, 5 hours later or something, we're sitting in the room.

My mom wanted to go for a walk. We walked in. She's got a bouquet of flowers sitting there, And my mom goes, oh my god, look at those lovely flowers. She was the one who said them. And I knew I knew when I saw them where they're from, But I went and grabbed the card and sure enough, Diane, we're thinking of you.

You're in our prayers. Love n p g. I I don't know that I I mean, you gotta understand I brought people home. My mom just rolled her eyes at, you know, just an idiot and I've been an idiot. And here I am standing there and I'm proud as hell to be a member of Alcoholics Anonymous.

I'm proud as hell to be a member of this group. I just beam with it and I just thought and it cheered my mom up and it told me I can do this because I'm not gonna have to do it alone. Because one of the things I've learned here is that nothing that happens I no longer have to do it alone. And if you're new I wanna tell you that. You do not have to do this alone anymore.

There is help for whatever is going on in your life. Be it you drink too much, be it you have character defects galore, whatever it may be, there's help. Those are some of the things that that, have happened for me. It's it's as I said, it's it's just unbelievable that, that I'm here. I've learned a lot in Alcoholics Anonymous.

I've learned how to be an adult. I've learned how to interview for jobs. I'd rattle off things I've learned in a in job interviews and they tend to hire me, but thank God we were just talking the other day. We were saying imagine if you went into a job interview and, and were honest, you know, you sat down and, well, Jeff, why should we hire you? Sir, I'm glad you asked that question.

I think the first point I need to make is that the voices in my head are down from 20 to 10. I think another thing you should know about me sir is that I've stopped stealing. One day at a time. And most of the time when I call in sick, I'm really sick. Can't do that.

Anyway, I want to, I've been debating whether or not I wanna do this or not, but we've been talking a lot lately, at least, circles I've been running in about, passing it on, giving this thing away, and we're at the corner of ground up a couple weeks ago and, Peg Martin spoke, many of you got to hear, and she did this wonderful thing where she had her response to stand up and so on and so forth, and it's amazing the power of Alcoholics Anonymous because you think to yourself, there's got to be massive conventions where we all sign up, but that's not where people get sober and that's not where people join AA. It's here at the Northern Plains Group. It's at the Buffalo City Group. It's at the Clubhouse, and it's one alcoholic connecting with another. Traditionally or usually it might take place through sponsorship, and if you look at the history of Alcoholics Anonymous and if you're new here tonight and you're thinking, well, how does it all fit in?

How does it all boil down to Fargo, North Dakota for God's sakes? I'll tell you. A 100 people got together and they wrote this book, Bill Wilson being one of the primary authors. That book goes out across the nation people start picking it up and reading it. One of the people who picked it up was a man named Chuck Chamberlain out in California.

And Chuck read it and he bought into the philosophies and decided to put action behind that philosophy and he started working with people and he started sponsoring people. And one of the people he started sponsoring was a man named Clancy Inmislain, who many of us know here and and, in fact, he's speaking this weekend in Park Rapids, and he sponsors him. Now Clancy starts sponsoring people all over the nation. 3 of the people that Clancy sponsors are Bruce Everson, my sponsor, Dick Martin, and Nancy Morris. If I've mentioned your sponsor, stand up.

Stay standing. Now we have some people standing here. If your sponsor is standing tonight, stand up. Okay. If your sponsor is standing, stand up.

And if your sponsor is standing, stand up. And if your sponsor is standing, stand up. Yeah. Get up, Calvin. And if you sponsor guys who can't recognize your standing, raise your arm.

That is the power of 1 alcoholic working with another. Thank you. Thanks, Sonoda. And if we do that next year, it'll be bigger yet because guys like Tyler are getting in your face going, welcome. You should get a sponsor.

I don't care who you are, and this meeting will be bigger and more lives will be helped and the miracle of Alcoholics Anonymous will continue to live strong in Fargo, North Dakota. That is the wonderful thing about it, and it can take place anywhere. People like me who have walked around hopeless, never really identifying with anyone, have finally found a place that I belong. I have finally found a place that I can fit in and be here and be okay with it and be happy for other people success and trust that God is going to take care of me. A God that I met by the way through taking 12 actions, 12 steps in Alcoholics Anonymous.

That is what I have here to offer, you know. I have a different life today. It's it's a nice one and a lot of different things have happened and I've got a career that I love and I've got friends I care about, kids, and, my 4 year old son came in as I was getting ready tonight and he said, daddy are you are you leaving? I said, yeah buddy, I gotta go to an AA meeting. He said, oh okay.

I said, you know why daddy has to go to AA? He said, yeah, I know, because daddy's sick and if daddy doesn't go he gets sicker. I wouldn't put it quite like that, Mark, but alright. And I gave him a hug. I just love that little fart, and he's sweet.

He's a sweet sense of a little boy and he cares about people. Then I walked out in the living room, my daughter is on the couch doing somersaults onto the floor after the 100th time I've told her not to. Keep that chair open by the way. And that's the life I have, and I kiss my wife goodbye and I jumped in the car and I came down here, and it's wonderful life. It is a wonderful life not because of the successes, but because of the feeling I have, because of the fact that I know I'm gonna be okay today.

We had a lot of people stand up tonight and as I said, I am responsible that the person coming in tomorrow or the person coming in tonight, I have a responsibility to be here and to shake their hand or to answer that phone or to refer them to someone who can help them. I have that responsibility. And, thankfully, at least today, September 2, 2003, I am fulfilling that obligation, and I hope I do tomorrow. I wanna thank you guys for having me here tonight. It's been an honor to be in front of you.

Thank you.