The Our Primary Purpose confernence in London, UK

Thank you very much. And now it gives me great pleasure to introduce our first speaker this this morning, Dave See. Good morning, friends. My name is Dave and I'm an alcoholic. Hi, Dave.

I do like to say that. I like to say that on a daily basis, and it's part and parcel of what I do because, with the head I have, if you take me away from a program of recovery, whatever kind of the illness that's still sort of lurks inside me would, whisper in the ear and maybe would convince me that I'm not. And I might even get well enough, I believe, my own publicity enough, maybe, just maybe, to go out there and try it again. So when I say I'm an alcoholic, I I I really need to sort of stop and say, you know, I'm an alcoholic and and and and and not just to as it sometimes does depending on my busy day, it kinda glibly trips off my tongue, and and I'm halfway through my day before I really realize that, you know, I haven't given that really the gravitas that it deserves. Because the truth of my alcoholism is that that when I came to the rooms of Alcoholics Anonymous, I was I was in a place where suicide wasn't just an option.

It it there was there there were it it it was a real sort of part and parcel of my life. And and when when any agent who could stand back and look at where his life was at that particular stage could see the damage that alcohol had done since the time that I picked it up at 16 years of age. And yet, you know, the madness of my alcoholism price didn't matter what it was. I was at a meeting last night, and I heard somebody talk about, you know, some of the places they've been and some of the things that they had done. And it just reemphasized for me that that there is nothing, absolutely nothing, was of any value to me when it came to a a choice as to whether, in fact, it was alcohol or this other value.

So the the stuff that got left on the side were family and and friends and and children and all that kind of stuff really counted for nothing when it came to a choice between either that or a drink. This is serious hard work here. So I'm gonna take off my, and when I when I say serious hard work, I mean, what we talk about here is is is serious stuff. We can have great fun, and we can have a laugh. And the great joy of recovery is about being able to have good fun in this particular process, but this is serious stuff.

This is life and death stuff. And the stuff that I hear today and the stuff that I that I get involved in in terms of my daily daily program is the stuff that maintains me, not just in terms of an element of peace and comfort in in who I am and what I am, but also in terms of my of of my very being, my very life. So I wanted to just pay very sort of proper respect to that simple phrase, which we use all of the time, which my name is, and I'm an alcoholic, you know, and to understand exactly what it means. What it means for me, is that, you know, alcohol assumed, you know, long before I understand anything about understood anything about addiction or or or a phenomenon of craving or any of that kind of stuff. What it meant for me is that that I I liked to drink, and I like to drink on an ongoing and regular basis.

And it and and and as the price got dearer and dearer and dearer, it ceased to matter. It became the crucial, main focal, central core of my life. And then with the with with with the great value of of of our illness of denial, of course, I wasn't able to recognize that. And anybody who dared to mention it to me was was gently moved to one side. And, I moved on to the next pub, or indeed to the next relationship, or to the next, job, or to the next country, or to the next town, or or wherever.

I was 16 when I picked up a drink, and and really, I was right for for for for a drink. I was shy. I was retiring. I was in adequate in how I saw myself. I I didn't think very much of me.

Didn't very much excel at sports. Had plenty of enthusiasm alright, but but generally speaking would have been the last man picked on the team or that kind of stuff. And and when I look back into that early days of childhood stuff, I I I discovered how to lose very gracefully, very quickly. So that, if I came last in the race, you know, I could always stick my hand out to the winner and tell him well done because that's what a man did. And yet inside, you see, there was so much of me wanted to be anybody else really.

I wanted to win and wasn't able to. And I mean, I I mean, I just used the the the the, if you like, the story of the race as as it because that's really symbolic in many ways of of of what was the rest of my life was like before I picked up a drink. You know, that part of me that wanted desperately to fit in and was so discontented in who and what I was that I would have been anybody else. I don't know if any of you remember Audie Murphy. Audie Murphy was a great old film star.

It just shows my age. When when I was going to the pictures on a Saturday afternoon, and, when we would come out of the pictures, everybody wanted to be Audi Murphy or Alan Ladd even. Gosh. I'm getting old. I I I didn't really care to a large extent.

I wanted to be anybody. Anybody other than who I was. That's how I kinda saw myself. And then, of course, when alcohol moved into me, you know, everything changed. I became Audie Murphy.

Instantly. It was like just instant coffee. You just added added the alcohol to me and I became Audie Murphy. I could sing. I could dance.

I could tell you funny stories. I could talk to you without blushing. And for the first time in my life, I didn't care. I really didn't care what you thought or how you felt, at least on the surface anyway. And that's how I felt.

So alcohol was wonderful for me in that first night. And the first night I got drunk, I was working away from home. I was 17 just just just short of 17 years of age, and I was working in a in a in a holiday camp in in Ireland in Mosney. And, I went back to an all Ireland AA convention since I might say, and and, they've no blue plaque on the wall to say Dave Carroll had his first drink here. And to some extent, you know, when I look at at at at at at the consequences of that first drink there, there really should be a blue plaque on the wall.

Probably paid for our our by by by the brewing and distillery companies, because I kept them kept them going for a wee while. And the 1st night I got drunk you know, the 1st night I had a drink, I got drunk. And the 1st drink I had, I can't even remember just so well what it was. It was pints of beer sweetened up with baby sham because I didn't like the taste, but I loved the effect. And the 1st night I got drunk, I ended up in bed with a woman who was old enough to be my mother.

I don't remember everything that happened, so I had a blackout. And when I woke up the next morning, there was part of me was absolutely appalled, and that other part of me that sort of said, wow. Let's do this again. And and and I kinda I pursued I pursued that evening in in many respects for 20 years. I chased the buzz of of of that that that comfortableness in my own skin, which had never put never been there before for for for 20 years.

And it brought me to the place that it brought all of us. None of us sitting here because it seems like a good idea, you know, or should I say none of us sat in and came into our first meeting of alcoholics anonymous. At least I certainly didn't because it seemed like a good idea. I came in because I was battered and beaten, and my life was in shambles. Those that were around me were were were were devastated, destroyed, really, by the illness of alcoholism in me.

I had a mom and a dad, brother and a sister. I had a wife and 3 kids. And then you can add on to that the people who who loved and cared for me, and all of were destroyed by the way by the way that I behaved over the period of 20 years. It didn't happen overnight. You know?

And and that's the other bit that fascinates me. You know, this this destroyed, you destroyed, you know, whatever sense of value, moral or otherwise, that I had. And and the unacceptable became normal for me. You know? And and and if you had said to me in the early days that I would drink in a manner that I had that I drank towards the end, if you told me that I would end up in the kind of scrapes that I was gonna end up in, I would've couldn't have seen it.

Could would've would've called you a fibber or worse. And yet the truth is, of course, is that, you know, the unacceptable becomes normal for us. And so we get to the primary purpose of a group. Because my story is such that that that my rock bottom had taken me to the place where I wanted to die and didn't have the for that. Tried.

And and and and like everything else in my life, failed spectacularly. And I ended up sitting in a unit in Dublin, in in in May 1986. And and the only reason I was there was because I wanted to be out of trouble. I didn't particularly want to stop drinking because, you know, like a good alcoholic, alcohol was the only thing that gave me any kind of peace. Although the the the the elements of peace in my drinking became less and less and less.

And and I'm sure there were there were minimal by the time I got to the place where I where I was sitting in a unit. But yet, you see the great lie that was there. The great the great untruth of the way of my alcoholism told me that, you know, that I was having great fun. And if you'd had a conversation a week before I tried to take my life, I would have told you that life was grand. You know that wee man who comes out from the underneath the house when the hurricane's been there and the whole place is in bits, and he turns to his man and says, ain't life grand, ma?

That's exactly how I was. Ain't life grand. And I perpetuated that falsehood, that that that delusion that that my life was fine to the bitter end. And I was 12 stepped in a meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous. The unit that I was at had 2 meetings a week compulsory, whether you're alcoholic or not, And and, you know, if you wanna have a giggle, I wasn't sure.

It gives me a giggle. How could I not be sure? And, you know, I I I sat in that room, and I listened to there was a wee girl did the tape did the top table, and, she was a very quite spoken wee girl. And I didn't hear everything she she said she heard. I heard I didn't hear everything she said.

What I did hear was chapter 5 read out. And at the meetings in Ireland, that's all they ever read out at a meeting is chapter 5. So I got to know chapter 5 off by heart. Thank God. And I remember one phrase in chapter 5, you know, from that very first meeting that kind of clunked into the back of my head.

You know, and there were there is one who is all power. And one is God. May you find him now. And I think the despair or desperation that I was in, even if I hadn't really got around to the thought that it was about alcohol, really. Just the despair and the desperation.

That moment of desperation, I kind of grasped and reached out and grabbed at that. And I remember thinking in that moment that maybe it could be different. Maybe, just maybe, my life could be different. And I listened to the other people share, and I was I was I was astounded at the honesty that I heard. And I saw people who were clean and dressed proper, who who who told stories that I wasn't even sure I could identify with.

But what I could see was the before and the after. You know, they told the before, and I could see the after. And that's what 12 stepped me. Just ordinary people do an ordinary stuff in extraordinary times in many ways. And I got telephone numbers.

And I got this wonderful bunch of caring, which which I I really couldn't understand and and and and and never could actually put a finger on as to what it was. It was just one human being caring for another as we do in Narcotics Anonymous. And it yet it was a total anathema to me. I couldn't because I never cared about anyone really. I did at a at a surface level, but deep down, I couldn't really grasp what what this unconditional love was about.

Mind you, I could sit on a bar stool, and I could tell you how much I love my wife and kids. But I couldn't really tell you how I was behaving. And I couldn't really tell you the fact that I couldn't stand up and go home. I couldn't tell you that kind of stuff. So I had I had versions of it.

A lot of my versions of life, you know, had come from the television set in truth. You know, we didn't get television until we were 14 in in in rural Ireland. And, you know, when I when I saw things like Little House on the Prairie and the Donna Reid show and I love Lucy, you know, I immediately recognized that my family wasn't right. My family was perfect. You know?

I I I have a lovely mom, who's still alive, and my dad is is is is a number of years dead now. But but the truth is I mean, there was certainly there was there was difficulties within the family, and there was there was an element, I suppose, of what we would call dysfunction or whatever a modern word for it is. But the truth is the real problem in my family was me. That was the real problem. And the fact that that that neither my brother or my sister are alcoholic in any shape or form really kind of points that out in many respects.

They grew up with the same mom and dad. So I'm kind of, you know, if I start to blame them for who I am, in some respects, it, it it it it it kind of loses its value in terms for proof, you know, because, they grew up in the same house as I did, the same amount of love and care that was given. Interestingly enough, neither of my parents were alcoholic. Both sets of grandparents would have been very heavy drinkers. Interesting, ain't it, the way it goes around?

But for me, the primary purpose of the kid of the of the the group in Knock Lion in in in in Templeogue in Dublin was the piece that actually helped me to get sober by the kindness and the love and the care of the people there. And when I was thinking about this, you know, before coming over here, I tried desperately not to project, you know, because when when I was privileged to be asked to speak here, you know, immediately, you know, the first thing that kicks in for me is inadequacy. And the second thing that kicks in is arrogance. You know? And then, you know, we sort of get down to the real stuff.

You know? I I I know, you know, that that all of this is managed by a loving God as I understand him, and and all I really have to do is to stand up here and open me up. He looks after it in many respects. I'll tell you a story. Many years ago, I was asked to speak at a convention in Birmingham.

And, I I had to do the chair on a Saturday morning, and and I felt discomforted and dissatisfied sitting at the back with with a friend of mine later on in the day and he said, did you buy the tape? I said, much much too humble to buy the tape. And he said, so am I, but we bought it. Right? And I was so I was I was so discomforted the way that it had gone.

And again, it just reflects my inadequacy you know, the deep down sort of stuff that's within me. That when I sat in the car the following morning to go home, I kind of threw the tape into the glove compartment and and drove home. And it it didn't cost me another thought in many respects. And about 3 months later, this bloke rang me on a Saturday afternoon for bit of AA business or whatever, as we do. I said, did you ever listen to that tape?

I said, said, I listened to it the other day. He said, you know, it's very good. I said, I listened to it the other day. He said, you know, it's very good. I said, I listened to it the other day.

He said, you know, it's very good. So I went out to the car and I got the tape, and I listened to it. And it was lovely. So the truth is I don't always know when I'm well or not. So that's why I have a sponsor, and that's why I have a home group, and that's why I have people around me who enable me to start sort out the Irish word for it is shite in my head.

Because I'm so capable of taking even the most simple fact and just squeezing it around. So the knock lying group of of of of of Alcoholics Anonymous 12 stepped me and fulfilled and introduced me to the concept of their primary purpose. Although, I wouldn't have been able to use the words of repurpose. Although, I wouldn't have been able to use the words of those times. And the other thing that strikes me is this, is that every group of Alcoholics Anonymous, and in London alone, there are 690 meetings or whatever it is on a weekly basis.

And each one of them has the capacity to 12 step to love and to care. Egypt who walks through the door like I did. And yet, the other side of the coin is that each group has the opportunity of destroying the opportunity for a for for for for a suffering alcoholic to get well. That's an awful responsibility. And and and can I tell you there are groups that I've attended where I would question how seriously they take the responsibility?

I've walked into groups, and I stood on my own in a corner because I was a stranger in the group, where people haven't reached out a hand and said, how are you doing? Now I'm well enough to be able and big enough and bold enough and brass enough to be able to say, yoo hoo. You know, I'm here or whatever or introduce myself or speak. So I mean but but the truth is, so I mean but but the truth is that if in my early days, I hadn't been shown that great love and that great care shown that great love and that great care and that great sort of, you know, sort of as only we can do it. You know, where that message, that little flicker of hope was taken and was was was fanned, if you like.

And and if if that hadn't happened to me, I dread to think of what have happened. I don't understand this stuff in many respects. I'm sure I understand my program as I understand it, you know, to the best of my ability. But I don't understand how the God of my understanding made it possible for me to get sober. Because in truth, you know, when I walk through into in in in into that wee group in Knock Lion on a Thursday night, not knowing whether I was alcoholic or not, not really wanting not to drink again because the thought of not being able to drink, you know, as we are in early days for the rest of my life was was appalling.

So not able to grasp that that that context or that concept. And yet, you people just just just just just gather around me. And the beauty of it was for me because there's, you know, the I don't know whether it's just me or whether it's alcoholism. I certainly have come across it around, is that if you tell me to do something, I have great difficulty. There's a little bit of me that still ranges.

It's still it's tied up in me step 6, actually, which kinda says, who the hell do you think you are to tell me anything? It's tied up with arrogance and and all that kind of stuff, but I was never told. I was encouraged. I was loved. I was moved through a process.

I was even allowed to make my own mistakes. Well, now wasn't that wonderful? And the other great gift is that I wasn't judged. You see, all my love life, I had judged me. And I had judged me with the bar set terrible high.

You know, because the standards the only standards that were that were of any benefit to me were perfection. And because I come a 1000000 miles short to to to to to pull it all together. So I'm never so grateful for that. And and and I'm just conscious of time here because I know we've got a lot of speakers to go. So my those of you who know me and know me too well, once I start, I'm I'm I'm difficult enough to shut up, but I I'm being responsible here.

So I just wanna finish with a wee story, which a wee story which which our dear friend, Dan, who's who's since passed on and many of you knew here and loved. Dan used to tell this story, and and I repeat it regular because it just typifies for me what we're about. And it's about the 2 old dears who are standing outside the AA meeting waiting for a bus to come along. And they're watching a slot troop through the doors 8 o'clock on a Tuesday night or whatever. And one old dear says to the other, what's going on in there, Mary?

And Mary said, well, she said it's a meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous. And she said, isn't that wonderful? She says, what do they do? Well, she said, it's very strange. Very strange.

They all sit around, and then one of them tells this real sad I think that just about says it all for us. There's a great joy of living. There's a great joy of loving in our fellowship. You know? And and, while while the program while the program comes from our book and from our text and from the study that we do and the work that we do.

For me, the great love of the program is in the people. And it's you people, you know, sort of who who delivered a message sponsor many years ago, and he was desperately trying to impress on me. I can't sponsor many years ago. And he was desperately trying to impress on me. I can't remember what it was at the particular time, but it was obviously very important because I was kicking up against it.

And I don't kick up against stuff that's not important. It's only the really important stuff that that the rebel part of me kicks against. And he says, come here. He says, tell me this and tell me no more. He said, do you believe, he said, do you believe that God works through people in AA?

And I said, I do. Yeah. Absolutely. Because I've been around long enough to hear that. He said, well, then for God's sake, listen to me.

He said, I'm people. Thanks very much.