John K. & Michael K. of the Primary Purpose group of Dallas, TX going through the chapter There is a solution at the Big Book Weekend in Pratt, KS

Together. We couldn't stay into the window. Alright. We're just gonna we're gonna jump right back into it. Everybody, I hope, has had a good lunch.

Got our batteries recharged. I got enough jalapenos in me to last for a while. We're gonna go start off on page 17, chapter 2. There is a solution. Oh, thank god.

Yes. Hallelujah. There's a solution. We'll get to it in about 7 pages. Alright?

This is pretty neat, you know. Bill lays out his story and we've gone through the doctor's opinion and they laid out, you know, this allergy and all this stuff, and now they're gonna dwell upon this more this step one stuff. They're gonna dwell upon this loss of control and this loss of choice, and and we're gonna see what where he where he takes us here. It says we have alcoholics anonymous know thousands of men and women who were once just as hopeless as Bill. Nearly all have recovered.

They have solved the drink problem. At first reading of that, you know, it's a pretty innocuous little paragraph, but look what it says there. Thinking about the first hundred, the people who wrote this book, thinking about to their success rate back in the day, nearly all recovered. Nearly all the people they worked with recovered from alcoholism. That's hopeful.

That's some good stuff. And it says we are average Americans. All sections of this country and many of its occupations are represented, as well as many political, economic, social, and religious backgrounds. We are people who normally would not mix. You know, we do I mean, obviously, we're from Dallas, you know, and I did a lot of most of my drinking, 90% of my drinking was in Dallas.

And I'm in these rooms or at these treatment centers or whatever. I didn't know a dang one of you. People who normally wouldn't mix, yet here we are. You know, that's kind of a cool thing. It says, but there exists among us a fellowship, a friendliness, and an understanding which is indescribably wonderful.

We're like the passengers of a great line or the moment after rescue from shipwreck when camaraderie, joyousness, and democracy pervade the vessel from steerage to captain's table. You know? And Joe and Charlie explained it, you know, back in the day when you had to do a long trip, you didn't just hop on a a flight. You know? You if you were going to Europe or South America or something like that, you you went on a on a ship.

And and if you're if you could bear if you're an immigrant coming over here from Europe and you barely had a pot to piss in, you're in the steerage of the you were in the bowels of the ship. And, you know, you you barely got any fresh air. But at the other end of the spectrum, if you had the real money, you know, big money, old money, Vanderbilt money, you know, you might be asked to dine with the captain of the ship. Yet when the ship goes down and there's a wreck, you know, we're we're not asking each other for w two forms or anything. I don't care.

You know? You gotta you gotta raft, and I'm drowning. It don't matter. You know? And that's what they're talking about here, but it this because this is important stuff right here.

Unlike the feeling of the ship's passengers, however, our joy in escape from disaster does not subside as we go our individual ways. The feeling of having shared in a common peril is one element in the powerful cement that binds us. So he's saying right there that the fellowship that we have is one element that's gonna keep us here. The treatment centers are telling me that I must go to 90 meetings in 90 days, keep coming back, blah blah blah blah blah. And then those of you who have a bunch of desire chips know that there was a lot of there was a lot of times there was a lot of times where I did not wanna drink.

Early on, I I wanted the heat off. But towards the end of my dream career, I did not want to end up where I kept ended up. And I get plugged back into the fellowship doing 90 meetings in 90 days. You know? One time, I did 270 meetings in 90 days.

I didn't have a job. I went to the noon, the 6th, the 8th. Day 92, 93, I'm looking for a tall building and a sniper rifle, and I'm taking some people out. You know? But look at it.

He calls it a powerful cement. So any you folks know what epoxy is. Right? It's 2 parts, hardener and a resin. Right?

You could have all the resin in the world. Ain't nothing gonna stick to it. You gotta mix those two parts together and then you've got a powerful adhesive that'll hold anything. The fellowship is one element that keeps us together. The other element is the program.

That's what keeps us here is the program. Says the tremendous fact for every one of us is that we have discovered a common solution, the program. We have a we have a way out on which we can absolutely agree and upon which we can join in brother brotherly and harmonious action. This is the great news this book carries to those who suffer from alcoholism. And I'm just a big believer that we need to get into the program that, Hey.

The fellowship loved me to death. Don't get me wrong. I don't have anything bad to say. They they will love me to death, because I will drink to death. They'll tell me to keep coming back.

I gotta have a program in my life. There's an illness of this sort, and we've come to believe that an illness involves those about us in in a in a way no other human sickness can. If a person has cancer, all are sorry for him and no one is angry or hurt, but not so with the alcoholic illness. For with it, there goes annihilation of all things worthwhile in life. Look at the words he uses in this book.

I mean, you you gotta sell you this book because he could've said, but there it goes with it all the thing. He calls it annihilation. That's what I did to the things in my life that I supposedly cherished. I annihilated them with alcoholism. I destroyed everything in my path.

It engulfs all whose lives touch the sufferers. You know, me being closed minded drinking back in the day, I was the you know, my my motto was, hey. Get off my back. I ain't hurting anybody. It's my life.

But I annihilated all those people who cared about me. All my family members who love me dearly touches everyone. I mean, I I challenge you. Go to Wichita. Go to go to the mall.

Christmas time, people are shopping. They'll be packed. Try to find 1 person in the mall whose life isn't touched by alcoholism. Let me know if you find somebody because we touch them all. Because whether it's it could be in my family, an alcoholic, or I'm married to an alcoholic, or my mother or dad's an alcoholic, or my brother was hit by a drunk driver or I had to fire it out, it touches.

It covers the board. We touch everything. It brings misunderstanding, fierce resentment, financial insecurity, disgusted friends and employers, warped lives of blameless children, sad wives, and parents. Anyone can increase the list. We hope this volume will inform and comfort those who are or who may be affected.

There are many. Highly competent psychiatrists who have dealt with this have found it sometimes impossible to persuade an alcoholic to discuss a situation without reserve. Anybody been to psychiatrist or psychologist? Come on. I like group participation.

Did you give him a fair shot? Did you tell him the truth? Come on. I was telling him the truth as I saw it, you know. Oh, come on.

I you put me on the doctor Phil show, I'll make that man weep. Tell him my sad story. Right? I'll make him weep. He ain't getting through.

I'm gonna tell him the way I think it is. But how about this? Strangely enough, wise parents' intimate friends usually find us even more unapproachable than do the psychiatrist or the doctor. Oh, when my mama starts talking to me about it, uh-uh. End of story.

Mind snapshots. Talk to the hand. Go away. Don't wanna hear it. Look at this.

Good definition of a sponsor. But the ex problem drinker who has found a solution, who is properly armed with the facts about himself, can generally win the entire confidence of another alcoholic in a few hours. Until such an understanding is reached, little or nothing can be accomplished. That's my sponsor. He's suffering from the same affliction that I am.

I'm the one who was dying. He wasn't. That guy spoke my language. We identified. It tells us about it in chapter 7.

Who spoke doctor Bob's language? Bill Wilson. Alcoholic number 3 is a classic example of this right here. They spoke Bill Dodson's language. Why?

Bill Dodson been going to church, been trying to quit drinking for years years years. When he saw that they knew all about the drinking game, he perked up. He was desperate. But the man who was making the approaches had the same difficulty that he obviously knows what he's talking about, that his whole deportment shouts at the new prospect, that he is a man with a real answer. That he has no attitude of holier than now, nothing whatever except the sincere desire to be helpful, that there are no fees to pay, no access to grind, no people to please, no lectures to be endured.

These are the conditions we have found most effective. After such an approach, here's some more hope. Many take up from their beds and walk again. You guys out there on the firing line see it all the time. People who are written off written off.

Yet when they come into contact with one of us and we present the problem and we share with them our experience and strength and hope, those 2 those people who were written off can take up and walk again. None of us make a sole vocation of this work, nor do we think its effectiveness would be increased if we did. We feel that elimination of our drinking is the be all end all. Oh, wait. My book doesn't say that.

We feel that elimination of drinking is but a beginning. No. We stopped 100 of times before. That was just the beginning. I thought that was the that was the the end of the game.

Stop drinking. You take booze away from me back in the day, my life did not get better. It unraveled in a hurry. Elimination of drinking is but a beginning. Look where it is.

Much more demonstrations of our principles lies before us in our respective homes, occupations, and affairs. That's where we practice these principles. You can give a monkey a big book and some flashcards, you can 12 step somebody. Right? Anybody can go to an AA meeting and sit around and hear somebody go all wise and got a lot of experience.

I can hear something really witty at your little meeting and I can pair it and take it back to my meeting and you'll pat me on the back thinking how great I am. I gotta practice these principles in all my affairs. You know, I gotta practice these principles with my family, with my friends, with my coworkers, people at, you know, people in the express line at Tom Thumb grocery store when they got, like, 23 items in the 15 or less. Gotta practice these principles. You know?

Drive me nuts. Here's my favorite line in the big book. Here's my favorite line in the big book right here because I love this one. It says, all of us spend much of our spare time in the sort of effort which we're gonna describe. That's my favorite line.

Why were they successful back in the day? Because all of them did this. All of them got a sponsor, worked the steps, and when they recovered, they got went out of their way to seek out another alcoholic and carried this message. All of them did that. That translated into anywhere from 50 to 90% success rate depending on whose math you count.

All of them did that. It was not an option. My sponsor put it to me bluntly. 1st night back, he told me, hey, I didn't ask him to be my sponsor. He appointed himself.

He says, John, I'm now your sponsor. You're gonna call me when I tell you to call me. You're gonna show up where I tell you to show up. You're gonna read what I tell you to read. And the minute you balk, go away.

Now, the nice little discussion meeting, those little fellowship meetings, they say, oh, that's too harsh. No. That was the best thing for me. The minute I bought could go away. Go find another group that'll do your way.

Mhmm. 300 groups in Dallas. 1 of them is bound to do it your way. If you wanna roll the way we roll, you do what we do. We're just doing it old school.

We're doing it the way they did it back in the day. All of us been much of our you look at the vitality of our group in Dallas now. It'll blow your mind. You experience it here. People of like minds, following these directions, doing this stuff.

This is what we do. That is that is my primary purpose. A few are fortunate enough to be so situated they can nearly give all their time to the work. Clancy out of California. Was it the first two years he was sober?

He couldn't get a job? Lived in the back of the shelter that he was living at, doing odd jobs for them so they let him stay around? Couldn't get a job for 2 years. I'm the genius in the nineties that had burned up everything in my life. And soon as I got out of treatment, it became imperative that first and foremost, I gotta get the holy trinity, the job, the car, the girl.

You know? Then I'll work these steps. You know? It's pretty amazing. If we keep on the way we're going, there's little doubt that much good will result, but the surface of the problem would hardly be scratched.

Those of us who live in large cities are overcome by the reflection that close by 100 are dropping into oblivion every day. Many could recover if they had the opportunity we have enjoyed. How then shall we present that which has been so freely given us? You know, we we I didn't come into AA looking like this. You know?

I was in bad shape. But our tendency in AA today, it seems like, is okay. Now that we get sober, we've got our little home group, and we come and we do, we have our little fellowship, we make our coffee and do our little stuff that, you know, will be there for the newcomer. Well, you know what? Our job is to go out and find the newcomer.

So we just take it for granted that those people out there know that we're in here. But the truth of the matter is is there's people around in this community right now drinking themselves to death, and they have absolutely no idea what the problem is. They think it's the child abuse or the divorce or the finances or whatever it is. They got no idea what's killing them. How are they gonna know unless we go seek them out?

What are you gonna we're gonna clean up, have a meeting in here, wait for them to show up here? How are they gonna show up if they don't know we're here? We have to get off our arrears and go find them. Hell, I found a bottle. Right?

I went to any lengths to get a drink. Any length. Drink some stuff that you're not supposed to drink. Me staying sober is no different. I got a big book and I've had a spiritual experience and I don't care where god puts me on god's green earth.

I'll find a drunk. I can have me and me. I can't sit here all sober and stuff, wait for the drunk to show up to me. They may not know I exist. I gotta go find them.

We've concluded to publish an anonymous volume setting forth the problem as we see it. We shall bring to the task our combined experience and knowledge, not our theories, not our opinions. They're experience and knowledge. This should suggest a useful program for anyone concerned with a drinking problem. Of necessity, there will have to be discussion of matters medical, psychiatric, social, and religious.

We're aware that these matters are, from their very nature, controversial. You bet. Nothing would please us so much as to write a book which would contain no basis for contention or argument. We shall do our utmost to achieve that ideal. This book comes out in 1939.

This book is now in, I don't know how many languages now, 40. Right? 56. 56. Okay.

All over the world. Christian communities. We got some guys in Iran right now translating our study guide. Doesn't matter. Doesn't matter what religious persuasion you come from.

Doesn't matter. This spiritual principles are spiritual principles whether or not you believe them or not. They there's a great book. This is not AA related. There's a great book called the spirituality of imperfection.

And it talks about spiritual principles in any religion, any theology, anything. That's what these principles are. They contend with nothing. There's there's no contention. They don't conflict with anything.

This translates easily into Spanish as it does to Russia. It doesn't matter. It's pretty cool stuff. Most of us sense their real tolerance of other people's shortcomings and viewpoints and respect for their opinions and attitudes, which make us more useful to others. Our very lives as ex problem drinkers depend upon our constant thought of others and how we may help meet their needs.

Constant thought of others. I'll tell you a little story. I I wasn't sober very long, 2 or 3 weeks max. In this little job that I had quit, and they hired me back when I got sober. I had to do a little project for them, and I was the only one who could do it.

And they didn't want me back, but I had they needed me back. And so they were gonna have me work for a few days, do this project, and they were gonna pay me cash. Right? And I didn't ask. I started working for them and I'm working and a week goes by and 2 weeks go by and the project's still going on.

We're wrapping it up. It's on a Sunday. I just know And I've had a great Sunday. I've talked to my sponsor. I've gone up to this little treatment center, helped some guys out and everything.

And I got home that Sunday night, and I'm thinking, man, they're gonna I'm gonna go to that job tomorrow, and they're gonna fire me. And what am I gonna do? I'm not gonna have money to pay the bills. And next thing you know, I'll be living in a down in a van down by the river and, you know, it just snowballed. Right?

Manufactured fear. Right? And I called my sponsor and he listened to me. He let me get it all out. He said, gives me the line.

John, you got a dollar? Yeah. I got a dollar. Great. I'm gonna hang up now.

You're You're gonna say a prayer and take your dollar and take your big book and go to 24 hour club, buy a cup of coffee, and talk to every SOB that walks through that door, tell them your story, call me in a couple hours when you're done. Concept out of others. I gotta get out of me to go help you. If I'm helping me all the time, not helping you, how am I gonna stay sober? I won't.

You may have already asked yourself, why is it that all of us became so very ill from drinking? Dallas, you're curious to discover how and why in the face of expert opinion to the contrary, underline this, we have recovered from a hopeless condition of mind and body. If somebody says you're always recovering or there's no such thing as recovered you can point them to this page and 30 something others. If you're an alcoholic who wants to get over it, you may already be asking what do I have to do? It's the purpose of this book to answer such questions specifically.

We'll tell you what we have done before going into a detailed discussion. It may be well to summarize some points as we see them. How many times have people said to us, I can take it or leave it alone. Why can't he? Why don't you drink like a gentleman or quit?

That fellow can't handle his liquor. Why don't you try beer and wine? Lay off the hard stuff. His willpower must be weak. He could stop if he wanted to.

She's such a sweet girl. I should think it stopped for her sake. The doctor told him if he ever drank again, it'd kill him, but there he is all lit up again. Now these are commonplace observations on drinkers which we hear all the time. Underline this.

Back at them is a world of ignorance and misunderstanding. See, that's my see, my mom sees me doing the things that I did. Her solution is don't do that. Right? You're killing yourself.

We love you. Don't do it. But until I got sober until I could take her through this book, she didn't know what was killing me. My mom is now a big book dumper. She ain't an alcoholic.

She can spot a middle of the rotor by the first sentence out of their mouth though. She knows the truth about alcoholism. Right? Those people react different. You know?

Their solution, they get they get in a little trouble or whatever, and their solution is they, you know, they have a bad night and get sick all over themselves on New Year's Day or whatever. Their solution is they stop. My solution was fight through it. You know? Tomorrow's another day.

Right? Moderate drinkers and now we're gonna get into some little types here. Moderate drinkers have little trouble in giving up liquor entirely if they have good reason. They can take it or leave it. Right?

Now here's the tricky guy. Then we have the certain type of hard drinker. He may have the habit badly enough to gradually impair him physically and mentally. May cause him to die a few years before his time. Here's the catch.

If a sufficiently strong reason, ill health, falling in love, change of environment, or the warning of a doctor becomes operative, this man can stop or moderate. Alright? So you got the moderate drinker. He can take it or leave it. You know?

It's no big deal. If he has a glass of beer with dinner, great. If not, great. Doesn't matter. And then you got the guy that's kind of confusing.

Right? Then you got this hard drinker type. Right? And we may not we know these people. I used to work in the bar business.

I know a lot of these people. They partied with me all the time. I thought they were just like me, but time goes by. Right? I'm the real alcoholic.

They, on the other hand, got out of the bar business, maybe finished up college, they fell in love, they've got little babies. They don't do that stuff anymore. Right? Treatment center spits these people out left and right. Given sufficient we have a lot of these people in Alcoholics Anonymous.

Right? They got a DWI. They got a little spousal spat and the cops were involved. The judge suggests Alcoholics Anonymous. They've been drinking too much.

They come to Alcoholics Anonymous. We got good coffee, some pretty women. They stay. They're saluting. They don't drink.

And they may be angry as hell, but they don't drink. But I'm not that guy. I've had all these reasons. I've had ill health. Falling in love, falling out of love, Good jobs, bad jobs, no jobs.

I've had every reason under the sun not to pick up a drink. I drink. That sets me apart because here it is. But what about the real alcoholic? He may start off as a moderate drinker.

He may or not may may or may not become a continuous hard drinker. But at some stage of his drinking career, he begins to lose all control of his liquor consumption once he starts to drink. That allergy is in full effect. Here's the further fellow who's been puzzling you, especially in his lack of control. That's twice on this page they're talking about control.

He does absurd, incredible, tragic things while drinking. He's a real doctor Jekyll and mister Hyde. Do you know why he uses that analogy other than the obvious? Robert Louis Stevenson wrote doctor Jekyll and mister Hyde. He died of alcoholism.

And they suspect that he wrote that book. It's kinda like an autobiography. That was him. He drank himself to death. He's seldom mildly intoxicated.

I was very rarely mildly intoxicated. It's kinda like Texas Hold'em, baby. I was all in. You know? He's always more or less insanely drunk.

His disposition while drinking resembles his normal nature, but little. He may be one of the finest fellows in the world, yet let him drink for a day, and he frequently becomes disgustingly and even dangerously antisocial. He has a positive genius for getting tied at exactly the wrong moment, particularly when when some important engagement engagement must be kept. He is often perfectly sensible and well balanced concerning everything except liquor. But in that respect, he is incredibly dishonest and selfish.

He often possesses special aptitudes or special abilities, skills, and aptitudes and has a promising career ahead of him. He uses his gifts to build up a bright outlook for his family and himself, then pulls the structure down on his head by a senseless series of sprees. That making any sense to anybody? I bet it'd be amazing what if alcoholics and others could, like, form a company and build something or make something, it'd be incredible the talent we have in these rooms. Artists, engineers, you name it, lawyers.

We've got great abilities. And I'd use these abilities to build up my outlook and then boom. Usually, at the worst possible time, I start to drink, and the whole thing caves in around me. He's the fellow who who goes to bed so intoxicated, he ought to sleep the clock around. Yet early the next morning, he searches madly for the bottle he misplaced the night before.

Michael touched on it earlier. We got any bottle hiders in here? Can't find the bottles, man. Where did I put them? Have y'all seen that movie The Lost Weekend?

When he's searching for that bottle and it's up it's up in the light, and I'm, like, sitting there watching the TV going, it's in the light. Come on. This guy needs a drink. You know? He needs a drink, man.

And he can oh my god. I lived alone, and I'm I got bottles of booze hidden everywhere, and I don't know where they're at. You know? If he can afford it, he may have had liquor concealed all over his house to be certain no one gets his entire supply from him to throw down the waste pipe. Gotta hide it.

You gotta be ingenious if you're living with somebody who might throw it away. You know? Hide it in all the good places and toilet tanks and under the house. And I did mine in plain daylight. I poured out a water bottle and filled it up with vodka and put it in the refrigerator.

Smart drunk. Nobody will ever think to look dead. Yeah. As matters grow worse oh, wait. They get worse.

Alright. Shoot. As matters grow worse, he begins to use a combination of high powered sedative and liquor to quiet his nerves so he can go to work. Then comes the day when he simply cannot make it and gets drunk all over again. Perhaps he goes to a doctor who gives him morphine or some some sedative with which to taper off.

Then he begins to appear at hospitals and the sanitariums. Good stuff. This is by no means a comprehensive picture of the true alcoholic as our behavior patterns vary, but this description should identify him roughly. Why does he behave like this? Why do we do it?

Now we're getting to the crux of the matter. Right? Why is it that I do this? If hundreds of experiences have shown that one drink means another debacle with all its intended suffering and humiliation, Why is it that we take the first drink? I mean, think about it.

If you walk up to a stove and you burn your hand, the next time you walk into the stove, you're gonna check. I mean, if we didn't have that kind of reaction to stuff, we'd never make it out of our childhoods because we'd never understand danger or fear or anything. We just walk out in front of cars. We just we'd die. We'd the the hope would be extinct.

Part of our gift is for survival, but yet when it comes to drinking, knowing all that's happened to me, what does my brain come up with? This time, it'll be different. I ain't gonna get burned this time. Why can't he stay on the water wagon? What has become of the common sense and will power that he still sometimes displays with respect to other matters?

Perhaps there will never be a full answer to these questions. Opinions very considerable as to why alcoholics react differently from normal people. We're not sure why once a certain point is reached, little or nothing can be done for him. We cannot answer the riddle. You think the worse we got, the more we try you know, we've tried everything.

Right? But we keep going back to it over and over and over. What is those people those normal people think? That they must be nuts. Right?

They're right. We know that while the alcoholic keeps away from drink as he may do for months or years, he reacts much like other men. We're equally positive that once he takes any alcohol, whatever, into his system, something happens both in the bodily and mental sense, would make which makes it virtually impossible for him to stop. Has anybody had a long period of sobriety and then he relapsed? Yeah.

How quick did you go down? Quickly? Immediately. Yes. And we we get along without booze.

And then once I take that drink, man, in a short amount of time, I'm on the rocks. It didn't take me anything to get there. Virtually impossible for him to stop. You know, and that's the and I've seen it too many times just in these years that I've been sober, people that have had long term sobriety. You know?

10 years, 15 years, 20 years. For whatever reason, they got disconnected, got off the program, did, you know, whatever reason, they went back to drinking. And you talk about some horror stories. A lot of them don't end up too good. You know?

The experience of any alcoholic will abundantly confirm this. Pass it over to Mike. Alright. Not a pretty picture that just painted. You know, it says, these observations would be academic and pointless if our friend never took the first drink, thereby setting the terrible cycle in motion.

Therefore, the main problem of the alcoholic centers his mind rather than his body. What a profound statement. Think about it. If I told you today I was allergic to strawberries, And I have a violent reaction to strawberries when I eat them. I start swelling up, I turn as red as this woman's shirt right here.

It's horrible. And then tomorrow morning, you see me in here with a bowl of strawberries. Pulling them out 1 by 1 and eating them and start blowing up like a balloon looking like a Macy day float or whatever. Scratching or scratching wheezing. What is my problem?

Is my problem that I'm allergic to strawberries? What are you gonna be thinking? Oh, really? See, our main problem centers in our mind rather than our body. See, my problem sits squarely upon my shoulders.

I've got a mind that wants to kill me and make it look like an accident. It wants to tell me it's gonna be okay. Have another drink. What is the part of the equation that can't be trusted? My mind.

Well, let me ask you this. What do you listen to 99.999 of your life? You're paying attention to the thing that's broke. The broken thing is calling all the shots. Think about that for a second.

That's frightening. I'd have better luck pulling someone out of a state institution who's mentally impaired and saying make all my life choices. They'd probably do better. It's an amazing thing. Here's a fun one.

The age old riddle. It says, if you ask him why he started on his last bender, the chances are he will offer you any one of a 100 alibis. How many hours have we spent? Why is it I drank? Why is it I did that?

I need to know why I drink. Hold that thought. So sometimes these excuses have a certain plausibility, but none of them really make sense in light of havoc an alcoholic's drinking about creates. I lost my job, so I'm gonna drink up the rest of my money. Makes a lot of sense, doesn't it?

What a great excuse to go get drunk and devastate your life some more. I just lost my job. Makes perfect sense in my mind. You know, sometimes these excuses have a certain plausibility, but none of them really make sense in the light of the havoc an alcoholic's drinking about creates. They sound like the philosophy of man who having a headache beats himself on the head with a hammer so he can't feel the ache.

If you draw this fallacious reasoning to the attention of an alcoholic, he'll laugh it off or become irritated and refuse to talk. Think about it. You ever wondered why your family members and loved ones looked at you like your head was on fire as you came out of your last debacle? And they're asking you what are you doing? You know, it's amazing.

Here's a fun one. Once in a while, he may tell the truth. Once in a while. Have you ever actually answered that question honestly? Why is it you went out and drank last night?

Have you ever actually answered it honestly? Why is it, Michael, that you knew once you start drinking your life comes undone and horrible things happen to you? I've had loved ones ask me why is it you knew what was gonna happen? Why did you do it? And I'd make up every because she left me.

Because the boss is mean to me. Because of this. Because of that. Because my daddy was a brutal alcoholic. That's why, you know, I'd come up with every reason in the world.

But a couple times, I actually got bone chilling honest and went, you know what? I don't know. And look what the next line says. It says in this in the truth, Strange to say is that usually he has no idea why he took the first drink than you have. And the fact of the matter is you can't answer that riddle.

We will on the next page. I'll tell you exactly why we drink. It's gonna tell us. Well, let's keep on. Some drinkers have excuses which they are satisfied part of the time, but in their hearts, they really don't know why they do it.

Once this malady has a hold, they are a baffled lot. Once that obsession has got a hold of us, that's the most confusing part. Later on, we're gonna find out no matter the necessity or the wish we find we cannot not drink. No matter how great the necessity, no matter how great the wish, I can't stay away from the first one to save my own life. Says there's an obsession that somehow, someday, they will beat the game.

This time it's gonna be different. If I just eat me some fried chicken nice and greasy, I can drink that Jack Daniels again and bad stuff isn't gonna happen. It made sense in my mind. That was one of my beautiful thoughts. Says, but they often suspect they are down for the count.

How true this is if you realize in a vague way their families and friends sense that these drinkers are abnormal and oh, do they ever. But everybody hopefully awaits the day when the sufferer will rouse himself from his lethargy and assert his power of will. It's frightening. We've gone to the same treatment facility. The first time I went there was in 1997, but we still go there every Friday night.

And we used to they used to have family days on Sundays and we go do step work with the people on visitation days. So John and I and a handful of us would be down there every Sunday afternoon doing step work with these gentlemen. And you'd see the family members circling around. Old old Jimmy. Jimmy's all tore up, but you can hear the family.

Jimmy says this time it's gonna be different. Yeah. Anybody ever said that before? I mean business this time and you see the family's hopes rise up and rise up. And the fact of the matter is we sit back and the chances of Jimmy surviving this thing are slim to none today.

You know, and look what it says. This is the tragic truth is is man be a real alcoholic that happy day may not arrive, and there's the truth. Says he has lost control at a certain point in the drinking of every alcoholic he passes into a state where the most powerful desire to stop drinking is of absolutely no avail. The tragic situation has already arrived in practically every case long before the suspect it. Many of us could have stopped early on, but we didn't want to.

Unfortunately, we overshot that mark. And by the time we got to the point where we didn't ever wanna drink again, it was way too late. If you wanna know why you drink, here it is. The fact is for most alcoholics, for reasons yet obscure, they have lost the power of choice in drink. Look at it.

Can you control how much you drink when you start drinking? I cannot call my numbers. I have no choice in the matter. Once I start, it isn't done until I can no longer hold a bottle up and pour alcohol down my throat. That's what happens every time I pick up a drink, but that isn't even the bad part.

The bad part is I come to from another one of those tragic events. Shaken like a leaf on a tree and say, that's it. I am never gonna do it again. Have you ever said to yourself, you're never gonna pick up another drink as long as you live and you meant it? People, oh, you just don't want it bad enough.

B s. I've wanted it so bad it hurt. Sitting there shaking like a leaf on a tree, tears pouring down my face, I don't wanna pick up another drink. 32 minutes later, what am I doing? I don't have a choice.

See, John touched on it. You wanna know the horror stories and they I love Alcoholics Anonymous, but inside these rooms of Alcoholics Anonymous, there are a lot of people who are not alcoholics. They're a hard drinker. They got in a little trouble. Guess what?

They found a way not to drink. They're lonely. They want some to hang out. They fill these rooms. They sit in here 25 years.

Just fill that seat. Just keep sitting in that chair and ever just don't drink no matter what. Put the plug in the jug. Do what I do. Well, unfortunately, that man is not an alcoholic.

There's the truth. The fact of the matter is a real alcoholic is going to drink no matter what. There is not a thing you can do about it. You are condemned to pick up that drink no matter what you do. You lock us up in a room and somehow we will escape.

Think about it. The fact of the matter is, for a real alcoholic, he cannot choose whether he drinks or not. Welcome to that our lives have become unmanageable. We're not unmanageable because I've wrecked a car. I got a DWI.

I've I've destroyed family members. All of that tragic stuff that happens as a result of drinking alcohol. Guess what? You drink enough booze like we do and tragic things happen. That isn't why your life has become unmanageable.

My life has become unmanageable because of the simple fact. Every time I say I am never gonna pick up another drink as long as I live, I'm unable to manage that decision to stay away from the first one to save my own life, period. That's what it means to be an alcoholic. I have lost the choice. It says their so called willpower becomes practically non existent, and we do have willpower.

I thought I was a bad weak willed person for years. That's what it meant. That's why I am the way I am. And the fact of the matter is we are the most headstrong people you have ever met in your life. We are, Except when it comes to alcohol.

When it comes to alcohol, our so called willpower becomes non existent. It is not a player. It looks great on paper, but it loses every time. Look at this. We are unable and underline this at certain times because I here's where the arguments come in, to bring into our consciousness with sufficient force the memory of the suffering and humiliation of even a week or a month ago, we are without defense against the first drink.

And I'll have people say, that's not true. At certain times, I stayed sober for 3 years. They told me I was gonna go to jail and and I didn't take a drink. That's all great. But have you ever shot seen the game Russian roulette before?

You ever seen the deer hunter, The movie interesting game. You put 1 bullet in a revolver and you spin the chamber and you put the gun to your head and you pull the trigger. You know what happens at certain times? At certain times, the gun goes boom and you don't know when that's gonna happen. And the fact of the matter is at certain times, fear, the suffering of what we went through in the past is not gonna be able to be brought up with sufficient force into my mind.