An Alcoholics Anonymous Big Book workshop in Plymouth, UK

Welcome back.

Just gonna take a little reading from the Big book. Page 108, paragraph 2.

Try not to condemn your alcoholic husband, no matter what he says or does. He is just another very second reasonable person.

Treat him when you can as though he had pneumonia. When he angers you, remember that he is very ill and I'll hand you back over to Tim.

Thanks. My name is Tim and I've been an alcoholic all day. Now

these chapters to wives in the family. After that that I guess there are two. I don't like thinking of things in schools, but I think there are two schools of thought in Alcoholics Anonymous

about what status this book has.

A lot of the people that use this book, most of the people that use this book will say that it's there's the basic text of Alcoholics Anonymous and people will disagree about what other a A books are helpful or not.

Some people say the 1st 164 pages have got everything that you need.

I'm not going to get into that debate,

but what I wanted to say is that some people say that every line in the book can only be taken in the context it was written,

and other people say that while the the ideas in there are spiritual principles of general application.

Now, I don't know how it was intended, what when they wrote it how it was intended, But I have some experience which is probably more useful than any opinion I have on taking things out of context, applying them in other contexts, and finding that they are

universally or at least widely applicable. And I, I believe in what gets called strong sponsorship.

And that means different things in different people's hands. Sometimes it means

the people coming in, you just tell them what to do and they better do it or you won't have anything to do with them. That's one form of strong sponsorship

and I've heard a lot of people say that that's what they needed, that's what worked, and nothing else would have worked.

I believe them. I absolutely believe them.

I feel excuse a digression. I I heard someone

heard a Jesuit priest

talking about a passage from the Bible. Where

ah, Moses is walking along one day and

there's a there's a Bush which is set a light

and he notices this is something odd about this. So he

starts talking to the Bush, which starts talking back.

I've had days like that myself.

And and he asks, he realises that this is he's not stupid. He realises this is no ordinary Bush,

and he realizes that

there's probably something divine going on here. And the idea at the time, you know, X thousand years ago in the Middle East, was that gods were located in specific places. And if you moved, you took a little bit piece of land from where you were. And that will be taking your God with you because God was located in a specific place. But protect a specific people at a specific time.

Um, and one of the, one of the ideas at the time among some people was that if you knew God's name, you could invoke God's name and get God to do whatever you wanted God to do, provided that you had a sacrifice of some sort. So God's name was something that was really protected. So only a few people were allowed to know what God's name was because only the the people who are in the know could invoke God's name.

And

so Moses says to the Bush, what's your name? And this isn't cocktail party chatter. This is he wants to know the name of this power so that he can use it.

And the voice comes back with four words, which are roughly I am who am. Now, that doesn't kind of mean anything. And so this has been interpreted in all sorts of different traditions. And sometimes that gets translated as who I have been. I will always be.

That doesn't work for me. There are all sorts of different translations. The one that works for me was one translation. Whatever you do, I will never let you go.

I will never let you go. Whatever you do, I'm always here.

Nothing you do is so bad that I can reject you and it sends shivers down my spine that

that is my my idea of what God is. No matter what I do, it has always been there. It will always be there and it will never,

ever let me go. I can shut my eyes and pretend it's not there, but it ain't going anywhere

and it can't be manipulated.

So Moses wants and he wants something he can use, but he isn't getting it. He's getting I'm here. And I believe that's what sponsorship should be like.

Um, this line here on 111, the first principle of success, this is A to the alcoholic wife dealing with her alcoholic husband. The first principle of success is that you should never be angry.

And I make mistakes. I've had sponsors angry with me and I've got angry with people and it never does any good.

A lot of this stuff to the wife about how to deal with the husband

is about love and tolerance. Our next thought is that you should never tell him what he must do about his drinking.

I don't need to. I don't need tell anyone what to do. I can say what I do. You want to do that too? It's up to you. If you don't, that's all right.

If he is enthusiastic, your cooperation will mean a great deal. If he is lukewarm or thinks he is not an alcoholic, we suggest you leave him alone. So I'm not going to pester anyone.

So someone comes to me for sponsorship. I can only show them what I've got.

I give them something to be getting on with and I say call when you're done

if you don't want to do us all right. We might not have much to say, but I'll always be here.

If you want to talk about something else, we'll talk about something else.

Have you got a problem? I'll tell you what solution I've had to that problem,

but you there are no deadlines, there are no rules. They're just, I can't. That's never worked on me. And occasionally I've tried that responses, I've tried to give them rules, I've tried to give them deadlines. And all they do is beat themselves up because they can't meet the deadlines.

And then they're too scared to call because in case you're going to be crossed with them,

vast principle of success is that I must never be angry. That's the ideal.

That's the ideal to work for.

And that Lana, I asked Jordy to read out. Try not to condemn your alcoholic husband, no matter what he says or does. I, I'm,

I can be very judgmental and my tongue is quick and our,

I don't know how accurate my criticism is, but by God, can it be sharp

when, when I'm sponsoring people?

I do think as well, you know, in computer courses they say don't worry about pressing the buttons. You can't break the computer by pressing the buttons. I think that's also true with sponsorship, that you needn't be scared. You can't break the person by pressing the wrong buttons. There are lots of other people in a A. As long as you've made it clear that you're just one of a gazillion people in a A and they can go to a whole bunch of people, you're not in any position of power.

They don't like it. They can go and talk to someone else. And to know that you're happy that they talk to other people too, that takes away the risk of saying the wrong thing. If it's the wrong. And I tell people I get to have bad days too. So if I've had a bad day, you can write it off as that. I'm never going to be perfect.

Try not to condemn the person. He's just another very sick, unreasonable person, as can I be. Treat him when you can, as though he had pneumonia. When he angers you, remember he is very ill. I had someone saying to me a few days ago,

I'm really sorry that you're having to say this again and again and again as I was saying the same thing again and again and again said I don't mind. I say this as as many times as necessary.

When people slip

and come back,

there's a

lying on 35.

Where is it

where Jim slips?

Here we go. To his consternation, he found himself drunk half a dozen times in rapid succession. On each of these occasions, we worked with him, reviewing carefully what had happened. Said I do that well, let's review carefully what's happened, and I follow the stuff on 120. Perhaps your husband will make a fair start on the new basis. But just as things are going beautifully, he dismays you by coming home drunk. And you think what? What is everyone at my

going to think of me if they see that my sponsees have a slip?

If you are satisfied he really wants to get over drinking, you need not be alarmed.

I'll say to people, do you really want to stop? And if they don't, that's all right.

I'll be here when you want to. I'm here. I'm not going to talk anyone out of drinking.

That is infinitely better that he had no relapse at all. As has been true with many of our men, it is by no means a bad thing. In some cases.

Your husband will see at once, Emma, that he must redouble his spiritual activities if he expects to survive. You need not remind him of his spiritual deficiency. He will know that. Cheer him up

and ask him how you can be still more helpful.

And when I look at this passage, I don't need to beat anyone up for slipping and I don't even need to beat anyone up

for not finishing their step four and not doing their step nine. They know they haven't done their step four. They know they haven't done their Step 9 or haven't been to a meeting for six weeks.

This information is available to them. They don't need me beating them up

and all I do is what it says on 35. Let's look at the period

before the slip.

What happened? Was it like Jim's story on page 35? Was it like Fred's story on? Was it like the Jay Walker? Were you the man with the hammer thinking a little bit of relief is OK, even though it's going to hurt twice as much the next day? What? What can you find yourself in this book if you can? Do you believe what they say that unless you do what's in this book

your toast? Do you believe that? What are your actions? Show there are some questions you can ask.

If someone isn't going to any lengths, the chances are they don't believe that they need to in order to stay sober. So they don't think they're quite the alcoholic that is described in here that has to let go. Absolutely. Perhaps I can let go a bit. Let go 3/4

um, and there's a line here as well. Ask him, cheer him up and ask him how you can be still more helpful. I don't know if you've ever tried it, but to say to a Swansea, how do you think I can help you?

You'll get some really interesting answers. If the relationship is getting weird,

that question will really help because it might just be they're looking for something that you can't give.

If he gets drunk, don't blame yourself or him. Doesn't say that. I'm adding that God has either removed your husband's liquor problem or he hasn't. If not, it had better be found out straight away than you and your husband can get right down to fundamentals. And this is one of my favorite lines in the book. If a repetition is to be prevented, place the problem along with everything else in God's hands,

which tells me I have to place everything in God's hands. So when I've got someone in front of me, sometimes I'm on autopilot. I know exactly how it's what to say, and it's just flowing beautifully. I don't have to think about it. We're connecting. Your eyes are lighting up. It's all working. Sometimes people throw you curveballs. You think, what on earth am I going to do with this? Or they're furious with you. Or just

you'll see everything.

Well, what would placing it in God's hands look like here?

God, if you're there, you show me what to say because I don't know when I'm on the phone to people, it's all become a standing joke that there are a lot of. I hear people saying, are you still there? And I am. I'm just, I'm just pausing because I, I, I don't know. I don't know what,

I don't know what to say.

I say OK, got I? I do not say here, but to fill the time.

Remind me God of a story

and I'll tell a story. I don't know why I'm telling it

and the person says

where'd you get that from?

Because it it hit something and I didn't even know why I was telling the story.

And this happens to me the whole the whole time that the story that the stories that I tell are the that's the great asset.

There's no sort of great wisdom. It's it's

stuff about my past, the dark past being the greatest asset. If in doubt, tell a story.

If you don't know how to fix something, how to unwrap it, how to workout what the hell is going on inside someone tell a story

and God will do the rest.

Because it's God's job to remove their liquor problem. It's not mine. It's God's job to heal them. It's not mine.

I was at a member of a group once in London's fashionable West End, and

there was a group conscience called so everyone's heart sank at this point. There was

a group conscience called to discuss that, a matter of extreme importance to the group,

and our

someone said that they objected objected to the use of the C word at the meetings. They found it demeaning and someone piped up. What word is that? Codependency.

But it it wasn't. It was another, another shorter word.

I've got some extra jokes about that group conscience after us, but this is being recorded, so I'm going to I, I, I better not tell them right now. But codependency is one of those things where

when you're about eight months, so but someone sidles up to you and informs you that you're codependent and that you need to read a book on codependency. Otherwise you'll never ever have healthy relationships because you're enmeshed and entangled and all sorts of all sorts of fancy things. And

I mean, I'm, I'm like the rest of you. I, I, I love another label. Don't don't

A problem. You can really get your teeth stuck into

and then you say to. So all does codependency actually mean. And then they start fumbling around with it and, and you know,

and there are some, there are some definitions around.

Now, I don't know if I if I am or ever have been codependent. What I do know is that my basic problem my whole life has been my relationships with other people.

This bit I'm sure of. As Bill C says, the effect on you, of you on me

without some kind of buffet in between is devastating.

And I looked for solutions to

our codependency or whatever I was calling it, my problems with other people.

Problems like living inside other people's minds or what I thought were other people's minds. Constantly thinking I could mind read and speculating and imagining what you were planning and trying to respond to what I thought you were really saying behind what you were actually saying. And like, I can't be OK unless you're OK. And if you're not OK, I need to fix you so I can be OK because I can't be comfortable in a room with an uncomfortable person.

So you're cold, you have to wear a jumper or I'm going to be really uncomfortable. Or you're cold and I'm the jumper,

or you're cold and I'm cold but I don't have a jumper. So you're not wet allowed to wear a jumper either. I mean all sorts of weird stuff,

and the more I tried to sort this out, the worse it got.

Funnily enough, the answer turned out to be in here in the chapter to wives.

The faith and sincerity of both you and your husband will be put to the test. And I think this applies to sort of marital intimate relationships. And I think it applies to friendships. I think it applies to relationships with work colleagues. I think it applies in your Home group. I think it applies from one group to another. I think it applies within intergroup. At any human relationship this is going to apply.

These workouts should be regarded as part of your education,

for thus you'll be lying to live. You will make mistakes, so when you make mistakes, it's OK, you're going to. But if you are in earnest, they will not drag you down. Instead, you will capitalize them. A better way of life will emerge when they're overcome. Some of the snags you will encounter

hurt feelings and resentments. Your husband will sometimes be unreasonable, and you will want to criticize

I. I know none of you will be so foolish as to get into relationships with unreasonable people, but perhaps you'll sponsor people one day who do so. This will come in handy. Then I Starting from a speck on the domestic horizon, great Thunder clouds of dispute may gather. These family dissensions are very dangerous, especially to your husband.

So this is all about them suddenly, is it? So we're worried about the other person's feelings? Yes, absolutely we are.

Often you must carry the burden of avoiding them or keeping them under control. Never forget that resentment is a deadly hazard to an alcoholic. We do not mean that you have to agree with your husband whenever there is an honest difference of opinion.

Just be careful not to disagree in a resentful or critical spirit. And this matter of disagreement,

for a lot of my life, I never realized I was angry.

I just observed that I was right and you were wrong. And because I didn't raise my voice, I didn't think I was angry. I am angry to the extent that I'm right

and the rules that I grew up around were. You have to be OK and OK means, like us, you have to be perfect. If you're not, get over quickly.

If you can't get over it quickly,

shut up about it.

If you can't shut up about it, go away. If you won't go away and you won't shut up about it, at least have the grace to look ashamed while you're doing it. Because we're not allowed to disagree. And what this is saying is you can, but never in a resentful or critical spirit. So there's nothing. Just because you disagree does not mean

you're wrong and I'm right.

You and your husband will find that you can dispose of serious problems easier than you can the trivial ones.

Next time you and he have a heated discussion, no matter what the subject, it should be the privilege of either to smile and say, this is getting serious, I'm sorry, I got disturbed, let's talk about it later. If your husband is trying to live on a spiritual basis, he will also be doing everything in his power to avoid disagreement or contention. And what this is telling me is I don't argue

if I if I'm arguing, I'm wrong. Even if I'm right, I'm wrong. Because if I'm arguing, I'm creating a block between me or you. And the substance of what we're talking about is irrelevant then, because I'm breaking the relationship.

The relationship that matters. It's the link that matters. So

my partner and I don't. We discuss things, but we don't argue. The one or two times I raise my voice,

he isn't in recovery. He's just sort of naturally, naturally doesn't need it. He left the room. He won't. He won't engage in any form of argument.

Your husband knows he owes you more than sobriety. He wants to make good, yet you must not expect too much.

And what I've learned in

a, A is in any relationships, actually, I'm to expect nothing.

If you want to give something to me, good for you.

As soon as I'm asking for it is a transaction.

If you're not giving it to me freely, for if you're not giving it to me for fun and for free expecting nothing in return, I actually don't want it.

What I've been taught there had to be of service to give of yourself for fun and for free, expecting nothing in return. Soon as I'm even monitoring what is coming back, I'm in trouble.

Patients tolerance, understanding and love of the watchwords. Show him these things in yourself and they will be reflected back to you from him. Live and let live. As the rule, if you both show willingness to remedy your defects, there will be little need to criticize each other.

This means in my relationship at home I'm never allowed to make a critical comment,

which is

a pretty hard thing to live by. But I'll tell you a story. But five years ago. Been with my partner for 7 1/2 years now.

Now, I wasn't strictly criticising, but what I was doing was.

I was doing the washing up loudly. You know

when you do it loudly, as if to say this was really your turn. It was not my turn, but look at me, I'm doing the washing up. How good of me

and

I saw his banging around

and I then and this was, this was achieving nothing because I'm I'm in a relationship with someone who does not manipulate and can't be manipulated. So you have to if, if this isn't getting a response, you have to, you have to up the ante and actually go for the jugular. So,

so I, I, I can't remember the words I said, but I had a go about the fact that it's always me that does the washing up or whatever it was.

And he left the room

and I instantly knew I was in serious trouble.

And about 10-15 minutes later, he came back into the room and he said

I have never,

ever criticized you.

I could make a list as well. And then he left the room

and he was absolutely right. He had never criticized me for anything. And this was one of the reasons I was with this person was because it was the first relationship. Well, there will be other relationships too. Is one of the first relationships in my life where I hadn't chosen someone who was constantly on my back,

someone who totally accepted me as I was, for better or for worse. But I wasn't returning the favour, even though, as was clear from that, I was doing plenty.

But of course my faults are perfectly excusable and understandable, whereas whereas your, your, yours cry out for immediate vengeance.

So

what I've learned in this relationship and from that passage is that if I'm in a relationship with someone that has a mechanism for spotting their own defects and correcting them over time, we will have a healthy relationship and I needn't engage at all in yourself. Correction mechanism.

If I'm with someone that does not have that mechanism, I ain't going to be able to impose it from the outside.

So I shouldn't be in the relationship.

And the Don Pritz line about people phoning him up about their relationship problems. And he says, I don't know how to how to have a healthy sick relationship

if I'm in a sick relationship, which is one where I've got some wounded self esteem. And you're supposed to fix it by becoming the person I think you ought to be.

However you cut that, there are no little tricks to make that work. The only relationships I've made work where I give for fun and for free, expecting nothing in return. And if something comes back, something comes back. And if consistently over time nothing comes back, I'll probably move on.

But there's nothing wrong with you,

just my lousy judgment for choosing someone that had nothing to offer in the 1st place. Can't blame you if you have nothing to offer. I can't blame you for that.

So this passage, and there are lots of others in these chapters, have solved all of the problems in the 12th step that I looked everywhere outside a A for a solution to.

That's all I've got on there. But we've got four questions and we're gonna have a couple from the floor. Are we?

So. Well, should we see where we go from? Yeah.

So

how do you know if you need to rework 1:00 to 9:00? There's a line underneath need. How do you know if you need to rework a

1:00 to 9:00?

I always have a project in a a. My project at the moment is a Is a step 11

project where I've got a set of exercises I I'm following for a year and when I get to the end of that, I'm probably going to look at the the steps again.

And what I've discovered is once every year or two,

I find myself in in a in a

position I don't want to be in.

And that's a position where the volume in my mind

gets turned up and up and up, and there's just chat, chat, chat, chat, chat, chat, chat.

I find myself overreacting to small things.

I find myself on my step 11 reviews at night writing the same thing over and over and over and over and nothing and nothing shifts. I I don't know when anyone in particular should

rework 1 to 9.

I think it for me, it's got a lot to do with how free do I want to be. And if I discover myself trapped,

why would I want to stay trapped and sort of muddle through? I don't wanna muddle through,

but a couple of things about reworking one tonight. I've heard

a lot of step fives over over the years and I've only had a couple where it felt like an empty exercise.

And in both, on both occasions, there was people who were sober for a very long time,

double digits well into double digits, who decided to. And I think the quotation is go back and do another Step 4.

So they hadn't gone back to step one, they'd gone back to step four. And

it sounded like they were just repeating.

They weren't even present for it. And I, I did this at about six years, 5-6 years sober. I went back and repeated a step forward, but I just, I didn't have a new experience with it. I just trotted out everything I thought I knew about me, wrote a few little things about how I'd like to be, which a friend of mine later described as recreating myself in my own image,

and nothing had nothing had shifted. I think this has got to come from if I'm going to do any work in the program of any value, I need to come at it from the perspective of whatever has got me this far is an asset because it got me this far. But if I'm stuck, it can't get me any further. So everything that has got me this far now becomes a liability.

So I'm going to need to set aside everything I think I know,

otherwise I won't have a new experience. And when I did that, I did that in a set of steps a couple of years ago, three years ago, two years ago. And, and, and last year,

the stuff that I wrote three years ago,

the stuff that was bothering me went the same 1-2 years ago, the same one last year. The stuff that I wrote down today no longer bothers me. And right now, new stuff is building up and I can feel it.

That's all right. That's just the way things are.

Weeds will always grow. Your life gets bigger, your ego learns how to adapt to that and grow like Ivy all over it. So

I guess the final answer to that one is, is

I know when I've got to a position of a self-imposed crisis. I can't postpone or evade, and I know I have no choice but to rework one through 9 where I'm toast.

I know that point. There's a point of desperation, and then I'm back at step one again. I'm at step one whether I want to be or not.

I like this one. I like the wording of it. Gratitude lists. What's your take on it?

I'm not sure I have it. Do I have a take? God, I I really hope I don't have a take on anything.

When I was about a month sober I was sitting in the Troubadour Cafe in Earls Court with a chap called Brian, who is about 18 years sober at the time and he said I think you should do a gratitude list. I was probably moaning, which was probably why he suggested it.

And so we wrote a long list of all of the good things in my life.

And at the end of it,

I I still had all the self pity, but now I had an extra thing. So I felt terribly guilty that I didn't feel grateful for all of these things which I intellectually recognized were good.

So I, I, I, I, I don't do them. I never, I never have. I I hear a lot of people saying good things about them.

Almost invariably I hear people saying good things about them, but I've not, I've not really used them as a tool,

not on a consistent basis. But what I do know is that I talked about looking at life through a straw and having a mind which captures only the negative. And I think that there there is a line up here in the family afterward.

It's one of the little Pollyanna ish lines.

I'm not sure I can find it. It's about counting your blessings,

however, which is here we go. When resentful thoughts come, try to pause and count your blessings. After all, your family is reunited, alcohol is no longer a problem, and you and your husband are working together toward an untreamed or future. And I do find this useful. What I, I, I do that for is I'll sit down with someone else and say, well, let's look at what's really going on here. So when I've trotted out all the negative stuff, I'll often do this with someone else. Well, so

the truth and the truth is actually there are lots of good things going on. There is lots of, but I can't, I often don't feel better. I don't feel grateful when I've done that. I just feel restored to some sort of balance perspective.

I got a text from someone about a year and a half ago and she said she was doing washing up and

she wanted to text me because she had this wave

of gratitude and she didn't know where it came from and just hit her. She started crying and she wanted to share it with me. Then I got a wave of gratitude which hit me. I started crying because this was someone who'd been drunk a few months before.

And that's the role of gratitude. It comes to me as a gift. Usually. I wish I could make it, but I can't.

I love the underlining here. Forgiveness. Yes, we have to, but how

and have to is underlined.

I'm really reactive. I'm like a firework factory and people are like naked flames passing through it. I just, I'm a lot better than I used to be, but I'm just, I just react like that to things and I was at a meeting.

Oh, somewhere else. How's that for anonymous? I was at a meeting somewhere else at some point and and this woman shared. Very nice woman

25 years cyber and she said my my friend so and so has just gone out after 33 years and and she was running around doing a a talk sponsoring loads of people, but she didn't leave enough time for herself and that's why she drank And I immediately saw red and thought, well, that's totally opposite to the a a message and she was of service and she was probably keeping secrets or had or there was something there. It wasn't because she was doing and, and that the whole,

you know, the whole

prosecution service, the public prosecution service was in full force. We were writing up, you know, the charge lists just the whole thing

and

how I was going to have it out with her after the meeting only so that she would understand, you know, where she was going wrong so that she wouldn't pedal this crap, you know, in front of all of these newcomers. And I was going, I, and this was in the space of about 3 seconds. It just, I just went straight there. The script was already there. Actually, I didn't need to write it. I just, the script was suddenly there. I thought, oh, I, I this is, this is wrong.

And I've been taught to do is a line on 66 where it says we are prepared to look at it from an entirely different angle. So I said, well, what that looked like that would look like looking at this from her angle.

And what's she doing here? Well, her friend is just drunk again. What would I do if my friend as few years ahead of me drunk again? I'd think, well, wonder why it happened because I want to make sure that it doesn't happen to me.

So if I can diagnose what she did wrong,

I can. I can do the opposite and then I'll be all right

because I don't trust God to lead me through this. I need to work it out

so I'm going to find out what she did wrong.

I thought I'd do that the whole time,

and as soon as I realized that she was doing exactly what I do in that kind of situation, the whole thing just dissolved.

I mean, her perception of it may have been a different perception of the mind, but the, the, the mechanism was exactly the same. It frightened her. And rather than trusting God, she worked, worked it out herself.

And how could she? I'm, I'm her. She's me.

How can I resent that?

And that's always been the way out. I love the prayer on

67 where it says they say an A, a pray for other people. I think this is a fundamentally good thing. But when you have a resentment and you pray for someone else, it's a little bit patronising. So it makes it sound as though they're the one that's in trouble, but it says God save me from being angry because I'm the one that's in trouble.

And it doesn't matter if I'm accurate or not. Overtime, I think I'm perhaps more accurate than I used to be, but being accurate is not What? As my friend Tom says, being right doesn't help. You can be intellectually right, but spiritually wrong, and I'd rather be spiritually right and intellectually wrong.

So that's how I approach forgiveness. And here's the

before we get to last question, is there anything from the floor?

Anybody got anything?

OK. OK.

This is the

$64,000 question. Unity.

We have a problem with unity in Plymouth. How do we improve and foster unity as we all have different approaches. Exclamation mark 1. Exclamation mark 2

in I I there's a a group that I don't belong to any anymore.

We all have a group we don't belong to anymore, don't we?

There's that joke about the the Jewish man that gets washed up on a desert island on his own, and they find him 20 years later and he's built two synagogues. The one he goes to, the one he wouldn't be seen dead in

a it's it's a bit like that in AAI mean you you couldn't survive if there wasn't a group that you wouldn't send a you wouldn't send your worst enemy to. Is there really,

I was, I, I was at a meeting, this a meeting of this group where I called a group I, I was hot under the collar that the secretary was choosing people to speak who were in my view talking rubbish. So what I thought we ought to do is have a a group conscience to determine what the primary purpose of the group was.

And

I called the group conscience right at the beginning of the meeting. And you could see there was this visible reaction as people would, people started actually twitching at this. And then someone did a perfectly sort of reasonable chair. And then the first person who spoke after the chair said, I feel very uncomfortable to be in a room where someone is bringing up primary purpose. I thought this was a safe place to come. And then

one, everyone was coming in with their view on whether or not the group conscience should even have been called and what was it about and what was the agenda and this. So the meeting was totally hijacked by this discussion. And you know, muggins were sitting here, sitting there thinking, what have I started? And there was no way I could defuse this.

And a chat piped up. I said my name is Marlon. I'm, I'm an alcoholic

and he said Unity.

Unless I have unity, I won't have personal recovery. And that's unity within me and that's unity between me and you. And that's unity within a a as a whole. And that primary purpose is important, but unity is part of tradition one for a reason. Tradition one is tradition one for a reason.

Your primary purpose is important, but it's all the way down the list

and it diffused the whole thing that it just you could feel the hot air leaving the room. It was marvellous

and what ultimately happened with that group was we had, we did have the group conscience. I think in the end it was played slightly differently, but we said what is the message of this group? If we're going to have a primary purpose, Primary purpose is to carry the message of this group.

What's our message? There are half a dozen people and each said something entirely, entirely different, wasn't variations, it was entirely different. And what was clear from this was that

we want a group. We didn't have a common purpose.

So all our problems as a group are coming from the fact that what

we had different names, we were there for different reasons.

And quite rightly the some of us, I think quite rightly some of us left because we were just a thorn in us. And aside to a lot of these people, he just needed to leave and be.

And one of the reasons there are so many groups is because everyone isn't going to have the same purpose.

But in my my view, I'm glad everyone who is in recovery is in recovery.

And at our group we do our dance and at your group, you do yours and let's be friends and let's cooperate an intergroup. But we're not right because we do it this way.