Workshop about the chapters The Family Afterwards and To Employers at the Spiritual Awakenings group in Bernardville, NJ

Guide people with, with, with their unhealthy balances and to kind of point them in the, in the right direction when they get out of balance, because it's very easy to do. I mean, I can, I can do it myself. And that's, that's what my sponsor gets the big bucks for. You know he, he, he points me in the right direction

with we think it dangerous if you rush his headlong at his economic problem. The family will be affected also pleasantly at first, but as they feel their money troubles are about to be solved, then not so pleasantly as they find themselves neglected, that may be tired at night and preoccupied by day. He may take small interest in the children and may show irritation when reproved for his delinquencies. If not irritable, he may seem dull and boring, not gain affection as a family would like him to be. Mother may complain of inattention.

They were all disappointed and often let him feel it. Beginning with such complaints a barrier arises. He is straining every nerve to make up for lost time. He is striving to recover fortune and reputation and feels he is doing so very well.

Sometimes mother and children do not think so, having been neglected and misused in the past. They think Father owes them more than they are getting. They want him to make a fuss over them. They expect him to give them the nice things they used to have before he drank so much. And the show is contrition for what they suffered. But that doesn't give freely of himself. Resentment grows. He becomes still less commutative. Sometimes he explodes over A trifle. Has anyone in here in early recovery recovery ever exploded over a trifle?

God damn I scooped trays empty. God damn it,

that was that was me. Don't you know I need ice?

The family is mystified. They criticize, pointing out how he is falling down on his spiritual program. Boy, those AA meetings, you are helping you.

This sort of thing can be avoided.

Both both Father and the family are mistaken. Though each side may have some justification,

understanding. That's, that's great. You know, first thing I did was show this to my family. Read, read this right here, read this sentence. This is what you're supposed to do.

The head of the House ought to remember that he is mainly to blame for what befell his home. He can scarcely scare square the account in his lifetime. How about that one? That's what living amends are for. But he must see that danger of over concentration on financial success. Although financial recovery

is on the way for many of us, we found that we could not place money first. I'm working with somebody right now who is desperate, desperate to get sober. Absolutely 2:00 in the morning, phone calls, the whole deal, absolutely desperate to get sober. But he cannot go to meetings. You just don't understand. His work is very important

and when you explain to him, well, whatever you put in front of your meetings and your recovery program, you're going, you're bound to lose. It's like, it's like the eyes glaze over,

you know, like that's, that's a, that's a propaganda or something. And we'll, we'll find out. We'll find out when he when he comes back from the Salvation Army after drum lessons, you know,

Not that we judge anyway.

For us, for us, material well-being always followed spiritual progress. It never preceded it. What a great sentence that is underlined. Highlight put an asterisk

1 thing I one thing I'd just like to talk about for a minute. I usually talk about some different thing before we get started every week. And what I'd like to talk about is The Tonight is the set aside prayer that we do rather than the serenity prayer. And for anybody that's not familiar with it,

the idea of it all is is to go into

this particular big book meeting with an open mind.

So many times the alcoholic has got something figured out to the point where when they hear something that doesn't exactly fit with their idea of recovery or their idea of of a A, or their idea of God or their idea of working a stat, they'll immediately reject it out of hand because that's not the way they did it, or that's not the way their sponsor told him to do it. They've got a different way of doing it

and what we want to promote really in this meeting is a sense of open mindedness. We're not trying to convince you that this is this is the correct interpretation of the Big Book, that my interpretation is the exactly perfect interpretation of the Big Book. That's certainly not true. As a matter of fact, many times in this meeting I've been corrected by someone and come to find out that there is a better interpretation or one that makes more sense

than the one that I had previously. So hopefully, myself included, I want to be open to being able to grow with this material and to be able to expand on the, on what I what I already know

or be open to a completely new conception. All, all these things are possible. So what we do in the beginning is we ask God to set aside our prejudice or our preconceived ideas and just try to be open minded for this next hour.

And some people can do it and some people can't. But I think it's a good attitude to try to have. Tonight we're on the chapter of the family. Afterward, we're on page 127, paragraph 2.

Since the home has suffered more than anything else, it is well that a man exert himself there. He is not likely to get far in any direction if he fails to show unselfishness and love under his own roof. We know there are difficult wives and families, but the man who is getting over alcoholism must remember

he did much to make themselves and that's that certainly is true.

I know that. I know that living under the same roof as me when I was in my active alcoholism was a difficult task for anybody,

and I know that there was a certain amount of sickness that that you must have experienced by living in the same living and caring for me in the same house. As each member of a resentful family begins to see his shortcomings and admits them to the others, he lays a basis for helpful discussion.

These family talks will be constructive if they can be carried on without heated argument, self pity, self justification, or resentful criticism. So there are some guiding, guiding principles to how to have the constructive family talks.

I believe that this is based in early, early sobriety, but it certainly can move on into into upper sobriety or long term sobriety.

Little by little, mother and children will see that they ask too much and father will see that he gives too little. Giving rather than getting will become the guiding principle. One of the great things that I heard not very far far back was bring to a relationship what you want to get out of it. Bring 2. Any type of relationship, the respect

that that you want to get, the caring that you want to receive. Bring everything that you want, want, want, would like to receive yourself to the relationship and amazing things will happen.

And they're telling us that this will certainly be the case with our family life all. But in the most difficult situations there, like it says there, there are difficult lives. And I'm sure that they mean husbands also. Assume, on the other hand, that Father has at the outset a stirring spiritual experience.

Overnight, as it were, he is a different man. He becomes a religious enthusiast. He is unable to focus on anything else. As soon as his sobriety begins to be taken as a matter of course, the family may look at their strange new dad with apprehension, in your, with irritation. I know somebody very close to me who this happened to. He got sober. And I mean, he'd been, you know, exactly what I'm talking about, that he had been a terror in this family.

And all of a sudden he sits down one night at the kitchen table at dinner and he goes, let's all pray. And his family looked at him and basically his wife says, you were you were a nut job when you were drinking. Now you're really over the edge. You know, I'm getting rid of your ass. And and she and she got rid of him so,

so big. He moved on to to better things. But there is talk about spiritual matters morning, noon and night.

He may demand that the family find God in a hurry or exhibit amazing indifference to them and say he is above worldly considerations.

He may tell mother who has been religious all her life but she doesn't know what it's all about and that she had better get his brand of spirituality while there is yet time. This is this is a form of spiritual arrogance. Several weeks ago in this meeting, I read a a paragraph out of a a Packer book that I thought was really wonderful. Because what I've seen happen in a lot of cases is the people who get the so-called big book recovery

will go out and criticize people with 20 or 30 years like right at the get go and they've got like two months sobriety. I mean, that's a form of spiritual arrogance that's going to get you nowhere. You know what I mean?

We have a common problem and yes, we have a common solution. And some of us may think that we found the exact common solution and, and go about spouting that.

And in some cases it's appropriate and in some cases it's just going to alienate you. You need to, you need to understand when it's appropriate and, and use a little bit of temperance and common sense when it comes to that. But there's definitely, I've been getting a lot of feedback about the people from this meeting

from people with a lot of time saying, you know, these guys are running around preaching the big book to people who've been sober for 20 years. Where the hell did they get their nerve? You know, So I mean,

you, you really have to, you really have to use a little bit of common sense when you're, when you're, when you're talking about this stuff. Because I'll tell you what,

we can help more people if we don't alienate them than if we do, you know what I mean? Let your actions be the proof that you're working a good program and not always your words.

I'll jump down off the soapbox. When Father takes this tack, the family may react on favorably. They may be jealous of a God who has stolen Dad's affections, while grateful that he drinks no more. They may not like the idea that God has accomplished the miracle. Miracle where they failed. You know,

the husband of the family, he's an alcoholic. He's been drinking for 20 years. The wife has done everything in the world. Spend all this money on psychologists and psychiatrists and, you know, send them to health farms and all this stuff. And he goes off to a A1 day one day and meets a plumber named Wally and never takes another drink, you know, and they do like, what the hell did Wally say? You know what I mean? Who's this Wally?

And and I, I sort of have this like a, there's like a they think there's a cult somewhere that they're, that they're not, they're not, they're not, they're not Privy to the information of.

And, and a lot of times there's a lot of fear generated in the family. Like, you know, you're going, you're getting involved with those A and as you're going to be selling flowers at airports soon, you know, so

they, they often forget Father was beyond human aid. They may not see why their love and devotion did not straighten them out. That is not so spiritual after all. They say if he means to write his past wrongs, why all this concern for everyone in the world but his family? What about his talk that God will take care of them? They suspect Father is a bit bombing.

He is not so unbalanced as they might think. Many of us have experienced that delation. We have indulged in spiritual intoxication like a gone prospector belt drawn in over the last ounce of food. Our pick struck gold. Join our release from a lifetime of frustration knew no bounds. Father feels he was struck. He has struck something better than gold for a time. He may be. He may try to hug the new treasure to himself. He may not see it once that he is barely scratched, a limitless load which will pay dividends only if he mines it for the rest of his life and insists on giving away

entire product. What a great, what a great parallel, what a great euphemism, or whatever. Think of you. Think of your sobriety.

You have scarcely scratched a limitless load of recovery which will pay.

You have scarcely scratched a limitless load of recovery which will pay dividends only if you mine it for the rest of your life and give away everything that you get. You know that is so true.

If the family cooperates, Dad will see that he is suffering from a distortion of values. He will perceive that his spiritual growth is lopsided, that for an average man like himself, a spiritual life which does not include his family obligations may not be so perfect after all.

We're talking about balance here. And a lot of times you see people, I believe it's fine to be unbalanced at 1st. At first, I don't think you can get enough a, a, you know what I mean, in your first year or so. But there there's going to come a time

when you're going to have to take responsibility for the rest of the rest of the stuff that surrounds your life, your family life,

your work environment, community affairs, you know, whatever you, I've, I've seen people literally hide in a A with 1520 years going to two or three meetings a day, have nothing to do with their family and, and be like, retire and just do nothing but a A. And I don't think that's healthy either. You know what I mean?

If the family will appreciate that Dad's current behavior is but a phase of his development, all will be well.

In the midst of an understanding and sympathetic family, these vagaries, the Gary's of bad spiritual infancy, will quickly, quickly disappear.

The opposite may happen should the family condemn and criticize that may feel that for years his drinking has placed him on the wrong side of every argument, But now that he has become a superior person with God on his side,

if the family persists in criticism, this fallacy may take a still greater hold on Father. Instead of the treating the family as he should, he may retreat further into himself and feel he has a spiritual justification for doing so. But the family does not fully agree with Daddy's spiritual activities. They should let him have his head. Remember, this is written by an alcoholic. You know, there's, there's like an alcoholic slant on a lot of this stuff. I don't think the Allen, I think the Allen eyes would change a few of these senses if we gave him a chance.

Even if he displays a certain amount of neglect and irresponsibility towards the family,

it is well to let him go as far as he likes in helping other Alcoholics. Until you start bringing them home. They start lighting the couch on fire. It takes a couch about two days to burn up. Now they just smolders. Anybody notice that

during those first days of convalescence, this will do more to ensure his sobriety than anything else?

Though some of his manifestations are alarming and disagreeable, we think that will be on firmer foundation than the man who is placing business or professional success

ahead of spiritual development. He would be less likely to drink again, and anything is preferable to that. I spoke again last week about somebody that I've been working with on and on for a long, long time. Who is that? He'll call you up. He'll be absolutely desperate to. I'll do anything this time. I'll do anything this time. Okay, meet me at the meeting tonight. Oh, I can't.

His life is just way too important to spend it sitting in Alcoholics and honest meetings. You know, there's got to be a better way. Can't you give me recovery on a silver platter, please?

Isn't there a shot I can take? You know? I mean, I swear to God, it's unbelievable.

The people that rush right back into business are, are usually, if they stay sober, they're usually so uncomfortable with untreated alcoholism. You know, the kind of, you know, gritting their teeth and yelling at employees and, you know, resentful at everything.

I think it's better to keep a good healthy balance for quite a while with with meetings and recovery.

Those of us who have spent much time in the world of spiritual make believe have eventually seen the childlessness of it. This dreamworld has been replaced by a great sense of purpose, accompanied by a growing consciousness of the power of God in our lives. We have come to believe He would like us to keep our heads in the clouds with Him, but that our feet ought to be firmly planted on earth. Amen to that again. I've seen a few people come in

who were pagans

and a few months into sobriety they start, they start to become born again Christians and they don't want to. They don't want to associate with the likes of us anymore and they're gone. And who knows, Who knows where they go. I'm not saying I'm not saying all born again Christians do this. I'm saying that I've seen some people,

it's so fanatically religious that they just, they don't want to have anything to do with the people in A, so they let what AA give them, take them away from AA. And that's, that's a crime. I think that is where our fellow travelers are and that is where our work must be done. These are the realities for us. We have found nothing incompatible between a powerful spiritual experience and a life of sane and happy usefulness.

One more suggestion. Whether the family has spiritual convictions or not,

they may do well to examine the principles by which the alcoholic member is trying to live. They can hardly fail to approve these print these simple principles, though the head of the house still fails somewhat in practicing them. Some somewhat is probably an understatement. Nothing will help the man who is off on a spiritual tangent so much as the wife who adopts the same spiritual program, making a better practical use of it. You know

that's a good one. There will be other profound changes in the household.

Liquor incapacitated father for so many years that mother became head of the house. She met these responsibilities gallantly. By foursome circumstances she was often obliged to treat father as a sick or wayward child. Even when he wanted to assert himself, he could not, for drinking placed him. Drinking placed him constantly in the wrong. Mother made all the plans and gave the directions. When sober the father usually obeyed. Thus mother, though through no fault of her own, became accustomed to wearing the family trousers.

Father come coming suddenly to life again, often begins to assert himself. This means trouble, unless the family watches for these tendencies in each other and comes to a friendly agreement about them. I was sponsoring one guy one time who he had turned over everything to his wife except his business affairs and his drinking. Those are the two things that he could he could still kind of handle, except his drinking got out of control. But he could still

manage his his business. He had his own business. So he gets sober and all of a sudden he wants to know,

he picks up the checkbook and he wants to know what all these checks are for. Well, she went absolutely apeshit on, you know, what do you care where those checks are going? You know, where have you been the last 20 years? So you really have to watch it when you start inserting yourself back in into an authoritarian position in the family

management. If you haven't been there in a while, you got to kind of do it slowly if you're going to do it.

Drinking isolates most homes from the outside world. Father may have lay aside for years old normal activities, clubs, civic duty, sports. When he renews interest in such things, a feeling of jealousy may arise. The family may feel they hold a mortgage on that so big that no equity should be left for outsiders. Instead of developing new channels of activity for themselves, mother and children demand that he stay home and make up the deficiency.

I'm working with a guy right now. His he comes back, he goes out, he comes back, he goes out.

He tells me that the biggest problem he has is his wife doesn't want to go in a I said we'll Dumber,

you know, Well, because you're gonna lose her anyway if you keep drinking. So what do you want to be sober and loser or drinking and loser? You know what I mean? If she has that, because I don't really believe she's got that big of a problem with AI think that that's an excuse he's used. So 'cause I can't, I really truly can't see anybody saying, saying, oh, you have to take that insulin again tonight, honey, you know,

aren't you? Aren't you leaning on that a little bit too heavy or, or you don't tell me you've got to go for dialysis again this week.

You know, I mean, that's what it's, that's what it's like. It's like saying so. So anyway,

I said, well, if she's stopping you from from going to meetings, get rid of show her the door. Tell her don't let the door hit me in the ass, honey. At the very beginning, the couple ought to frankly face the fact that each will have to yield here if there is a if there if the family is going to play an effective part in the new life, father will necessarily spend much time with other Alcoholics, but this activity should be balanced. New acquaintances who know nothing of alcoholism might be made and thoughtful consideration given to their needs.

The problems of the community might engage attention. Well, the family has no religious connections. They may wish to make contact with or take membership in a religious body. That was a very big thing in in the early days. Although not not absolutely vital, it was certainly encouraged. Alcoholics who have derided religious people will be helped by such contacts. Being possessed of a spiritual experience, the alcoholic will find he has much in common with these people, though he may differ with them on many matters.

If he does not argue about religion, he will make new friends and is sure to find new avenues of unselfish usefulness and pleasure. That was my problem with religion. I never could walk into a church because I argued about their policy. You know, their policy was, was didn't make sense to me and I wasn't really happy with it. So I prejudice myself right out of any benefits that I could have gotten from religion.

He and his family can be a bright spot in such congregations.

That's a nice promise. If we get sober, we have a spiritual experience, and we return to a church, we can be a bright spot in that church. He may bring New Hope and new courage to many a priest, minister, or rabbi who gives all his all to minister to our troubled world. We intend to forgot the foregoing as a helpful suggestion only So far as we are concerned, there is nothing obligatory about it.

As non denominational people we can, we cannot make up others minds for them. Each individual should consult his own conscience.

We've been speaking to you of serious, sometimes tragic things. We have been dealing with alcohol and its worst aspect, but we aren't a glum lot. If newcomers could see no joy or fun in our existence, they wouldn't want it. Have you ever been to one of those dark tunnel meetings where everybody just sits around like this? There's you tell a joke and they don't even smile? I mean, I, I've spoke at some meetings like that. There's like seven guys

and they're they're all like 60 years old and they just sit there like this,

you know, sober one more day today. And that's all you got today. You just got today. I mean, those are those are the type, those are the type of people that we're talking about here. We absolutely insist upon enjoying life. You know, if you, if you, if you're, if you're sober and you're, you've recovered, tell your face for God's sake. You know, you feel like telling these people,

you know, did a God damn life

and and go to a meeting where there's some enthusiasm and close that one down. You know what I mean?

Not that I not that I judged. We absolutely insist upon enjoying life. We try not to indulge in cynicism over the state of the nation's, nor do we carry the world's troubles on our shoulders.

You know, I used to just why are you drinking today? Because of the troubles in the Middle East,

you know good reason. When we see a man sinking into the mire that is alcoholism, we give him first aid in place what we have at his disposal for his sake. We do recount and almost relive the horrors of our past. But those of us who have tried to shoulder the entire burden and trouble of others find we are soon overcome by them.

So we think cheerfulness and laughter make for usefulness. Outsiders are sometimes shocked when we burst into merriment over a seemingly tragic experience out of the past. But why shouldn't we laugh? We have recovered and have been given the power to help others. That's a good promise. Everybody knows that those in bad health and those knows that those in bad health and that those who seldom pray do not laugh much. So let each family play together or separately as much as their circumstances warrant. We are sure God wants us to be happy

and free. Absolutely. We cannot subscribe to the belief that this life is a veil of tears, though it was once for that for many of us. But it is clear that we made our own misery. God did not do it. We have self will. We allowed self will to run riot. Our troubles are of our own making. And that's not an easy pill to swallow when you walk in here. But if you don't swallow it, you're not going to get free because if all your troubles are out there

out there is not going to change how you going to change everything out there.

So you're going to be a slave to it all still. But if you if you come to the realization, the truck, your troubles are of your own making, there's a way to get free of it. And this book will show you avoid then the deliberate manufacturer of misery. But if trouble comes, cheerfully capitalize it as an opportunity to demonstrate His omnipotence.

Usually I like to start off with

a reading of 11 kind or another, usually non conference approved. But I, I want to,

Dave sent me an e-mail today and I want to talk about this just for a brief moment.

Basically these are the 1998 chip sales by the Houston area Intergroup of Alcoholics Anonymous. What they do in the South is they do a poker chip system. You get a white, I believe it's a white desire chip. And what that is, is that's, that's like getting a 24 hour coin up here. It's you're, you're deciding to get sober and it's your first meeting.

So there were 19,000 desired chips in the Houston area purchased in 1998.

There were 79101 month. There was 5400 two months,

there was 4700 three months and you look down here to year, there was 18101 year chips. That's less than one in 10.

So if you assume that the people who get a desire chip, if they're sober, they'll get a one year chip, we're looking at a less than one in 10 people stay sober a year who come in desiring to stop drinking. And if you go down to like, let's go to 8 years, that's 557 eight-year chips,

that's like 40 to one,

OK? The reason I'm talking about this is because

if you're anything like me and you come into Alcoholics Anonymous, you don't want to drink again. I did not decide to come into a, A to, to take a month off of drinking or something. My life was such in the shitter that I, I just couldn't, I couldn't possibly go on living drinking and I couldn't go on living without drinking. And you know, when I came in,

I had decided that it was going to be for good and for all

if I could, to not drink again. And it's saying here that it's that you have a one in 40 chance of going eight years

when you walk through the door. Now, why is that? It says rarely have we seen a person fail who is thoroughly followed the path. Well, then how come one in 40 stay so over eight years if you believe these statistics? And I've got my own theory on that. And that's basically that you don't see, you don't see 39 of them following the path. And really, that's what this meeting was basically

brought into being about. It's, it's about

people sharing their current experience on how you practice the principles, how you thoroughly follow the path.

And I believe that the people that come to these this meeting here are interested in in learning and sharing their experience about that because it's very important. I don't know what happens to the 39 other people in the Houston area. I don't want to know

because when we go back out, it's not pretty safe. You know, we don't win awards for being good people and things like that. You know, we don't, we don't get Nobel Peace Prizes and and shit like that.

Just awful things happen to us. So anyway,

yeah, yeah, let's go to 20 years. I didn't want to depress anybody too much. 177 twenty year chance and 340 year chips.

That's like forty 000

and we could find a paper when we had 20 years 1955 and they published the 2nd edition. They listened to statistics in the board. We assembly fathers in the recovery rate A or Y

versus like less than 1%. What's gonna mean?

And that's why I said good to see you. So the grandpa's as well.

So anyway, the, the positive thing about these statistics really is, is you don't have to be one of the 39. The proper use of the willpower is to to thoroughly follow the path. And we can do that if we know what it is. And, and we're going to talk a little bit about that tonight. We're going to start on page 133 in the family afterward,

one paragraph down.

OK, 3133

now about health. A body badly burned by alcohol does not often recover overnight, nor do twisted thinking and depression vanish in a twinkling. We are convinced that a spiritual mode of living is the most powerful health restorative. That's that's a nice statement right there, And I've found that to be true. We who have recovered from serious drinking are miracles of mental health, but we have seen remarkable transformations in our bodies. Hardly one of our crowd now shows any mark of dissipation.

This isn't always true, but it's certainly true in my case. I'm probably I bumped into my, my ex boss making an amends and he hadn't seen me in about seven or eight years. And his words to me were

Chris, you're a young man. That's what he said. I looked older eight years before when I was drinking than I do now that, that I'm sober. It's absolutely true. And I believe in body, mind and spirit. So, so I, I, I exercise a lot.

I'm probably in the best physical condition that I've ever been in. That's not always true, but it certainly can be. At least we're afforded the opportunity if we stay sober.

But this does not mean that we disregard human health measures. God has abundantly supplied this world with fine doctors, psychologists, and practitioners of various kinds. Do not hesitate to take your health problems to such persons. I'm glad that it doesn't say drinking problems. Most of them get frilly to themselves that their fellows may enjoy sound minds and bodies. Try to remember that though God has brought miracles among us, we should never belittle a good doctor or psychiatrist.

Their services are often indispensable in treating a newcomer and and in following his case Afterward.

One of the many doctors who had the opportunity of reading this book in manuscript form told us that the use of sweets was often helpful. Of course, depending upon a doctor's advice. He thought all Alcoholics should have constantly have chocolate available for its quick energy value at times of fatigue. They've learned a lot about alcoholism since these days. And. You go into a sugar withdrawal when you quit drinking, if you've really been drinking like a sumbitch. You go into sugar withdrawal when you start detoxing because your body is used to

absorbing a lot of sugar. Alcohol is hugely

filled with sugar, so all of a sudden you're not drinking the sugar. You're going to bounce all over the place. You're going to chirp like a squirrel.

He added that occasionally in the night, a vague craving arose which would be satisfied by candy. Many of us have noticed a tendency to eat sweets and have found this practice beneficial. I'm one of them, Yeah, you know what I mean? Maybe one of these days we'll we'll recover from the sugar thing. But I've, I've given up. I've given up a lot of things on the way

and we'll work on that.

The word about sex relations. Alcohol is so sexually stimulating that some to some men that they have overindulged. Couples are occasionally dismayed to find that when drinking is stopped, the man tends to be impotent. I don't think this is true nowadays, and I think I can prove it with a show of hands. Anybody here that's impotent because of alcohol, please raise your hand. Men in their see it just doesn't happen.

Well,

question. That's what one one in 30. You know, that's pretty good. Anyway,

unless the reason is understood, there may be an emotional upset. I can imagine some of us have had this experience only to enjoy in a few months finer intimacy than ever. There should be no hesitancy in consulting a doctor or psychologist if the condition persists and we now have that wonder drug Viagra for anybody.

We do not know of many cases where this difficulty lasted long.

The alcoholic may find it hard to reestablish friendly relations with his children now. That's certainly true. Their young minds were impressionable when he was drinking without saying so. They may cordially hate him for what he has done to them and to their mother. The children are sometimes dominated by a pathetic hardness and cynicism.

They cannot seem to forgive and forget. This may hang on for months, long after their mother has accepted Dad's new way of living and thinking.

In time they will see that he is a Newman, and in their own way, they will let him know it. When this happens, they can be invited to join in morning meditation, and then they can take part in the daily discussion without rancor bias. From that point on, progress will be rapid. Marvelous results often follow such a reunion. This has got to be at least the third time they've talked about involving the family and morning meditation. They talk about that being the forgotten paragraph when we're reading the 11th step. But it certainly was an Oxford Group,

Oxford Group practice and it followed through into early Alcoholics Anonymous as we know it. It's one of those things that I think that they, they, they kind of let slide a little bit. You know, you don't see too many sponsors these days really, really pushing that at home, you know what I mean? But it certainly has its benefits

whether the family goes on a spiritual basis or not. The alcoholic member member has to if he would recover,

the others must be convinced of his new status beyond the shadow of a doubt. Seeing is believing the most families who have lived with a drinker. Here's a case in point. I love this. Remember that Bill Wilson drank like 20-5 pots of coffee a day and he smoked himself to death. He had emphysema. His last talk. They had to pump him up with oxygen. And every few minutes, you know, he he start to go like this and they'd have to pump the sumbitch up again. You know, I mean he smoked his lungs right right out of his body.

So keep that in mind when we're going through this next paragraph. Here's a case in .1 of our friends is a heavy smoker and coffee drinker. There was no doubt he overindulged seeing this and meaning to be helpful, his wife commenced to admonish him about it. He probably had current experience with that. He admitted that he was overdoing these things, but frankly said that he was not ready to stop. His wife is one of those persons who really feels there is something rather sinful about these commodities. So she nagged and her intolerance finally

to a fit of anger and he got drunk. Of course our friend was wrong, dead wrong. He had the painfully admit that and mend his spiritual offenses.

Though he is now a most effective member of Alcoholics Anonymous, he still smokes and drinks coffee. But neither his wife nor anyone else stands in judgment. God damn it,

she says she was wrong to make a burning issue out of such a matter when his more serious ailments were being rapidly cured. We have 3 little monos which are apropos here. They are First things first and through study of the earlier literature. First things first is is is basically

the your your recovery. Keep your recovery first, keep your relationship with God first, and all the other things will follow.

Live and let live. That has a lot to do with what we learned in the 3rd and 4th step about how we try to manipulate and control people. And Easy does it, which I don't think Easy ever did anything from it, but Easy does it. Is is is one of them

Not one of my favorites, But anyway, let's do a little bit of two employers.

Here's some oral history. I'm not absolutely sure about the validity of this because there's just not a lot of people who who were alive when this was written that were really connected with it to to a great degree. There were some of the secretaries that Bill Wilson had for him. But one of the one of the bits of oral history is a man named Hank Parkhurst was instrumental in writing this chapter. Hank was

the type of person who he actually worked on the Panama Canal and he was like one of those straw bosses who he was very, very powerful individual. And he he he he managed a lot of people at one period of time, more so than anybody else really in the group that were that was pursuing this big book. So the oral history goes that he was really influential in the writing of this chapter. He ended up getting drunk soon after,

either after or soon soon before the Big Book was published

and got very, very resentful toward Bill Wilson because he thought he would become one of the grand high muckety mucks and Alcoholics Anonymous because of his his penning this chapter. And he went, he went about all the the AA groups, which there weren't many at this time in the New York area, scumbagging Bill Wilson saying like what a jerky was he, you know, he ripped me off. And another bit of the oral history was Hank owned 1/3 of the stock in the Big Book and and turned it over,

turned it back over to Will Bill Wilson and his his influence while he was drinking

and found out later that that might have been a mistake. How many millions of copies of the Big Book have been published today?

Yeah, that's, you know, even in a buck a book, you know, that that was a that was a financial faux pas of magnanimous proportions. I would say so anyway,

whether or not all that's true, that's that's some of the oral history.

Many employers nowadays. We think 1 member who is we think of 1 member who has spent much of his life in the world of big business and that would be hanged. He is hired and fired hundreds of men. He knows the Alcoholics as the employer sees him.

His present views ought to prove exceptionally useful to businessmen everywhere. But let him tell you. I was at one time assistant manager of a corporation department employing 6600 men. One day my secretary came in saying that Mister B insisted upon speaking with me. I told her to say that I was not interested.