The forewords to the Big Book at West End Big Book Awakening meeting in St. Paul, MN

Good morning. I'm Barb. I'm an alcoholic. I'm Amy. I'm an alcoholic. Welcome to Big Book Awakening, St. Paul's West End Club. Saturday morning Big Book study. Thanks for listening today. As a Big Book study, the goal of this recording is to increase our collective knowledge of the book Alcoholics Anonymous by sharing with each other. Today we're going to start with the preface and all of the forwards. Actually, what we're going to do is start on the title page.

The second sheet of paper in the book is the title page. It says Alcoholics Anonymous,

the story of how many thousands of men and women have recovered from alcoholism. That right there is a first promise in the book. Recovered being in past tense, not being in present tense. We're not still recovering today. Today I'm recovered from alcoholism. I'm recovered from the seemingly hopeless state of mind and body. This book teaches a way that Alcoholics can stay happy and sober by a knowledge of three things. And we're going to refer back to these three things through the board and preface.

One is the problem,

that is what alcoholism is. It's an allergy of the body and and an obsession of the mind. Two is the solution. We must find a higher power and we can find a higher power via a spiritual awakening. And three is a practical program of action, the 12 steps to get #2 to occur. Going to pass it off to Barb for starting with the preface. So in the preface, the main thing I picked up out of the preface for, for what we're talking about is that

this book has become the basic text

for, for our organization and it has helped large numbers of alcoholic men and women to recover. And what this is telling me is that if I read and follow the instructions in this basic text, I will recover, no question about it. And then in the forward to the 1st edition, it's Roman numeral 13. In, in my book,

we, we have Alcoholics Anonymous are more than 100 men and women

who have recovered from a seemingly hopeless state of mind and body.

You know, when I first read that, I don't think I understood what, what they were talking about, but I lived in that. It was not seemingly. I lived in a hopeless state of mind and body for good 10 years before I got desperate enough to to come up here. I, I lived in in a place where I would wake up every morning and scream at the ceiling.

Why am I here? I had no reason to be alive that I could see. And then I would just start popping pills and head off to work and, and do my thing and come home and drink myself to bed, pop a couple benzos, go to sleep and, and every day, every day for about 10 years, this was how I lived. And I thought I was fine. If you had asked me during that time, Barb, how you doing? It'd be I'm fine. I'm fine.

How are you? However, it was a hopeless state of mind and body. I did not like me. I did not like my life

and this book and the program in this book has totally removed that, the difference between then and now, it's not the difference between night and day, it's the difference between death and life. And there is no question about it in my life. So precisely how we have recovered is the main purpose of this book. And again

and we have to do is follow the instructions as they are in the book and I'll pass it back to Amy. Awesome, thanks, Barb. I like that. Also precisely how we have recovered. It is obviously Alcoholics Anonymous is helps people to not drink, but what it has really helped me with the not drinking part is kind of a side effect of what the program has done for my life. It helps me with the way I think I spent.

I spent a good chunk of time sober

between not using and starting a program. And in that period of time I saw how my thinking causes a lot of problems. I I think things are bad, I react as though they're bad and then I literally make them bad. And today I don't do that to the extent that I used to, and I definitely don't do it to the extent that drinking seems like a really good solution. And this program it. It's weird because the not drinking is

an effect, but it isn't the main effect for me. It's kind of a

side effect of straightening out my thinking.

So yeah, going on Roman numeral 13 on a Roman numeral 14, the second page to the forward of the 1st edition at the top, is kind of an interesting tidbit. The only requirement for membership is an honest desire to stop drinking. And what is cool about that is on page 24 in there's a solution. At the top of the page is a sentence that says at a certain point in the drinking of every alcoholic, he passes into a state where the most powerful desire to stop drinking is

absolutely no avail. So it's kind of interesting that there's more needed to work this program than just being a member. The only requirement for membership is not enough to help keep us sober. Just being a member isn't enough to get number two of the three things that we mentioned at the beginning of this recording. The solution We actually have to work the steps.

So Barb's going to start talking about kind of the history as seen in the Florida, the 2nd edition on Roman numeral 15.

So we'll go back a little bit in the early 30s

and they talk about in the early 30s of fellow named Roland Hazard, who was just a terrible, terrible alcoholic. But even even before that, and before the before the the Great War, as they called it, there was a, there was a group gathering up in Manchester, Vermont. And that included the Thatcher family and the Hazard family and Wilson. And there was a young woman from the Bronx

named Lois whose family summered up there.

So some of these people, they knew each other when they were, they're kind of growing up, you know. And anyway, the, the war happened and, and everybody got older. Bill married Lois, but Roland Hazard had a a fierce alcohol problem. And he stood to inherit millions from the family. And the family was was doing everything they could to get him fixed and

nothing in this country work that. So they sent him over to Switzerland

to work with Doctor Young and drive. Young treated Roland for about a year and then sent him on his way. And Roland got as far as Paris. And somebody asked Roland the wrong question, which was do you want to drink? So Roland was rolling around in in the Paris mud for about 3 days and his friends got him back to Doctor Young. He thought he was going to try Young again. So he'll go back and and get that help again.

And he got too young and and Young said there is nothing I can do.

There's absolutely nothing I can do.

And what what Roland has at this point is it's a combination. And, and on page 60 in the ABC's, those those three things we need.

So A is we're alcoholic and we can't manage our lives. Roland went back to Young. I think I believe in that state. And what Jung told Roland essentially was B, no human power is going to relieve our alcoholism. What Young gave to Roland was the absolute desperation that he needed

is when he finally said, doctor, Are you sure there's no way? And Young said, well, you know, I've seen some people recover after some kind of a religious or spiritual experience. And prior to this time, Roland was an interest in the spiritual experience. I mean, I know before I came up here, I sure wasn't interested in any kind of a spiritual experience, you know, you know, unless it came from the drugs. But

so Roland went back to the States and he got hooked up with the Oxford Group and then later when

and was shooting pigeons out in Manchester, the family had sent him back to Vermont to get him out of their way. And he was mad because the pigeons were crapping on his paint job. And he said cheer outside and started shooting them. And by that time, people in town were Pretty Little fed up with that. We took them before a judge. He had one call to make. He called Roland. Roland came bail. Debbie out said, you know, leave him with us. And they took Roland to the Oxford Group and Roland got it. Roland came down

New York and he got it and he was doing some outreach work in New York and he remembered Bill Wilson. So Evie took the message to Bill and that's that's later. And that's later in the story

before Bill goes to Akron in May of 35. In Akron itself, there is an Oxford group already. And what happened? There was a guy named

Jim Newton was hired on by Harvey Firestone to be a an executive assistant

and and Newton knew about the Oxford Group. Firestone had a son who was a fierce alcoholic. Newton took the son on a business trip, took him to the Oxford Group. The son was cured. So Firestone's like, well, we got to have Oxford Group in Akron. So they got Oxford Group in Akron and Bob was dragged to the Oxford Group in Akron. Bob had a had an alcohol problem that he thought nobody knew about.

And

in right around May of 35 was the first time Bob was at the Oxford group and he confessed to that group that he had an alcoholic problem. And so the practice of the group was to pray for a month when somebody, some member confessed some problem they had. So the whole group was praying for Bob in May of 35. And then a call comes in from the Mayflower Hotel.

Bill calls Henrietta Cyberlane, who lives in the coach House of the Firestone. She's the daughter-in-law

and and of course, what she says when Bill causes I've been expecting your call and I just, I get goosebumps when I figure that, you know that. Yeah. They were praying. So they expected a miracle to happen and crazy it did. And and that started a a when Bill met Bob at that at the at Henrietta's coach house in Akron. And the rest, as they say, is here

what Bill gave Bob. You know,

Bill, Bill had been talking to Silk Worth about how he's working with all these drunks and nothing's working. And he had been dragging drugs out of the bars in New York and and filling them full of his white light spiritual experience. And they weren't interested. You know, they're like, yeah, I mean, I get, I get that when I drink Rumble and. And. And so Silkworth told Bill you need to talk to him about your experience. And So what happened with Bob? Bob didn't want to go see Bill. He didn't want to go see some stockbroker from New York. Editor

Alcoholism, You know, I I wouldn't either.

They dragged him. They dragged him over to Henrietta's. He was going to talk to Bill for 15 minutes and they ended up meeting for five hours. And what Bill did for Bob, because Bob already hit the spiritual solution. Bob had the Oxford Group.

He couldn't stop drinking. He couldn't. He didn't know what that was all about. And it turns out it's a disease. Silk Worth had given Bill the knowledge that alcoholism is a disease. Like you said, it's a disease of the mind and of the body. And with that, Bob was able to quit. And we give it back to Amy here. Awesome. It is amazing how

many different people were involved in Bill getting all of the knowledge for this program to become a thing.

As Barb said, he got #1 from Silkworth, he got that alcoholic suffer from two things of physical allergy. Once alcohol enters the body, we have an allergy and we can't stop drinking. I think about when I was drinking, there was never enough. Like if I if I threw up, that wasn't enough. That just made my room. If I ran out, that wasn't enough. I'd go roaming the town looking for more, breaking into frat houses, whatever it took.

And we have an obsession of the mind. We can't not drink again.

If I had been able to form a coherent enough thought of, hey, this is kind of causing me a problem. Failing out of college is kind of a problem. Getting kicked out of the sorority, that I mean, is kind of a problem. Crashing my car, getting arrested, going to jail, being forced into treatment is kind of a problem. That would have been enough for me to stop drinking, but it wasn't because we can't not drink again. In addition to the physical allergy, we have an obsession of the mind. Silkworth gave that info to Bill.

Number two came from Abby, Abby said. People like you and me have to have a higher power.

We can get this via a spiritual awakening, but we need a way to get that. That's what Barb was saying Bob had. Bob was a member of the Oxford Group. He got he needed a spiritual awakening, but he didn't have number one. He didn't know exactly what the problem was, and he didn't have #3 he didn't know how to get the spiritual awakening. Like what way works what the Oxford Group was had, what were six tenants. These became the 12 steps

on page 59 in the Big Book

in How it works. That is where the steps are listed,

the tenants. You can see how the steps came from the tenants of the Oxford Group.

The tenants went like this complete deflation, which is kind of like step one, dependence on God, kind of like our Step 3. Moral inventory is straight up our Step 4, Confession is our Step 5, restitution is our step 9, and continued work with others in need is our step 12. So you can see the ones that ended up getting added to that. Abby was actively doing continued work with others in need,

the 6th tenant of the Oxford Group, our 12 step when he met with Bill and ended up giving Bill the final piece to be able to start getting sober.

On page

27 in the on page 2919, page 19 in the Roman numeral forward to the second edition.

Oh,

this is a start of the traditions on page 19, which is kind of cool. You can see the first thoughts that Bill was having that ended up becoming our traditions.

The steps are the principles by which the individual alcoholic could live. They're the things that we do in our own lives to be able to have a spiritual awakening. But to keep a A together, we needed to develop principles by which the A A groups and a A as a whole could survive and function effectively. And Barb is going to walk through the traditions on these pages.

Thanks, Amy. Just a minute on the on the steps. I was watching a Bill W documentary and he was talking about writing Chapter 5 and everybody up until he wrote Chapter 5. They published a book and started practicing. 12 Steps had been doing the the six tenants of the Oxford Group,

and what he was saying in the documentary was that he had to figure out a way that those drunks couldn't wiggle out of the program. So that's why that's why we ended up with 12 instead of 6.

So, and, and again on page Roman numeral 19 or XIX, we had to unify our fellowship or pass off the scene. And that that's tradition one. Our our common welfare has to come first. Personal recovery depends on a a unity,

a tradition

two which is for a group purpose. There is one ultimate authority and it's a couple of sentences down was thought no alcoholic man or woman could be excluded. Our leaders might serve but never govern. Each group has to be autonomous and it's it's also tradition

three, anybody can join. Anybody who wants to stop drinking can join. Nobody asks you if you're sure you want to stop drinking. There's no membership card. There are no membership fees.

Anybody can walk into this room and and start talking with a fellow alcoholic on the

tradition for each

each group has to be autonomous and that says that right there this this also that there's to be no professional class of therapy. This saved my life just really saved my life. I had been to therapist for years. I lined their pockets big time and then and I spent a lot of money going to treatment and and it was my money. I cashed in the four O 1 Ki didn't didn't come under insurance that

and

and as long as I was paying these people, I,

I didn't have to pay any attention to what they said because I was the one who had the power. As long as I had the bucks, I had the power, right. I get out of treatment, I move into a sober house. I start working with a sponsor and I'm trying to figure what's her angle? What's going on here? Why is she spending this time? Why is she doing this? And, and for the first time, one-on-one with a fellow human being, to be able to share that,

that desperation

that I had, that desperation that drove me up here, that that hopeless condition of mind and body, to be able to share that with a fellow human being was the opening that let me begin my real process of recovery. So, so that's a pretty important one. No professional class of therapy in a A I mean, it's not that you know, you can, you can do it anywhere else.

Let's see what else I got there. No fees or dues. Expenses were to be met by your own voluntary contribution.

Again, that's part of the non professional tradition. 7/7 thanks. It is there

the least possible organization even in our service centers, which is 9 public relations based on attraction rather than promotion. We want people to see what they want in us. We we don't need to go on on the corner and and beat the drum

1111 that was 11 all right. And

anonymous is, is 12 still 11? Is it

Anonymity is a spiritual foundation. It's 12, but it's also eleven with the public relations rate. Yeah, kind of a combo. Cause 12 isn't mentioned otherwise, right. In no circumstances should we give endorsements, make alliances or enter in any other public controversies. And that's it. And that's 10. And that's where that's where we're not. I was in, I was in the Intergroup office the other day and somebody, somebody called in and.

The kid who was answering the phone was recommending where they should take that person for treatment. So when he was done with the call, I said, you know, we don't really do that

as an eating office. We don't recommend treatment Centers for people and and that's because

like I said in my story anyway, if I knew that a A was associated with a treatment center, I would figure that I was paying them and and so I wouldn't have to listen to them. And that was what I had on the traditions. Back to you. Awesome. So on the next page, page 20 in the Roman numerals for to the second edition, there's some statistics which are kind of interesting, says of Alcoholics who came to a A and really tried. 50% got sober at once and remained that way,

25% sobered up after some relapses and among the remainder, those who stayed on with a A showed improvement. So if you think about when this book was written, there weren't, there weren't sponsors, there weren't meetings, there wasn't even a program. This was the beginning of the program

I these statistics are are were written when people who came to a a were low bottom drunks. It was like you were you were desperate as hell at this moment in time to come to a meeting.

That's what the statistics were. So when people are low bottom ready to die, there is no other solution. There's no wig room. There's no other way 50% got sober at once. The statistics aren't quite the same today from what I understand, which makes sense because now we have, I mean, I see commercials for treatment programs I on television. What got me into treatment wasn't that I was about to die. Technically, what got me into treatment was that I

my car, for the first time, I was caught drinking and driving. Not the first time I drank, drove just the first time. But my car stopped moving and I was forced to sit on the side of the road until a police officer pulled up.

The statistics now are different because people aren't low bottom drunks. This program is really not appealing in a lot of ways. If there's another way out. If there's not another way out, or at the moment I decided holy shit, this is really too uncomfortable to continue to live this way. In my head. My life wasn't actually technically entirely falling apart at the moment that I decided I was going to actually give this program a whirl. I was just so uncomfortable

inside that it seemed that the drastic steps required the the drastic steps of the book were better seem more appealing than just my everyday thinking in my head.

Moving on to the third and 4th edition

just kind of goes over the difference. I'm not actually sure what they talk about. Let me read them really fast

I think. I think all we marked was at one alcoholic sharing experience, strength and health with another.

That's that's our mission. Yeah, that is it's what you talked about when you said that even getting therapy, everything beforehand, if you could see someone else's angle, then things become less palatable in some way.

I think about when I was going to therapy, I didn't I didn't talk to my therapist about things that were actually going on. Remember when I was first put in treatment, it wasn't related to a A at all. Trying to do a fourth step, a fifth step like, no, that that was not happening because this treatment center was being it was part of my probation. I had to pass treatment. Then when I came to a A and met, actually met with a sponsor for the first time, met a person who I was like, all right, you

be my sponsor. I heard that you should ask someone to be your sponsor if they have what you want. And she literally had a cookie. I like cookies. That was my, that was my threshold. I asked her to be my sponsor and then meeting with her and trying to figure out what is her angle like? What is she like a teacher? Is she like a parent? Is she like a police officer? What is the hoop that I need to jump through? But she wasn't any of those things. She didn't care if I stayed sober. She just cared if she stayed sober. And that was the big deal to me. Each day at the bottom of 22

Roman numerals, bottom of the four to 33rd edition. Each day is somewhere in the world. Recovery begins when one alcoholic talks with another alcoholic. Sharing experience, strength and hope.

All right, I think that's a rip. Awesome. Thanks guys.