The Salt River intergroup roundup sponsorship workshop in Scottsdale, AZ

Well, good morning, everybody.

My name is Bill and I'm an alcoholic.

It's always interesting to see who shows up for an 830 workshop

Strange group, so I feel right at home.

I'd like to start off with something. This is a workshop on sponsorship. So we're going to talk about a lot of things about that, about where it came from, a little bit of the history of it, how it works. And because we're kind of a small group, maybe we'll get into some Q&A or

give you guys a chance to express your opinion rather than just mine. And So what I'd like to do is I'd like to start off this with a 2 minute meditation. And if you would, let's think about the people that were here when we got here, the people that were kind to us, somebody that got us a cup of coffee, showed us the ropes and helped us find a seed in the meeting. And

maybe called us unsolicited just to see how we were doing. Those people that really

kept us here, most of us don't really remember what they said to us,

but we sure remember how we were treated. And it was rough out there for a long time. And you walk into a A and a A to me is a very safe place. It should be a very safe place. And mostly I think it is. So let's let's think about those people. Maybe just give a little thanks or just picture their faces in our memory. We'll do it for a couple of minutes.

Thank you.

It's a quick two minutes, wouldn't it?

Umm. So our topic this morning is sponsorship.

I get to do this a lot around the country, which is a real gift. Visit different places, go to different places and talk to people and do some workshops. And

I got sober in Southern California, in the South Bay. I live in Torrance and it is a hotbed of sobriety. There is birthday singing and cakes and everybody claps after everybody shares and it's just kind of a zoo. And that's my home. That's my culture. That's where I got sober. So when I go around the country and they're not singing Happy Birthday and they're not clapping and they're not, I go, what is wrong with these people?

Walked into Alano clubs and actually seen a sign on the wall that says we don't care how you do it in California? Because I think they think we're a little pushy and arrogant, you know, and probably some truth to that.

But here in Phoenix, I understand that it's much the same. I get down in my family's from here and I've been down here quite a bit. And in our part of the country, in our area, there is a real ethic of sponsorship.

It's real hard to go to meetings where I'm from anyway

where that is not talked about. Get a sponsor, work the steps, go to lots of meetings. You hear that incessantly. In other parts of the country, it's not really the case.

There is a movement afoot,

Wally P, my buddy. Back to basics, and people will talk about the fact that we've lost our edge,

that our success rate isn't what it once was,

that we're not as effective as we used to be in Alcoholics Anonymous. I think that's completely wrong. I think we're as effective and as dynamic and aggressive and successful as we've ever been, and we'll talk about that a little bit. I'll give you a reason why I feel that way.

Alcoholics Anonymous came from an organization called the Oxford Group.

Bill and Bob were both members of the Oxford Group.

The way Bill met Bob was through the Oxford Group.

Henrietta Sieberling was Anne Smith's sponsor in the Oxford Group.

When they got together,

Bob finally stopped drinking.

They went to Oxford Group meetings. They were the alcoholic squad of the Oxford Group. Bill Wilson was kicked out of the Oxford Group in New York. The reason he was kicked out of the Oxford Group is because he wasn't Maximum.

They wanted him as part of the businessman's group because he was a stock speculator and he had a lot of connections in Wall Street,

and they wanted him to work within that community to try to bring people into the organization. And all Bill wanted to do is work with those drunks,

so they kicked him out.

When the first meeting started,

they were having meetings in Akron at the,

what was his name, T Henry's house. And the the the meetings got too large. They were bringing in too many drunks. Most of them weren't staying sober. So they finally started a meeting in King's school, which I believe is still going on in Akron. And Clarence Snyder, down in Cleveland, was the first guy to start a meeting called Alcoholics Anonymous.

They weren't so connected to the Oxford Group,

but the Oxford Group teaching was one-on-one. Evangelism, they called it. They called themselves soul surgeons

and what they would do. They didn't gather people together in large tents and try to convert them. They weren't really a church. They were a non denominational Christian organization. But they were a movement. They had aspirations. They wanted to change the world. They're still around today. They're called initiatives of change. I visited their place in coast Switzerland last year. Just remarkable. They're still active, vibrant organization.

And so when they formed Alcoholics Anonymous, they went with what they knew.

The Oscar group had house parties where they shared,

they gave testimony and they each one shared their story. They lined people up together, people with similar problems or similar issues. Even if they weren't called problems, they would say, well, why don't you 2 get together and meditate together?

And what they would do, these two people, the sponsor and the sponsee, would sit and meditate. They would have an issue or something that they were concerned about possibly. And they would meditate for a period of time and they would have a pad in the paper. And after they got done with the meditation, they sat down and they wrote out what God said to them, 'cause they fully expected to receive an answer.

Then just to be careful, they shared that with each other to make sure it wasn't the devil

you know, cleared it through somebody else, you know, and, and they had four steps. A lot of times you hear it talk about 6 steps, but they were really only four and they added a couple when they for before the book was ever written, wrote.

So Wilson and Smith went with what they knew. This is what they knew.

Wilson was very open about the fact that all of one day at a time, God as you understand God, all that stuff came from the Oxford Group.

There are some really interesting books written where you can take the big book and then apply it to Oxford Group writings and it's just plagiarism. You know, the 12:00 and 12:00, which our speaker last night was the first time I'd ever heard anybody in Alcoholics Anonymous talk so much about the 12 and 12 and actually read from it from a podium. Some would consider that heresy,

but the 12 and 12 is a very different document, isn't it? I mean, if you've read it, I mean, it's 15 years after he got sober. And mostly it's about his defects of character. Mr. Wilson. You can track his life through a, a writing, you know, 'cause he wrote about himself. And that's why we identify with him, very similar to him.

Well, in the 1940s, after the book came out,

when they wrote the book, Wilson actually went to Sam Shoemaker, who was the minister of Calvary Chapel. And he said, Sam,

we need to write a book, and I want you to write it because Shoemaker was very prolific, real charismatic, Billy Graham said about Sam Shoemaker. If Sam Shoemaker hadn't have died of cancer in the early 60s, you would have never heard of me.

Shoemaker was a big deal in the United States. He was the head of the Oxford Group movement in the US, He's Episcopalian minister, spoke a lot on college campuses and stuff. And he was just a, and this is, I can wander off into the history of a A, but he had a lot to do with the founding of Alcoholics Anonymous. And I think probably more than anybody, he was Wilson's sponsor, somebody that Wilson really listened to.

Well, he went to Sam and he said, write the book.

Shoemaker in his brilliant said, no, Bill, this is your gig. You know you do it. I'll help, but you can do this. And so Wilson sat down and started doing it. And as you know, they passed it around. They kind of edited it and they softened it up. Well,

the 75% success rate

comes from the forward to the second edition

and it talks about 75% of the people get sober, 50% sober up right away and stay that way. Another 25% after a slip or two, they get sober and the other 25% show improvement.

And where do you get this statistics? You get these statistics

from a failed stock speculator,

a shaky handed proctologist

who they pretty much kept out of the loop. Bob was just working with people. You can bill, you go ahead and promote. And I'm going to go over here and Hank Parkhurst who is a used car salesman, these are the guys that came up with phony stock certificates to works publishing to try to raise money and some of those are still floating around.

And so 75%, how do they know?

How do they know 75%

1939 They wrote the book and they sent it out there and they made, they called the steps suggestions.

Any of us that have been around a while know that that's bullshit. You know, you pretty much have to do something if you want to stay around here. But they call them suggestions. They said we instead of you. They softened it. They softened it and they sent it out there hoping to get people to respond. This was a sales tool and I think unabashedly so. I mean, this is what they wanted. They wanted to get, they knew they had something really worthwhile

and they wanted to market it. Remember, his idea was to build hospitals from one end of the country to the other, which is pretty much happened.

Not the way he envisioned it, but it's pretty much happened, hasn't it?

I mean, recovery is an industry. It's an industry now. It's hip now. Who knew? No.

Well, in 1941, Bob Smith, old Bob over here, just working with people, came up with a an incredible document. It's called the Akron Manual.

I've got a sign up list here if anybody would like to get copies of this stuff that I'm going to quote from you. Put your name and e-mail address and I'll e-mail it to you.

The Akron Manual

surface that some years ago and

I believe this is what they were really doing compared to what was written in the book or what was known publicly.

So I'm going to quote you a few little lines from the Akron Manual, which is the real eye opening.

This is written to the newcomer and to the sponsor.

Another thing you hear, sponsorship is not mentioned in the big book. It is 2.

The Big Book is much bigger than 164 pages. People seem to forget that there are stories in the back part of the book all about sponsorship.

Explain that we are not in the business of sobering up drunks merely to have them go on another Bender.

Explain that our aim is total and permanent sobriety.

What happened to One Day at a Time?

Definition of an Alcoholic Anonymous?

An Alcoholic Anonymous is an alcoholic who, through application of an adherence to the rules laid down by the organization, has completely forsworn the use of any and all alcoholic beverages.

The moment he wittingly drink so much as a drop of beer, wine, spirits, or any other alcoholic drink, he automatically loses all status as a member of Alcoholics Anonymous.

AA is not interested in sobering up drunks who are not sincere in their desire to remain completely sober for all time.

Not one time in this thing does it say one day at a time,

and that's a pretty thick thing. Not once. There is no one day at a time in this thing.

These guys were serious

to the newcomer.

It is your life. It is your choice. If you are not completely convinced to your own satisfaction that you are an alcoholic, that your life has become unmanageable. If you are not ready to part with alcohol forever, it would be better for all concerned if you discontinued reading this and give up the idea of becoming a member of Alcoholics Anonymous.

Sweet Doctor Bob,

remember when I first read this? I called my sponsor, went whoa dude, I can't believe this. These guys were cruel.

A word to the sponsor. You must fulfill all pledges you make to him, either tangible or intangible. If you cannot fulfill a promise, do not make it. You have in your hands the most valuable property in the world, the future of a fellow man. Treat his life as carefully as you would your own. You are literally responsible for his life.

Bit much?

Alcoholics Anonymous is 100% effective for those who faithfully follow the rules.

100% effective.

It is those who try to cut corners who find themselves back in their old drunken state.

Before long you will have a new thrill, the thrill of helping someone else.

There is no greater satisfaction in the world than watching the progress of a new Alcoholic Anonymous. No whiskey in the world can give you this thrill.

Above all, remember this. Keep the rules in mind.

As long as you follow them, you are on firm ground, but the least deviation, and you are vulnerable

as a new member. Remember that you are one of the most important cogs in the machinery of a A. Without the work of the new member, AAA could not have grown as it has. You will bring into this work a fresh enthusiasm, the zeal of a crusader. You will want everyone to share with you the blessings of this new life. You will be tireless in your efforts to help others. And it is a splendid enthusiasm. Cherish it as long as you can. That's a really beautiful paragraph, I think.

I mean, this is what these guys were experiencing.

They were out, they were going to hospitals and they would go into a hospital and they would go down the beds and they would ask each one of these guys, do you want to stop drinking? Do you realize that you have a problem or do you want to we have a way out, do you want to stop? And if the guy said yes, they would bring him into a meeting. If he said no, they just went on to the next bed.

So they called them out.

They didn't try to sell this thing to somebody that wasn't interested. If there was somebody sitting there that was really hurting, they would bring these guys out of the hospital. They'd start working with them, start talking with them and, and, and they would get sober and they would see their lives change. God, they were just pumped up. They weren't writing inventories.

They were saving souls

every day. What Can you imagine how exciting that must have been in the early days when it was like, you know, one week you go to a meeting, there's five people there. You know, three weeks later there's 15

and then two 3-4 months later there's a hundred. I mean, that's what it was happening. That's what was happening. Can you imagine the phone calls between Akron and New York as they were? They were trading ideas. They were talking. How do you, how do you convey this? They didn't know how to convey it. They did not know how to convey it, especially before the book. They didn't have any structure. They just knew that they were sober and that they sat down, they talked with each other. Remember, Wilson came from New York, where he was dragging people to his apartment.

And they were just drinking. He never saved a soul Silk. We're told him quit preaching religion and tell your story. The non alcoholic told him, shut up, Bill, you know, you know, I don't think they want to hear about Jesus. You know, there's nothing worse than a born again agnostic, you know, it goes out there. Or a recovered smoker, you know, or somebody who's suddenly become vegetarian, you know?

Not that any of us identify with,

for you are ready to sponsor some poor alcoholic who is desperately in need of help, both human and divine. So God bless you.

I love this one. This is great. This is the capper, I think. Really,

you aren't very important in this world.

If you lose your job, someone better will replace you.

If you die, your wife will mourn briefly and then remarry.

Your children will grow up and you will be but a memory.

In the last analysis, you are the only one who benefits by your sobriety.

Seek to cultivate humility. Remember that cockiness leads to a speedy fall.

Medical men will tell you that Alcoholics are all alike and at least one respect. They are emotionally immature.

In other words, Alcoholics have not learned to think like adults.

You know what you hear in a a meetings is you hear about this thing called alcoholic thinking

as if there really is such a thing.

It's emotional immaturity

and we say no, I have special thinking.

It can't be. I have special thinking

and you need to consider that when you're dealing with me. I have special thanking.

I think we're just immature, as painful as that might be.

At meetings, don't criticize the leader. He has his own problems.

This is a 1941. The same shit was going on you know,

and is doing the best he can to solve them. Help him along by standing up and saying a few words. He will appreciate your kindness and thoughtfulness.

Don't criticize the methods of others. Strangely enough, you may change your own ideas as you become older in sobriety. Remember there are a dozen roads from Chicago to New York, but they all land in Chicago. Or something like that.

How soon you will be cleared of a desire to drink is another matter that depends entirely upon how quickly you can succeed in changing your fundamental outlook on life.

For as your outlook changes for the better, desire will become less pronounced until it disappears almost entirely.

It may be weeks or it may be months. Your sincerity and your capacity for working with others on the AAA program will determine the length of time.

Here's the closer

Alcoholics Anonymous is based on a set of laws known as the 12 Steps.

Years of experience have definitely proved that those who live up to these rules remain sober.

Those who gloss over or ignore anyone rule are in constant danger of returning to a life of drunkenness.

Thousands of words could be written on each rule. Lack of space prevents, so they are merely listed here. It is suggested that they be explained by the sponsor. If he cannot explain them, he should provide someone who can.

Akron Manual

as a a evolved from that, yes.

Is it a good thing? Mostly. Mostly,

I think we've opened the door. We've allowed a lot of people in.

We are not going to hospitals anymore, seeking them out and dragging them into meetings. They just come wandering in,

thousands of them all the time. They get sent here by the courts, They get sent here by their parents, you know, from recovery places, recovery houses. We are the world's aftercare program.

You know this is exactly what Bill Wilson wanted.

Exactly

matter of fact, I think he'd be happier is probably more than he ever thought would ever happen. He spent the last years in his life and and tonight I'll tell my story. But my father was involved in this, and Chuck Chamberlain and a bunch of people going to Washington, lobbying Congress, trying to get them to open up funding for hospitals for recovery, to stop putting Alcoholics in prison and put them into recovery programs.

They wanted validation from the federal government so the insurance companies would start treating it as an illness, as a disease, as the AMA recognized it in the early 50s.

And that happened. The insurance companies jumped on the bandwagon. It was underwritten by the federal government, and all of a sudden there were hospitals all over. All the Alcoholics were going and getting jobs as counselors. Remember, some of you remember, still are, but there's not as much money in it anymore.

And there was a there. There arose an antagonistic relationship between these hospital programs and Alcoholics Anonymous.

It became a war. It was not pretty.

It was not. It was not good. I think Wilson was really rolling over in his grave when that happened. All of a sudden we got our nose bent out of joint. We wouldn't sign the court cards. We we didn't like the hospitals. They were dumping attics and Alcoholics Anonymous and it's just not right. And there was a war sprang up.

So pretty soon the insurance companies quit funding it. Now you've got 12 step houses. You've got social model recovery places. And what do these places do? They use the meetings for their program. They use us for their program, which I think they should. We're the experts. The inmates are running the asylum, you know,

Don Pritz, one of the trustees of former trustee of Alcoholics Anonymous and died not too long ago,

said. A very powerful thing. He said there are no issues and Alcoholics Anonymous that cannot be resolved through intelligent, informed sponsorship.

We're the ones that know where we are

when they come in. I think we're the ones to describe where they are and what the rules are when they get here. And one breath will say rules, you shouldn't say rules. But in the other, in the back of our heads, there are rules, aren't there? And some people come into a A and they don't follow the rules and we get pissy, you know?

A man by the name of Tom P

got sober in 1941 and he got tight with Wilson and he ended up helping Wilson and a a edit the second addition to the Big book and edit the 12:00 and 12:00.

And he was an educated academic kind of guy and, and he got really involved in this. And then he split off from Alcoholics Anonymous because he felt that

we weren't adhering to the principles.

And he founded his own little organization in upstate New York, and he called it All Addicts Anonymous.

And they started doing things the correct way.

They started eating correctly. They started adhering to certain rules, the way he thought A A should be. My sponsor, Jay, actually visited this place a few years ago. And Tom P just has recently passed away. The the older the son is now running it

and it was a group of trailers parked in the woods and Jay came out of Eagles. It was like Jamestown, man. It was scary. It was scary, man. Nobody was laughing very much. You know, it was a little icky,

but in the 70s they wrote a document that I think is really, really good. And it's called Gresham's Law. And Gresham's law is, is an economic term. And what Gresham's Law says is that good money follows bad money,

that when you start putting investing into something that isn't good,

but you keep doing it long enough, pretty soon it becomes the standard. This is the way we do it. So the good money will follow it. And then everybody stands around and goes, what happened to our fortune? We were doing what we'd always done.

Well, this is something they wrote about Alcoholics Anonymous. They applied this to Alcoholics Anonymous and they talk about strong, medium and weak program. What's it look like if we're losing our edge, Where is it being lost? What have we lost? What is there? Is there some good stuff in the past that we've overlooked? Have we really stepped away

from the strength of Alcoholics Anonymous? Have we? Or haven't we break it down? So they broke it down. They looked at it and said this is what we think

this is. By now it is possible to distinguish 3 variant practices of the program, which we have labeled the strong cup of coffee, Medium cup of Coffee, and Wheat cup of coffee approaches

Strong A, A

the original undiluted dosage of spiritual principles. Strong AAS took all 12 steps. Bill and Bob didn't know

that you couldn't. You. You didn't have to do some of it and you could stay sober. They couldn't tell it. They thought you had to do it all.

I mean, they put the thing together and say if you do all of this, you'll be OK. They didn't know that you could do half of it and be cool.

You know they didn't know that

strong as took all 12 steps and kept on taking them.

They did not stop with the admission of powerless over alcohol, but went on right away to turn their will and life over to God's care. They began to practice rigorous honesty and all their affairs. In short order, they proceeded to take a moral inventory, admit all of their wrongs to at least one other person, take positive and forceful action in making such restitution as was possible to those wrongs, continue taking inventory, admitting their faults, and making restitution on a regular basis,

Pray and meditate every day, go to two or more a a meetings weekly, and actively work the 12 step carrying the A message to others in trouble.

I think that's it, isn't it?

That's pretty much it. If you're doing that, you're probably in a pretty good space, you know,

medium.

The medium A A started off with a bang, pretty much like the strong AAS, except they hedged or procrastinated on bits or parts of the program that they feared or did not like. Maybe the God steps, maybe the inventory steps, depending on their particular nervousness or dislikes. But after they had stayed sober for a while, the medium AAS eased up and settled into a practice of the program that went something like this

in a a meeting a week. Occasional 12 step work,

leaving more and more of that on the newer fellows as time went on.

Some work with the steps, but not like before. Less and less inventory as they became more and more respectable.

That's painful.

Some prayer and meditation still, but not on a daily basis anymore. Not enough time due to the encroachment of business engagement, social activities and other baggage that went along with the return to normal life and the work a day world.

I think that's, I think probably all of us, if we've been around a while, we've all done this. We've all kicked back a little. You know, I'm cool.

I'm all right, you know

the week AAS are a varied lot. The thing common to all of them was that they left big chunks of the program totally and permanently out of their reckoning right from the outset. Sometimes the God steps, sometimes the inventory steps, often both. We K as tended to walk talk in terms like all you need to do is stay sober is go to meetings and stay away from the first drink.

Most of the weak AAS who were successful in staying sober were pretty faithful meeting goers.

Since they were doing so little with the principles, their sobriety and their survival depended more exclusively than those of the strong and medium A's on constant exposure to the people of A. A.

I think the key

to strong AAA and sponsorship. I think the heart and soul of Alcoholics Anonymous is sponsorship. I don't think the meetings are A

I think the meetings are fellowship meetings are good. I'm lucky. I like AAI, enjoy it. I did pretty much from the start. So it's fun to go. I like to be involved, I like to participate, but I think there's a big difference between activity and action.

I think there's only one job in Alcoholics Anonymous. Only one

that's working with others. There's only one form of 12 step work.

There's only one,

and that's working with others. There are not a lot of different forms of 12 step work. There aren't a lot of different ways that you can give back to the fellowship. There's only one. All the rest of it is activity, and all of the activity is wonderful. It's being part of a community. It's the fun part. But there's only one form of 12 step work. There's only one reason why you and I were saved.

That's to help others

in a formal way. Not just driving them to meetings, not just calling them up once in a while or accepting their phone calls, but sitting with them alone in a room somewhere, reading the book together, turning the pages and working the steps together alone. That's intimate. That scares the living bejesus out of most of us, That intimacy.

We're all looking for it. We all want to be closer to each other, but we don't know how.

This is the mechanism, this is it. This is the 80% of the program.

80% of the program of recovery is working with others. 20% is steps one through 9.

It's sober 101. It's not the big deal.

Working with others is the big deal.

So if that is the big deal, how do you do it?

What do you do?

Are there rules?

Are there rules?

I think there's a few rules. I think never talking down to an alcoholic as a rule,

I don't think we need to do that. We don't need to point our finger at him and say

put them in their place. You know, isn't that what's happened to us most of our lives is being put in our place?

I think being a listener

is important to the recovery process, to being a sponsor, learning how to listen and not just talk all the time.

I will go through certain things when I'm sponsoring you.

I will become your therapist.

You will suck me into your drama,

especially if it's really interesting,

and I will try to solve your problem for you.

I'll really try.

I'll be your surrogate father. I'll hold you and Rock You. I'll yell and scream at you if I think it might shake your tree. You know, maybe this will get him to listen. When none of that works, I will then stop doing those things.

That's how I grow.

That's how I grow up,

that's how I learn how to interact with other human beings is because I identify with you up front, going into the process, I identify with you. You and I have been in the same incomprehensible, demoralized place. We've lost most everything, especially most things that are dear to us, even if it's not financially. So we identify with each other

and then we begin the process. Now

in the early days of Alcoholics Anonymous, there was number long-term sponsorship.

There weren't any long term sober people. You know, they didn't know that this would go on Their, their idea of sponsorship was you bring the guy into the meeting, you bring him into the fellowship, into the recovery process. He worked the steps with him usually in a day

in a day. They'd get it out of the way. You know, you write down some stuff and they weren't so much into the columns and stuff, but I bet you some were, you know, some of them got into it. Some of the academic ones were really broke it down, you know, and got into what you got to do it like this, you know, And so we we come up with this format and certainly that's what they put in the book. If you read the book, the four step in the book, Alcoholics Anonymous is pretty comprehensive.

You have to kind of pour over it a little bit to find out what they were really getting at. But it's not a life story, is it? That's not what it's about.

It's not the good and the bad. You know you don't put yourself at the top of the immense list because you've been your own worst enemy. You know you don't have to learn to love yourself before you can love others. You know that kind. You don't take what you can use and leave the rest. You don't. All this crap has been, it's just my opinion, but it's really good

and, you know,

get that off the table. But none of that is in the book, and you can see what it's about.

The sponsor should understand this, OK, But what these guys did is they guided them through the process of the step. Boom boom, boom boom.

And then sending out Abby Thatcher with 60 days sober.

60 days.

Clearly, he was cured.

Clearly

he Debbie is cool. Go get him, Abby. Go get the worst one. You know, Mrs. Oxford Group. No way. Hey, Oxford Group goes, you were a loser. Go find another one like you. You know, seemed apparent to them, didn't it? I mean, this was apparent. This is what you do. You know, you take somebody that was in the throes of alcoholism or gambling addiction or sexual addiction or whatever it was, food addiction, whatever they had that was going wrong. And when you cure them,

you send them out to cure someone else. You drop the Pebble in the water and boom, off it goes.

This is ancient stuff.

Heavy showed up there 60 days sober and said I've got religion. Scared the shit out of Wilson. You know, I was like, my God, it scared him so bad. He got drunk and went looking for him,

you know.

So now Fast forward to us.

I've had the same sponsor for 22 years.

I don't want to break in another one.

You know, he's younger than me. He's got a full head of hair,

All of which pisses me off, you know?

But that's the longest relationship I've ever had.

22 years I've been with that man.

So now we've got this weird kind of relationship, the sponsor thing, that goes on for a long time. And it's beyond just working the steps, isn't it?

Things change in sobriety as we evolve.

I'm emotionally immature. I drank through that part when I was a teenager. I got loaded and I missed it.

I got sober at 37, almost 38 years old, with the emotional development of a 16 year old,

and this kid was done an honor student.

He was the one with the bit of a problem with authority.

And here he is, 6 foot five, 280 lbs,

middle-aged. Looks like he's grown up,

but he's not. He's not.

He walks in the room and you don't pay any attention to him and he gets all pissy. He walks in the room and you're looking at him and he gets all pissy.

There's no way that he can't not be pissy, you know? So he starts working the steps. He works the steps. He does an inventory and he gets honest with this guy and he makes some amends.

My sponsor told me a couple of things that I think are very important.

His job as my sponsor is to guide me through the process of the 12 steps so that I might find the power that's greater than myself. It will solve my problems,

he said. I'd be happy to talk to you about what you think your problems are so that you will not share about them in the meetings.

The meetings are for recovery from alcoholism, not about how your day went

22 years later. Because I, I, I started, I just believed him. I didn't know. And I just went to meetings and I went back and I reported. I said, you know, you're full of shit. They're talking about how their day went down there all the time. You know, what is this you're telling me? Because that's not what I'm experiencing in the meetings. He goes A, A is a safe place. You can say anything you want in Alcoholics Anonymous. I'm just giving you my opinion.

What I see now is I see a lot of people in Alcoholics Anonymous.

I think what Wally sees and what the back to basics people see, what all they see is people using the meetings as their sponsor.

People that don't have a sponsor or don't use one

are not working the steps on a continual basis bring their problems to the meetings,

which is never what it was supposed to be for ever.

This is the strong medium, weak indication. Lots of people that use Alcoholics Anonymous as a support group, as a self help program, as a refuge, and it is those things. It can be those things,

but is it a very good one? No,

it's the character defect center of the known universe.

There is no facilitator sitting there to help us work through our stuff. It's just us waiting our turn to share our crap.

There is the illusion of intimacy because we talk about heavy shit.

It's not in them and it's just us talking about ourselves again

and continually over and over and over. That horrible self obsession, that horrible bondage of self,

what my sponsor did for me and a group of people, my Home group and stuff. As they said,

get into action, start driving them around, start working with them.

I started sponsoring people when I was nine months sober

and I've been actively doing that for 22 years.

I've gone to hospitals with you. I've watched your children be born. I've watched your children die.

I've watched you die.

I helped my parents die. I watched my friends get sick and recover. Some do, some don't.

I've been called in the middle of the night to come and try to help you through a domestic dispute with your wife,

which fortunately just before I left the door, I called my sponsor and he said when you walk in there, what are you going to do? I had no clue, you know, and I didn't go.

I called him up and I said, you know,

come on over here, why don't you get the hell out of the house and come over to my house, which is what he did.

I want to tell you a quick story and then maybe we can talk about some of this stuff about technique and whatnot.

When I was

maybe two years sober, this guy was standing in my kitchen

and he had left the phone number of my house to the hospital where his mother was dying. And he knew that he'd be there. So he left the phone number

and they called him and they said you better get back here.

Looks like she's not going to make it. So he got up to leave, but he wasn't leaving

and I knew he want what he wanted and I didn't want to go.