The Primary Purpose convention in Oslo, Norway

I'm Jennifer. I'm an alcoholic.

My sobriety dates January 12th of 1992. I have a sponsor and I actively sponsor women. My Home group is the Midtown group. We meet in Wilmington NC Mondays, Thursdays, 7:00. Would love to have you come see me. I have an extra bedroom.

I love my new friends that I've I've met this weekend and it's just been an awesome trip. It's been great to listen to some of the challenges that

you know, you have here in Norway and the wonderful people that are trying to get sober, that are staying sober.

It's such a blessing to be a member of Alcoholics Anonymous and to travel, you know, all the way over here and feel like I'm at home with my people. Thank you for making me feel so welcome. Thank you to the committee that has done an amazing job for a great weekend for a bunch of Alcoholics that get together and fellowship

and get filled up because that's my experience when I go to conferences, when I go to service assemblies. I also love that the theme is the Commonwealth Air because I think our traditions are so important. And hopefully I'll share a little bit tonight about my service and, and how those traditions have played a role in my life and my relationship with God and how all of that kind of a mesh is because I feel like

our three legacies are just, it's the reason I get to live a wonderful, beautiful life. And if I didn't,

I've gone through periods of time in my sobriety that I was very active in service, but I wasn't writing inventory. And I felt like I was dying on the inside because this alcoholic right here, who and what I am. How many people were here last night?

OK, better. How many people were not here last night?

Wow,

see I'm now I'm conflicted. Like do I tell a little bit of my story so you get the gist? I feel like I should.

So I grew up in Texas, right outside of Dallas area, and I just had a really rough upbringing. I'm going to Fast forward through a lot of this stuff, but just to give the people who weren't here last night a little bit about me, my alcoholism, and what brought me to the rooms. Because I think it's really important to qualify, especially if there's somebody that's new here. I would go to meetings in the beginning

and speakers would speak and I would be glued to what they said until they started talking about recovery. And then it was like

I didn't understand it because I didn't know anything about being sober. And none of that stuff made sense to me. But I understood when people talked about their drinking and I understood when they talked about the insanity of the way that they thought. Because when I got here, I, my, I could not sleep at night. I would try to go to bed and I would lay in bed and my head would just race

and I just felt crazy all the time. Alcohol is what numbed a lot of that insanity that went on in my head. And I can tell you that that insanity can come back to me in sobriety if I'm not actively working steps. And I'll talk a little bit about that as well.

But I grew up in Texas, outside of the Dallas area. My older brother and I were thick as thieves. We ran around together. I was a tomboy. I hated my red hair. Used to rip it out. And the thing about this too, is in Texas, everybody has big blonde hair. Like if you've been to Texas, you understand.

And like my mom is this tiny little petite thing, big blonde hair. And I just felt so inadequate as a human being. And that was just this exterior thing that separated me. What I didn't know is that if I had a different color hair, it would have made a difference because I was in here empty and I was just, I just didn't respond like normal kids did. And I have nephews now. My brother had two children that

I get to watch them

and I can watch their little faces and I'm like, Oh my God, I get what you're going through right now. Like we have to keep a, a going for those two little ones because one of them we just got to keep him out of prison. And then the other one like I just, I feel his emotion because I see that and I just think, man, I remember feeling that way. He's so sensitive and I was so sensitive. Like I would everything would hurt and crush me. And I always said that I was shy.

Most people who know me say there's no way that you're shy.

What I know today is I wasn't shy. I was terrified. I was scared. I didn't know how to talk to kids. I didn't, you know, I just didn't know how to. And so I stuck with my brother. He was like my little blankie, you know, So I ran around with him. My first drink was when I was eight years old. My mom gave me a beer. And, you know, I felt like I'd finally arrived. My mom was active alcoholic for most of my life.

She has, I think 18 or 19 years sober now.

In about 12 years ago my mom started learning how to be a mom and showing up in my life, which has been a really beautiful thing.

She's my person, I love her so much and I get to go to conferences with her. My friends hang out with her when I'm not around which irritates me.

I sponsor she came in town for. They had a big celebration for me this year for my 30 year anniversary and my mom came in town and I had her speak for my anniversary and my sponsee afterwards said Oh my God if your mom lived here she would totally be my sponsor not you. I was like,

my God, take the dagger out of my heart.

But my mom's awesome and we get to share this life and recovery, which is a beautiful thing. But growing up, she was not reliable. I never knew if she was going to be there. And she was the person who I wanted to be. She was the cool mom, you know, was totally inappropriate things that you shouldn't do with your children. Like we would watch terrible movies like The Exorcist. And I mean, we were like five and six years old, you know what I mean? Like, she was not the greatest mom and she would say that if she was here,

but nonetheless, she was the person I wanted to be with. So when she hitted and made that beer, I was like, oh, my favorite place was where she worked. It was old Irish Pub. Your feet would stick when you'd walk across it. It's not like urine. It was just like this gross place, you know? But it would, I loved being there and I'd wipe the tables down and I just wanted to be a waitress.

And so that was kind of the the stage that set me up for what would then happen whenever I got to really experience the effect of alcohol,

because the house that I lived in was abusive. It was insanity and very painful as a kid. Like I just wanted to disappear all the time. And so when I had that first experience of what alcohol could do for me,

I knew it was the solution. It wasn't like a conscience thought like this is what I'm going to do for the rest of my life. But it was this understanding of I like that and I want more. And anybody who knows me,

if I like something and I want more, it is game on. I am not like stop and go. I'm fast and faster. That's just how I operate. That's how I do. AAI didn't get sober to live a mediocre life. I got sober to have this wonderful, beautiful life. And I want more. And for me, what that means is continuing to work the steps at continuing to grow. Just because I've been sober a long time

doesn't mean anything cuz I can get just as crazy just like that if I'm not doing the things that I need to be doing.

So I, you know, I live, I live sobriety like I would if I was drinking my face off, you know?

And so we found this bottle of alcohol. My brother's friend was over. I kind of had a crush on him. And we ran upstairs and we just kind of inherently knew how to play quarters. And off we went. And that first shot hit the back of my throat and it was like acid going all the way down. And it hit the pit in my stomach and I felt like I could breathe and it was powerful.

What would then happen is that I became so intoxicated they dared me. I couldn't finish the rest of the bottle. And I just turned it up because I like a good deer and

I had alcohol poisoning. I was vomiting blood at some point. I was, I was violently I'll. But what happened before that was I was laying on the couch and everything was spinning. And my brother, he would call me these terrible names and he was saying these terrible things to me. He was like yelling at me. I think I was being loud or something. And I could hear him in my ear holes, but I did not hear him in my heart.

And that was what alcohol did for me.

It didn't matter what you thought about me. Like if I was up here loaded, I'd be like, Lou, I would have No Fear. I would have no anxiety. That's what alcohol did for me is it gave me the ability to just be OK in my own skin and feel like a human being again. Like I'd never experienced that.

And, and so from that point until the time that I came to Alcoholics Anonymous, I drank as much as I could, as often as I could. And I wasn't a daily drinker when I was, you know, 10 years old. But I can tell you by 11:00 and 12:00, I was sneaking out the window and I was hanging out with people that were 1015 years older than me. And then as I got older, I was hanging out with people that were 20 and 30 years older than me.

And, you know, and then sanity and, and then this is kind of my whole life was revolved around when I was going to get it, how I was going to get it and where I was going to get it. And I would do anything and everything. I remember one day,

and, and this was by the time I was drinking every day, I was a daily drinker. I drink first thing in the morning until, you know, I would pass out. And when I would go to school, I would do other things like substances to get me through the day. And I'd gone to school and somebody had given me a handful of something at that I'd taken, and I got really sick and I started vomiting. And they sent me to the nurse

and they sent me home. And I told I was like

stressing out in the nurses office because I'm like, it's Friday night and I can't let them know that I'm sick. Like I'm not. I knew I wasn't really sick. And I was like, if they can't know that I'm sick because then I won't be able to go out. So I'm planning and scheming like how am I still going to be able to go out? And so I got home and I was like, man, that sour cream at school. Like so I did something to my stomach like I'm fine. I just need to lay down and rest

because I didn't want grandma to be like, you have to stay home tonight. You're sick. And

And she bought it, right? Like my grandmother, she always called me her little redheaded Angel. And then when I got sober, she said that my Halo hangs around my ankles and

just true. And and so, you know, I ended up going out that night getting totally obliterated like I did every single night. And most the time too, I would go out, I would come back home and then I would sneak out the out the room, you know, because all my friends, they drove, they would take us and we would buy liquor and I would keep it stocked up in my room.

I went to rehab when I was 13. What I learned in rehab is drugs are bad. Just say no. It was a whole campaign. I was like, OK, check. I got that. It made sense to me. Now I think about that today and I'm like, I don't know why I thought it was legal for a 13 year old drink their face off. But for whatever reason, there was this justification with alcohol. There was always this thing that there's no way a liquid can have power over me.

I just couldn't compute it because in my mind it was like drinking water, like

it was not the same. And and that was a big part of as I drank and then once I got sober, working through that stuff in my first step. And I did that with a sponsor because I still had these ideas when I came to Alcoholics Anonymous. I did not come skipping in here going I have a problem with alcohol and I need your help. What happened is alcohol stopped working for me and I got to a place that

I was so isolated and alone and, and part of the thing that I loved about drinking was it gave me the ability to be around you all,

but I was never around you. All my drinking was by myself at the end.

It wasn't going out partying and having a good inside partying. I mean like drinking so much that I'm then vomiting and like wetting my pants like that was partying for me. But I was no longer going out doing that stuff with you guys. I was staying home, sitting against my door, drinking my face off

and, and, and basically I and I had been suicidal multiple times during this time period. Like I'd taken bottles of pills before I cut my wrist. I'd done different things in terms of having that despair,

but what it led me to the end of my drinking was

this despair that I'd never experienced before because the pain of life felt like it was going to kill me. And I remember thinking this is going to kill me. Like I felt like the pain of the world was literally just going to crush me dead. And I, I just didn't want to go on. I said I saw no purpose in life. And, and what I believe happened on January 11th of 1992, as I was given this experience that I believe my higher power intervened

because at that time, three months prior, six months prior, a year prior, two years prior,

I would have told you

that the reason I was the way that I was was because of my parents. It was because of what happened with my stepmother. It was because of how my father was not around and didn't love me. It was because my mom, you know, wasn't able to be present and didn't fight for us, right? It was all of these things, all exterior, all your fault. That night, I knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that the world would be better off without me. I just knew it to my, I mean

everything within me, I knew that the world would be better and to this day I believe that

because who I was

was selfish and self-centered. I never thought about anybody else. The only thing that I did was live to drink and drink to live like that was what my life was about. Thankfully, there were certain things that were not introduced into my life at that time because I wouldn't have made it here. You know, I was fortunate that alcohol was my master and that was the main thing that I, no matter what, every day I was drinking,

I was pretty much emaciated at that time. You could count my ribs. I had bleeding ulcers

and you know, like I remember once I went to rehab and I had this counselor and after I got out of treatment, he met with me like 6 months later and he and he talked about the physical aspect of my alcoholism and how he said you know, I see kids come in all the time. 141516 years old. He said, I've never seen a kid come in,

be in the late stages of alcoholism at the age that you were. Most of the time, there's other things that they're in here for. It's drugs, it's heroin, it's this, it's that. He said you're a real alcoholic. I remember how the way he said it was so cute. He's from Chicago and had this thick accent, real alcoholic Jennifer.

And so like, that's what it looked like. But what it felt like was that I could not go on. And and I did what I, you know, never wanted to do. And, and I said a prayer and I didn't believe in God, but I prayed and, and I said, if there's anything out there, please let my heart stop. Don't let me wake up tomorrow. And

you know, I think about that today in terms of like the correlation. I don't know why I said make my heart stop. And the reason why that's important is because years later I would end up having to have open heart surgery because my entire life I had no wall in between my right and left atrium. And so I, I, I was always short of oxygen, which I now blame all my problems on. I wasn't getting enough oxygen to my brain,

but nonetheless, like I that was a part of that prayer that night. And because I couldn't figure out how to kill myself and make sure that I wouldn't wake up,

I just didn't want to exist anymore. And you know, when it talks about the Four Horsemen and it talks about the Wildermann in, in, in the overwhelming loneliness, I've never experienced that since that day

other than the next day on January 12th when I woke up because that overwhelming hopelessness and emptiness was there. And I happen to get a phone call that day. It was from this girl I was in rehab with, her name's Abby. And and she called and she asked me if I wanted to go to a meeting. And I did not want to go to a meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous that was not on my list for the day. And I started trying to make these excuses, but for whatever reason, and what I believe is because I no longer had a plan,

usually I always had a plan like,

you know, if it was something to do with I was in trouble at school or if I was in trouble with the grandparents, I had a plan as to how I was going to work that out. If I didn't have enough alcohol, I had a plan as to what I was going to do. I always had a plan. I had no plans. And, and I think that's essential for me. It was essential because my ego was gone, my pride was gone and I had no ideas how to how to make things better. And I really thought that I was broken. I thought there was just something within me that was not normal and I was never going to get better.

And, and I went to that meeting and it was the Back to Basics group in Arlington, TX. And it was full of old, old men with like Santa Claus beard suspenders, like they were old dudes, you know, And that was back when you could smoke in meetings. The walls were yellow from the nicotine stains and there was like 10 of them there just chain smoking, right. And I, and I, by this time, you know, my isolation had taken me to the fact that

half my head was shaved off. I wore like black eyes, black lips, combat boots.

I was a lovely creature and,

and I was angry and you could feel my rage when I was sober. I would go into black outrageous and I'd come too, and I'd be on top of somebody just slamming their head into the concrete. That's just who and what I was when I got here, you know, And, and I like going to this meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous looking like a wreck. And those old men greeted me and they, they didn't show me like the copies over here. They got a cup of coffee and they sat in front of me

and I experienced what I believe is the love of Alcoholics

as the unconditional love, unselfishness that these men showed me over the course of the next year was amazing. And it was what kept me coming back because I didn't believe I was alcoholic. I mean, I said I was alcoholic that night because that's what all you people were doing. But to my innermost self, I didn't believe that, right? I just wanted the pain to stop. I wanted to feel better because I don't like to feel bad. I still don't like to feel bad. You know, I'm all about, I want to feel good. And,

and they, they asked me, can you make it here tomorrow night at 8:00? And I was like,

I can try. And they said, here's our phone number. If you think about drinking, give us a call

like that's weird. And, and they would stay after meetings, right? And they would, they would share their experiences and they would tell me these stories and, and it was a really beautiful experience. Let me tell you that Home group is not the Home group that I would choose today. I would never choose that Home group as my Home group. These guys, there's certain aspects of it that were amazing. They loved me where I was at. I mean, they let me be exactly who and what I was.

And they didn't tell me I needed to dress a certain way. They didn't tell me I had to work the steps a certain way.

They didn't do any of that.

They allowed me to be exactly where I was at. They also elected me the GSR of that Home group when I was 90 days sober.

I never went to one meeting

because I didn't know where the meetings were. I didn't know what I was supposed to do. I certainly wasn't going to ask because who asks for help? Not this alcoholic. And but you know, they said that it's the most important position in Alcoholics Anonymous. And I was like, I have the most important position in Alcoholics Anonymous, right? So it what it did is it made me feel important and a part of and I was a terrible GSR, but it made me feel important.

And, and my experience with the old timers is it's that

if I did something, they would act like it was the best thing that's ever happened in the entire world.

Not the case, right? And it continued to happen like later on. And I'll tell some of those stories about some of my, my old guys and gals that you know, that that came into my life. Because I believe that

when we are looking at our, our traditions and we're looking at the things that are important, even though that wasn't the Home group that I would choose, I believe that that Home group was centered in our traditions and making sure that the new alcoholic belt at home, I think that that was their primary purpose to help no matter what.

And, and you know, so I did the things that they suggested and I started, you know, working the steps. I remember this biker,

big like burly biker, and I had been working on my 4th step for like a couple weeks and he was like, shut up and sit down and write it. And I was like, Oh my God, you know, like he was aggressive about it. And so I sat down and I, I shut up and I wrote it right. And what happened as a result of that was like, I spent months worrying about these things that were already in my head. And all I did was put it on paper.

So if you're new and you've never worked a four step, it's really not a big deal. You're walking around with that stuff all up in your head, and it's way worse up here than it is on black and white. That was my experience.

So one of the things my old guys told me when I came in because they were like we there's five things that you do every day and I've done these five things every day and I haven't had a drink. They've been sober 30 something years or whatever

and they said you got to pray every morning, get down on your knees and pray and ask your higher power to help keep you sober. I said I don't believe in God. I said I didn't ask you if you believed in God. I told you to get down on your knees and ask your higher power to help you stay sober. And I was like, but I don't believe in God.

You can get down on your knees and say a prayer and not believe.

So again, my experience is I don't have to feel like doing it. I don't have to like it. I don't even have to believe in it. My experience is I've done the physical actions that have been encouraged for me to do an Alcoholics Anonymous. I'm 100% of the time it works

because when I ask for help and I received that help and I do what that person tells me, for whatever reason, self is removed. I've turned my will in my life over to this human being who's given me direction and and I believed in Alcoholics Anonymous for a long time. I did all kinds of weird stuff trying to find this relationship with this higher power that they talked about that I don't necessarily always understand. Second thing they told me to do was go to meeting every day and they told me to read in the big book every day,

to talk to another alcoholic on the phone every day.

And then at night, if I hadn't taken a drink to get down on my knees and think what was whatever was out there for helping me not take a drink.

And I was like, that seems simple enough. Like it seems really simple. Like 5 things. That's all you got to do those five things every single day. And, and, and so I did those things and, and when things would come up because I had obsessions that those first 30 days I had obsessions, I had uncomfortability. I celebrated a birthday six days being sober. It was terrible. It was the worst birthday I've ever had.

I didn't know how to,

I was so young when I got sober that when you're 15 years old, the only thing that matters to you are your friends. And I had to cut those people out of my life, right? I didn't and not that I had a ton of them, but there were still people who, you know, like 20 year old guys that would like knock on my window that I've been hanging out with that were my friends. Again, we call those people pedophiles, but nonetheless, you know, that they would like call me or whatever. And and I had to not engage with that behavior. And that was behavior that had become

very normal for me.

Umm And so it was really hard and I had to go to school and just go to school to learn. It was weird. I was not used to that. And I'll tell you, I was a week sober and I went home and I told my my grandparents, I said, I'll kill myself if I have to go back to school. Like I can't. I mean, I literally felt like the pain, like I was having anxiety attacks. I was freaking out because I didn't know how to deal with what was going on inside. I was so angry and I was so out of control with my emotions. I didn't know what was going on

because I wasn't used to being sober. I didn't know anything about being sober. I know all about being drunk. I didn't know anything about dealing with what was going on in the inside. And I checked myself into rehab with like, I don't know, I think I was like a week, 10 days sober when I went to rehab. And The funny thing about that is that when I went back to school, like I left and have my head shaved combat boots, like

I was literally the school like mess up and people let me know it too.

And I went to a very prestigious kind of school. Like I mean, these kids got Lamborghinis for graduation type of school, right? That's not how my family was, but that's how a lot of the families that I went to school with were. And I come back to school and I'm like in preppy clothes and like little Cole Haan loafers. They were like, where did you go? You know, like this old transformation thing happened because I was in rehab for like 3 months

trying to learn how to deal. And, and I'll tell you, there was a lot of traumatic things that happened

not only in my childhood, but things that happened when I was drinking because I'm not hanging out with the cream of the crop when I'm drinking my face off. And Alcoholics Anonymous didn't fix that stuff. What my experience is, is that I bring the stuff to Alcoholics Anonymous. And where I've been directed is to seek help wherever I need to get help.

And, you know, counselors were able to help me with some of those things that I needed help with. Because I'll tell you, my girls sometimes come to me with things. I am not a doctor. I am not a physician. I'm not a therapist. Until I start getting a paycheck, I'm not your therapist. And I tell my girls that if they want to talk about their problems, I'll listen to it one time. The second time you call me, you better have inventory written, you know, like that's how I've been taught in Alcoholics Anonymous.

And so like that, that, that's

kind of how I grew up in AAA. And, and so I got, you know, I had gotten introduced into the steps. I was going to meetings at night and I was going to, to treatment during the day. And, and I started having this community and, and they would invite us to go do things with them. Essentially. We played Pictionary most of the time and we got to dinner a lot

and I was always so embarrassed to them. And I think about it now and I'm like, I love going to dinner with all the crazy wackadoos in a, a, you know, like

when you look at a table and you look around the table and you're like, how did we all end up here together, right? Like it's always just such, this big conglomeration of people who are just from so many different types of life. And I love that today. And, and typically when I travel, like if I'm in a meeting and there's like this crazy person in a meeting, I'm like, that's why I want to go sit down and talk to, you know what I mean? Like, tell me what's going on. You know, like, I want to get to know you. I want to know what's happening in your life in six months and nine months in a year,

because there was this guy that came into our Home group. He thought that we could see his thoughts. He looked like Grizzly Adams, like not the clean cut Grizzly Adams, you know, the scruffy, like not doing well Grizzly Adams. And he would walk around barefoot all the time and he was like real, real overweight. And, and I would always greet this guy and, and he kept coming back and he got in connected with the guys in a, a, the young guys. And

he got a job working at the Blimpie's, which is like a little sandwich shop, you know.

And then, and then he applied to go to the Cape Fear Community College. And then he applied to go to the university. And then he got a real job. And then he was a doctor. When you watch that transformation happen in a human being, it's unbelievable. That's the best show in town for $2.00, you know what I'm saying? Like pay that all day long.

The miracles and the things that happen in people's lives are really unbelievable. And, you know, I think about my old guys like it must have been amazing for them to watch

what a train wreck I was. And, and it makes my heart smile a little bit because I've seen it happen in girls and, and knowing like

they would always say, it helps me more than it helps you. And I remember thinking, what are they talking about?

I didn't understand that. And then this young, this young girl, she was older than me, but young girl had come to our meeting and they, they said you need to go talk to this girl. So I went over and I started talking to her and I just started sharing with her what my experience was. I only had, you know, probably 6-9 months sober, man, I felt high afterwards. I was like, this is the best feeling ever. I couldn't. I'd never experienced anything like that.

And they said, do you know what that is?

And I was like, no, but I like it. And they said you weren't thinking about you,

right? Because when I wake up in the morning, as much as I love all you people, the first thing I think about is not y'all, it's not. I think about me every day. The first thing that I wake up, what am I going to eat? Where am I going to go? What am I going to do? You know, I've got to go here, here, here, here. And like, you know, all of the things, that's what starts when I wake up.

And so if I'm not centered with my higher power and I don't have my intention for the day and I am not focused on how can I be of service to the people around me, I'm going to continue through that day thinking about me, me, me, me, me. And and that's my problem is me, right? So that was my first like act of being able to help somebody else out else out in sobriety. And it was like, it felt good.

I was one of those people that

I've heard people refer to him as takers in a a you know, they come, they show up for everything. They go to the parties. They, you know, go to the conferences, but they don't do anything

right. And I was that person for the first, you know, essentially 3 1/2 years of my life. I mean, I did some little services. I'd clean the ashtrays and things like that, but I wasn't really involved. I was GSR by name only.

And so when I moved to North Carolina, I was 3 1/2 years sober and I moved to this place. And what happened was,

and you know, through this time, I had these big spiritual experiences that were really powerful

because when you go from living the way that I was living to living just this really, my life started getting amazing. I started having dreams. I had never had dreams before. I had never thought like, oh, I could do this someday.

I never had like career aspirations. I never thought anything. I remember I had this project in high school and my senior project, and we were supposed to make this draw these pictures of like what our legacy was going to be or whatever. And I actually had stuff to put on there. I'd never had dreams of things that I wanted to do. And of course, by this time, I wanted to be a counselor and like save the world because that's what everybody with 3 1/2 years sobriety wants to do.

And so I moved to North Carolina and of course, they don't do a a right. I hear this amazing speaker

who would become one of my giants and umm, and he like spoke to me. He'd dagger in the heart. He was like, when I'm in a meeting and I don't want to hear and I'm not hearing what I I need to hear what has been passed on to me. I have a personal responsibility to give back. But if I'm sitting in the back judging everybody the problems on me and it was like, that's exactly what I was doing. And he also had gotten sober really young. His story was

one of the most powerful that I've heard, you know,

and I went up and I talked to this guy after the meeting and, and we got connected and I thought, you know what, I'm going to go to a conference and I go to this conference and my life would forever be changed because I went to this young people's conference. I know my, I got my young people, people up in here and I go to this conference. It's crazy. Kids are yelling, hooting, hollering, lots of energy. And I was like, wow, 'cause I'd never been able to hang out with anybody my own age. I hung out with senior citizens. I did not know how to relate or talk to. I didn't know how to talk to people. I

again, I was shy. I was terrified because you weren't going to like me. I didn't know how to talk to you. It felt weird and awkward. And I ended up meeting other people from my city and we started talking. We were like, how cool would it be to hold this conference? Like where we live.

And what formed out of that was not only did we start a young people's group in our town, which didn't exist, but we got on this committee because they awarded the conference to us. We went to Kinkos. We stayed up all night long making these copies. In this formal presentation, we had no information. We didn't know what hotel we could hold it at. We didn't know anything. But we made it sound like we really know what we were doing, right? Like we put a lot of effort into it

and the committee, like the Advisory Council, it was a regional conference and it was being held in Charlotte,

North Carolina.

We live in Wilmington, NC, which is 3 hours. So most regional conferences, they're going to go to different states because you have 13 states in your region. So you want it to rotate. They send it to the same state two years in a row because like we pulled on their heartstrings, you know what I'm saying? We're good manipulators and we got that conference and then we're like, Oh my God, what do we do right?

And we and we, you know, we started hosting this conference and I've never been involved in service that way. And young people's gave me

this vehicle to get involved in service. And it was, we had so much fun. We would just jump in the car and drive to Syracuse, NY. I'd leave it. It was, you know, I live at the beach, so it's, you know, warm all the time. I'm like in shorts and I wake up and there's snow all around me, right? And I'm in New York. And we had so much fun. My, I put so many miles on my car just driving all over the place. We had a great time.

I was the Co chair of this conference, so part of my job was to get people to come to the conference.

That's how I learned how to talk to people.

It's being of service. It was having a flyer and being like, hey, why don't you come to our conference? It's going to be so much fun. We live at the beach. And then I would meet all of these people from all these different places and it gave me a vehicle to be able to talk to you because I don't know how to go up and say, hey, I'm Jennifer, how are you? Like, I just didn't know how to have a conversation with people, and service is what opened that up for me.

And I did that for years. I not only serve on that, I served on a lot of young people's conferences

and, and I learned how to fight. I learned how to fight there. I never knew how to fight. I would fight dirty. That's how I fought because I'm always going to win.

And my experience on being on a committee and young people's is you're never gonna win all the battles

ever.

I remember sitting in a business meeting in the chair. They used to always say y'all are like an old married couple, 'cause we would just like, bicker at each other, right? And

I remember looking at him and he was saying something and I was thinking to myself, he is an idiot. Like we thought so differently about different topics,

but the way he was talking, this thought came to me. He loves Alcoholics Anonymous,

and I realize that because it was always about winning, it was always about being right. And in that moment I realized how to be a part of a committee and to listen to other human beings that have different perspectives than I do and to try to understand where they're coming from. The gifts that I've received in Alcoholics Anonymous make me able to be a good employee, do well in my career.

Everything that I've learned, I learned as the result of being involved