What Early A.A. Was Like

[MajestyJo]

What Early A.A. Was Really Like


You won't learn this in A.A.'s basic text today or in our meetings. But the simplicity of early A.A. will really astound you and attract! Usually there was hospitalization or at least medical help to save the newcomer's life. Only the Bible was allowed in the room. Recovered drunks visited the patient and told their success stories. The newcomer had to identify, admit that he too was licked, and that he would do whatever it took. Dr. Bob visited daily. Then, he would explain the disease as they then understood it; and on the final day, asked two questions to which there was only one answer: (1) Do you believe in God? (2) Are you willing to get down on your knees and pray? The newcomer then gave his life to Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior.

Many were too sick to venture far; so they lived with the Smiths (and later others) in Akron homes. It is a myth that they recovered in an afternoon or in four easy lessons. They shook. They shivered. They fidgeted. They forgot. And they were ashamed, insecure, and guilt-ridden. But they learned what a loving God had made available. At the homes, they had daily Quiet Time (Bible study, prayer, asking guidance, reading a devotional, and discussing Anne Smith's Journal).

They shared their woes and problems with Dr. Bob, with Anne (his wife), and with Henrietta Seiberling. They had similar Quiet Times in their personal lives or at their home. They had one meeting a week. No drunkalogs. No whining. No psychobabble. Just prayer. Reading from Scripture. Quiet Time. Use of The Upper Room or similar devotionals for discussion. Then surrender upstairs for the newcomer in a prayer session resembling that in James 5:14-16.

The "elders" prayed with him that alcohol be taken out of his life and that he devote himself to living according to God's will. Following that, downstairs there were announcements about newcomers at hospitals. Socializing. And it started all over again.

There were sessions with Dr. Bob involving a moral inventory (as to adherence to the Four Absolutes), confession, prayer to have the sins removed, and plans for restitution. Did it work? You bet it did. 75% recovered in Akron. Soon, 93% were recovering in Cleveland. That's why we need to know about early A.A.! It took surrender. It took God. It took the Bible, a life-change decision with attendant action, and witnessing to others. It took fellowship. And it took time--lots of it.


Received with thanks from my friend Arlene posted on my site Star Choices

[MajestyJo]

"Please, Lord,
teach us to laugh again;
but God, don't ever let us
forget that we cried."
--BILL WILSON


IN SPITE OF US

Alcoholics Anonymous is a fellowship designed and
administered by a bunch of ex-drunks whose only
qualification for membership is that they can't hold
their liquor and don't want to learn how. It has no
rules, dues or fees, no anything else that any sensible
organization seems to require.

At meetings the speaker starts on one subject and
winds up talking about something entirely different
and concludes by saying he doesn't know anything
about the program, except that it works. The groups
are always broke, yet always seem to have money
to carry on. They are always losing members, but
seem to grow. They claim AA is a selfish program,
but always seem to be doing something for others.

Every group passes laws, rules, edicts, and
pronouncements which everyone blithely ignores.
Members who disagree with anything are priveleged
to walk out in a huff, quitting forever, only to return
as if nothing happened and greeted accordingly.
Nothing is ever planned 24 hours ahead, yet great
projects are born and survive magnificently. Nothing
in AA is according to Hoyle. How can it survive?

Perhaps it is because we have learned to live and
laugh at ourselves. God made man and He made
woman. He made laughter too. Perhaps He is pleased
with our disorganized efforts and makes things right
no matter who pushes the button. Maybe He is
pleased, not with our perfection, but with our sincerity.
Maybe He is pleased with our trying to be nobody but
ourselves.

We don't know how it works but it does and members
keep receiving their dividend checks from their AA
investments. It is smart to be sober, and it is much
easier, my friends, to STAY sober than to GET sober.


SOMEHOW IT WORKS FOLKS, IN SPITE OF US
-- KEEP COMING BACK! --

- - - - - - - - - - - -

The humor description letter posted was written in
Danbury, Connecticut, around 1956 by 2 (now Deceased)
members of A A. It was originaly entitled, "A A Odity."
The 2 members were Bill Mcdonugh, and Bill Starberd,
and was written as they were fooling around with a
typewriter that Mcdonough was required to learn to
operate for his new job.

[MajestyJo]

They did have their own Steps, I will have to see if I can find them. I think there were 6 or 8 of them.

Other groups started from AA, as AA started from the Oxford Group. The reason AA was changed, was to include people who were not of the Christian faith, he didn't want to leave anyone outside of the circle.

As other groups came along, they changed things according to their philosophy. CA uses AA's Big Book while NA has their Basic Text. What is the difference, if it aids recovery. One person use to say to me all the time, "We do it the NA way." She didn't like me using the word sobriety when referring to drugs. For me, sobriety means soundness of mind. Having soundness of mind while high on pot or any other substance isn't quite the same thing in my books. A guy said to me that he knew someone who felt closer to their Higher Power when they used pot. This same guy fell of a 6th floor balcony, became paraplegic and later died.

We only get out of the program what we put into it. Some are content to sit on a chair and get a sponsor and a home group, often going through the motions, and wonder why they relapse. It isn't about others, it isn't about Bill or Dr. Bob, it was about me, who could not use no matter what, who was really sick, and needed recovery. What do I need to do for me? At first all I could do was go to meetings. I wasn't capable of doing more than that. The thing was, I stayed away from speaker meetings, except when there was an anniversary. I went to open discussion, step and Big Book meetings. You can get lost in big open meetings. I compared instead of learning to identify, so I went to discussion groups because I couldn't shut everyone out and I got my message for the day.

All I know is the program worked for me. I had tried to quit my way for 8 years and I ended up with alcohol and pill addiction. I later became aware of my other issues and I went for outside counseling for that. I gave each counselor a copy of the 12 Steps. They didn't know where I was coming from. A lot of the program I got sent to, I found the people there were in the place I was before recovery, so I left. I got what I needed from AA, not just the literature, but from the people in the rooms of AA and other fellowships. I have one reason to go to AA and one reason to go to NA, but I have 3-33 reasons to go to Al-Anon. I am codependent, an adult child of an alcoholic, I was married to a man I labeled an alcoholic, I think the other one qualified for SA. I have a son who is in active addiction, plus I have had many sponsees relapse and two who went back out and didn't make it back in because they were not willing to do Step work, and they died. They would call me after the fact, if they managed to survive. I am grateful for them, people like them did my research for me. It isn't any better out there, in fact it is much worse than when I came into recovery in 1991.

You can do the 1st Step on your knees if you want to, I can't get down there. All that matters is that you take Step One 100% or there is a good chance you will relapse. Many forget that Step One comes in two parts, the second half for me, means my life is unmanageable when managed by me.

I was in the church for the first 20 years of my life. It didn't stop me from being an alcoholic or an addict. I had my first taste of alcohol at the age of 10. I didn't drink alcohol again until my late teens and early twenties. I was put on Valium by my doctor at 16. I remember the Ahhhhhh feeling when the communion wine hit bottom. I wanted to know what I was missing out on. When I was baptized at 14, and took part in communion I can remember trying to take a gulp and make it look like a sip. They had real wine for communion in my church, the Gospel Hall. My grandfather who built the church was a traveling minister. I went back to the church in recovery, and I could talk to the people, but they had no understanding of me, and i found what I needed in the rooms of recovery.

What I got was, yes dear, I sinned too. It doesn't work that way, at least not for me. SIN means "Soul in need" always looking for something outside of myself to make me happy. That is where the insanity of the disease comes in. I have to turn my dis-ease over to the God of my understanding on a daily basis.

Thanks for letting me share. I will look for the OXford Steps, I'm sorry, I got off topic.