New vitality and confidence make it unnecessary to smooth over the rough spots with Scotch
WHEN the harsh, irrefutable fact that alcohol was ruining my life finally confronted me, my first and consuming emotional reaction was one of fear–fear of the drastic change which I knew must occur and which by all reason should eliminate alcohol from my life.
Drinking had been a key bit of business in my stage play of existence. I played at it when I worked and I worked at it when I played. It was now out of control and was having telling effects mentally and physically. Yet I could not conceive of day-to-day procedure without it.
I knew, or thought I knew, about AA. To me it meant closing the door on alcohol and throwing away the key to vitality. Vitality, in retrospect, was smoothing over the rough spots with Scotch.
Meetings once a week? A group of ex-drunks talking about the evils of booze or comparing scars, conversing on saving man from his weaknesses? Not for me. “Devise your own program, just don’t drink,” I thought. There were reflections on my attempts at limitation. But I felt there hadn’t been a determined effort toward total abstinence. I must have known that on my own I would have an out if the need arose. I was afraid to close the door. I was afraid I couldn’t change, I was afraid I didn’t want to.
During this period of fear and indecision, the situation, as always, did not improve, it worsened. Something would have to be done. Did I want to progress to the inevitable end or didn’t I? Through the fog crept the thoughts of false pride and miserable, unfruitful self-denial. Why not place myself in a position where it might be possible to help another and thereby make the decision count far more? Those ideas implanted by my soon-to-be sponsor prompted me to my first AA meeting.
There my fear turned to excitement. I found something more than strength in Twelfth Step work. I found something more than the will and power to stay sober. Coupled with regained vitality and confidence was the revelation that this group was concerned with far more than how to stay sober in Twelve Steps. Here were men and women asking questions and analyzing human behavior in a manner which was as stimulating as any I have ever heard.
I have enjoyed a college education, but no class in psychology or philosophy produced for me the effect of the AA inquiry into man and his universe. AA was asking the questions which we so often dismiss from our minds in the quest for fame, fortune or security. Here were people who had had their faith wrested from them, whose minds had been on a roller-coaster of emotion and conflict and whose bodies had suffered as only those of alcoholics can suffer. Here was no bigotry, no pre-determined effort to convert, no finality, but an honest group of human beings, I think, saying, “Dear God, You have allowed me to live and I want to know why. I want to understand You and my fellow man. Help me with the truths of tolerance and compassion. Help me to truth itself.”
AA doesn’t provide all the answers, but it does one thing with unequaled vigor–it asks questions!