The Steps
Admit you have a problem.
Admit you need help.
Get help.
Take a good, hard look at yourself.
Talk about it.
Prepare to be responsible.
Take responsibility.
Look at the mess you’re in.
Work to improve.
Put the Steps into practice.
Pray and meditate.
Carry the message.
God grant me the wisdom to know your will.
The sanity to carry it out.
And the comfort of knowing I am in your care.
Sobriety: A good attitude to a sound grip of reality.
Tommy’s Story
I started drinking at eighteen, as you do. I was a moderate drinker for six years – then I went insane. After the psychotic episodes, anxiety, unemployment, and depression became a problem, alcoholism slowly crept up on me. At first, it was the accidental binges – I would go out to catch a band and have a couple of drinks, then wake up the next day with a hangover, having spent money I had intended for something else and wandering what had happened. By the time I was twenty-seven, I was drinking on a daily basis, and after six months of this, I realised I was an alcoholic. Unlike the madness, I knew where to get help for alcoholism; so I walked up to the AA office in Darwin to seek assistance.
When I walked through the doors, I saw The Serenity Prayer. “Oh, I love that prayer, I didn’t know it had anything to do with AA.” I soon realised a friend of mine’s father was an alcoholic, and his mum was going to Alanon – the first of many great revelations that would come to me working The Steps. Next, I saw The Steps; The Steps! I had been hearing for years, “You’re going to have to do The Steps”, now I knew what it meant. I mentioned I was a little concerned by the word powerless. I was told, “You don’t need to do all your steps at once – get yourself to a few meetings and work from there.” The woman asked me how much I was drinking. I answered, “Two or three longnecks of VB a night.” She told me to go away and come back when I was serious. I had to convince her I had a problem, and I got myself to a few meetings. But they didn’t make much sense to me because I was insane, and what I really needed was hospital, doctors, and to start working out medication. Shortly after, I got admitted to Cowdy Ward, the psychiatric department at Royal Darwin Hospital.
Two years later, after a particularly disastrous overseas trip, I found myself trapped in my parents’ backyard in rural Queensland. No friends, nothing to do, nowhere to go, and a free cask of wine sitting on the top of the fridge. I went from two or three longnecks of beer to two litres of cheap wine a day. I kept this up for four years without seeking out help. Not because I was in denial about being an alcoholic but because I didn’t think I was up to AA’s standards. I thought AA was for together people; people with jobs, houses, and families. Not for insane, unemployed, want-to-be artists living in their parents’ backyard. They say you hear the differences at first. Then, in 2003, I had some success with the clown business I was trying to put together and returned to Queensland from Darwin determined to get my act together. I had put it off long enough; it was time to do The Steps.
Step one was a no-brainer for me. Powerless over alcohol, I had been drinking on a daily basis for six years, despite not wanting to. I didn’t drink because I wanted to; I drank because I couldn’t cope without it. My life was unmanageable. I was thirty-three, living in my parents’ backyard in a place I just didn’t want to be. I had been on welfare for ten years, and Centrelink had put me in the too-hard basket. I had had multiple admissions into psychiatric hospitals – did my life have to be any more unmanageable?
Steps two and three: I had no problem with the existence of God, but I believed God intended for me to be a drunk. I quite resented God for making me a drunk. I had been struggling to understand God for many years: after a meeting one night, a member told me I had to accept God as I understood him. “But I can’t understand God!” “Then that is what you have to accept,” and I understood. I had asked God into my life many years earlier, but it is not until I started working The Steps that I started to understand what God was trying to tell me.
Then the hard work begins; step four. There is just so much I was ignorant of, in denial of, confused about, or deluded about. With diabetes, the doctor takes some blood and does a test, then tells you what kind of diabetes you have and exactly how much you need of what to fix it. With mental health, they ask you some questions, come up with a funny-sounding diagnosis, and hand you some pills. “Here, try this, see if it helps.” I knew I was crazy, but I didn’t know how or why or what to do about it. Make a list of resentments; all I could think of is: I don’t like living in Hervey Bay because it’s boring and there are no opportunities, and I can’t work out work. Then one night I got to thinking there were some things in my past I wasn’t happy about, and all of a sudden I had in front of me what had driven me insane. I had to get myself into hospital the next morning, where I was told, “We don’t deal with that kind of thing.”
I didn’t have schizoaffective disorder; I had post-traumatic stress disorder. Mental Health was not impressed. I didn’t know that I was smart or how that affected my life. I was very confused about my identity as an artist. I had mixed up artist with: smart, with that stuff, with some personal values, with some identity issues every artist deals with; the result was a confused, shambles mess of an ego. I had to face up to the fact that they had put me on the pension for a reason, and I needed to accept that and be grateful I lived in a country with such generous welfare and make the best of my grant. Early in working The Steps, I was asked,
“Have you heard anything you can relate to?”
“Well, there are some things I think yes, that’s me, and there are some things I think I’m glad that’s not me, and there are some things I think that could be me, and there are some things that ring a certain bell, but I can’t think what it is.”
”Do you know anyone else who drinks like you?”
“Well, my dad drinks as much as me.”
And the penny dropped – how could I have missed that! It just didn’t occur to me that the fact my dad drank as much as me as often as me for longer than me made him an alcoholic as well. My problems didn’t start when I started drinking; they started twelve years earlier when my dad started drinking. This was just the start of facing up to the realities of my life, and at first, it was a terrible shock to the system. Working The Steps set off a doozer of an episode in Darwin in 2004. I spent six weeks in hospital and ended up back in my parents’ backyard in complete defeat.
When it came to making amends, I was just me and my higher power; AA people didn’t seem to understand what I was talking about, and Mental Health didn’t want to talk about it. I needed to mend the relationship between me and my parents; this relationship was very badly broken. With my mum, this was a long, slow, painful process. But highly rewarding, my mum came to understand that I am not a chef or a baker and that my interest in art, theatre, and philosophy is not a mental health condition. As a result of the effort we both put in, we could have a sensible conversation about anything from the weather to troubling family issues; with mum, it was a courageous situation. With my dad, it had to be a short, loud confrontation. I said what I needed to say, but ultimately, he still goes around telling people I’m a baker and believes my artistic interests are a mental health issue; with dad, it is a serenity situation.
In 2007, I discovered private psychiatric clinics; they’re like a five-star hotel with a psychiatric theme. I highly recommend them. I soon discovered that my heart was beating twice as fast as it should be. When I got the medication to fix this, the anxiety attacks stopped, and I was able to stop using Valium. In 2010, with the help of medication, I was able to quit tobacco, and money stopped being such a problem for me. In 2015, I took up study in philosophy and theology, something I had long wanted to do. In 2022, I was able to return to Darwin, a place that feels like home to me. I had clawed my way out of the pit of despair I found myself in in 2005. I have been fearless and through in working The Steps, and this effort has borne fruit in the form of a more sane and manageable life; but I just can’t stay sober. I have had what I call sober binges: nine months when I first started AA, a few weeks here, a few months there, time with clinics and rehabs, two years while living and working with a Christian charity that ministers to homeless people; but ultimately, I pick up again. I don’t pick up thinking it will be different; I pick up knowing I can rely on the drink to make me feel better.
I now have twenty years of experience working on The Steps. The promises are real in my life, but I haven’t been able to get sober. I have met many others with similar stories and done much of my step work over a few beers. And that experience has led me to the conclusion that AA is broken. It is not working the way it is meant to. It is certainly not working the way it claims to. Rarely have we seen a person fail? Try ninety-five percent fail! AA as a whole needs to do The Steps and make amends. It is failing in its mission to help afflicted alcoholics achieve sobriety and denigrating those who fail as being born lazy and morally deficient. The endless parroting of clichés may be comforting for some, but for the vast majority, they are ineffective and boring. The Big Book is being treated as the infallible word of God. But the literature is the scribblings of a very flawed drunk written nearly a hundred years ago. Prayer and meditation are a vital part of the AA prescription, but there is no prayer or meditation happening at meetings. Sectarian members have a monopoly on sharing their views of God, and the religious members are frightened to speak about the God of their understanding. The rooms are occupied primarily by drunks that simply decided to stop drinking and have no understanding of a compulsive alcoholic. The mental health component of alcoholism has not been addressed, despite the huge innovations that have occurred in this field in the time since The Big Book was penned. The modern medications that can be of assistance in achieving sobriety are not being talked about. AA needs a wake-up call, and I am hoping to achieve that with this book.
Rarely have we seen a person fail
You are probably familiar with the song Amazing Grace. What you are likely not aware of is that it is a song about a drunk getting sober. John Newton’s parents enlisted him in the Royal Navy; he didn’t like it in the navy, so ran away. When he was caught, he was indentured into the slave trade. The life of a sailor was a wild and woolly one. It was a well-paid job, and while at sea, there was nothing to spend their money on. When in port, sailors would spend their generous wages on drink, gambling, and prostitutes. So when John was not at sea ill-treating slaves, he was behaving badly in port towns. Then one day, he wandered into a church and received the good news. Not long after, in a wild and terrifying storm, where he was terrified for his life, he had an amazing encounter with the Holy Spirit. He immediately gave up alcohol, gambling, and promiscuity, saved up some money, and headed back to England to become a writer of spiritual songs and a lobbyist for the abolition of slavery. Something to think about next time you hear that song.
This is what Carl Jung called a profound psychic change, and it is something that has been going on throughout history. For as long as there has been alcohol, there have been alcoholics, and for as long as there have been alcoholics, there have been people overcoming the disease. One such example is Bill Willson. Bill was a very sick alcoholic – on the brink of death. All the fun of drinking was gone, but he just couldn’t stop. Eddy, an old drinking friend, came to visit. Bill was excited at the prospect of some of the good old days – but something had changed in his friend. “I’ve found God,” Eddy told him; “Oh God,” Bill thought. Eddy persuaded Bill to come to his Oxford Group meetings. The Oxford Group was a loose association of Christians that would gather to work on their faith. They had literature and slogans, would share about where they were in their Christian walk, they had a six-step program, and they liked to sober up drunks. Not long after joining the Oxford Group, Bill ended up back in hospital. There he had his amazing grace moment and saw the light. He didn’t drink again. Rather, he set out to find other drunks to sober up. Eventually, he found Dr Robert Smith, a hard-working professional, a good husband, a thoroughly likeable sort of guy, who would have a few drinks before he went into surgery to stop the shakes. Dr Bob was also in an Oxford Group trying to get help and was able to sober up after meeting Bill. June 10, 1935, the day Dr Bob had his last drink, is considered to be the founding day of Alcoholics Anonymous. The formation of the Twelve-Step programs is one of the most profound events of the Twentieth Century.
“Rarely have we seen a person fail,” the introduction to How It Works starts. It certainly isn’t true now, and I doubt it was true in 1939; this is ego-maniac Bill Willson at his worst. He’s had a bit of success, and it’s totally gone to his head. The introduction then goes on to explain how anyone who doesn’t work for it is born morally deficient. It is staggeringly offensive for anyone who battles to get sober, and it is read out at just about every meeting. The purpose of the introduction is to first give hope to what has been described as a hopeless situation, then empathise the need for hard work and honesty, but it is an appalling piece of prose that makes some extraordinary claims, denigrates those who struggle, and feeds the arrogance of dry drunks who find it easy to get sober. This is particularly ironic given the programme was meant for those who find it hard , not those who find it easy. It seems likely to me that the majority of long-term sober people in AA are what I call first-steppers. These are people that can sober up at the first step. This can be a doozer of a step to get over; first, they have to admit they are drinking too much ( “I just have a couple of drinks at the end of the day to relax”), then they have to admit it is causing trouble ( “it’s everyone else that is causing the trouble”), then if you haven’t at least tried to control it, you probably shouldn’t be in AA. But having admitted that they are drinking too much, that it is causing trouble, and that they can’t control it, they have arrived at step one and simply decide to stop doing it. Then the meetings and the sharing are about reinforcing the decision, that needs to be made on a daily basis, not to pick up that first drink. Just don’t pick up that first drink? You are clearly not dealing with the same thing I am! There is no way a first-stepper will be able to understand a compulsive drinker. Rather, they shake their head and say, “Will this guy ever get it?” What happens when you take a boring, arrogant drunk and remove the alcohol? You get a boring, arrogant, sober alcoholic, welcome to AA.
The Big Book does a really good job of dealing with Bill Wilson’s problem. At his best, Bill Wilson was a narcissistic egomaniac who liked to show off with his money. At his worst, he would steal money out of his wife’s purse, that she earned as a checkout operator, to buy gin and have sex with prostitutes. In the early days of sobriety, he continued to sleep around and would boast about his sexual prowess at his Oxford Group, a Christian group that was trying to achieve purity; it’s just the kind of guy he was. The Big Book deals with egotistical, resentful, fearful, selfish, and promiscuous because these are the things that came up in Bill Wilson’s inventory. But not all alcoholics are like this: there are those with low self-esteem, the guilt-ridden, those that serve on everyone else but never have time for themselves. Different alcoholics need to take a different approach to The Steps. The friends of a guilt-ridden alcoholic may be sick of hearing sorry, and a different approach to amends may be needed. My sex life was a long way from ideal, but work is the area where I had some big things to face up to. I go to AA meetings and keep hearing the same stories. Is it that everyone in AA has the same story, or are people just trying to fit in? This is important because if people are not sharing their stories but sharing stories that fit in, the honesty’s not there, and that might explain AA’s lack of effectiveness.
When I first started working The Steps, I heard the similarities; the drinking was the same. But over time, the differences became more pronounced. I started to question whether or not I was an alcoholic; certainly, I didn’t have the same thing that was described in The Big Book, and I wasn’t hearing anything much like my story in the meetings. But when I went into the hospitals, I met lots of people with stories like mine. I’m a crazy guy that drinks to deal with the madness; I went insane, my life became unmanageable, and I learned to drink to deal with it. I drank the way I did because I have a medical condition that was effectively treated with alcohol. The problem is it has so many nasty side effects. Over time, I have found medications that deal with my condition better. I found medication that slows my thinking down, medication that stops the anxiety attacks, medication that helped me quit smoking, and medication that helped resolve a resentment I had with my parents. I don’t need to drink anymore. But I have a long, positively reinforced habit of picking up a drink; how do I beat that? Am I an alcoholic, or am I a problem drinker? Having treated the problem, can I return to moderate drinking? Is abstinence an option for me? Is there a medication that can help me achieve this? I can’t get help or understanding with these issues at AA. My condition doesn’t fit the template, and I’m not even allowed to ask these questions at AA.
A lot has happened since Alcoholics Anonymous was published. At the time, membership stood at about 100. There are now over 123,000 groups in approximately 180 countries, and the Big Book has been translated into over 100 languages. Lessons have been learned, and the AA program has evolved. Medical science has advanced in its understanding of addiction, both at the biological and psychological levels. But Bill Willson died in 1971, and there have been almost no updates to the AA literature since. Dr Silkworth, in his letter to AA, writes, “there is the manic-depressive type, who is the least understood by his peers and about whom a whole chapter could be written,” that was over eighty years ago. Where is the chapter? The prospect was grim for someone like me in 1939: permanent institutionalisation, straight jackets, restraining tables, strong sedatives, lobotomies. The modern medications have seen an end to these practices, and people like me can manage a fair degree of functionality in the community. As a result, people like me are turning up to AA to get help with drinking issues, but the help isn’t there because the person seeking help doesn’t fit Bill Willson’s description of the alcoholic. The Big Book will always be the Big Book; it is an important work of literature; but like Plato’s Republic, it is out of date.
What about the quit-drinking medications, why aren’t these being talked about at AA meetings? Bill and Dr Bob tried all sorts of things to help people get sober, do you think they would have refused to try Antabuse, Campral or Naltrexone? Antabuse is a dead cert, you just can’t get drunk if you are on Antabuse. You can’t even use aerosol deodorants because the alcohol will cause you to break out in a rash. It will smell bad, it will taste bad and if you swallow it it will make you sick; you will end up in hospital very sick before you get drunk. It doesn’t treat the alcoholism, it just makes it impossible to drink so you still need something like AA. Campral reduces cravings and can give the AA member a five percent better chance at recovery. Naltrexone is the controversial one as it involves slowly cutting down rather than suddenly stopping and leads to the option of moderate drinking. It’s called The Sinclair Method (TSM) it works for eighty percent of people who try it. At the point of extinction the alcoholic using this method will have lost all interest in drinking. But no; if it isn’t in the Big Book, it isn’t a valid way to treat alcoholism.
A god of your own understanding
Religion is a dirty word in AA. In the early days of AA there was a division between those who wanted AA to be a Christian organisation, those who wanted AA to be a sectarian organisation, and those who wanted a god of your own understanding. Eventually the Christians and the sectarians settled their differences and agreed to meet in the middle. This has been a great strength of AA and has allowed it to spread across all manner of the world’s religious persuasions. As AA spread across the world it transcended spiritual boundaries. Alcoholism doesn’t discriminate on religious grounds and neither does AA – in theory.
The irony about being non-religious is you don’t get out of religion by being non-religious; rather, non-religious becomes your religion. And like so many religions, the sectarians can find themselves: taking themselves too seriously, pushing their religious views on other people, and getting offended when someone else has a different idea. There is a story I heard of a Muslim, a Christian, a sectarian, and a pagan who walk into a café together. They sit down, drink coffee, chat, and have a pleasant afternoon. It’s not a joke; it is what happens when you’re not a complete asshole. In Australia, the sectarians at AA are being complete assholes and have monopolised a god of their understanding. When the non-religious AA says a god of your understanding, he means a god of his understanding, and you better agree with him, or there will be trouble.
Half the population of Australia claims some religious affiliation – primarily Christian. Given such a large demographic, there are bound to be religious people at AA. Christians are not forbidden to drink and are not immune from problems with alcohol. There are lapsed Christians who are drawn back to the God of their childhood. And there are those who, when confronted with finding a closer contact with a god of their understanding, seek out religion to achieve that. One Christian AA told me if he went for a god of his own understanding, he would end up with himself. But the Christians are afraid to share the God of their understanding because they don’t want to offend the sectarians.
AA is not the place to preach the gospel, but Christians need to be able to confess their faith and refer to the Bible. The whole program comes out of the Bible, and there is wisdom in that book that can help the AA make sense of sobriety. To the Christian AA, I would say don’t place your lamp under a bush; put it on the mantel where it can shed light on the room. The sectarians will just have to deal with their resentment through prayer to the god of their understanding.
They say AA is not a religion. But look around the room: the banners, the wooden circle with a triangle in the middle, the jewellery, the tokens, the bumperstickers, the replica of the original Big Book; these are looking a lot like religious icons. You can hear a member share about their trip to America: you can go to the hotel where Bill made the call to Dr Bob and make a call on the phone he used, you can go to Dr Bob’s house, it’s a large house that serves as a BnB, you can see the typewriter Bill used to write the Big Book, the house is slightly elevated and there are twelve steps leading up to the porch, there are twelve bricks around the fireplace in the living room and above the fireplace is a picture of a camel; great significance is read into the camel “the camel can walk through the desert one step at a time and not have to drink”, you can go to Dr Bob’s grave and exchange a token that is left on the gravestone; this is looking a lot like a religious pilgrimage. Then you tell me the Big Book has THE description of the alcoholic and THE solution to the problem and it must not be questioned or altered in any way. The solution is to attend lots of meetings, read the Big Book every day, get a sponsor, spread the message, praise the program and tow the line. And if it doesn’t work for you it’s because you are not doing the program honestly and thoroughly; this is looking a lot like religious dogma. Dogma is an inevitable consequence of religion and you can’t get out of it by being secular or New Age. The problem with dogma is it erodes the original spirit of the message. AA was meant to be a group of drunks getting together to help each other to stay sober. It has become a society of reformed drinkers, that just decided to stop drinking, where they can enjoy the fellowship of other reformed drinkers and feel comfortably smug about their moral superiority. At which point the AA member is revealed as an arrogant religious zealot pushing an unquestionable theology. A hypocrite displaying all the traits he so strongly disapproves of.
The tram guy
When I first started working at The Steps, I was told I shouldn’t even go past a pub. I was living at the YMCA in Darwin at the time, and there was a nice pub across the road from the entrance. There were, I don’t know how many, pubs between my home and the bus station. There was no way I could avoid going past pubs. Then, over time, I started to hear about the tram guy. He must have been a very geographic kind of guy, as I have met people who have met him all over the country. This guy reckoned the tram was his higher power; as the tram went past the pub. I find this to be quite absurd. The thing about trams is they stop; there would have been a stop before the pub and a stop after the pub. And the thing about pubs is they’re everywhere; there would have been more stops near more pubs as the tram rolled along. It simply isn’t possible not to go past pubs. You can’t go to the supermarket without going past a bottle shop. This is a good example of a cliché that is parroted endlessly without being given much thought.
This, however, brings up a point that should be talked about: triggers and how to deal with them. Avoiding triggers is one way of dealing with them, but sometimes there is no avoiding them. A trip to the supermarket is going to involve going past the bottle shop; there will be unavoidable social occasions where others are drinking; a hot day mowing the lawn might bring on a thirst; a cold winter’s night might make a warm, cosy bar look tempting; finishing a task might make a drink seem rewarding; a plane flight might seem more comfortable with a muscle-relaxing beverage. The thing is to be aware of triggers and prepare for them. Think ahead and be ready for the challenges you might face.
A drink for a drunk
Are six months into working the steps, I was faced with a dilemma: a festival I was involved with organising was putting on a band night in an Irish pub. I was torn as to whether or not to go. In the end, I decided I was getting sober for a reason; to get better at that sort of thing. So I went and had an awesome night. I found I naturally gravitated to the table with the non-drinkers. I was shocked to discover some of them were drinking water; are you allowed to do that in a pub! I enjoyed the music and the company, the next day I remembered it all clearly and wasn’t worried I had made a fool of myself. It bought me back to the time before alcohol was a problem and I could enjoy a night of live entertainment and not get drunk. The only problem was I drunk too much Coke. I told an AA friend about this and he suggested soda water would be good in those circumstances. I have since discovered a squeeze of citrus in soda makes for a crisp, dry, refreshing drink in place of a beer. Non-alcoholic beer or wine is controversial as it might be a trigger, but some find it helps. Lemon Lime and Bitters works for some, but there is a hint of alcohol from the Bitters. Tea and coffee are the mainstay of AA meetings, but the caffeine can become a problem. Especially as meetings tend to be held late in the evening. A mocktail might be an option in some drinking spots. You’re not likely to want beer or wine after a milkshake. What to drink in place of alcohol would be a good subject to share at meetings.
What do you drink in place of alcohol?
Just for today
In 2000 I found myself trapped in my parents’ backyard in rural South East Queensland and I just didn’t want to be there. I was wanting to make a clown business work and Hervey Bay was not the ideal place to do it. Then in 2003 I got myself back to Darwin and had a very successful season. I came back to Hervey Bay determined to get my act together and started working The Steps. The thing with Darwin is the weather sux for half the year and opportunities for work like mine drop out in the wet season. There was a limited window of opportunity to head back up north. I was tossing up whether or not to go back in 2004 or leave it a year and get more established in sobriety first. I went to AA friends with the dilemma but I got the answer “just for today, just live for today.” Eventually I decided I would head north that year and announced this at a meeting. In response I got “are you sure, have you thought about it, maybe you’re doing a geographic?” I have found this is typical of the kind of help I can expect from AA.
“Yesterday’s history, tomorrow is a mystery.” Well actually there is something you can do about the past; you can learn from it. “Those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it.” There is something you can do about the future; you can plan for it. “If you fail to plan, plan to fail.” The philosophy of just for today stems from Bible teaching:
Matthew 6:34 Give your entire attention to what God is doing right now, and don’t get worked up about what may or may not happen tomorrow. God will help you deal with whatever hard things come up when the time comes.” (The Message)
But the Bible also teaches “this too shall pass.” Don’t get stuck in the here and now, or else you might find yourself thinking “right now I feel bad, right now a drink will make me feel better, forget the lessons of the past, forget the consequences of the future, right now I’ll have a drink.” Dwelling on the past or worrying about the future can be unhealthy. But a free spirit living in the moment can be reckless and dangerous. The whole point in sharing is to learn from the past and be reminded about the future consequences of picking up.
For many a day at a time is too long to deal with. It has to be an hour at a time or a minute at a time. But given time. But given time you are working a week at a time, then a month at a time, then a season at a time, then you are planning the years a season at a time; then you are set free from the bondage of the here and now.
Just for today is not the answer to all life’s problems.
Geographic
I found myself trapped living somewhere I just didn’t want to live. It was boring and there were no opportunities for someone like me, the things I liked doing didn’t happen there. That and I was trapped living with the people who drove me insane and I had to listen to my Dad’s insane ranting when he was drunk on cask wine at the end of every day.
I was told by AA that there were no conditions under which people, places or things could be a problem and that I must under no circumstances do a geographic. I found escape with a circus, which was a full-time geographic. It was too exhausting to stay with the circus all the time, so when I wasn’t with the circus I was with: family, friends, hostels, camping grounds, sleeping rough and homeless shelters. I was told by AA I mustn’t do geographics. This was generally to be achieved by settling down with the person making this judgement; because that person’s place is the best place in the world to get sober – what am I going to do in Ayr Reg? It is typical of the arrogance of a sober alcoholic in the AA program.
It is an example of what I call the reality problem. So much of psychology and self-help practices relies on the problem being addressed being an imaginary problem. “My teenage sons are grown; their hair is long. Is it any wonder I drink!” But the situation I was in was a real emotional nightmare. It was not a serenity situation; it was a courage situation. I needed to make some changes. But AA doctrine is clear: people, places, and things are never real problems, and you must never do geographics.
Dealing with other people
Look at The Serenity Prayer. There are three things in play: serenity, courage, and wisdom. How quickly the AA leaves into the arms of serenity, but sometimes it is a courage situation, which is why you need the wisdom to discern between them when dealing with life’s challenges. I was having problems dealing with the way my parents were treating me. I was able to work The Steps with my Mum, which was a long and painful process with a lot of crying and a little shouting. The reward for our effort was that we were best friends for the last twenty years of her life; with my Mum, it was a courage situation. I have not been able to work The Steps with my Dad because he is neither honest, open-minded, nor willing; with my Dad, it has been a serenity situation.
You can’t do anything about other people is an unquestionable doctrine of AA. But this statement is a lie; we need to educate other people on how we want to be treated. This truth could be a problem in the hands of an angry, arrogant alcoholic, but not everyone with a drinking problem is like that. We must not allow ourselves to be pushovers; it is good and healthy that you set clear boundaries.
The last drink is irrelevant; the next drink is not a problem.
“Physicians who are familiar with alcoholism agree there is no such thing as making a normal drinker out of an alcoholic. Science may one day accomplish this, but it hasn’t done so yet.” pg 31 Alcoholics Anonymous.
I’ve had money in the bank for the last four days and have not picked it up. I could if I wanted to, but I just haven’t felt like it. I spent most of today sitting in a café that serves alcohol, writing some letters to publish on my blog. I wasn’t in the slightest bit tempted to go for a glass of wine; I was content with my iced latte. I have no idea when I had my last drink. It was a Bloody Mary and I thoroughly enjoyed it. I drink when I want to; it is no longer a problem. What an amazingly awesome place to be. For decades I drank despite not wanting to and the only solution was abstinence, that try as I might I could not achieve.
It is not a supernatural miracle; it’s a miracle of modern science. All that is required is that you get a pill and take it one hour before you start drinking. The alcoholic slowly loses all interest in drinking. It’s called The Sinclair Method. It’s kind of hard to get your head around; it helps if you have some understanding of neuroscience. It plays a trick on the reward system and the neural pathways that drive you to pick up slowly dissolve. It is frustratingly slow and at first it doesn’t seem to be doing anything, so it helps if you know why you are doing what you are doing. There is a book “The Cure for Alcoholism” and a movie available on YouTube “One Little Pill” that explain things well. Also, there is a Facebook support group “The Sinclair Method Warriors” that can offer much-needed encouragement and a place to express exciting milestones in recovery; it is an exciting journey to recovery. I doubt the Sinclair Method would have given me mastery over alcohol before achieving sanity, and my sanity was dependent on working The Steps. The Steps are an invaluable tool in achieving a sane and manageable life; but The Sinclair Method changes the whole way we need to approach The Steps.
In summary
AA is broken; it is making an extraordinary claim it isn’t even coming close to living up to, then belittles the vast majority of people it lets down. The description of the alcoholic is a narrow-minded description of Bill Wilson. The literature hasn’t been updated in nearly a century despite developments made in the field of addiction treatment. The fellowship is venerated in a way that has become unhealthy and hypocritical. More modern, up-to-date, and effective methods are being ignored. The issue of mental health has not been addressed. There is only one understanding of god that is permissible to mention at meetings. AA members are falling into line with a group dynamic and not honestly sharing their story, creating meetings most newcomers can’t relate to. AA has become a society of boring, arrogant, self-righteous hypocrites. The program as a whole has become bogged down in an unquestionable religious dogma. It is time to stop prising the program and ask what has gone wrong.
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