AA Book Club

  AA history and literature together - read Bill's 1948 Grapevine article on Tradition Eight: Tradition Eight Throughout the world AAs are twelfth-stepping with thousands of new prospects a month. Between one and two thousand of these sick on our first presentation; past experience shows that  most of the remainder will come back to us later on. Almost entirely unorganized and completely non professional, this mighty spiritual current is now flowing from alcoholics who are well to those who are sick. One alcoholic talking to another; that's all. Could this vast and vital face-to-face effort ever be professionalized or even organized? Most emphatically, it could not. The few efforts to professionalized straight twelfth Step work have always failed quickly. Today, no AA will tolerate the idea of paid "AA therapists" or "organizers."  Nor does any AA like to be told just how he must handle that  new prospect of his. No, this great life-giving stream can nev...

  Big Book topics for study, meditation or use with a sponsee (from our online AA literature study guide at aabookclub.org): Good Thinking I was to test my thinking by the new God-consciousness within. Common sense would thus become uncommon sense. I was to sit quietly when in doubt, as king only for direction and strength to meet my problems as He would have me. Never was I to pray for myself, except as my requests bore on my usefulness to others. Then only might I expect to receive. But that would be in great measure. My friend promised when these things were done I would enter upon a new relationship with my Creator; that I would have the elements of a way of living which answered all my problems. Belief in the power of God, plus enough willingness, honesty and humility to establish and maintain the new order of things, were the essential requirements. Simple, but not easy; a price had to be paid. It meant destruction of self-centeredness. I must turn in al...

  Sobriety Meme of the Week:

July 30: On this day in 1950, Dr. Bob gave his farewell talk at the First AA International Convention in Cleveland, OH. Here is a transcript of his remarks: My good friends in AA and of AA… I get a big thrill out of looking over a vast sea of faces like this with a feeling that possibly some small thing that I did a number of years ago played a small part in making this meeting possible. I also get quite a thrill when I think that we all had the same problem. We all did the same things. We all get the same results in proportion to our zeal and enthusiasm and stick-to-itiveness. If you will pardon the injection of a personal note at this time, let me say that I have been in bed five of the last seven months and my strength hasn’t returned as I would like, so my remarks of necessity will be very brief. But there are two or three things that flashed into my mind on which it would be fitting to lay a little emphasis; one is the simplicity of our program. Let’s not louse it all up with Fre...

  From AA and the Books of James, an original work examining the Big Book and two sources that helped inspire it: "Few pieces of outside spiritual literature have been as influential on AA and its Founders as William James’ 1902 book Varieties of Religious Experience and the New Testament Book of James. William James is the only outside literature explicitly cited in the Big Book, and a key phrase from the Book of James is used there. Bill W. and Dr. Bob were exposed to both books early in their quests for sobriety, and their impact on A.A.’s program of action can be seen in its primary text. We shall be looking at the role of these books in the personal stories of AA’s founders first, then the influence they had on the Big Book and AA’s program of action." Free downloadable PDF available at these links:  AA and the Books of James  or  AA and the Books of James More original studies of AA literature at   AABookClub.org   (Alternate site:  AABookClub.wi...

  Sobriety Meme of the Week:

Did you know that AA had a service structure before the Big Book and a formal program of recovery? The Big Book was written in late 1938 and early 1939, and published on April 10, 1939. But the Alcoholic Foundation (precursor to the General Service Organization) was already in place.