A helpful breakdown of Step Four out of the Big Book:
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From AA Book Club's original study guide The Twelve Concepts for World Service for Dummies - An Introduction to AA's Forgotten Third Legacy: "In these pages we hope to provide an introduction to the Twelve Concepts for those who are not yet familiar with them. A full and complete examination is not possible merely through writing, for these principles are not a theory, they are meant to be practiced. But we can provide a simplified (we hope not 'dumbed down') explanation of the Concepts - a Cliff's Notes version, if you will." Available for free download at these links: The Twelve Concepts for Dummies or The Twelve Concepts for Dummies More original studies of AA literature at AABookClub.org (Alternate site: AABookClub.wixsite.com/aabc )
AA literature and history together - Read Bill W.'s 1948 Grapevine article on Tradition Six: Tradition Six The sixth of our Twelve Points of AA Tradition is deemed so important that it states at length the relation of the AA movement to money and property. This Tradition declares in substance that the accumulation of money, property, and the unwanted personal authority so often generated by material wealth comprise a cluster of serious hazards against which an AA group must ever be on guard. Tradition Six also enjoins the group never to go into business nor ever to lend the AA name or money credit to any "outside" enterprise, no matter how good. Strongly expressed is the opinion that even clubs should not bear the AA name; that they ought to be separately incorporated and managed by those individual AAs who need or want clubs enough to financially support them. We would thus divide the spiritual from the material...
Fill in the blanks on this quote from the 12&12: “THIS is the Step that separates the ________ from the ______ .” So declares a well-loved clergyman who happens to be one of A.A.'s greatest friends. He goes on to explain that any person capable of enough willingness and honesty to try repeatedly Step Six on all his faults—without any reservations whatever—has indeed come a long way spiritually, and is therefore entitled to be called a man who is sincerely trying to grow in the image and likeness of his own Creator. A) the Big Book 'Thumpers' from the Meeting Makers B) the 'recovered' from the 'recovering' C) the men from the boys D) the wheat from the chaff (Answer is on page 63)
Throwback Thursday AA history post - The six articles published in the Cleveland Plain Dealer in late 1939 led to tremendous growth in Cleveland's AA Group #3, but also got Clarence kicked out: That fall Clarence smuggled freelance reporter Elrick Davis into meetings of that first Greater Cleveland group and Mr. Davis wrote a series of articles on A.A. which were published in the Cleveland Plain Dealer. This resulted in over 500 calls for help to be tended by the only 13 active members... Many members were upset by this workload and by the surreptitious manner in which it was done. So they voted Clarence out of A.A. (which was something that could be done at the time). (aa.cle.org) Alcoholics Anonymous Makes Its Stand Here [First of Six Articles] By ELRICK B. DAVIS Much has been written about Alcoholics Anonymous, an organization doing major work in reclaiming the habitual drinker. This is the first of a series describing the work t...
Big Book topics for study, meditation or use with a sponsee (from our online AA literature study guide at AABookClub.org ): Reasonable Disclosure We found that as soon as we were able to lay aside prejudice and express even a willingness to believe in a Power greater than ourselves, we commenced to get results, even though it was impossible for any of us to fully define or comprehend that Power, which is God. (Page 46) Faced with alcoholic destruction, we soon became as open minded on spiritual matters as we had tried to be on other questions. In this respect alcohol was a great persuader. It finally beat us into a state of reasonableness. (Page 48) When we became alcoholics, crushed by a self-imposed crisis we could not postpone or evade, we had to fearlessly face the proposition that either God is everything or else He is nothing. God either is, or He isn't. What was our choice to be? (Page 53) Our stories disclose in a general way what we used to be ...
From Stories of Recovery.org , a brief bio of Lois W., wife of Bill W. and co-founder of Al-Anon, and links to several of her talks. The first talk includes Searcy W., Texas AA pioneer and 'Ebby's sponsor.': Lois Burnham Wilson (1891-1988) The co-founder of Al-Anon and married to Bill Wilson. Lois was there from the beginning working the program along side her husband Bill. Lois was the oldest of 6 children, her father a surgeon in Brooklyn NY. Her grandfather was a prominent pastor and scholar in the Swedenborgian Church , a church Lois was raised in. The affluent Brooklyn Heights family spent their summers at their summer home in Vermont. Her brother Rogers was friends with a Vermont local boy, Bill Wilson. When Lois first met Bill she was engaged, so meeting Bill presented her a challenge. Lois quickly made a choice, one that would completely changed her life. Lois and Bill were married a few months before Bill was deployed to Europe for WWI. Lois' complete life sto...
Potential Alcoholic Potential alcoholics drink excessively and dangerously, but may not yet have progressed beyond human aid. Many will eventually become Real Alcoholics in time. Big Book: "I studied economics and business as well as law. Potential alcoholic that I was, I nearly failed my law course. At one of the finals I was too drunk to think or write." Page 2, Bill's Story "Potential female alcoholics often turn into the real thing and are gone beyond recall in a few years." Page 33, More About Alcoholism "We who are familiar with the symptoms, see large numbers of potential alcoholics among young people everywhere. But try to get them to see it!" [In later editions, an * leads to a footnote indicating that there are more younger AA members than in the early years of the Program.] Page 33-34, More About Alcoholism Of the idea that knowledge of the disease of alcoholism will protect one from getting it: "That may be true of certain nonalcohol...