Wed Night AA: Speaker Meeting

Good evening,

This being the last wednesday of the month (of the year for that matter), we'll be having our usual Speaker Meeting this wednesday night. Personally, I love speaker meeting for 2 reasons: 1- It's a great way, at least for a good speaker, to illustrate through their experience how the program works -- how to practice these principles in all our affairs, and 2- It's a great way to get to know someone in the program, after hearing a person's story you really can't help but feel closer  to that person.

On that note, I had a curios conversation this weekend. I was visiting my father and I mentioned to him that some of my old classmates were talking about our upcoming 15th year HS reunion (holy crap, 15 years?! ). I noted how difficult is to make friends like the type of friends you make when you're a kid. His reply has been marinating in my noggin for the last few days (proof wisdom can be found in the strangest of places!!).

What he said was that as an adult we see the people we meet, to one degree or another, as a source of competition - competition for money, property, prestige, sex, self-esteem, security, etc. As a kid, that concept hasn't yet fomented in so we're free to bond at a deeper level.

In a way, that's what makes AA so special too. When I first came to AA, the folks I met here did NOT want what I had!!! They didn't want money, or anything material from me and they sure as hell didn't want any of my so-called "wisdom" - they just wanted to help me with this drink problem and the only requirement was the willingness to go to any length. There was no sense of competition which can pervade "regular" life. Something about the friends I've made in AA reminds me of the type of friends I made as a kid because of this.

For this new year, my wish for you is to return to that state of innocence where the world was not some hideous place where we needed to "out think, out maneuver and out perform our peers in order to eek out a miserable living from the salt mines of an unfriendly universe" (Chuck C), but a place of wonder, discovery and joy -- where an open heart is all you need.        

Best regards,

David ten Brink

2015 Meeting Dates

-->Reading: Being Sober and Becoming Happy
01/28/15 Speaker Meeting <Steve W.>
02/25/15 Speaker Meeting <Gerard P>
03/25/15 Speaker Meeting <Mark D.>
--> Reading: A New Pair of Glasses by Chuck C. 
04/29/15 Speaker Meeting <Russ W.>
05/27/15 Speaker Meeting <Omar P.>
06/24/15 Speaker Meeting <Ricardo A.>

--> Reading: Personal Stories back of Big Book of AA <--

07/29/15 Speaker Meeting <Adam S.>
08/26/15 Speaker Meeting <Kevin M.>
09/30/15 Speaker Meeting <Fred D.>
10/28/15 Speaker Meeting <Owen A.>
11/25/15 Speaker Meeting <Roy M.>

12/02/15 My Chance to Live p309-318
12/09/15 Student of Life p319-327
12/16/15 Crossing the River of Denial p328-337
12/23/15 Because I'm an Alcoholic p338-348
12/30/15 Speaker Meeting

1/06/16 It might Have Been Worse p348-358
1/13/16 Tightrope p359-368
1/20/16 Flooded with Feeling p369-374
1/27/16 Speaker Meeting

2/03/16 Winner Takes All p375-381
2/10/16 Me an Alcoholic? p382-387
2/17/16 The Perpetual Quest p388-397
2/24/16 Speaker Meeting