Sign up to save your podcasts
Or
Share What two words did Bill W. think were the most important to measure sober progress?
Share to email
Share to Facebook
Share to X
Share to email
Share to Facebook
Share to X
Or
What two words did Bill W. think were the most important to measure sober progress?
If you want to subscribe to LOL Sober, hit the purple button below. I’m mostly publishing free pieces right now, but paid subscribers do have access to monthly premium pieces—such as THIS comedy special about my 10 favorite addiction/sobriety jokes!
At a meeting recently, we read a passage from As Bill Sees It, the terrific book of Bill Wilson’s writings about drinking and sobriety. The part we read was from the September 30 entry, and it begins: “All progress can be reckoned in terms of just two words: ________ and _______.”
He said these two words were magnificent standards to live by. Not good standards. Not great standards. Magnificent standards. That’s a high bar, huh? I’ll give you 10 guesses to figure out the two words he chose.
Or you could click here and see for yourself.
Or I could just tell you them, one at a time. Which is what I will now do.
I’m cheating a little because I already heard the answers. But if you’re willing to trust me, I will tell you retroactively that my first few guesses would have been: honesty, willingness, powerlessness, open-mindedness, humility, acceptance and, maybe, truth.
Drum roll, please...
Bill’s first magnificent standard is humility. Okay, I might have guessed that. That’s probably among the top 5 or so answers if you polled sober people. It’s a pretty simple proposition: The more humility I have, the better my sobriety is. In times when I don’t have humility, I’ve managed to stay sober… but those times haven’t been emotionally sober. Lack of humility means I don’t listen, because I already know the answers. Lack of humility means I am not right-sized—I’m either king of the world, or I belong locked up in the basement because I suck.
So humility is one of the core principles to a good sober life. I get why Bill picked that one.
The next word, though, surprised me. The second word is… drumroll again, please… responsibility.
Hmm. What do you make of that? It caught me off guard because I don’t remember that word popping up too frequently in our literature. I can only specifically recall the Responsibility Statement, which directly says whenever anybody reaches out, our hands will be there to grab them, and for that, I am responsible. But I don’t remember the last meeting I was at when someone referenced the Responsibility Statement. I guess I know it, so I must have heard it a bunch somewhere, right? It’s not like my family says it at the dinner table or anything.
I spent some time pondering that idea of responsibility, and it makes sense. I do have a responsibility to live a sober life. I’ve experienced addiction, and now I’ve experienced recovery and what it can do for me, my family, my job, the world. I have a responsibility to live a good, spiritual sober life, and carry the message to anybody suffering.
Lately I have been struggling with having a short fuse. I go from feeling fine to pretty pissed about the slightest transgression. I got into a minor spat about a parking spot the other day, with my 8-year-old daughter in the car, and I couldn’t help but wonder what the hell is going on with me. I work pretty hard not to get into dumb arguments any more. And yet…
Luckily I haven’t said or done anything really stupid. But it is perplexing. Nothing really changed in my life. I don’t have some new huge outside pressure; I just have gone from 0-to-60 MPH pretty quickly for some reason.
But since we read that As Bill Sees It passage at a meeting, I have really been thinking about my responsibility to carry a message of hope and patience and serenity. The key word is responsibility. It isn’t a gentle suggestion or recommendation; it is my responsibility.
So I will try to do that going forward.
This newsletter is a place of joy and laughter about the deadly serious business of sobriety. So, as I will often do, let me close with a joke:
HEARD AT MEETINGS: “I stopped drinking and got the monkey of my back, but the circus is still in town.”
(Credit: AA Grapevine, May 2003, Chuck B. from Berea, Ohio)
Please spread the word to a sober friend! Find me on Substack… or Twitter… or Facebook… or Instagram… or YouTube. And introducing my web site, LOLsober.com.
This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit nelsonh.substack.com/subscribe
View all episodes
By Nelson H.If you want to subscribe to LOL Sober, hit the purple button below. I’m mostly publishing free pieces right now, but paid subscribers do have access to monthly premium pieces—such as THIS comedy special about my 10 favorite addiction/sobriety jokes!
At a meeting recently, we read a passage from As Bill Sees It, the terrific book of Bill Wilson’s writings about drinking and sobriety. The part we read was from the September 30 entry, and it begins: “All progress can be reckoned in terms of just two words: ________ and _______.”
He said these two words were magnificent standards to live by. Not good standards. Not great standards. Magnificent standards. That’s a high bar, huh? I’ll give you 10 guesses to figure out the two words he chose.
Or you could click here and see for yourself.
Or I could just tell you them, one at a time. Which is what I will now do.
I’m cheating a little because I already heard the answers. But if you’re willing to trust me, I will tell you retroactively that my first few guesses would have been: honesty, willingness, powerlessness, open-mindedness, humility, acceptance and, maybe, truth.
Drum roll, please...
Bill’s first magnificent standard is humility. Okay, I might have guessed that. That’s probably among the top 5 or so answers if you polled sober people. It’s a pretty simple proposition: The more humility I have, the better my sobriety is. In times when I don’t have humility, I’ve managed to stay sober… but those times haven’t been emotionally sober. Lack of humility means I don’t listen, because I already know the answers. Lack of humility means I am not right-sized—I’m either king of the world, or I belong locked up in the basement because I suck.
So humility is one of the core principles to a good sober life. I get why Bill picked that one.
The next word, though, surprised me. The second word is… drumroll again, please… responsibility.
Hmm. What do you make of that? It caught me off guard because I don’t remember that word popping up too frequently in our literature. I can only specifically recall the Responsibility Statement, which directly says whenever anybody reaches out, our hands will be there to grab them, and for that, I am responsible. But I don’t remember the last meeting I was at when someone referenced the Responsibility Statement. I guess I know it, so I must have heard it a bunch somewhere, right? It’s not like my family says it at the dinner table or anything.
I spent some time pondering that idea of responsibility, and it makes sense. I do have a responsibility to live a sober life. I’ve experienced addiction, and now I’ve experienced recovery and what it can do for me, my family, my job, the world. I have a responsibility to live a good, spiritual sober life, and carry the message to anybody suffering.
Lately I have been struggling with having a short fuse. I go from feeling fine to pretty pissed about the slightest transgression. I got into a minor spat about a parking spot the other day, with my 8-year-old daughter in the car, and I couldn’t help but wonder what the hell is going on with me. I work pretty hard not to get into dumb arguments any more. And yet…
Luckily I haven’t said or done anything really stupid. But it is perplexing. Nothing really changed in my life. I don’t have some new huge outside pressure; I just have gone from 0-to-60 MPH pretty quickly for some reason.
But since we read that As Bill Sees It passage at a meeting, I have really been thinking about my responsibility to carry a message of hope and patience and serenity. The key word is responsibility. It isn’t a gentle suggestion or recommendation; it is my responsibility.
So I will try to do that going forward.
This newsletter is a place of joy and laughter about the deadly serious business of sobriety. So, as I will often do, let me close with a joke:
HEARD AT MEETINGS: “I stopped drinking and got the monkey of my back, but the circus is still in town.”
(Credit: AA Grapevine, May 2003, Chuck B. from Berea, Ohio)
Please spread the word to a sober friend! Find me on Substack… or Twitter… or Facebook… or Instagram… or YouTube. And introducing my web site, LOLsober.com.
This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit nelsonh.substack.com/subscribe