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From: [email protected]
Category: Category 1
Date: 11 May 1999
Time: 17:24:56
Remote Name: ip142.atlanta14.ga.pub-ip.psi.net
Greg gave his las NA talk in a small North Carolina town. This is a faithful transcription of that talk.
Greg Pierce’s Talk
April 17, 1999
“My name’s Greg and I’m an addict. We all going around around, around and around? <chuckles> “ (talking about cassette recorders)
Well alright. Umm, I’m real glad to be here to help you celebrate your anniversary, and I’m tickled to death that we have so many new members, Because I very strongly believe that the newcomer is the lifeblood of this institution, the lifeblood of this…thing we call Narcotics Anonymous. The lifeblood of this society, whatever you want to call it. Umm, for those of you who are new, you can probably discount about ninety percent of what you learn. I believe that recovery over a period of time is a process of simplification.
We learn a lot of stuff about recovery, you’ll come in here, and you’ll do worksheets, you’ll read books, you’ll talk to this person, you’ll talk to that person, you’ll get sponsors, if you can stick with the basics you have a chance. It’s real easy to get lost in all the.. the gimmicks.
We have a brand new set of wonderful step writing guides- but you can work them diligently, and they won’t help you stay clean. We have a Basic Text- you can read it every day, and it won’t help you stay clean. We have a book called It Works How and Why that gives you lots of information about the steps, and the traditions. You can learn it perfect, and it won’t help you stay clean. It’s what you do with that information. It’s the way you take that information from all sources and apply it to your daily living and use it to find this thing called recovery. And recovery’s a very precious gift.
Umm, this is liable to be an interesting talk tonight. Umm, because in the last couple of months I found out that I have cancer of the liver and uh, I don’t feel real good, but you see I’m an NA member and the day I found out I had cancer of the liver, I called my sponsor and went to a meeting. That’s what NA members do!
That’s part of how this program works. We don’t isolate. We don’t hide. We don’t disappear into the woodwork when things get tough. We reach out to the fellowship. We reach out to our sponsors, we reach out to our meetings, we reach out to those around us that we’ve come to learn to love and depend on. Umm, that’s a big part about how this works.
This is a place where we take turns saving each other’s lives. And you know, the people that come after you that you meet in recovery- treat them real well, cause you never know when your life’s gonna depend on ‘em. And you’ll meet people that come after you- even though there were… it seems like a whole bunch of brand new people here- stay clean…. hang around- give this thing a chance- keep the faith. There’s something very special happening here. You know some of you who introduced themselves as being new have probably been here before. Some of you have probably never been here before.
Ah.. give yourself a break. Try this way of living- what have you got to lose? If you’re like me- you don’t have much to lose. If you’re like me- you didn’t get here ‘cause things were going good in your life. Those of you who are here for your first meetings- you know- I know where you lived- it’s called Hell. ‘Cause that’s where NA is- go to Hell, and turn left. That’s NA.
You’re not here because you’re good at holdin’ down a job. You’re not here because you’re good at stayin’ out of trouble, you’re not here because you have successful relationships. You’re not here uh, because you’re uh, you know the candidate for poster child of mental health. You’re here for the same reason that I’m here. You’re here because you’re none of those things.
You’re here because you’re in a trap… that you can’t get out of by yourself. And despite all the things you’ve tried, you’re still in that trap. In other words, In desperation, we sought help from each other in Narcotics Anonymous. In desperation we sought help from each other in Narcotics Anonymous. And it doesn’t make any sense. Doesn’t make sense that we can getb together, a bunch of losers, and anybody’d stay clean. But we do.
You know I’ve seen NA grow from 20 meetings to 40,000 meetings. I don’t even know how many there are now- that’s a guess- maybe more than that. I’ve seen NA meetings grow from perhaps uh 150- 200 people attending, and maybe a quarter that many involved, uh, to look around the room- there’s as many people here tonight as were in NA when I got clean. And here we’re in Winston Salem North Carolina of all places. The birthday of a group- all together. You know what- there’s another meeting in Bombay isn’t there. And there’s one in Denmark- I had the opportunity to speak not too long ago in Denmark. There were 900 NA members from Denmark there. 900! Members from Denmark!!
You know I didn’t know when we had one from Arizona, or one from Carolina, or one from New Jersey. There were times when there weren’t any anywhere. Umm, we got people staying clean living this way of life all over the country. And there’s power here- there’s miracles here- there’s magic here, if you will. But it isn’t going to work unless you let go, and let it work. One of the things I’ve learned over the last Twenty- eight years is there is no substitute for surrender. If you want this thing to work- you’re going to have to give up. You’re going to have to give up being a dope fiend, you’re going to have to let.. give up you know being hip slick and cool. You’re going to have to give up standing on the corner.
You’re going to have to give up all those things that sometimes seem so attractive when you’re not hurtin’ too bad. And reach out for help. First of all to an NA member, second of all to a loving God. There is no substitute for surrender. There is no therapist that you can go to that’s gonna make everything OK. There is no church you can go to that’s going to fix your addiction. There is no book with all the magic answers in it.
There is no medicine that’ll take care of your addiction. When I say my names Greg and I’m an addict it means three things and they’re very simple. Number one when I put drugs in my body, I lose the ability to control how they react in my body. I lose the ability to predict where they’re going to take me. Number two I have a tendency to get strung out on anything. I’ll take wonderful things and make them self- destructive.
You know- its reading- I got a book- I didn’t read it much on the way down- ‘Cause I wasn’t feeling all that well I was catnapping in the car most of the way. I love to read! I didn’t read before I got clean. But I’ve learned it’s a great escape. But you know what? If I pick up a book and get into it, I may.. might have to finish it before I set it down. Now I might be able to set it down, in the meantime, but I have no way to determine that. I’ll get strung out on all kinds of weird stuff. And thirdly, when I say that I’m an addict it means that I caryy this spiritual illness that seperates me from you. Seperates me from every other human being. It separates me from God, it separates me from life and reality. And uh, that’s difficult.
You know we know what it’s like to be alone. One of the things I remember before coming to NA was the lonliness of addiction. The lonliness- even when you’re in a room full of people. And some of you sitting here tonight, in a room full of people, are about as lonely as you can stand. Nobody knows it, cause you have’t let anybody in- cause you’re afraid. Cause of all these things. I came around the program- Now I did what prettry much what we do-I mean there aren’t a lot of different ways, we think we got some unique handle on how we do this program, but there’s not.
And I come around here and the first thing that happens is I start going to meetings and I stop using and you know it’s kinda like I start getting high offa not being high. It’s almost like not using nothing’s a new drug. And then after a while I’m going to these meetings, and I’m listening to what people are reading and all this stuff- You know I kinda memorized that stuff. Couldn’t read very well. And I know people who’ve come around to NA without being able to read at all, who learn to read by listening to the readings in the meetings. Again and again and again and again and hearing them , and seeing them at the same time. If you have a problem with reading, get yourself a little white booklet, and as the readings are being read, follow along with it. And that can teach you how to read.
It’s taught a many many people how to read. Um, you don’t have to talk to anybody about having a reading problem- lot of us have reading problems. But read along- learn the words. And at ninety days, I had all the answers. I had ‘em all! I had this shit down. I’d tell ya- ask me any questions- ask me a question- just go ahead.. I’ll tell ya. And I’d spout this stuff about the “Therapeutic value of one addict helping another is without parallel. I didn’t have any idea about what I was talking about. Or I’d say something like , “there’s one thing more than anything else that will defeat us in our recovery, this is an attitude of indifference or intolerance toward spiritual principles.” Do you think at ninety days I had any idea what that meant? It sounded good- you know- it made me feel like part of- and people would accept me- they’d pat me on the back saying Oh you’re doing good- but the reality is I didn’t know- I didn’t have a clue- I just memorized the words!
And I thought I had all the answers- you know the funny part about it is I did have all the answers- I just didn’t know which were which- and which went with the which questions. You know or what they meant or how I could use them in my daily living- that’s the biggie. Our twelfth step says, ”Having had a spiritual awakening as a result of the these steps, we tried to carry this message to addicts and practice these principles in all our affairs.” And I’m big into practice these principles in all our affairs. You know once you find out about how this program works, start using it in your life! In every area of your life. You know, don’t withhold anything. Don’t reserve anything. You know reservations are the kind of the things I told God “Hey God I’ll handle this one, you just leave me alone. I can take care of it, I can handle it.”
And I’m in trouble. Cause I can no more handle my life than the man in the moon. You know, if I could handle my life, I sure wouldn’t end up sitting up here in front of you guys with cancer- I’d be bouncing around the room you know- finger poppin’ talking long shit. But I’m here tonight because I’m an NA member. I’m here tonight because this is part of how I live. This is as much about a part of the way I live as uh, turning my will and my life over to the care of God. Or writing an inventory, or making amends or any of the other things the program teaches me to work.
Over the years, our programs change, you know I got to that point where I was talking about knowing all the answers- and that only lasted about a month before the roof caved in. You know the big blue bird of feelings flew over and took a healthy dump and I figured out oh this is why I used. And I had no way to cope with those feelings- I had no way to cope. And what’d I do? I turned to the program. And I can remember at six months going Oh my God it’s not the drugs.
Cause I thought drugs were the problem. I really thought the drugs were the problem. And had you asked me I would’ve told you I was powerless over heroin and it had fucked up my life. And that’s what the first step said. But that’s not what the first step says.
The first step says we’re powerless over our addiction, that our lives had become unmanageable. And again addiction is a three fold disease- it’s physical, and that has to do with the drugs that we used, but its also mental and spiritual. And my experience is the mental part and the spiritual part are much more devastating and much more far reaching than the physical part of our disease. Now once we clean up and kick a habit, the physical has pretty much taken care of itself. The mental and spiritual aspects of our disease continue throughout our recovery. The potential for the physical continues on for our recovery.
But in reality the mental and spiritual aspects are things that you’ll have to deal with all your life. And again the tendency we have to get strung out on anything, take wonderful things and make them self- destructive. And number two, lack of faith, lack of hope, lack of trust, inability to <not sure>, self obsession, low self- esteem. Those things are things that we have to cope with on through time, and things that I have to struggle with today. The most difficult thing in my life today is the third step. The most difficult thing in my life today is the third step. To really make that decision to turn my will and my life over to the care of God as I understand him.
As I continued, and approached a year I got into the what they call the birthday crazies, where just before a year where, where, you’re into sabotage, you know? Oh my God I’m a sick man another three weeks I’ll have a year and I’ll have made it, what’ll I do now? How can I, how can I wreck this? Or just after a year when you’re going, <whew> boy I’m glad I made that, now I can get back to looking like a real person. The reality is that I’ve been looking like a real person. You know, or the step that happens at eighteen months, when we find ourselves bored with the program and it says it in the white booklet we get tired of repeating our new practices or that, uh, that sometimes in those times are when the greatest changes take place within.
Um, I’d get tired of this. I you know, I’d discovered that there were other things to do other than go to meetings. I mean, I found Star Trek on the TV, I found books, I found hobbies, I found things I enjoyed doing, I thought, I found things that were fun. Certainly not a whole lot more, certainly a whole lot more fun than listening to you guys.
You know we come in here, you know meetings don’t change too much, from day to day, year to year, you know every once in a while ther’s something spectacular that happens, but basically year in year out, people say pretty much the same things. Newcomers ask the same questions, people’s responses to those questions are pretty much the same, you know, uh, and it’s not a thrilling existence, it’s not, you know the thrilling part comes in watching someone’s eyes, the thrilling oart comes when you’re talking with someone after a meeting, and you can see a change take place. See someone begin to live, where once they were dying. That’s the thrilling part.
(continued in Part Two)