Other People

 More from Bill W on honesty . . . .

It's funny to me that the A.A. pamphlet entitled "A.A. Tradition - How It Developed by Bill W" is dominated by his writings and speeches on the spiritual principle of anonymity.  A distant second is the warning that money and organization will surely doom us but it's anonymity first, last, and almost everything in between.

"Anonymity is the greatest protection our Society can ever have.  It says that 'The spiritual substance of anonymity is sacrifice.'  The new signs to serenity read: 'This way to sanity and serenity - the price is self-sacrifice.' We couldn't get rid of alcohol unless we made other sacrifices.  Big shotism and phony thinking had to go.  We had to toss self-justification, self-pity, and anger right out the window.  We had to quit the crazy contest for personal prestige and big bank balances.  We had to take personal responsibility for our sorry state and quit blaming others for it.

We're these sacrifices?  Yes, they were.  To gain enough humility and self-respect to stay alive at all we had to give up what had really been our dearest possession - our ambitions and our illegitimate pride.  But even this was not enough.  Sacrifice had to go much further.  Other people had to benefit, too."

Okay, are you as sick of this crap as I am?  I take umbrage at the suggestion about personal sacrifice to "stay alive" - hardly worth it - and then I had to start doing nice things in the world at large.  I hate anything that starts with "other people."  As you may remember one of my founding life philosophies is that I don't care about other people.  Other people can go somewhere else.  Other people invariably annoy me.

Have a nice day elsewhere.