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Historian tells How AA Works
by James M. Read, Ph.D.
"Being an alcoholic means being HUMAN, written large." lt means having the same human sensitivities, experiencing the same human feelings and failings, the same joy and sadness, only more so! This is according to historian Ernest Kurtz, who spoke recently at a workshop in Boise titled "Alcoholism: Causes, Impacts, Diagnosis and Treatment."

I was delighted to be able to attend this workshop, sponsored by the Walker Center in Gooding and coordinated by the Area Health Education Consortium (AHEC). It brought together three nationally known and highly regarded experts in the field of alcoholism. They were all good, but Kurtz was outstanding.

He is THE Historian for Alcoholic’s Anonymous. He is the first writer to have been given access to the archives of the General Services Office of Alcoholics Anonymous in New York. He has conducted numerous interviews with the early founding members of AA, and he has studied the group intensively. He is able to speak with authority on AA, and he does so very impressively. I came away with a profound new respect for AA and for alcoholics.

AA works by telling stories. I knew that but I didn’t know why. Telling stories is the age-old way people have of transmitting knowledge. For an alcoholic, telling his story (without nostalgia) serves as a constant reminder of how bad things were, and that the past can be revived with only one drink.

Telling stories conveys wisdom. As the philosopher Kierkegaard so aptly put it "Life must be lived forward but can only be understood backward." In AA a good deal of review of the past is undertaken in order to better understand. AA helps the alcoholic understand the alcoholic.

The treatment process begins with one essential element: penetration of the denial, "I am not an alcoholic." The alcoholic must first encounter the "self-as-feared" before he or she can come to know the "self-as-is." It is only through this self-encounter that the wisdom necessary for recovery can be obtained.

Treatment of the alcoholic involves instruction about alcoholism along with efforts to overcome denial. Treatment prepares the alcoholic for the recovery process that happens in and with AA. If you believe Kurtz, as I do at this point, AA is the only way to achieve and maintain a serene sobriety.

No matter what the researchers are looking for, jokes Kurlz, they seem to find that the alcoholic has more of it or less of it than other people. It doesn't matter what dimension of behavior, biochemistry, or personality, the result is always the same. Alcoholics have more or less, never the same.

The next time you picture an alcoholic as a skid-row bum, try to erase that awful stereotype. For all but a tiny fraction that image doesn't apply in the least. Alcoholics are just human beings like the rest of us, only more so. Being an alcoholic means being HUMAN, written large.

Originally published in The Idaho Statesman, 4/20/83

For more information contact psychologist James M. Read, Ph.D. at: jread@jread.com

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