Plain Language, Big Impact [Season 1, Episode 4]

- The views and opinions expressed during this podcast are those of our guests. No one person speaks for A.A. as a whole. - Our primary purpose of carrying the message of Alcoholics Anonymous is fulfilled in many ways: from one alcoholic to another, outreach from a professional, through A.A. groups, PSAs, podcasts, it goes on and on. But perhaps most significantly, through our literature.

The very name of our organization comes from its first book, "Alcoholics Anonymous," a publication that has sold over 30 million copies and counting. From the General Service Office, our publishing department now provides hundreds of resources designed to help individuals navigate their recovery journey. In this episode, we'll explore the deep impact of A.A. literature, sharing stories and insights that highlight how these texts can resonate profoundly with those seeking change.

My name is Nathan, and I'm an alcoholic. Welcome to GSO. (upbeat music) Producing and licensing a vast array of materials worldwide, A.A. World Services' fellowship-owned publishing program is a highly respected professional publishing house in its own right. At the helm is David R., Publishing Director. - Hello. - You must've seen a lot of changes in publishing here in the past 10 years. - Oh, yeah. - Can you share on some of your experiences with these changes?

- We've focused intently on, as I see it, two areas of carrying the message. Number one, we're a program of attraction, and number two, A.A. is all about inclusion. A.A. is inclusive, never exclusive. And over these past 10 years, we've seen so many new tools and new ways to help facilitate that. Primarily, attraction. We've seen a whole rise in visual culture. They used to call some of the pamphlets the grays. - This is true. - And so now, we feel like we've turned on the lights.

A.A. now can look more like the Fellowship itself: colorful, vibrant, full of life, living in grace. - How is new A.A. literature created? Can you break down the process from its initial idea through conference approval, writing collaboration, publishing? - So all of our items of literature originate out of what we call expressed need. And that's one of the most beautiful things about our publishing program. It all starts from the A.A. membership itself.

And so an idea could originate from an area, or a committee, or a group. And these ideas for, say, originating new items of literature or revising items of literature that have already been conference-approved. And most of our items of literature are conference-approved. That means something.

That means they have gone through a rigorous process of ideation, how they originate; fleshing out the idea; participation by A.A. members themselves, by the fellowship, in the creation of the item of literature. - Do you have an example of this expressed need of some new literature that's out now? - One of the most thrilling examples is our newest item of literature, the "Plain Language Big Book," subtitled, "A Tool For Reading Alcoholics Anonymous."

- Yes. - The expressed need for plain language or simplified language is a concept that, for decades, has been brought forward by A.A. members regarding our literature. How can we take some of our items of literature that were written so many years ago and make them accessible for folks in the 21st century? - The "Big Book" was published in 1939. - Exactly. So something that was written in the 1930s reflects the language and style of discussion and writing of the time.

And the "Big Book," so beautiful in its language, for some people, presents a barrier to understanding. - Right, things are different now. And our literature can reflect that. - Even in the 1940s and '50s, there were folks in A.A., our archivists tell us that called the "Big Book." That's really a highfalutin language there. That's pretty flowery. Even Dr. Bob, at times, created his own pamphlets to help illuminate the 12 steps of recovery and A.A.'s program.

- So decades ago, the fellowship was calling for plain language, "Big Book" and other literature. Why does it take so long for it to come to fruition now? - The process for all of this is quite painstaking. In 2021, the General Service Conference voted in favor of developing a draft of the "Plain Language Big Book."

That set about a process that took years of forming committees, selecting a writer, working with A.A.'s professionals in the office, and creating this incredible painstaking collaboration of writing, rewriting, editing, tweaking, polishing, all in efforts of bringing forth the spiritual resonance of the original "Big Book." - About how many people inside the fellowship were involved in getting the "Plain Language Big Book" published? - That is remarkable to share. Hundreds.

When you think of all these committees, you think of three years of conference members reviewing progress reports, sample chapters, and the finished draft itself. So many folks in A.A. had a hand on the development of this project. - There's a lot of people that are incredibly passionate about the "Big Book." and when they heard about the "Plain Language Big Book," they were worried that it was being replaced. Is that, at all, what's going on?

- That was never the intention of this project and is not the reason for the book. What we have keyed on is to make a tool available that can be used as an entryway, a doorway, an archway, to walk through some point of entry and access for someone who is setting out to read the "Big Book." So this, in no way, is intended to replace the "Big Book" itself, the beloved basic text of "Alcoholics Anonymous."

So we took much care in deciding what would be presented original text right next to plain language explanation. And we arrived at a few parts of the "Big Book" being presented that way in the "Plain Language Big Book." There's a chapter called "The Doctor's Opinion" that has letters written by a noted expert on alcoholism that contains some, one might say, dated medical terminology.

And so there, we present side by side original and plain language so readers can see very clearly what is being discussed. Once A.A. members get their hands on the "Plain Language Big Book," the spiritual resonance, the beauty of the words of this book will be felt. And this will be a very important item of literature for the next century of Alcoholics Anonymous. (pensive music) - For more information about A.A., please visit our website at aa.org.

(pensive music) - What about individuals who can't get their hands on the physical copies, and I'm talking about persons in custody or the visually impaired, how would they gain access to our literature? - Oh, this is a very good question, and another focus of ours is accessibility. How do we ensure that anyone anywhere can experience the hand of A.A.?

We like to think, and in that hand, maybe a book, a link to the website or the meeting guide, or perhaps for those who can't hold in their hand or read printed material, digital. And so we have escalated our publishing program to meet that need. This is very recent, folks can download the audiobooks. They could listen for no charge on aa.org, another wonderful tool for access.

And we have reached out to corrections, jails, prisons through tablets, so folks in custody can access eBooks and audiobooks, and they can read, listen at no charge in custody. - Can you tell us a bit about the Navajo translation of the "Big Book"? - Oh, one of my favorite experiences, just a standout experience in the past few years was the completion of the Navajo "Big Book" in audio recordings. The native language is pronounced Diné. It is an audiobook available in CDs. Why In CDs?

Because that's what the Fellowship asked for. This book project started arguably in the 1970s with tapings that were made in folks' living rooms. It took years, and years, and years for the folks of the Navajo communities to achieve what they felt best represented the integrity of the original English "Big Book," as all of our translations seek to do. - Here's a short portion of Chapter 5, "How It Works," from the Navajo translation of the "Big Book."

(speaker speaking in Diné) What else is new from publishing? - First up, our A.A. service manual is just coming off press after a couple of years of polishing and committee work, making the service manual as accessible as possible. In the pamphlet lineup, "Black in A.A.," in English, French, and Spanish, featuring new stories to sharing the experience, strength, and hope of fellowship.

Also, "Young People in A.A.," recently revised with fresh new stories and illustrated with really wonderful illustrations that benefited in particular from wide participation of young people in A.A. And then we also have the new booklet, "A.A. for the Older Alcoholic," also featuring fresh stories that show a very wide swath of the A.A. older alcoholic fellowship. - I heard about a Fifth Edition of the "Big Book." How's that coming? - Very exciting.

Over 2,500 story submissions have been read and reviewed and are being considered for an updated edition of the "Big Book." It's a very intensive multi-year project. And also very exciting, a work group has been moving apace on the Spanish "Big Book" Fourth Edition, which which will feature a polished translation of the original text and fresh stories representing a very wide swath of the Spanish-speaking A.A. fellowship. So, stay tuned, much more to come.

- Alcoholics Anonymous is coming up on its 90-year anniversary, and A.A. is a lot of things. It is a spiritual program. It is also a literature-based program. It started with one book, and now all the fundamentals of A.A. are still found in our literature. Why do you think that remains true to this day? - The first meeting I went to, I stumbled into a meeting in the basement of a Catholic church, I am not Catholic, and at that meeting, there were books on each table.

The book was "Daily Reflections." And folks proceeded to read one page of that book and have deep emotional responses to it. I was floored. Here were men talking about emotions, women just sharing deep stories together, finding this transformative experience based on one page of one book. At the end of the meeting, someone came up to me and said, "Are you new?" And I said, "Oh, yeah, well, uh-huh." "Well, do you have a book?"

"Oh, I love books. I work in publishing," and I was blah, blah, blah, blah, blathering on. And he handed me a soft cover, "Big Book." The hand of A.A. carrying the message. That message was a "Big Book" handed to me, a stranger. It's how A.A. happens, and that story rings true still today around the world. - David, thank you so much for coming in today. - What a delight, I was so pleased to be here. Thank you.

(upbeat electronic music) - To find a meeting near you, or a meeting online, download the Meeting Guide app on your mobile device. (upbeat electronic music) - David spoke of the importance of A.A. literature in all its forms, but also access to it. The share from our GSO guest this week is exemplary of this need for access to our literature; not just for himself, but for the entire Fellowship. - Hey everybody, I'm Michael. I'm an alcoholic. Well, I stopped drinking in February of 1982.

And I was born with congenital glaucoma, so I've been visually impaired since birth. When I was young, I could see colors and more light than I can now, but I lived a crazy rebellious life and I was one of these guys that in high school, if everybody was doing something, I wanted to do it, even though I was blind. And one of the crazy things that I loved doing was drinking.

I was always obsessed with booze, open a can of beer for my mother at a family gathering or a neighborhood gathering, that cold can in my hand. Then I'd get a sip or take a sip of somebody's highball. And man, I'm thinking, "Man, I want more of that." And I'll never forget the first time I took that drink. And let me tell you, it was Nirvana. It did something for me. It turned off all the fear, the anxiety, the low self-esteem, any hangups I had. And man, I loved that feeling.

And I used alcohol throughout the years to be my friend, to help me wake up, go to sleep, to be funny, romantic, intellectual, whatever I needed it for, it was my friend. (pensive music) I eventually got to the point where it was all doom, gloom, and disaster. And I met people along the way who used to say to me, "You ought to come to an A.A. meeting."

And I was thinking, "Who the hell are they to talk to me like that?" And then I got to A.A., and I wish I could tell you it was a smooth ride from the time I walked in the door, but I had a lot of ups and downs in my sobriety. But I didn't pick up a drink. And why? I was protected, and I had people around me who loved me and people who said to me, "Just keep coming." I just am so thankful for the people, especially the people I met in the beginning who have helped me through this journey.

(gentle upbeat music) I mean, sometimes, being blind, I feel like, "Hey, I don't belong in this sighted world." Because when I first came into A.A., I could walk to meetings. I lived in a city that was like a grid, like here in New York. So you could walk to meetings. I had my seeing eye dog. I could walk if I couldn't get a ride. Now, I live near the Jersey Shore, and it's not as easy to always find a ride to and from a meeting. So, that is a challenge for me.

Also, like anybody else, I had a lot of distractions. But also, I can tell you, I wanted to make myself an exception to certain things in A.A. because I said, "Well, I'm blind, so I can excuse this, I can excuse that." And there is no excuse. I had to learn that the hard way. (mellow music) Some of the other challenges I still have is I feel like I haven't read everything. I want to read more, like there's so much literature out there.

And the "Big Book" is recorded, the "Step Book" is recorded, and the "Daily Reflections," I have in Braille. There's just so much literature that I can't get enough of it. The other challenge I have is some people don't know how to relate to someone who's blind, and they don't understand the whole concept.

Blindness is one of the most feared disabilities in society, and it's not that they're not friendly to me or that they don't thank me for sharing and come and ask me for advice or anything like that. And there are a lot of people who come into the rooms with disabilities. Some of them are visible and some of them are invisible. And there are people who can't read, and they're embarrassed to tell you they can't read.

There are people with mental disabilities and other impairments that they don't know what to do, they feel lost. And I think we have to find a way to make them feel welcome. (gentle upbeat music) - Not that we're experts in every disability, but we have to let them know, "Hey, come on in here. If you need a network..." Especially in the beginning, to understand things more thoroughly and to get active.

I have to say I was blessed because I had a bunch of crazy dudes around me, and they told me, "Get in here and make the coffee." I was washing coffee pots and all that business in the beginning. But I can see where a lot of people with disabilities, especially blind people, a lot of people wouldn't say that to them. We have to find out who needs what. And hopefully, we'll intuitively know how to handle problems, which baffle us. But how do we get these people active? How do we get them to greet?

How do we get them to help set up a chair, organize something, put out there could do something. And so I think it's a problem not only for people who are visually impaired, but who have other impairments, and I think they need to feel free to come forward and ask for help. (gentle upbeat music) As time goes by, I feel more and more blessed to be in this program. I am someone who never ceases to look past the magic. It's beautiful.

And I wanted to come here and just make my foundation a little firmer, understand what's going on, understand where we came from, and to be part of it, to just have more appreciation for the program where we've come from and where we've evolved to today. (gentle upbeat music) - For more information about A.A. materials created to support those facing accessibility barriers, please visit aa.org and look for Accessibility Resources.

- That's Misha who you hear every episode with the disclaimers and drop-ins. She's now the Public Information Staff Coordinator, but we first met her in the "GSO Tour" episode when she was on the Treatment and Accessibilities Desk. - Welcome, everyone, to the General Service Office. My name is Misha, and I am an alcoholic. - We wanted to have her back to tell a story of her own. Hey, Misha. - Hey, Nathan.

- So, you and I had been talking about A.A. literature, and you told me this incredible story about an experience you had while you were abroad, and I was hoping that you could share that story with our listeners today. - You asked me about my own personal experience with the literature, and I thought about this story about something that happened before I came to work at GSO.

- Mm-hmm. - So I was a grad student, and I was planning to be out of the country for more than a year doing research for my dissertation. And I was going to a place where, as far as I could tell, there wasn't very much A.A. And I'd been sober a while, and I felt like I had a good connection with my sponsor, and my home group, and steps, and all the tools that were offered.

So I wasn't nervous about whether or not I would stay sober, but I was really concerned because I really wanted to make sure that I did everything I could to ensure that I would stay connected to the program. - Make's sense. It can be tough to stay connected when you're away from home. - So I reached out to the General Service Office. - Nice. - I was kind of nervous because I kind of didn't know what they did or who was going to answer.

And the first person who answered was someone who connected me with LIM. - LIM, as in L-I-M? - That's the Loners and Internationalists Meeting. And that's this kind of wonderful service that's been around for decades, where A.A. members who are in places where they're on their own, they might be aboard a ship or in a remote location, they connect with one another in a kind of a print meeting and through email.

And sometimes, they call each other, but they stay connected and they stay sober that way. - Incredible. And was GSO able to help you out with any resources? - The next thing that I asked for was literature. - Right.

- Because I was planning to go to Bangladesh, and at the time, I didn't speak Bengali, the language that they speak there, also known as Bangla, so I had a language course set up where I was going to be doing this intensive language training, language learning, and I wanted to have a "Big Book" and any other literature that I could find in Bangla. And so I reached out, and the folks at the General Service Office hooked me up.

It was really wonderful, and it gave me this sense of feeling connected, even before I got there. - That must have been reassuring. - Yeah, and it also gave me insight because that "Big Book" had been translated and printed in India for the Bengali-speaking folks who live there. - And what kind of effect did that insight have? - I started to understand that A.A. wasn't just in the U.S., or Canada, or Europe, that A.A. is really happening all over the world.

And so I took my "Big Book" with me, and I got to Bangladesh. And while I was there, I connected with a couple of individuals who were sober members, and that was really wonderful. And I started to feel, though, a little bit squirrely. - Mm-hmm. - You ever get that feeling and you just feel like you're in your head too much? - Oh, yeah. - Maybe thinking too much. - Uh-huh. - And I knew from being a sober member that the answer for me to feeling squirrely

is service. - Yeah. - There weren't any A.A. groups where I could be of service, so what I did instead was I reached out. I had heard about a guy who ran an orphanage, and I thought, "Well, I could ask him if I could be of service in some way to the work that he was doing with these kids." - Great idea. - So I gave him a call, and he very quickly and cheerfully agreed that I could come and help. He said, "There's something that I think you could help with."

He said, "We have now, for the first time, a group of women staying here at this center." - Hmm. - They had landed at this orphanage because they had been ostracized from their families. Many of them had been rejected because I think their drinking behavior or their alcoholism was seen as something that was so shameful and such a problem in their families or in their communities that they had essentially been rejected or kicked out of their homes.

And they had landed in the orphanage because they had nowhere else to go. We've been allowing them to stay with us here at the orphanage, and maybe you could talk to them. I was like, "Wow, sure, I'd be delighted." And so I went into the room, and I met this group of about 15 women, mostly younger women, but not all of them. And there were two social workers. And the sense that I got was that the social workers were really well-meaning, but they had no idea how to talk to alcoholics.

They were kind of maybe scolding the women a little bit, telling them, "You should just stop. You should go back to your families. You should be good mothers, good daughters, good workers. You should not drink alcohol. You should get it together." So I listened to this for a while, and I wasn't picking up all of it, but I really was listening hard and trying to pay attention. - And then how did you approach the situation?

- I talked about being an alcoholic, and I talked about some of the, like, shameful and terrible things I had done while I was drinking. And I was speaking in Bengali, maybe fragmented Bengali, but I could tell that the women were getting it. They were getting what it was that I was trying to tell them.

And then I got to share that because of Alcoholics Anonymous, I was able to hold my head up, that I was no longer ashamed, that I was no longer a disgrace, that I was no longer somebody that my family wanted to avoid, that I could be a part of a family and a part of a community, that I was a good daughter, and a good sister, and a good partner, and a good worker. And that all of that was because of something called Alcoholics Anonymous, and that I owed my life to it.

And that they didn't have to be ashamed either, that they could take this miracle, this thing that I had gotten, and they could change their lives too. - Wow. - And at the end, I was crying and they were crying, and I was able to give them my Bengali "Big Book" and say like, "Here's where the answers are. Here's where this message is. Here's where you can learn more about how to do this thing, about how to get sober, and stay sober, and help other people get this amazing gift as well."

I don't know how the story ends for them, but I felt pretty confident that having a "Big Book" in their language in that place was going to make a difference. That it was going to mean that some people were gonna get the message, and that the miracle that I had been given might be given to them as well. So, yeah, I feel pretty. It was a pretty amazing thing to be a part of. - Yeah. Yeah, it was a pretty amazing thing to be a part of.

- Part of what I feel so grateful for is that these two staff members took time out of their day to help make sure that I had what I needed when I left the country. For members, the way this works is that if you're going to someplace kind of off the beaten track, you might call the office or reach out to the office, email the International Desk, international@aa.org.

And if you do that well in advance of your trip, that staff member might be able to help connect you to any A.A. members who might be in that place. It's pretty wonderful to be part of this international fellowship. - Thank you, Misha. (pensive music) - We hope you enjoyed this week's episode. Be sure to visit aa.org for access to, and more information about, A.A. literature. Be sure to subscribe, so you can keep coming back.

- Thank you for listening to "Our Primary Purpose," a podcast produced by the General Service Office on behalf of the Fellowship of Alcoholics Anonymous in the U.S. and Canada. (upbeat electronic music)