Hey everyone, my name is ***

I have to speak at a meeting tonight - an AA meeting. I say a meeting, and I think everyone knows what I'm talking about. I speak at meetings - I mean I comment, or I share as we say - though probably not often enough (according to my sponsor). Tonight I am the speaker - the one who has to sit there in front of everyone and talk for 20 -30 minutes and then everyone's comments relate to your "lead" as we call it. Speaking in front of people is my absolute least favorite thing to do, ever. I would rather take the bus to work than speak in front of people (and some of you know how adverse I am to bus taking). Seriously, I don't like it. In college, if a class included "presentation" in the course description, I didn't take it. So one wonders how I got through law school then? Well, I hated that part of it - especially the randomness. And you might think I choose the wrong profession, not liking to speak in front of people, but fortunately, I never have to. I get to sit in my office over here in the Northeast corner of the building and communicate with the partner I work for via instant message (he sits in the office next door). Okay - we don't always do this - but there are days when my job can feel pretty isolating. I like it.

When people ask me to speak at meetings - I can't for the life of me figure out why. It's for one of two reasons - it's because they know my story so they know that the odds of me being sober right now are about 0% - and that makes for a good story I suppose, or - it's because they have seen me around but never heard me say a word and suddenly feel compelled to hear what I have to say. I think this is the case tonight - this person has never heard me say anything. I always have this self-doubt - this moment of - well my story is boring, I can't possibly have anything to say that will help anyone. It comes in waves too - I won't get asked for a while, and then suddenly I'll get asked to do this a bunch times within a few week period. Anyway - it makes me nervous and I don't know why. What could be an easier story to tell than the story of your life - the story you are more intimately familiar with than any other story. Sometimes it's a topic that you are supposed to talk about, sometimes a step. This time it is just my story - what it used to be like, what happened, and what it's like now. Why don't I just say no? Because, anyone would tell you that you should always say yes when asked to speak at a meeting if you are able to do it.

I have to remember that it's not about me. I'm just there to carry the message. It's just there are times that I sit in meetings and I listen to people speak/give leads, and I think, you are such a liar or what you are saying is so fucked up, or you are an idiot even - whatever - I judge people. I worry that people are sitting there listening to me thinking - will you shut up already. So I pray before I have to do this - I pray to say the thing that one person needs to hear. Because that is what I love about an AA meeting - you might say something that saves another person's life today, or they might save yours.

I can do this right? What is my deal? Every part of me wants to feign illness. I think the last time I had to be the speaker at a meeting, was when I spoke at a meeting in my home town back in March - that really might have been the last time. I had to stand on a stage, at a microphone, and tell my story to a few hundred people, for an hour, and it was recorded. How embarrassing is that? I have a copy of it and it's available for download on the website for that meeting. People could be downloading and listening to this embarrassing piece of material. (I've actually listened to it - and it wasn't that bad). If I can do that - surely I can sit in front of 50 people and talk for 25 minutes. The most amazing thing happened that night when I spoke at that meeting - I got up there on the stage and right before I opened my mouth to say "hey everyone, my name is *** and I'm an alcoholic, this amazing feeling of calm and peacefulness came over me, and I wasn't even nervous. Me, in front of hundreds of people, not nervous - it was amazing.

The title of this post - we always introduce ourselves before we say anything in a meeting - hi my name is ***, this has become automatic. So automatic that it scares me sometimes. So automatic that I have to pay careful attention when I am in reality that I don't introduce myself wrong. Especially on a day like today when the only thing on my mind is AA. Probably 75% (maybe more) of the times that I say my name - the very next thing that rolls off the tongue is - and I'm an alcoholic. Can you imagine if I accidentally did that in the wrong kind of meeting - a work meeting? Eeek.