Bill Wilson Quotes

I keep telling people: Don't make me the poster boy for AA because I don't know a lot about sobriety, but I do know a lot about drinking.

I had what AA calls 'a convincer' - which made me realize that I couldn't do it any more. I went out drinking for about 70 hours here in London. At the end I knew I was done.

I don't believe I'm a recovering alcoholic - I'm someone who used to drink. AA comes from a religious movement and that whole thing of 'I'm always burdened with this' and the original sin idea. It's not like that for me.

I did mostly alcohol. There were drugs, too - pills - and there was a danger that I would go over the edge. I could have. I thank God I didn't.

The sad fact is that the vast majority of drunks stay drunks. There's a small minority of us who reach that fork in the road where one side says 'live' and the other says 'drink'.

Twelve-step promotes spirituality, not religion. It gives a practical, day-to-day spirituality that tells me what I can and cannot control. There is room to be imperfect and to be someone who struggles to find God.

But I think that the most important thing was to really stop drinking.

I began drinking alcohol at the age of thirteen and gave it up in my fifty sixth year; it was like going straight from puberty to a mid-life crisis.

I had a drinking problem. Right now I should be in a bar in Texas, not the Oval Office. There is only one reason that I am in the Oval Office and not in a bar. I found faith. I found God. I am here because of the power of prayer.

Home Protection—protection against the tyranny of drink.

Why is it a badge of honour to say you spent 15 years in AA ball?

I am full of theories that are based on a very liquid foundation, because I used to be a drinker.

I had a 10-year heroin habit and kicked that. Then I became an alcoholic. I drank two fifth's a day.

Anybody can be a non-drunk. It takes a special talent to be a drunk. It takes endurance. Endurance is more important than truth.

I've been sober now for 18 years. With all the drugs, psychedelics and narcotics I did, I was [really] an alcoholic. Honestly, I only used to do cocaine so I could sober up and drink more. My last five years of drinking was a nightmare. I was drinking a half-gallon of rum with a fifth of rum on the side, in case I ran out, 28 beers a day, and three grams of cocaine just to keep me moving around. And I thought I was doing fine because I wasn't crawling around drunk on the floor.

I don't have a drinking problem 'Cept when I can't get a drink.

Drugs and alcohol were ruling my life. I made a lot of bad decisions while I was drinking alcohol. The first thing I stopped was cigarettes and tobacco.

When I got sober, that was 1990.

And I have always told the patients when I talk to them. When they come around and say, 'What will you have to drink? Oh that's right you don't drink.' Just speak up and say, 'Of course I drink. But I just don't drink alcohol.'

I think a lot of cynicism has dropped away from my shoulders since I stopped drinking.

I never had one beer. If I bought a six-pack of beer, I kept drinking till all six beers were gone. You have to have that kind of understanding about yourself. I haven't had a drink now in 12 years.

I'm a recovering alcoholic so I should be home.

I was an alcoholic, for sure. It became a problem steadily over the course of six years.

You can't drown yourself in drink. I've tried, you float.

Alcohol is a very patient drug. It will wait for the alcoholic to pick it up one more time.