Fr. Bill Wigmore
CEO of Austin Recovery

It’s too bad that 12-Step programs don’t introduce more newcomers to Dr. Harry Tiebout. He was Bill Wilson’s personal psychiatrist; but more importantly than that, Tiebout was the man responsible for A.A.’s early acceptance within the psychiatric community. Back in the early 1940’s, he saw that the 12-Step process could successfully treat alcoholics where his own and so many other psychiatric methods and models had failed. Having a goodly number of alcoholic patients, Tiebout had an understanding of what the psyches or inner-worlds of most of us addicts were like. In a word, he said we were: “immature.” (If you’re new to recovery or new to exploring your inner-world, I’m sorry to be the bearer of that bad news!)

But Tiebout’s view was that deep inside, at the level of the unconscious, most of us addicts have a tremendous, but unseen psychic-battle being waged. Somehow, we got stuck in our own psychological development; and according to him, lurking deep inside, lies a very immature King or Queen just waiting for the opportunity to takeover our conscious lives and again emerge as the imperial ruler of all it surveys.

Tiebout said that starting from the time in our mother’s womb, we’re each “Lord and Master” of our own little kingdoms. To use Freud’s famous phrase: we’re each: “His majesty, the baby!” And so, if we find ourselves uncomfortable in our confining, little “womb-kingdom” we simply start kicking our Momma till she turns and gives us a softer and more comfortable spot so we can stretch and settle down to sleep. And when we find ourselves getting hungry and in need of a late-night-snack, well, we just yank on the royal, umbilical chord and call for: “Womb Service!”

And that’s all a very normal and perfectly acceptable state of consciousness before we’re born. It’s even a state that’s tolerated by every parent for the first few years of a toddler’s life because toddlers are tyrants demanding instant gratification for their every whim: “We want - what we want - when we want it.” (Is anyone in recovery starting to identify?)

Now I used to think that my own alcoholism started when I had my first drunk at age 12 – and that it subsequently stunted my psychological development, beginning as a teenager. But after studying Tiebout and after doing any number of “emotional inventories,” I’m afraid I got “psychologically stuck” long before then. I’m a bit ashamed to admit this, but I remember back in kindergarten a really traumatic thing happened to me: I was made King of my kindergarten class. Now I didn’t really think that was traumatic. As a matter of fact, deep inside, I secretly thought that was simply a case of some long, over-due justice! The world was finally coming to see what, inwardly, I had known all along. As my favorite philosopher Mel Brooks once put it: “It’s good to be ‘da’ king!”

So my kindergarten teacher placed a paper crown on my head and all the other kids bowed deeply and did whatever I asked. At long last, life on the outside resonated with my secret life inside! But the trauma came a week later, when my teacher told me that my reign was over and she asked for the crown back. She said it was now some other kid’s turn to be the King. Inside, I was devastated! If I had a pint of vodka in my Superman lunchbox, I’d have downed it on the spot!

Tiebout says that in us addicts, this immaturity – this “inflated Ego state” as he calls it – it remains buried inside us just waiting for an opportunity to reemerge and crown itself yet again. Drinking or drugging is just such an opportunity and what Tiebout saw in the 12-Step philosophy was a spiritual program that could deal successfully with this life-threatening monarch within.

And so, while unconsciously we may want to be the King or the Queen, the Program stresses that we’re all equal within the rooms of recovery. Instead of being royalty, we’re all treated as commoners – No one of us is any better than the next guy. Who has the most sobriety? It’s the one who got up the earliest that day. The Program stresses humility and it says unless we find enough of it and unless we stay psychologically and spiritually in touch with it, that Little King or Queen inside will rise up again and its next insurrection could well be our last.

Other immaturity traits Tiebout noticed, are that both toddlers and addicts are always in a hurry and unable to accept frustrations of any kind. Who would dare to stop the king? So to overcome our inner “hurried-ness,” the program stresses our need for “patience.” One day at a time… Easy does it… Let go and let God. We need to slow down long enough to keep the monarch within from taking over and destroying everything we’ve spent months or maybe even years building up. And where “frustration” is our common problem, the Program teaches us to say: “God’s will be done - and not our own.” We’re asked to start, Living life on life’s terms.” Stop demanding that everything in life go exactly the way his or her royal majesty demands. Stuff happens! Stuff happens even to us kings and queens! And it happens to us without even stopping to ask our permission! How do I react when stuff happens to me? Someone cuts in front of me in line or on the highway and the monarch inside shouts, “Off with their heads!”

Tiebout goes on to teach that, “Living a life without Ego isn’t a new concept.” He says “two thousand years ago the world witnessed a man who actually succeeded in doing it.” Psychologically speaking, Tiebout was saying that Jesus gets to be the King because he was the only man humble enough to be king and not let it go to his head! He is the principal – we are his agent. He is the king – and we’re in God’s kingdom, playing our assigned roles. All good ideas are simple the Big Book says – and this simple idea is the one that keeps us from re-inflating our Royal Egos and from going out one more time and making a real mess of our own little kingdoms.

Mel B, after all these years, I hope we’re both a little wiser in knowing it’s really dangerous to be da king! And whether we’re Louie the XVIth or some poor alcoholic or addict, it can sometimes be fatal!

If you would like a copy of Harry Tiebout’s articles on Ego please send a royal courier or an email request to: This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it