The Disease of the Mind – Church Book Study – Part 4 of 5 – Bob A.

I wound up talking about step three, so we'll go from there and then maybe later on, not tonight, but later on maybe we could make a review of, a quick review of where we've been as far as the steps and as far the beginning of the alcoholism and the ego and self and the point for me most of the time is that is that Alcoholics Anonymous I don't need help to read because I can read and I always have been able to read if I was AA's concerned anyway and so there's through some time a time factor of not being able to have the message or have the means or the ways of doing anything different than what I have done in the past, meaning either in the drunken stage or in the sober stage of going to AA and living in a life that was always the same coming from the dranken life. Not drunken behavior, but just the drunken drinking life, you know. And so then the readings and then come the meetings, I got accustomed to go into meetings and listening and hearing and re-experiencing everything that I did from the drunken world. Now, not the dranken behavior world, but the draken stage of drinking where the alcoholism is already established in my brain by the way I think, act, and the way i handle life and react to life and everything else. And then when I'm in AA, I'm still reacting the same way. I'm Still doing the same thing. and yet though I've been going to meetings I'm years away from the bottle of the actual drinking and so the steps as I looked at them in the beginning and read them and had a sponsor and so on like that they were only something to do to get past something get through something get something done and over with it's okay from now on but alcoholism is not like that and so I had to have a new beginning I had great help And the reason why I'm saying this now is that sometimes, and I know and experience these things personally and everything else. I'd go to meetings and sit like you're sitting now. And there'd be somebody up here, andI don't care who it was, it doesn't make any difference. And they'd be talking about their lives and what they, the way they've seen it and what happened and so on like that. And I would sit there, and I would get bored, and I'd get thinking that I'm not like that. That isn't me, you know, and so on. And so I'd shut down. You know, my brain would shut down, and yet though I'm here for an hour, an hour and a half to try to learn how to live and how to be and have something different than what I have got. And so this here is the purpose of the steps. And today, this day, today, for me, is that it doesn't make any difference. I still have to have the guidance, the direction, the power of God. I still Have to have The Twelve Steps today to be able to go through this day without the alcoholism brain taking over, thinking and changing and doing and everything else like that. So it isn't a question now of being too darn smart, but it's not a question nowadays that I'm cured because I'm not because it says that in the big book. And anything I say now is not my interpretation. This is what it says in the print of the Alcoholics Anonymous big book, 12 by 12, possibly the sermon on amount, age, comes of age, and so on. Because I learned what's wrong with me. I found out in AlcoholicsAnonymous that it's more than just going to meetings. It's more Than Just Staying Sober. It's More Than Just Fixing Things Temporarily. maybe a situation or an happening or an event or something like that and so I don't today it's not a question now of being charged up because I went to a special meeting and I heard a special speaker or something like that it's, it's a, it's nothing it's none of that at all although that will happen but that isn't the ingredients that I need and so the thing about what I'm driving all the time and talking about all the times is that if I don' t do what I should do in a way of life that's already established, meaning this Alcoholics Anonymous 12-step program. And so I have to have help all the time because there's only a few short pages in this book and it covers 12 steps. And in those 12 steps is a way alive. And so this way of live now doesn't come in a fixed position. In other words, like five years I could get it all. 10 years maybe I could get it all 20 years maybe I could hit it all and then I would have from that moment on I wouldn't have the disease of the mind alcoholism and I wouldn'y have the troubles that I do have in a day I live in and so I have to start now realizing just exactly what am I doing here why was this here why was book printed why did all of a sudden did Bill Wilson and Dr. Bob get together and then come out with this book in 39 and then since that time since that time now up to this very minute that this here is still the way of life that treats alcoholism and I don't care who you are I don' t care what walk of life you come from I don´t care if you´re male or female I don''t care what´s happened to you period personally because that isn´t what´S wrong because I know for a fact that I have been in many many places drunk and sober and I have had great great amount of adversities of all different types but see that still isn't what's wrong and now it's i'm coming up to what i'm leading into here mainly is the fact that we stopped on step three and we didn't finish step three and truthfully you could i can i know i can talk seems like forever and never leave step three or any step freely because it is an ongoing living process it's a method to live for any alcoholic with alcoholism that's needed because this isn't about a drunk law see this is nothing to do with the with a wet side nothing at all and I didn't understand this or I wasn't aware of this see the understanding part of it would kick out there would have said I wasn t aware of why I was really sitting here in Alcoholics Anonymous why I came here over 39 years ago come up 39 and a half years but see it doesn't come in years and these days that I live in they keep changing people change situations change and I don't know how to live in the day I'm in because things turn things go against me things become difficult I acquired new new defects of character that I didn't even have when I was drinking and I've been a couple year and I got new defector characters out and so I say I can't look at life like that though but I have to because that's the purpose of the 12 steps is so that I had a sponsor that said I'm going to show you a way of living where drinking is not necessary I'm gonna take the bumps out of the road I'm to help you do something so that you can have what we have and here's he's returned to now the Alcoholics Anonymous program and so that's the beginning then last week it took off on step three then I learned I've learned through the years that everything about Alcoholics Anonymous I have to personally know for me, not for you. I haveと keep looking inwardly. Even though I do look outwardly, I cannot use that outward look to judge, criticize, compare, remember any of these things because that's the function of the disease when it's not treated. That's why I can't have what God wants me to have because I won't let Him and he can't do for me what I won't let him do for me it just won't happen it's like getting on your knees and praying and getting up and walking your own path I'll guarantee you you'll have to do again what you did yesterday in step three it's worded so it has great meaning because all steps are like this now every one of them are like this it started out in step one where I admitted I changed the pronoun from a plural to a first person singular I admitted I'm powerless over alcohol and dash that my life is unmanageable I came to believe in a power greater than me that could restore me to sanity now I'm in three I have to make a decision to turn my will and life over to care of God as I understood him so then now it's a new beginning it's the new ball game now see and this ball game I'm talking about is a daily one this isn't something now to get past something this isn'T something that's isolated all by itself with step three so I can say I know what's wrong you you need step three today see or something like it's nothing like that this is all based on a method a method that treats alcoholism a method of living that's consistent it works all the time every time it's in its fullest form you don't have to add anything to it take anything away from it you have to do today exactly what the program or the steps or that god says to do for your life we i have to put this on an individual basis now me this book was written for me this is all about me it's not about you at all that changes now see that changes internally so that i can't look outwardly and think you need this and he don't need any at all i don't need it because i've done it see the the attitude itself when uh when i have a mind that i do have and it's been damaged it's hurt it's always about self and this self will stop me dead in my tracks from going any farther than where i'm at that's a lot of work i don't need to do this i'm okay today i'm years away from drinking so on like that but see this that's my problem my problem is i got a thinking problem i don t have a drinking problem i have a thinking problem and this thinking problem is going to do and create a life that was always there when I was drinking and then I'm not drinking that's the same life there's no difference I look at you funny whoever you are I'll find fault with you immediately I'll fight about with you and I don't have any reason at all to do that I have no reason at all to judge you criticize you condemn you or think that you're you should be somebody else or you should act another way or anything like that and that could be in somebody close it could be a total stranger could be somebody over in a car somewhere or it could have happened yesterday and I'm still talking about it today it's terrible it's really terrible it's a devastating disease because it's an ism it's the alcoholism it's going on this very minute and it does not it does get any place other than self it can't it don't have the power to do that and so this year when I make a decision to turn my will I have to understand a decision what it is and a decision to me is a lopsided deal it's always about one thing one way regardless of which way it was going before it's got to go this way it can be no place else it can't be from no other way at all it's gotta be a decision about what it says about turning my will and my life over to God's care as I understood him understood him means exactly that from step two not from my childhood because I had no God in my childhood no power at all and I didn't have anything going for me from Bibles or churches or history or past or anything else like that so then if it says words like that I must understand or I must accept words like that as something that's there that's important it's really important and this is what I'm saying now is about step two where I came to believe that a power greater than me could restore me to sanity not sobriety sanity soundness of mind wholeness of mind a mind that isn't captured with self a mind that isn' t closed minded a mind that's receptive to whatever is going on and this is why it's called a recovery program because it's not a program of failure it's no it's a program just for certain alties at a certain day for a certain reason it's none it's got to be a way of life and so I had to find out now too about my will what my will is my will is where the power lies and where the power lies in my life and my body is in my mind because it's a thinking process it's a right and wrong process it is a process that I use as full of ego so and so this here now if I if that's my will and it's already there then I can make a decision to do something with something that is there that I know about and I do know about this now I've got some idea anyway and my life is no more than where I'm at in the moment I'm in in the day I'm in right now this is my life I'm here and I'm going to turn my will and my life over to care of God as I understood him understood him again just is what step two was all about so now you see I'm taking step one and I've taken step two and I am doing and in the process now is step three but it's not three by itself no more it's three with with three steps together and this here was a hard concept to do because I kept forgetting about or not using our dreaming or thinking about what I had just learned or what I have just accepted or what i surrendered to or what am here for even because after a while I'll come to meetings like this then I have no reference at all going in my brain about my behavior here I don't I don' have anything I'll take a head trip I'll be like you're sitting there now and then I'm miles away somewhere my body's here but my head somewhere else because this is boring just say this ain't got nothing to do with nothing so you know that's what my mind tells me but yet though you see I'm here because if I go anywhere else but here I'm gonna die I'm going to do again what I did yesterday I'm gonna hurt people I love I'm Gonna punish people and I'm ready to do that instantly I don't have to have you do something and then remember about it which I do that also. But I'm always there. I've got a chip on my shoulder. I really do. And I'm looking for trouble. Then I don't want to do these things, but I know they're going to happen. I know I'm going to get run and scared. I'm gonna hurt you wherever you are. And I am going to be the same man I have always been all my life. In charge, in control. I'm the authority. I go to me for answers and I get the answers and I do it. I don' t want to d o that no more. I want to have an open mind. Step two told me truly what I need is an open mind a mind that's not full of me not an empty mind but a mind that isn't full of self a mind that doesn't have preconceived ideas or experiences that it'll go to head knowledge things like that so that I can be receptive to what it says here that if I make a decision to turn my will and life over to God's care this here is what I mean to find out how you do that I don't need to read this now I do read it And I read it all the time. I'm talking about today's reading, by the way. I'm not talking about yesterday or years. I'm telling you about this life today, for today. And this is real hard to do sometimes because I get caught up in that world out there too and I just don't put no importance here because I already have done this many, many times. I've wore books out even. So yeah, it's true, see? But my attitude says, well, you don't need to do that. You've got other things to do. It's okay, you know. Get to it later, you known. So on like that. The idea now again is that this is for me I've got to keep this primary I had a sponsor that was a god man a step man and he made sure that as he talked to me and as he and listen this man he didn't phone me on the telephone he never called me on the phone he'd come up to the door in the afternoon he worked till about 1.30 or so let's go away we went he didn'T say you want to go to a meeting you want to go over to the hospital you want to go around the drying out farm something like that he DIDN'T do that let's go the way we went this here man this alcoholic the sponsor of mine knew exactly what was wrong with me and he was trying to help me and I thought at the time he was kind of trying to make me even like him I thought he was trying to do this because he wanted it that way because he kept hammering on me all the time and what he was doing he was trying to do exactly what these meetings are about even now I know these meetings don't treat alcoholism I really honestly God knows that because the meetings don't change the character that I am. It gives me information, it gives me eyesight, and it gives you the fellowship, it gives all the things that I need to know about why we're here. But until I myself put this in an application form, until I perform this day, I don't have it either, and I can't have if. But I can have it if I will do what he did. And that's what he was trying to teach me. and he was trying to teach me something about how you have to do this and his way at that time was first things first and it was always a primary thing first things first he had to put me in a hospital that was the first thing I lost my job he had to get me the job back I had to get my life back he paid for my food and my rent and my house until I got working first things first were put in that category so that I myself could look at each and every day and do something in the day I'm in for my life that was really a major thing a thing that was killing me a thing that was keeping me in turmoil in conflict and fears and everything else and so this year started to make sense later not now because he was doing my thinking for me I wasn't thinking like that he was thinking like that and it's the same thing as right now is what I'm seeing because if you as an alcoholic are satisfied with your life if you're satisfied with what's happening if you're satisfied in each and every day how you treat people how you turn on people how do you affect people if you are satisfied with that behavior there's no need even come to AA there's no need to even think about steps because this is a program of recovery recovery and this means a great deal to me because the hours that I spend at meetings or the hour-and-a-half I spend it meetings or anything like that. It's for my benefit so that I can have again the life that God presents to me, that I could contribute to life where I don't have a bad brain because of it. I don' t have to go to my mind and find nothing there but trash, nothing there but just harm, memories, hurts, and I don''t have to live in a day I'm in because I acted up so badly last day, last year, whatever it was, because I got a mind like an elephant and it'll keep punishing me all the time he'll keep punishing me he'll keep it storing the memories of all these things and this is now the purpose now of doing something now that it talks in here in step three and it talks in here it says like all the remaining steps step three calls for affirmative action for it is only by action that we can cut away the self-will which has always blocked the entry of god or if you like a higher power into our life faith to be sure is necessary but faith alone can avail us nothing we can have faith yet still keep God out of our lives so as I'm learning this and as it's being offered to me there is principles now that are being established now I don't know the word principle I don' t know if you do but I don because when they say things to me in Alcoholics Anonymous and when I read things and they talk about principles I don''t know the function or the display of principles as I live my life because my life happens too quick I go into a day I go in to a situation and immediately I've got the answer and I say the things they say I do the things I do and I wish I hadn't done but I can't take them back I didn't but I don't know that principles if I look at the word principle and decide now what's that word mean really and what are they talking about and they're talking about the truth the truth but truth about anything and if I can just now start to relate this now to my way of thinking the truth if I if I want the truth is that if I want to have friends I must be a friend that's the truth but it's a principle I treat you right you're going to treat me right that is the truth that's a principal so it started to make sense to me what they're starting to do here now in this year program recovery about when they say about principles practice these principles and all our affairs it says that the 12th step is an end but you see I don't know and I can't think fast enough in a day I'm in to do what I should do I do what I do because that's what all I know to do and it has no guidance no reference to right or wrong it's right to me when I do it even though I do it and I get hurt and I'll hurt you and then I want to take it back when I can so if I'm going to make a decision to turn my will which is me in the power form it's going to be my mind over to God's care and my life is going to be dedicated like now where I'm at I'm going to be with God wherever I'm at the best I can and so I'm going to have to start putting this thing together and start using this now as a way of life I'm going to have to associate my life to God no matter what's wrong with me whether it's a bad thought whether it smoking whether it eating whatever it is relationships but you see I come here only for alcohol and then I find out that alcohol is not my problem I find out that alcoholism is a condition of the mind and it's all about self self survival so pleasing self everything but I forgot though who I am I don't have the power to change my mind or to make the world different than what it is or to make you behave so I like it I don't have that power and I don t know this word power either in a power form because I do everything today because that's my life and I have to do it I got the car takes power to drive that car not the kind of power I think power to stay out of other people's lives power not to drive two cars at one time yours and mine because you don't know how to to drive see the power to think with sanity soundness of mind I don't have that I've got a mind it doesn't even consider that as a necessary thing I could sit where you're sitting now and anything I'm saying you can say it's wrong but it's the truth and you can't change the truth I know you can I tried too many years I try to prove my sponsor wrong even I could never do we sat at table similar to this in my, in my dining room over in Canoga Park there. My doctor's there and I'm here and all night long he's got his finger in my nose and wanting to know how I'm so damn smart that I know how to answer people and how to talk about people and I know how this guy is an SP and this guy's something else or something else. We sat there all night wrong. If I'm trying to convince him I'm right and he's showing me the truth then I can't argue against the truth because every time I open my mouth I don't know what to say right I can't say that because I don t care if a liar says the truth it's still a truth I don' t care see and this now is something that I have to accept but this is what the steps are teaching me now how to live in the day I'm in in a world that I see the world that it's in my life and this not is really the foundation step three and this says here also about three and this is very important because you see there's they talk a great deal in here and three there's a lot to cover in three but it says here this it says then it explains that the other that the stutter steps of a program can be practiced with success only when step 3 is given a determined and persistent trial this statement may surprise newcomers who have experienced nothing but constant deflation and growing conviction that human will is of no value whatever they have become persuaded that rightly so that many problems besides alcohol will not yield to a headlong assault powered by the individual alone this is starting to make sense to me now in sense means that I'm starting to be aware of me and my life and what I'm doing and how I do it and everything else because you see in the beginning I came here only to stay sober only to say out of bars only not to give drunken behavior that's what I thought was the name of the game and now they're talking about something entirely different here in the first half of step one they spoke they speak of alcohol as the disease the word alcohol and about a twofold nature is an obsession of the mind with a physical allergy and hitting bottom and then it's not even referred to anymore they're not going to talk about alcohol but you see I don't hear that I don' know that I think I'm here because the name of the game is don't drink don't drink don' drink and yet though I've got so many things wrong with me I've got a mind that this goes a million miles an hour and it goes in every direction you can go in and it tells me things and I believe these things I listen to me and I'm in trouble now deeper than I was when I was drinking I've gotta unmanageable life and I am not drunk I'm not drunk and so they have become persuaded and rightly so that many problems besides the alcohol will not yield to a headlong assault powered by the individual but now it appears there are certain things which only the individual can do all by himself in the light of his own circumstances he needs to develop a quality of willingness when he acquires a willingness he is the only one who could make the decision to exert himself trying to do this as an act of his own will all of the 12 steps require sustained and personal exertion to conform to their principles and so we trust to God's will is what we try to make our will conform to God will that we begin to use it rightly now this here started helped me a great deal because you see I could read this but I don't know what I'm reading I don't what they're referring to I don t know that this is me I think it's still you I still think that okay don't think I'm not even thinking about getting drunk I think and then you're you acted so badly that I have the right to do this just rip you wide open and I go but this is still we're filling the subject matter of learning how to make a decision I had to find out that what they're talking about here is they're talking about a power now that I'm going to use this power that I can use is called God whether I accept that word or use that word if not it's not important right now but what is important is the idea is to know that there's something other than me in this world that can do far greater things that I could ever do something that I couldn't trust something I look around at meetings my sponsor and all you people and I see you and I know you're not drunk and I know that you can't keep yourself sober and I know you can think the right thoughts to live be happy joyous and free I know this because I can and if you're like me if you got the disease of alcoholism you've got to think and act and be the same way when it's untreated the alcoholism when it is untreated you must go somewhere so where could you go you have got to go to you certainly can't go to your neighbor you don't live in your skin he don't have a brain but you've got to go to self but you see there's a power that I learned into that I could use in three because it explained that into there's a power greater than me whether I agree with that or not or whether I don't want to even call him God which I didn't at that time but it came about it did come about and it came about because of what three says step three it says once we have come into agreement with these ideas it is really easy to begin the practice of step three you know in all times of emotional disturbance or indecision we can pause after the test for quiet and the stillness simply say that will surrender prayer and so it means now that if these words that they put in here that wherever I go and I had to learn this year because I had great difficulty in work I had really a problem at work that couldn't be around anybody you know I was constantly in conflict with somebody I was always fighting arguing and just brazen hell all the time then I found out that there is a method that's already in progress it started in three the identity was in too. The disease was in one. Self was there all the time and each one could know that this is for me, not for you. And so I can benefit by something if I will do something. So I call upon God because I want God in my life. Now that means my will. My will says why don't you ask God? Why don't You talk to God? And so this started a process for me it started from my knees in a bedroom started talking to a power a god that wasn't my god it was blown to another alcoholic and i started doing this because i was told to do it i was told how to do and sometimes i could actually honestly get out of that bedroom with the power greater than me i could put it in the car with me i Could go to work down the street and sometimes i'd get all the way to work and this was a piecemeal thing but it was a thing that was taken place in my life and it was very self-evident to me that every time every time I associated my life to God for help for just to be there I would look at my watch at work as I flagged tickets you know that I do work now I'm a mechanic so I get a hard copy I do the work and I flag a ticket I get paid by the flag so I have to know the clock see because I it's a time factor and so every time I associate associated this this watch this time factor whether it lunch flagging or whatever it was i associated to the power to god i'd say i'm sorry god i haven't i haven t even thought about you in the last half hour last hour i said i'm back forgive me but what i was doing i was doing something that i was told to do i was trying to go somewhere other than to self i was time to believe that there was a power greater me would help me i would associate my life then to the Power by talking to the the power not in the morning not at night but actually when when trouble wasn't even there this started to take hold because it started now to change me and all I was doing is just following directions all I was doing was not arguing and not saying that's not needed that's baloney and all that kind of stuff I was actually doing it and then all of a sudden these guys said say me Anderson you go to church and I said no and they say well something's happening to you see I was starting to slow down my mind was starting get less powerful over my life I was starting to add something in my life that was from an application about a recovery program this sounds like it's a long way around but believe me this what I'm talking about now I couldn't go another inch in my life for any reason I could add or try or do anything else other than what it says is step three if i don't do three there's no way that i can make a searching and fearless moral inventory of me period there's not way i can even go farther in the program of recovery until this is established until i make a decision because you see the decision i'm making is not just about alcohol the decision is how to live in a world i'm in without alcohol this is something that becomes important now how to drive a car sanely how to eat sanely, how to do this sanely or that sanely. How to talk to your neighbor sanely it's all about living my life though not yours this is where I missed the mark for two and a half years I didn't do this for two and half years in AA I was the same man sober as I was drunk for two and a-half years I was getting worse two and-a-half years later I didn' know I didn''t know who I was I didn ''t know what was wrong with me I thought that all you had to do is just stay sober you're gonna eventually make it you've done it you're going to hit the mark one of these days and you'll be alright after that that's not so the payoff of this here is I believe as in each individual alcoholic I've seen literally hundreds of guys that I've worked with some gals even that would listen that would try that would do the same thing that I was doing not that what I wanted them to do but what it says to do talking about a program recovery talking about the Alcoholics Anonymous reason of being here why the book was written this was written for alcoholics with alcoholism this wasn't written for humanity like the Bible or for your neighbor or somebody else it was written for me me personally and now this here has been hammered in my head I've failed so many times I make mistakes but that's not what the name of the game is about it isn't about that what it's about is having something now that I could use so that I don't have to be like I was or like I'm gonna do this here now is a proven method it works every time but you but if you're like me you leave this your room you get out that door sometimes I can get in my car before I lose it sometimes I go down the block before I lose it somebody couldn't wait until I get around the corner and blow their heart at me and now I really lost it I'm back to so I'm backing the disease of alcoholism I'm starting to burn I think of you shouldn't do that this is what this is all about right now because we're not in we're now did my defects are character yet we're trying to establish something so that I can go farther enough and do something with success because when I mean well I can't do well when I talk to me I say the same thing over and over again all the time what I said yesterday I'll say again today and it killed me yesterday is going to kill me today because it's a wrong authority it's the same brain this sounds again maybe it gets boring maybe you can get kind of figure well Jesus let's get going you know well that's that's exactly what I needed to know constantly daily each and every day I need a daily reprieve contingent on the maintenance my spiritual condition my spiritual condition is starting now to be there but yet I don't want to I just don't wanna stay there too long see I want to get I want to get ahead of this game see I wanna get this passed I want to get it over with I want be free now see but I can't be free because this is only a daily retreat this is the disease of the mind that until I get a head transplant or die it's gonna be there that's all we're good yeah I gotta accept that and this is no death warrant this is opposite this is something that I'm going to benefit from this is good living this is a good life this is something now that it's there all the time in fact the things that happened to me and has happened to me since this were things that there's no way possible I should have them no way no way but I get them anyway and this is something that you know I'll do something and it pays off tremendously and yet though when I did it I didn't know what to do and I did it but I didn't need to know what to do so long as I turned my will in life over to care of God the principles are there the truth is there I live on the principles or the truth and they produce again what they're supposed to they're consistent and there's a lot of them there's many of them that I need to know about personally need to know about you know it's just like when we close the meeting and then we say the Lord's Prayer forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those that trespass against us that's a principle but if you will do that it'll happen that way the serenity prayer same thing why would I say something and not mean it why would i say something that benefit from it why what I come to meetings like this and then go right back into my brain go back into my diseased mind go back in to the old life and yet I just got through spending all these years and all this time reading and doing this and doing doing that well it's because of what's wrong with me so this doesn't get boring I just came off a retreat this afternoon from up at San Lorenzo good up there you know since Friday beautiful beautiful you guys have been up there know what I'm talking about it's something special really special and all you talk about is life that's there for us all of us in a recovery program an application program of performing now differently than we did before and it has no reference to how new you are how many years you got whether you're white, black, big, small rich, poor, uneducated smart, anything it hasn't got no reference for that at all only for a way of life to treat alcoholism and that's the only requirement is the word alcoholism and yet though it's there for each and every one of us regardless if we go to a retreat or not so this now is again the same thing that we keep talking about all the time an application it's very hard to swallow it's really hard to keep going for it all the time it's a lot of work it is a lot of listening a lot reading but it's so it's some life a method of life that money can't buy I know it can buy I've tried every way in the world to do it my way and I found no success until the time came that I too did exactly what my sponsor said to do here are the steps we took and we're taking them we're doing them or living them so you know what we ought to do if we were going to have a coffee break but now I think we've been going I know you get tired of sitting there and I know it's a long time to be just listening to this but it's very important I still haven't even got off of three yet That's something that I wanted to get out of that real quickly. Let's have a coffee break for maybe five or ten minutes. Yeah, it's okay. I'll get off at step three and maybe we can come back a little later or something like that because the important thing about for me anyway is that I know how to read and I know how to listen but I don't know how to retain it I don' t know how to use it as a way of life I have to constantly do something that so that it becomes primary or first things first and that's the application living life from the 12 steps so I have to now I have to the picture is so big for living my life that I see I can' t look at the steps as a completed thing or a thing that's going to start at one and be all the way over here at 12 and then there's the picture that you look at as a way of life because it can't be that way, it's just too big. But I've got to put the importance about each day of what's going on. So it isn't a question now of retaining the whole step three or step two or step one or any step, see? But there is principles, truth, that I'm going to learn about that's going to fit my life and need it for my life in the day I'm in. So this is an ongoing process. This is, for me, it's an ongoing process. It says in here, it's continuous and it has to be this way so it isn't a question now of missing a few things or not being here tonight you have to be here next week and then tonight we'll spoil anything because it won't. The idea behind this now is that the words that are in the steps are very important. The words like willingness. I must know what willingness means because when I'm here I might have the willingness but when I go out the door I might not have it I go down the block or so and I don't have willingness at all now and the willingness now is to have exactly what's needed for my life through the grace of God through God's power through God way our will and so this is already being established right now this is ready this is really being established whether you agree with that or not it's not important because there will be a time I know this and it happened to me and it happens to me many, many, many thousands of times is that the right thought the right telephone call the right answer solution it happens in spite of me. It happens. It really does. But you see I don't relate that to the grace of God. I relate it to luck. I relate that to something that's like a windfall or some kind you know like sometimes I go a whole month but I'll make it a dime and then in the last two days I'd make enough to pay my mortgage or something like that and I would think I lucked out. See, that isn't luck. That's living in a world and performing in this world through the application of the principles of the 12 steps. Not the 12 Steps now as numbered steps but principles to live by to guide me direct me make me think act and be who I should be not who I want to be or who I was. So this is so important now to talk about so that it doesn't leave you because you can't retain the things that are in my brain. You can only retain whatever it is that you have. And so this is important now because why should you and me have this way of life offered to us and not use it, not benefit by it? Because that's what we're here for. And it's called a program of recovery, not a program a failure, not a problem not a hit and miss, special people only can have it at special times. No, it's not. it's a method of living which will do for you what it does for me and that's treats my alcoholism see and so in steps now we can I can stay in step a long time and so I'll get off at three but the important part about what I want to say about three is is that that there is principles in three to do to apply to use it's not a reading process if you don't if you can't retain something or if you don't know what I'm talking about or if we've already been in the method now that will do this for you all you have to do is do it it's not a question of what wanting to know how to do it it's already here to do. It's not so it's not up to you to decide where you're going to place it and how you're gonna use it when you're to use it or you're going to use there anything like that this is a change of character this is a change of character now. Remember this, see? You can't come here as an alcoholic and still use your brains or your old ideas or anything else. This is all brand new. This is proven. This like looking at a truth again. No matter how you look at that truth, you can't make it an untruth. It just isn't there. And this here is important for me to say this all the time because the minute that you have failure, the minute you get a subpoena or IRS thing or whatever it happens which you called adversity or troubles or anything like that this goes right out the window and then you get down into self I get in itself anyway and then they get worried and I get through it and threatening I gotta have to tell you all about it and then we have to read I have to relive it and I have the experience all the doomsday again you know and all that kind of stuff no way no damn way that's the way I used to be sure but I'm not going to do it today I can't do it today the reason I can is because I'm not thinking with self I've already established who God is as a power and so this is where I have to use this so now it comes to this year that as we're doing this now we're going into step four that everything is established now everything is there if I will do what I'm supposed to do and told to do and shown to do then I can do I can make a searching and fearless moral inventory of my defects and I had to get this straightened out the first time I missed this by eight miles just because I heard so many stories about defects of character and I know today there's guys around and I've been with them too on the weekend they've got an inventory in their trunk of their car it's been in there six months but this is an old story you know I used to have a garage in Denver and I used to take these guys and gals and I have a big safe you know regular dial safes you know in my garage and every night I would lock up all their inventories and put them in there put that old safe on you know and the next morning they show up we're doing the steps you know get out their inventory and give it to them but the only reason I did that is one guy left his inventory in his car one night went home and his wife found it rent and divorce them. So we're in inventory. And the thing about inventory is that this, now keep an open mind on this because it's only my opinion. And this is very, very important to me though. And see, I was told in the beginning, and it's still here, you know, is that there's things that happened to me that caused me to drink. See? And these things are still in me today. Now see, i don't agree with that at all i lived a drunken life see i lived the life that i wanted to live see and to live in this life that I wanted to do certain things and so these certain things that I did was in the drunken stage and it was a way of life a way of thinking a way of acting which I perfected see that's not why I drink the why I drink and why I lie and why the way I lived my life was in the day I was in and I drank that way too I drank for the day I was in and I thought and used my brains in the day I was in then when I get to AA I'm going to try to search out and find defects of character and these defects of character are already in my brain they're there they're established doesn't make no difference how they got there they're there and so these are the things that I'm going to have to learn about because this is the character that I am this is what motivates me this is why this is how it makes my life go wrong or right doesn't make no difference it's still there and I can't look backwards and search out things where I can name something when I was three years old five years old when I didn't even know what a drink was and then blame that for why I drank and then why I'm here today after maybe 20, 30, 40 years later and say that's why I'm like I am is because of that see that don't make sense the searching and fearless moral inventory that I have to learn about is the true character that I am who I am why I treat you whoever you are a certain way why I can't stand certain people why I can't accept situations why I can't adjust my life so that I'll fit in your life I've got to have you change I am I'm not going to change see so this kind of thinking now is what they're trying to show me in the step four see this searching and fearless moral inventory of the way I live what I think, what I represent what's behind all this where's the deep down true motives for what makes me tick right now, this minute not go backwards at all just today, this day how I can't even accept something out there because I instantly reacted to something and it gave me trouble I hurt somebody I accused somebody I turned on somebody I thought bad of somebody what is this all about then see I'm talking about Alcoholics Anonymous Recovery Program I'm not talking about applying steps I'm talkng about learning and writing about who I am and really am this is very important because as I wrote there was a lot of things that I didn't want to write about or there was a lot things that I wrote down I didn'y even know what I was writing them down for because I constantly consistently go in the day I'm in and when I have no contact with you or you're not watching me and I'm not reading I do my own thing anyway yeah I'm up to my old tricks all the time and I learned how to talk to God this way too by the way and this is important see because I would I would constantly keep going to God in the day I was in whether I'm working I'm a mechanic see and I am working and Iam talking to God and Im working see and then say forgive me God I am up to old tricks I just did it again would you help me again but you see I learned how to develop a relationship at work only, not driving my car not with my wife because every night I come home this book here was laying on the Davenport it was up to page 58 chapter 5 how it works and it was laid on the davenport like this every damn night I'd come home she never said a word to me but you see what she was telling me she was putting a message out there's a program of recovery read it this year believe me this year is something that at the time I knew why that book was open I knew that I thought thoughts that I couldn't think about what she was doing, how she was doing things and everything else but I thought I had the right to do that I did many dumb things I hurt her and I hurt many other people because at that time this here book of recovery was not my way of life I was still my way alive I came to meetings like this and I remain pretty much the same man I've always been but I wore this face and I stayed at meetings I didn't drink and all of these things I'm talking about now were being offered and I said no I said, no I don't need that but yet though inside of me each and every night I would relive and I'd rethink the same way I always did I would go in the experiences that had happened many, many days and months ago and already yesterday and then this year I didn' t understand what step four was all about I didn't know this and this here is very important because steps each and every one of them there's only a few pages a few words and yet though there's the same words in the same pages that started way back in 39 when they printed this same thing they haven't changed nothing's changed I only know one word that's been changed it's in the tradition but this here what I'm talking about now is something that's being offered to me it's something that I can have something I can use something I could benefit by but I must do what it says to do and so I see in step two I learned how closed-minded I am I've learned it too that I'm always I'm in the debating society all the time which comes first chicken or the egg you know and this is true see but I but I don't look at life that way when I'm out there doing that in the day I'm because I don t have any reference to the disease and I think whatever is I'm doing out there is necessary to do needed to do it the right thing to do and yet these are the very same thing that I'm supposed to now in step four I should find out who the hell this character really is see and these defects of character now as I started writing them down I found out how to do by writing down exactly what was in my head today this day with no reference to where it started how many years it's been there or anything about it other than the fact that I am jealous I'm envious I'm I've got a chip on my shoulder I'm hostile I'm angry all the time I'm looking for a fight regardless of where it's at even at a meeting I'm looking for trouble because I live trouble I come from trouble trouble is what if the world's all about is that you have to push and shove you have to make things right when everything's wrong see but these here what I'm talking about is something that I don't want to look inside of me not really and I don't want to admit even to self that that's me see but there's there's a process going on now there's of method going on out and these also are truths these are principles and so that they're starting now to become something that I can be aware of not to understand or anything like that because this is no more than just writing no more just going doing a method writing down something and then also including now I Now, I found out that I don't have to keep itemizing my defects. I don' t have to put down that I'm angry. This guy, that guy, this guy, her, them, whatever. All I have to do is understand or see and recognize a defective character. It's like being a bank robber. You don' T have to tell me how many banks you rob by their addresses. Just tell me you rob banks. That' s good enough. I know who you are. So this is the same thing now, see? And then I find out that after I write this here, and it's all about today's thinking even though it's coming from yesterday or yesterday's life it's also it's not all about today's life and about what's in my brains and who I am today so this year now will knock out a lot of Alphys I've been around anyway of using excuses or searching for things that are not there or going to things that they think were put there many many years ago and that was part of why they drank that isn't why they drank I know damn well it isn't for me I drank because when I drank it treated my alcoholism it made the world that I could live in without the conflict, without the worry without the trouble, see the booze was treating my alcoholismo it was but I didn't know that and then when I go into life then and I find out how to live in that life to treat my alcoholisme with booze I have to develop a character that can think fast, do fast and protect self and stay on top of the heap and be first and everything else about it but I have to push and shove and hurt people to do this I have become somebody that is going to remain that way and think that way and this is the purpose of the 12 steps and that's what step 4 is about because 4 and 5 and 6 are going to be together in relationship of what they're doing but each one is an individual each one don't need the other to do the one and we're only in step 4 as quick as I can understand that there isn't a process of time here I don't have to you know I've had babies especially one guy he had a I got him and he had some years but he's still flip-flopping and everything he had book it was a book and it was an inventory book all about step four and it went for five years I looked at that and I couldn't believe it you know he wanted me to read it too you know yeah he wanted to read he got mad because I wouldn't read it you know and so this is this is a process that doesn't take time this is something that you do that after this is listed if I made a searching and fearless moral inventory myself I agree that you can do this again if you need to and you can do it ten times this year if you want to it's still okay with me I don't care the point is though is what the heck you're doing for the purpose you're doing it for is done so that you can now have one meaning step one two three and four as a method now becoming together principles that you're taking from one step and building a life now so that you can have a daily reprieve contingent on the maintenance of your spiritual condition because that's what you're bringing forward all the time. You're bringing a power, a God, so that you can do now today because God will do this and he will allow you to have all the information and the help so that you can have this what you need and this is God doing for you what you can't do for yourself and that's pretty well accepted in my life anyway and so this now becomes something to do and we can talk again now and keep talking about this but the point of this is that to have the ability or the capabilities of putting down an inventory list making an inventory a searching fearless this here now is very well established because even when I can't remember that I still have the principles that will come from this principles now of not lying I don't need to lie I don' t want to tell a lie there' s too much wrong when I do tell a lie, I hurt people I get in awful bad trouble the principle or the truth behind it is don' T lie because I found out I'm a liar and so the idea now is that I can put a list down about me, I can make a list about me and this list will cover a lot of territory this will expose me to me as I am not as who I say I am this is now an inwardly thing this is something now because in the next step is a step that I never knew what the hell the next step was about and there was a time that I went for a long time in AA without step 5 in my life because there were things when I used to even talk years ago and I used to talk and I'd say there's things that I haven't done in my life I'll tell no man and I really meant that and I did that but there did come a time there was a time in my life and this year the way it happened is the way that always happens it got so much of a load to carry around I was always being afraid of being found out I was listening to you unload completely to me but I never did that myself and I felt guilty and I knew it was wrong and I know that there had to come a day when the program of recovery in an application form to its fullest meaning the whole 12 steps would have to happen otherwise if the book says it's possible I'll get drunk probably will and I can see why because I can't live in memory and guilt I can' t live being walking on eggshells afraid that you might find out who I really am you might found out what I really did you see this is very important but the important part about 5 was the fact that I could admit to God I can admit to you but I couldn't admit it to myself I wrote it but I could not accept it because the self says no the only reason you did that is because they made you do it I put down things that it had to be that way it could not be no other way I had to do these things you made me do it I had a job I had the handle the situation that way I had tell the boss he told me I am going to fire you one of these days and I had lied to him then I had go hide my car somewhere by a joint somewhere so I didn't park near the joint he'd see my car and know I'm in there getting drunk. I thought that's what happened so you know he didn't have to see my car all you had to do was look at me or he had to see me come staggering in. He knew damn well where I was. And so this year I didn'T accept who I was I lied to myself self-deceiving to self I painted pictures that I looked at that weren't true weren't real that wasn't me I had to be like that it's the same thing today this this day and then in this book is in the steps are always talking they're not talking about alcohol now they're talking about problems they're talking about things that they're in my life today that I can't I can live with I can handle and it has nothing to do with being drunk hasn't got a damn thing to do with bars and life and drunken behavior it's all about thinking and it's always about thinking about me all is about me I'm so damn important to me you can't believe how important I am but that's an attitude that's not a conversation see that's an attitude, that I already have established it's already there I can do better than you could do I don't give a damn what you're doing either I don t even know if you know what you do and I still couldn't do it better that's in the attitude I walk around looking at life like that how can anyone anyone have a day of anything at all of any meaning living like that doing that how could you you know and then we're not there yet but it wouldn't get the step six we'll get there and talk about this what would where I'm leading into and it's so damn important to see me actually see me now step five is where I learned that the major part about five in my life would be to understand not understand to be aware of what the purpose of five is now I couldn't I could admit many many things and I found this out in dr. Tebow I can admit a lot of things but I don't accept it I don' believe it I do it for a lot of reasons I do I excuse my behavior one way or another the way I look at you the way you think of you the way it treats you the what I want out of you and so on like that these are things that are in my brain you can't get in my brain but I'm in there and these very same things I'm talking about are coming exactly from me this is what this here business now about as far as step five is that I could admit to anyone under any condition I can make that happen and I could have admitted to you and to God I could be very easily do that now to God but I cannot do it to myself no more because I won't accept that I won' believe that I don't think that I think that I can make it I can change I'll change I'll do differently I was always getting ready I was studying this book here I studied it and studied it I go to bed reading it and maybe the whole damn night reading it you know I was always in a rehearsal I was always going to do this and I was getting prepared to dothis and I was really getting informed to do this the main event would happen and I wouldn't even know it the day would come and go and I never used a word out of that book for my life. But I was getting ready and I was well there. It never happened. Admit to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of my wrongs. That's pretty hard to do. That is hard to do it. It's hard. I couldn't go to another man. I could go to another man and tell him how I think, how I act, what's going on. I just couldn't do but I had to cover it up. I had him all around. I had the hope that maybe they would say the right words at the right meeting at the wrong time and I would know what to do and it would fix me or something like that. Back down in three, I had learned a great deal about dependency. That's what I didn't talk about. But the dependency is there very well explained. But it's only dependency in the beginning for alcohol. The rest of my life, no. Leave it alone. I'll take care of it. and now I'm up in I'm in a step now this is step five where I'm going to have to do something very seriously now I'm gonna have to accept me for who I really am I wrote about me and that's me and I'm gunna have to accept that that's mean wherever I'm at whatever I'm doing this is the character that I am this is how I live this is what I do this is where my motives now come from deep down inside this is why I get in trouble this is Why I'm restless irritable discontent because I can't do anything else but that I'm going to have to accept exactly the purpose of why it's there and the main purpose is there is to identify and accept exactly what I wrote about because in the next step step six that where I'm gonna be entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character and it's put in right words it says it the right way the only thing about step six is that the last page in step six in your book gives me a leeway a little bit it gives me somehow so that I don't have to do everything in one day so that I don' t have to have all my defects removed and then I'm nothing I can it says this even so long as I don''t take an attitude this I'll never give up this I' ll be like this all the time because I'm getting a lot out of this this defect this way of living this wayof treating people this wayoff using people I found out in step six from defects of character and from accepting this what I foundout in five that I'm a taker. I'm a takER. And this is the character I am now. This isn't a drunken stage. This doesn't happen when I get loaded with abuse or anything like that and I'm out of my mind or anything like that. It doesn't mean that. It means that I'm like this all the time. That I'm looking out for me. I'm using you whoever you are for full of satisfaction for what I want. Me first all the time. that's an attitude again now the only time I'll do otherwise than that is that if I'm alright I might look your direction I might consider you this here now is identifying something in me that I have to know about because you know I can't explain the way my behavior out there in the world I'm in when I got money in my pocket when I gotta wife, I gotta house, I got a car I got everything going for me but I'm still using you I'm still taking advantage of your kindness your relationship your everything this is real serious I have to look at this now honestly self-honesty self only not to you self-onesty inwardly that this character that I am is going to be like this till he dies unless he changes my future is always going to be from my past if I don't change what I did yesterday I'm going to do today this is something now that's not even considered at meetings at any book study or anything else that I have been to and done but I know this stuff and I had to find this out for my life whether or not it's important to you whether or Not you want it hasn't got a damn thing to do with me whatsoever I'm not here for you I'm here for me I must be the man God says that I shall be through the application of these steps so the day that I live in I can live in this day and I can live in this day without the alcohol and I can live in this day without being all restless irritable discontent full of failure full of fears full of all the things that I'm doing that are killing me and I'm still going to do them again and it doesn't make no difference what they are this isn't about drinking this isn't about being drunk or anything like that this is always about the same thing a condition of the mind a mind that I go to and I live there I don't live in the world out there I live up here and when I live here if it's not treated I do exactly I think exactly I am exactly who I was when I got here I can't do that no more I'm not if there's no damn way I'll accept the behavior today and get it think that I have the right to do that whether it's running you off the road whether it's thinking that I don't like you or criticize you whether I do whatever I do I don' t do that I don''t want to pay that price I don'T want to be that far away from God and from this life I don ''t want too I know what it's like I'm not talking about any of you I'm talking about me that's why I came here I make mistakes I don´t walk on water either I have the disease of alcoholism I'm liable to run a little too fast today I'm able to say something too quick today I'm liable to do exactly what I used to do today and I know that but the idea behind this now is that I don't have to live like that I don' t have to continue on doing that I used start something and I couldn't stop it I used get into an argument and I'd have to take it the whole way and I didn't give a damn how bad I hurt you or how bad i got hurt I still did it I would ruin relationships with loved ones whether it was my wife friend, girlfriend anything didn't make no difference and I still don't know what's wrong and yet though it's telling me what's wrong it's showing me what to do you see before I used to go to meetings and I better look at the time I get all wrapped up here I'm coming down the wire again I used to go to meetings all the time and I would sit there and I I would think thoughts of all types and I would think that this here can be done anytime at all I think that this was needed here not here, there, not here so on down the line I didn't know that I'm an alcoholic with alcoholism wherever my brain goes my disease goes that's a fact I can't use my brains in my life for my life without being treated meaning that I have to have another method I have a power greater than me and I have the directions out of the 12 steps the principles to live by and then I can live in that day according you know it's a hell of a concept to accept but believe me this I have over 39 years I'm going for 39 and a half years if I make it to December it'll be 40 but you see it don't come in time but it came a long time ago and that's why I'm still here if this was a program where I had to live like I used to be I couldn't stay here there's no way there's not way I can go out in that world out there and see the failure and possessions lost and money gone and relationships gone and all this. And then be happy, joyous and free. Baloney! Man, no, I can't do that. But I can do this and I've been doing this for a long time but it's only through the grace of God and the program of recovery. And I had to listen to... I had the time I had a search I had keep going I get smacked in the face and I have to get up and walk again and I had to keep trusting God I had to keep going to meetings like this and I'd have to hear and read this when I'm talking about this ain't my idea I don't have any ideas different than you I don' t have a method of living without the steps either I'm who I am I'm an alcoholic with alcoholism I got a brain that's damaged and I need help and this is the only way for all of these years I missed the mark for some years and I was always flip-flopping and I always looking elsewhere for things and as I had to come back to this meaning the program of recovery today's life this is tremendous this is really something I'm going to have to wind up we're all done already and I thought we'd get farther down the line than we are but it's good though it really is good if it's important to you if your life is important to me like my life is important to be then you'll know like I know that if I don't do it it just won't happen if I dont follow directions I can't have it either that's all We could close with a large prayer and maybe we could give a minute of meditation in silence and then we can close with the large prayer. Our Father who art in heaven O hallowed be thy name Thy kingdom come Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven Do us this day our daily bread and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us and make us not into temptation but deliver us from evil for thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever keep coming back thank you I'm glad you're here