Fifth Step and Financial Amends – And Joe H. – Prescott Big Book Study – Part 4 of 8 – Mark H.

and they sat down with me, and I saw some amends that I have not been aware of, some financial stuff. And I went home and talked to my wife, and we decided to sell the house, beautiful house, and move into a trailer and pay off those financial amends. And he said he was more free than he'd ever been in 26 years, and I thought, wow. the courage for somebody with that much time to do something that drastic, to get free. So of course, being an alcoholic and wanting to follow in their footsteps, I called Paul Martin. I said, I'm coming to Chicago. He said, bring an inventory. They do something similar to what Paul and I were talking about yesterday where you do resentment, you do fear, you do relationships and then there's about 12 other entrees. There's about12 other entries. That's a good, entrees. Chew on. Something to chew on. He gave me a little something to chew on and it summed up the whole inventory and it was the seven deadly sins plus a couple more like self-pity and a couple other ones. I wrote this inventory. I went to visit my family in Battle Creek, Michigan and drove to Chicago on a Thursday. He said, come on Thursday. Don't make any plans until Monday. I said, great. I arrived in Chicago on Thursday they took me to their home group, nice group. There was another man there whose story was in the first edition. Paul was there. He had probably 48 years at the time. He's now like 58 years sober, and they do a step a week. They talked about the 10th step. They took me back to a hotel, and as I was leaving from the car, Paul hands me a mimeograph sheet, and it says Friday, 9 o'clock Sam, 1 o' clock Charlie, 4 o'lock Harry. Saturday, Sunday, nine o'clock, one o' clock, four o' o'clock. Sunday, Nine O'Clock, One O' Clock, Four O'clock. They're going to send nine idiots by my room to hear my fist step. I got up to the room. My ego was already, even before the first one, my ego was just screaming and this same thought came, hey, if this is the way it's going to be, surrender, give in to the experience, have them take the phone off and take the television and make it a three-day retreat. I had done a few retreats by then. And so what I did was, with no telephone, with no television, I did an hour meditation before and after each one. And three days later, I'd done 18 one-hour meditations and nine fifth steps. And it was like one of those movies where they're interviewing babysitters and it changes the face and then another one and another one. There were guys from six months to 50 years. and every one of those experiences were different. What they would do is they would read their inventory these guys keep inventory just for people that come from out of town to stay current he would read his inventory and ask for feedback and then I would read mine and he would give me some feedback I think Saturday after the sixth one my inside I just wanted to start screaming I just want to do something and I sat and I broke through another wall and then three more came the next day. Now, I don't know if I would do that again with nine people or go to Chicago but since then I have seen that more than one fifth step with more than one person does take out any resistance in steps six and seven. I think you can usually tell if you've learned enough of humility, honesty and openness that we find it necessary when you face the sixth and seventh step questions. You will also take out resistance to making amends. Yeah, yeah. I've done fifth steps on a mountaintop with Don Coyus. I've been in the ghetto in squalid conditions, just as powerful. I've gone fifth steps with women, mine. it's an experience not to be missed because maybe for the first time you can have a similar experience like they describe here. But maybe you'll also have an experience where maybe forthe first time in your life there's actually two people in the room. Not like it always been because I don't know about you, but for me it was always me and whoever I wanted you to be. The day of my first fifth step with Don. Of course, and it was with this book. That's why this is kind of special for me today. I had my fifth step, this pile. My first inventory was big. I also completely understand a lot of the ideas about getting somebody through the first eight steps quickly, right away. They need some power. Mine was just a little different. I think I was five months in inventory. I heard a guy the other day, he said he was two months and two hours in inventory, two months putting it off and two years writing it. I understood that. This last one, I wrote, well, I'll get to that later. But that first inventory was pretty big, and it took three days. And you know what Don did with me the first night? I read all day, probably six, seven hours at his house, and I had that experience where it was me and Don. Then he said he was going to speak across town in Denver. And two or three hundred people at a meeting in Denver is a pretty big speaker meeting. And we're walking in, and as we walk into this church with two or 300 people, he said, oh, I forgot to tell you. I'm now leery whenever I hear that from my sponsor. Oh, I forget to tell ya. He said, you're speaking first. Halfway through my first inventory, my first fifth step. And my mind said, there is absolutely no way I can do that. He said, good, every time you do something you know you can't, God will show up. Next time you're asked to do something your head tells you you can'T do it, do it. You'll find out God's there. God's in the risk. God's risking it. And I got up and I didn't know until two days later when I read those promises that he just went over, I experienced the fifth step promises standing in front of those people. I was able to look them in the eye. There was peace. Went home. It was a powerful experience. I have fist-stepped with groups, small group. I just fist-estepped with five people this last inventory in the same room. These men that I meet with every Monday night, I read to them. It's a powerful experience. I remember one of the most powerful... And if you've never listened to a fist-step, don't miss that. You know, not only does the book say that I should feel honored, you actually can. And how long has it been being so wrapped up in self that you felt honored by anything anybody wanted to trust you with? How long has there been since anybody's trusted you with something? And for people to come by my house and want to lay that whole thing out? So my first one, it was pretty big, took three days. and I know he had said that I should write down anything I was going to take to the grave and I hid it on a little piece of paper inside here in this leather cover and you know what by the time I was done reading the three parts of that inventory resentment, fear and sex it was silly not to read that to him it was just a stupid thing I'd woken up in an apartment in New Orleans one morning with a strange individual prancing around the room that I didn't want to know what went on and I was ashamed and of course he had some that were even worse right and you'll probably never be surprised but sometimes you might be we know a guy in Denver who heard a fist step of a guy on the witness protection program in our NAA and the guy went out after the fist step put a contract on the guy that heard his fist step put a contact on him put a new contract on his life because he's heard about some stuff he shouldn't have heard about I know that probably one of the only things in Alcoholics Anonymous I've never violated that I've always held close to my heart is the confidence of a fifth step I've made a lot of mistakes but I have never revealed anything specifically about somebody else's by name I remember one time where I had heard a guy's resentment and fear inventory and the next day he was going to come over to read his sex inventory and he paused before we started and he said, there's something I need to tell you. I knew exactly what he was gonna say. He said, I'm gay. I said, great, read your inventory. He said but I've never had sex with a... I said I'm sorry, I didn't hear you. He said I've ever had sex with an animal or a... I said so you've never had sex With an animal? He said no, no,no,no. I've Never Had Sex. man was 35 years old he started I said well what did you write he said I've written about all these relationships that I've had in my head my whole life I said Well, I've had a few of those two. Why don't you read what you wrote and about 20 minutes into it in a moment of silence. He looked at me and I looked at him and we knew we were exactly the same that selfishness dishonesty resentment self-seeking and fear took me to doing all kinds of stuff, and that same stuff took him to doing nothing. But in the middle of that, we were both the same. That area of his life changed, came alive. I've had times where the inventory is so clear, the fifth step seems silly. I have had times where the inventory is not that clear, and the fifth is really powerful. I had times when both were powerful. But I think the main thing that I always needed to experience is that you and I aren't any different, and there's really no separation between us. This last one, I had read to Mark. I had red to two people in New York, and then we went to do a retreat. And on Sunday morning, Mark's kind of like saying, you know, what should we do this morning? I said, well, why don't you do a guided meditation on everything up to the fourth step, through the fourth step. And then I'll just read a couple pages from this inventory that I've just read for several days to several people. My mind said it'll be no big deal. So he did one of these great guided meditations on the first four steps and then I said I'd like to share a couple pieces of inventory from this current inventory. And I read one. It was just like I could have been reading the newspaper. I read another one, and I'm kind of looking down like this, and then my mind goes, there's 80 people in the room. And I looked up, and I had an experience like I was reading a fifth step to like 80 people. People on the front said that my whole face changed when it was done, and I was like bright. They could feel this. And when it was done – I only read like three or four pieces of inventory. When it was done, I felt this warmth. It was a very powerful experience. But I think you have to be willing to risk making a fool of yourself, laying out the truth, being a human. And at some point, you have come to love that part of yourself that will always be human. I've had a teacher about 10 years ago who lived with Thomas Merton for many years. His name is Dr. Jim Finley. And he used to talk to me about compassion. And especially when I came back from India because I'd been like studying with a human being that knows a lot about compassion. And he would always ask me, what do you think about compassion now? And it was always a definition based on how I might feel towards someone. You know, you view a beggar. You view a suffering person. And He would kind of always shake His head and then, you know, I would be left with considering it. And he said, you know, maybe you're starting to experience some true compassion for yourself, a loving acceptance of yourself, and maybe you'll stop perpetuating violence on yourself by always trying to change that part of your being which will always be a human. And when he says that in Los Angeles with all these people who are always into the latest thing that always with this desperate anxiety filled drive to be changing is lack of compassion and it's violence. It's perpetuating violence on yourself by always trying to change that part of yourself which is broken or human. And I came to, and I think the fifth step experience is both listening and reading one have been a big part of finding some compassion for myself. You know, I had a harder time the first time somebody mentioned making amends to myself than I did with any amends that I've ever made as far as really internal resistance. Lack of intimacy with myself has been as harmful as lack of intimacy with others or lack of privacy with God. so I read this inventory I've either learned enough of humility and honesty that I find it necessary and I come to these questions and I think wow you know asking am I willing asking one of the first six step questions and you know I think between page 75 and 76 they make a major jump you know how kind of like everything up to this chapter is you can't trust your own mind, your problems of your own making, selfishness, dishonesty, resentment. And I think after a fifth step from those promises, I think that they really mean it when they say you may have had certain spiritual beliefs, but now you've begun to have a spiritual experience. Because I think by the bottom of that page where you do returning home, remember, returning home is part of the fifth step, not the sixth step. You return home, you find a place where you can be quiet, you review the first five proposals, you look at the cement, the stones. But I think when you turn that page, literally, and in the process itself, you'll notice on page 76 they now start to ask you to trust, to trust this experience, this God, this whatever you want to call it, because they start to say things like, if you can answer to your own satisfaction. That's a trustful statement. Have I answered to my own satisfaction the questions from returning home? If the answer is no, do returning home again. Maybe you have to do it two or three times. I did returning home after each fifth step this time. When I got through that last one, there was no resistance, and I had answered to my own satisfaction those returning home questions. Then we look at step six. We've emphasized willingness as being indispensable, and after being around for a while, my ego says, well, that's kind of for the new people, isn't it? Willingness, I'm way beyond willing. I'm a big-time believer, and I don't really see the significance of that question. Is willingness important at this point? Is it indispensable? So then I ask the next question because I've skimmed over that first one. Am I now ready to let God remove from me all the things I have admitted are objectionable? Yes. Can he now take them all, every one? Can he? Yes. And I was always told to add one there from the ABCs. Will he? Oh, I don't know. I don't know if he will. Oh, that's why willingness is indispensable. I'm willing to believe that he will then a stupid statement which was the first one willingness is indispensible becomes very relevant when I'm asked the right question. Not am I ready to let it all go? Not can he take it all each and every one but will he for me as I am with mud on my face? You know it's hard to save your ass when you're trying to save your face. It just depends on how much face you got left to save. Yes, I believe he will. And there's another one you could add there. Am I willing to let go of my ideas of what I think that might look like? Where that it might involve going? You know, there was a part of me that would have just loved to stay in Denver when I was five years sober. I was happy. I did not choose to leave Denver. My sponsor's down the street, I'm working with people, I'm serving on the state committee, and I went out to California to make amends. And I'm literally moved there because I said I would follow through on an amends and ended up there for a totally another reason. Again, I could have stayed in Santa Monica a lot more time after 10 years in Santa Monica. It would have killed me because of what I was doing with the stuff you told me I should be doing, I ran it into the ground. So do I know what that might look like? What God might have for me? Then it asks you to trust again when ready. It doesn't say don't trust your mind. Don't trust your intuition. Don'T trust God. It says are you ready? We say something like this and after I bet everyone in this room who's done at least one inventory and one fifth step absolutely knows in their heart why that seven-step prayer says the good and the bad. Because if you started with a list, I love these sponsors that have you make a list of assets and liabilities, and by the time you're done with an inventory, you don't know the difference because some of the stuff you thought was really good was killing you, and some of this stuff was really bad saved your ass. I do that mentally. I've never done it on paper, but I should one time. At the beginning of the work, make a lista of the things you think is really good and really bad, and at the end of a fifth step, they've almost reversed. Stuff that I thought was bad because it's uncomfortable, because it'S painful, has brought me back to God one more time. And stuff I thought was really good because it was comfortable and safe is the stuff that was killing me. So I know now why they say the good and the bad, all of me. Take it all, you know? I also have to say to you that if you've been around for a while and your prayer life has not evolved and you're saying the same prayers, although there might be a few you still love. If your prayer life hasn't involved and you are saying the old prayers that you've been saying all these years, you might want to ask yourself, am I stuck? Has there been evolution to my prayer life? And I'll give you an example. There came a time for me not too long ago where the seven-step prayer, the way it's written in here, was unacceptable to my spirit. And that is telling God when. It seemed to me the seven-step prayer had a little too many nows, you know? But we said something like this. It doesn't say we said each of these words. Something like this, I remember the first time Don Coria said to me, write your own third-step Prayer. Ooh, that was a threat. That was a thread. But there came a time when saying, my creator, I am now willing that you should have all of me, good and bad. I pray that you now... See, I'm telling him that I'm ready now and that he should be ready now. God ain't coming to believe in me. He already does. My willingness becomes a lot less important the longer I'm sober because you know what? He is willing. That you remove every single defective character. I used to read that when they would do it at the end of a meeting? Defective characters. Please remove all these defective characters, which stand in the way of my usefulness, which is really what I want to do. And to you and to my fellows, grant me strength as I go out from here to do your bidding. I just couldn't tell God when anymore. And I have a seven-step that comes from my heart. That's when your prayer life will start to evolve, when your prayers... I bet a lot of people in this room have had times where the prayer begins without you thinking that you're going to pray now. Spontaneous prayer that arises from your spirit. That's what I rely on because there's going to be a moment when I'm not going to play and I'm going to drink. And maybe that spontaneous prayer will stop and remind me. I used to think prayers were for God. My God, how arrogant. That my prayers actually did something for God prayers is to just quiet your own mind and remember where it's coming from God doesn't sit up there well Mark said 20 prayers today but he only said 10 yesterday so I'm going to screw his life up when he only says 10 and give him stuff really good when he says 20 no, no, I couldn't believe in that anymore prayers are for us God doesn'T need any prayers especially when you find that it's an energy that's within each of us and it's just aligning yourself with that energy and that's part of what prayer does. And now we need more action. I've always said there's an experience at each step. There's even miracles at some steps, but you want to know the real miracle of each step when you're in the action of the next. You want to Know When You've Done Six and Seven when you don't have any reservations that you're going to work on or fix any of these defects. I love these kind of sponsors too. After my fifth step, my sponsor gave me a list of my defects in the order that I was going to work on them in. I think six and seven are about God. I hope they are. I pray, that's the prayer. I hope six and eight are about me. Six and seven or in your hands. And you know when you're done with six and Seven? When you're making a list of people you've harmed. That's the miracle of six and seven. When you do an eight like the miracle of step three, when you got a pen, you're writing your inventory. That's the miracle of the first three steps. And I make this list. We were told to put them on cards but I think one of the big mistakes that the group I come from and some of the people I've known, I think 1 of the biggest mistakes we've made is not spending enough time on the 2nd half of step 8 I believe the most overlooked word in the 12 steps in the short form on the wall is the last word of the 8th step and that is and it's used twice in that step made a list of all and became willing to make amends to them all my sponsor told me he got free in the eight step in the Colorado State Penitentiary before they let him out and that his freedom in step nine comes from your willingness in step eight. And I do not, I now, I don't know if it would have worked with me the first time with a big list. I had about 350 amends the first times. It's not because I'm a big time gangster. I just lived in a lot of different places and where I live I hurt people. And I never thought I would be given the power to make all those amends. And And I wish, and I do now, I do not go past step eight until I'm willing to make amends to them all. And you know what? I've never been asked to be willing to do something that I don't have to do. And I think the most overlooked word and the number one phenomenon that takes more people out of Alcoholics Anonymous than anything else is not making amends to them on. That's what such people means. Made amends to such people, that means all of them. and I get really scared sometimes when Mark and I hear sponsors who edit people's amends list. I actually heard some guys in Dallas that were told by their sponsor, don't go back to any of your ex-girlfriends. My sponsor told me those are some of the most important relationships in your life. You go back every one of them. You just be clear on your motives and let them know why you're there and that it's not to get back together. I think if one step sums up the title of this weekend, which Mark always refers to when it comes to amends, is how free do you want to be? Do a little review on some of my experiences with the fifth step. First of all, how many of you have read a fifth step to a man of the clergy? Raise your hands. So a few of you. so the rest of you who've never done that you have an opinion and experience you've never had right see the spiritual life's not a theory I've read two inventories to priests one was a priest in AA, that was different than the other one both of them were great experiences I have read Fifth Steps to women I took a woman She now has 38 years of sobriety. I took her through the steps when she was 32 years sober, and we swapped fifth steps. You want to get clear on some stuff from a different perspective? Have a woman who's in her 70s with 35 years of sobriety listen to your fifth step if you're a man. You'll get awake and do some stuff that a man would never wake your ass up to. Because the book doesn't tell me. it gives me instructions but it doesn't get specific on gender varying lengths of sobriety I've done that several times read fifth steps to a lot of people in the same I'll call it the same lineage that I have because they understand and approve what I'm driving at. My first experience with multiple fifth steps was in the early 90's and it was very profound very very profound the big book says that I take this inventory to read to person or persons and I was asked to consider doing that reading it to more than one person of course I'd never done it so I begin to voice my objections to that and that's when the man said to me what I just said he said so let me make sure I understand this you have an opinion on experience you've never had is that what I'm hearing from you? He said, more than likely, that's one of your major defects. He was right. That's a practice I have today when I dialogue with people. I'm not the least bit interested in an experience you've never had. If you've ever worked with meditation, don't try and talk to me about meditation. If you have a lot of unfinished amends, don'T talk to ME about what it's like to have none. if you have no meditation life because don't talk to me about that if you don't have much experience with inventory i'm not interested in your opinion why the spiritual life's not a theory i have to live it men and women and a who influenced me in this book were very clear this is about you pursuing a course of action having experience so that's the place that i that i came from with that when when i look back in hindsight it appears not much happened for me in the sixth and seventh step until I ran across that sacraments of penance. And the way I used that tool was, I would read an inventory, spend the hour in review, and then I would take that and I would begin to read what these defects of character were and pronounce myself guilty or not guilty. And I suspect the reason I had such a profound impact on me is, number one, I had never seen such a large assembly of defects, almost all of which I was demonstrating in my behaviors and actions. And it did several things for me, and Joe touched on some. I'll tell you one it did. It introduced me to my brokenness and how my efforts to fix myself will never work. It introduced мне to your brokenness it made you and I the same at a level I'd never experienced before it allowed me to experience forgiveness for myself that is crucial because all relationships with all people and with all things start first of all with the one I have with myself when I stop judging myself I stop judging you when I'm compassionate with myself I'm passionate with you that happened for me using that tool which is why I like to use the tool it is not in my experience to do anything with 6 and 7 other than the course of action as outlined I don't review my defects I don' t work on my defects the idea of embellishing my defect whenever I hear that, that's what I think I'm going to embellish my defect I do these exercises and then I move on now the eight step list over the years many eight step lists my memory is not as clear as it used to be on the extent of the list i can tell you who who winds up making the list virtually everybody that's on my resentment inventory then i spend some time in prayer and ask god to show me any names that were not on my inventory i always had some they always came up there are some people in my life who i harmed who i did not resent my grandmother is a classic example of that there were other amends that surfaced, bubbled up over the years. I'll give you an example. Mother Earth. I was probably 14 years sober before on the eight-step list it came up that I need to make amends to Mother Earth Mother Earth is a living breathing organism and when I looked at what I had done to this living breathing organism that sustained me because I was so asleep it sickened and appalled me And there was an amend, an ongoing amend that I had to make. And you begin to remember more. I told a friend the other day, if God had revealed to me the amends that I have made over the past 20 years, I'm sure I'd have committed suicide. It would have been beyond anything I could have comprehended at that time. So over the years, more and more and more gets revealed. I believe that there's a reason for that. So that's how I make my list. I have no judgments about what shows up in my list, nor will anybody rob me of the freedom that can come from making that amends because they haven't done much with amends, so they're going to transmit to you what they have. I could tell you story after story of that of some people I've done work with who had gotten up to a ninth step and had 60, 70, 80, 90, 100 amends and sat across from someone and they whittled it down to 10 or 15. Anytime that happens, it happens because the person sitting across from you whittLED their list down to ten or fifteen. They're robbing you. They're robbed of your freedom. They might as well give you a razor blade as they edit your amends list. See, I'm grateful for the influences I had and those influences that I had felt the word all was very significant and made us work with the word all and made me and made it start from today and go back as far as I can remember looking for any kind of harm any kind or harm put it down, free of judgment Write it down. Did this back in grade school. Did this, did this, did this. God, I remember one time Mark shared with me that he'd been through the work. It was maybe the sixth or seventh time. And he got to the eighth step and he prayed, Dear God, please show me any amends I'm not aware of. And I think it was 50 specific instances with no names came to him. And it was all about women. And he read those to a woman, and that area of his life changed. To this day, he's not gotten married again. For Mark, that's a slip. For me, it would be a progress. A lot of truth in what he just said. And when we're getting pretty close to taking a break for a session. Then when we get back, we're going to cover some of the specific instructions around amends and then we're going to share some of our own personal experiences and then some ofthe experiences of some people I've had the pleasure of working. Now, Joe had made a statement about a lot of people drinking or not staying sober because of unfinished amends. And I don't know if that's true or I don' t know if it's not true. I know that the big book tells me that if I don''t go to my utmost, I'll never get over drinking. So I strongly suspect what he said is probably very true. Very true. You can't believe some of the big books and not other parts just because some is more convenient than others. We're going to see in here under amends that, well, I' ll read it to you. You will never get over drinking until you've done your utmost to straighten out your past. Now, I don't know how you all would interpret that sentence, but I believe it speaks fairly clearly. I'll never get overdrinking until I've done my utmost, U-T-M-O-S-T, to straighten out my past. And I believe that means all of it. Take a look, all of it. And are you willing to go back and are you willing to clean that all up? Are you willing to pay all the money back? Are Are you willing to sit across from all those people, your mother and your father and anyone that you've created harm to? Brothers and sisters and ex-wives and husbands and boyfriends and girlfriends and employers, police departments. I was a Vietnam vet, Vietnamese. I'll talk about an incredible experience I had behind some of that. how do you make amends for the taking of a human life never get over drinking until you've done your utmost to straighten out the past how do You make amens for robbing people of emotional security every one of us in this room if you're an alcoholic One of the greatest ways that you harm people in your life is you've robbed them of emotional security hour after hour and day after day How do you give that back I have discovered staying clean and sober did a lot for that I get real angry at times with alcoholics and addicts in this area I told you I work in the field of chemical dependency and I work at a long-term treatment center and one of the things that we do is we ask family members to write our clients, their loved ones and these are not necessarily young people they could be we have two clients in their 60s we ask them to write letters and we want we ask then to write in those letters we would like a letter from you telling us how this person's behavior has impacted your life and we do that for a very specific reason one of them has to do with amends but the second is to wake these alcoholics and addicts out of their delusion of how they didn't really harm that many you've all heard it when it comes down to it I'm the only one that I've ever harmed wow the only ones I'm amends to is myself I wish I had brought some of those letters We started this two months ago, and they'll make you cry. It is unbelievable what we do to people. Got a 28-year-old female, and the father writes a letter. This daughter's been using drugs for seven years, and this letter will tear your heart out. this man talks about he almost lost his business he was so worried about for just heart-wrenching, gut-wretching stuff and getting those letters has just brought a whole other dimension to me in this amends I'm not the kind of guy to ask to work with and if you're going to be coming at me with unwillingness to make amends it is unbelievable what we do to people and we are asleep to what we do to people. I think there's reasons why the book says, Mark, you're here to be of maximum service to God and your fellow human beings. Give, give, give. Make those amends. Call those people when you say you're going to call them. Don't rob them of emotional security one more minute and try and help other people do the same thing. We're going take a 15-minute break. I have two things. the seven deadly sins which are mentioned in our 12 and 12 can be very beneficial at different points the seven deadliest sins which are mentioned in our 12 and 12 can be very beneficial at different points the seven deadly sins can help you with clarity in your fourth column of the inventory they can help you during six and seven when you're looking at the nature of your defects they can also help you to review again when you're filling out your eight-step cards as to how we harm people from those seven deadly sins. If nobody's ever heard them, this is what they are. Pride. Envy. Gluttony. Lust. Anger. Greed. And sloth. I was told after this last fifth step to add intolerance, sarcasm, gossip, and self-pity. There's a lot more. I also thought this was interesting. Mahatma Gandhi, one of the most influential figures in modern social and political activism, considered these traits to be the most spiritually perilous to humanity. Wealth without work, pleasure without conscience, science without humanity, knowledge without character politics without principle commerce without morality and worship without sacrifice I also wanted to read this maybe we can do a moment of silence this is the original seven step prayer as used by Dr. Bob with Clarence Snyder Dear God I'm coming to you on my knees in all humility to humbly ask you to forgive all my past wrongs and to remove all my defects of character I want to start a new life today and I ask you to help me to do so and to keep helping if I keep asking in step three I turn my will and my life over to your care thank you for taking complete control of my life and thank you for this opportunity to wipe my slate clean and start my life anew. In step four, five, and six I have completed my moral inventory and admitted to myself and to another person the exact nature of my wrongs. I now admit these wrongs to you God. I am entirely ready to ask and pray now that you please remove from me every single defect of character specifically I ask you to remove the following shortcomings listed in my four-step moral inventory. Read aloud there those defects from your list. Thank you, God, for this opportunity for a new beginning in my life and a chance to be part of the solution in life instead of the problem. Please grant me wisdom, knowledge, and strength as I go out from here to do your work and live the victorious life you have designated for me. Thank you God for the 12 steps of Alcoholics Anonymous which will make your plan for my life clear to me. Thank you and praise your name. Amen. What time is it? How about we come back at quarter to four? How about if we take a moment of silence and follow that with a serenity prayer, please? thank you join me in the serenity prayer God grant me the serentity to accept the things I cannot change the courage to change the things that I can and the wisdom to know the difference mention a couple things before we talk about the ninth step I had mentioned to you the tool that I like to use for 6 and 7. It's called the Sacraments of Penance. If you go to a Catholic church or Episcopalian church, hopefully they will have it there. Normally, you can get them to make a copy of that for you, and all it is, they call it the Sacrum of Penence. How many Catholics in here? you should have some familiarity with it because before you go do confession what they like you to do is sit down and review your sins sins means to miss the mark and the tool and format they use for that are the sacraments of penance so you sit and you look at that and then you would normally go sit across from a priest i was introduced to this initially by a, not a Roman Catholic priest, Episcopalian priest. And I was used to confession from the standpoint of the confessional and you can't see and that isn't how this guy did it. He sat across me and basically said let's rock and roll. And he had given me the sacraments of penance and he gave me two weeks to sit and look at my life and review my life and so I went in and I think it had been six years since I had done that. That, by the way, is a whole other experience from a fifth step with an alcoholic, still very profound. And so I went through that with him. He was not familiar with necessarily the program of AA and he certainly wasn't familiar with amends and when I told him the amends that I'd made up to that point in time it was amazing to him. It was literally amazing. and he could not believe that we had a program which basically said, go to your brother and make peace with your brother, and that we actually did that. He said his experience is people in the religious life don't do much of that. They talk about it, they talk about forgiveness, but he said mostly they do it within themselves, but they don't go sit across from people. So he thought you and I had been given a great gift. So that's where you'll find that. If you go on the Internet, too, I'm sure you'll find some information. And remember, again, it's a tool. I was driven to that through the 11th step, which is be quick to see where religious people are right and make use of what they offer. That's the kind of guy I am. If there's a toolbox for me, if there's any tool out there that can help me in my spiritual path, I will use the tool. I don't care what donkey it comes from. I bought a lot of tools from a lot of different donkeys, and they've all been very, very helpful to me. A couple comments, and then I want to review some instructions as we go through amends, and I'm going to share some of my personal experiences with each of these amends. I want to make this statement. The first nine steps are a process we go through to then be taken to the spiritual dimension of steps 10, 11, and 12, to reside and live in that spiritual dimension. My experience is, for a long time, I was real caught up in 1 through 9 and missed the fact that those are baby steps to catapult me into the world of the Spirit. Don't let your focus and attention go on 1 through9. There are a series of steps you take to have an awakened spirit and to grow an understanding and effectiveness for the rest of your life working with the disciplines of Steps 10, 11, and 12 to take that awakened spirit out to be of service to guide your fellow human beings. Do not let your focus fall on one through nine. That's just the process. Those are just the clear-cut path that we get taken down. And so many people then miss out. This idea of how free do you want to be, in the fourth step I begin to disconnect from ego. I do the fifth step I disconnect even more and the seventh step I connect to God, and it's in the ninth step that I connect to you. If you have a lot of unfinished amends, I'll try and describe to you what it felt like to me and how I experienced myself and you as I went through amends. When I first started, having done the work in the first eight, I was at peace within myself and I could look the world in the eye, yet when I would go into my meetings with you and you could be very close to me, there was still a sense of separation between me and you. And when I went into rooms in which I didn't know people, there were still a sensation of separation and a sense of fear in every area of my life, financial, career, every area. And as I begin to go through the amends process. As I begin to pay the money back, as I begin to make amends to family and then to friends and then the business acquaintances, as i begin to follow the process as outlined in the book, that sense of separation and that fear slowly begin to leave me with every successive amend that I make. And once again when I look at that experience I think it's reminds me of what I told you in my resentment inventory. If I resent you and God is in you, I'm blocked. If i have an unfinished demand and God isn't you, there's a part of me that's not complete with God. And it seemed like every single one that I made, I began to experience a greater sense of freedom and peace within myself and with you. So how free do you want to be, I think, is very, very appropriate in the area of amends. Again, and what we want to do is review some of the instructions in the área of amens with you, and then I'm going to share some of my experiences. Again back to page 76, and we're going to start to get some very specific instructions about 10 lines up from the bottom. Of course it talks about we've made this list whom are willing to make amends. We made a list and we took inventory and then I said we pray and we add names to the list. We now subject ourselves to this self-appraisal. Here's the first instructions. We're going to go out to our fellows. Now, I sit in meetings and I hear this theory of I'm willing and I'm going to wait till they show up. I cannot reconcile that with my book. This says I need to go out to my fellows and repair the damage done in the past. That's the first instruction. Second, I'm going to attempt to sweep away debris. Remember in the fourth step, face and be rid of that which has me blocked from God? Some debris has me locked from the power and conscious contact of God in my life. I'm gonna attempt to swipe away debris which is accumulated from my effort to live my life on self-will and run the show myself. If I have not the will to do this, I ask until it comes. That's a third instruction. and now these squiggly lines again which tells me they're fairly important remember Mark you made an agreement at the beginning of this work you'd go to any links for victory over alcohol and they're going to tell me that two more times in the amends and now it starts out with the list of business acquaintances and friends that I may have hurt I had I'll just start with business I had worked for two fortune 500 companies and there were probably about five other companies that I'd worked for when I was this is I'll go but this would be some experiences off my first set of amends and I don't know about you but when I'm drinking and doing drugs I'm not giving my employer a fair day's work that's my experience so in the process of the amends what I needed to take ownership of was that I hadn't done that. That I had made an agreement with them, and the agreement was they would pay me X sum of money in return for these services, and I fell short on what I said I would deliver. I'll take a couple examples. I worked for one of the world's largest chain manufacturers in Colorado when I was up there, and my boss was in Houston, Texas. I think I saw him two times in a year. I bet you that company didn't get one month's worth of work out me. I got blessed. They had the worst snowstorm in the history. It looked like I did a lot of work. I didn't do anything, and I drove their car, and a lot dense in it, and I forged expense accounts, and they literally paid me a whole year's salary, none of which I earned. So by the time I got time to make this amendment, that man was long gone. So I was left with calling the head of personnel back in York, Pennsylvania, and I called back there. And he asked me if I would write a letter. He was a little confused at what I was trying to do. He just couldn't get a wrap around it. So I wrote him this letter. In this letter, I told him that I followed the instructions in the book, that I was in recovery from alcoholism, that I would never stay sober until I'd done my utmost to clean up the past. And in my relationship with this company, here's what I did. I took a year's salary for you and at best gave you one month. and here's what I made in that year. Here's what you paid me. I feel you got at least one month out of me, but I owe you 11 months. And during this year, here's an expense account, and here is what I estimated I turned in. Here is what estimated I really spent, and I owe to you that. And I'd like to know what form of payment and how you would like that. And I mailed that in. And I got a call back, and he and I talked about that thing. He was amazed that I was willing to do that. That was his first experience, apparently. He said to me, listen, there is absolutely no way in the world we can do that I very much appreciate what you've done with all this but he said, I did think about what you said and there is one thing that you can do and that is, I said, what's that? And he said don't ever apply for a job with us again. And that's how I made amends to employers. I didn't get thrown out of offices. Some of the larger companies, they don't know much what to do with that. But I had another man I worked with, very close, very small company. This man stood by me in times in which my drinking had gotten pretty insane and sat across from him and talked and asked what I could do to make that right and watched this man basically cry about how it broke his heart watching me destroy my myself and the pain he went through when he had to fire me and when he had to let me go you know and what could I do to make that right with him and uh he didn't and again people are so forgiving now he did not want me to pay back any money he asked that I stay sober and that I just stay in touch and let him know how I was doing he said I always felt that you could have a very successful career it would make me happy if you brought that about because He said, that's all I ever wanted to do was help you in that path. And I have done that with that man because that's what he asked me to do is set the thing right. So I went back to those businesses that I'd worked for and I cleaned that up with him. Talks about friends. Boy, I had a list of friends that I had done some things with through the process of steps four through eight, I got clear on what that looked like and I began the journey. This is where I really learned with friends initially was where I learned that I robbed these people of emotional security. And if that hadn't been explained to me, I wouldn't have caught that. I was looking at harm in the form of, I lied to get money to buy drugs to do this. I slept with your girlfriend. You know, those kinds of things. And I remember three of them in particular. See, when Joe and I kid Joe about the use of the word friends, I have maybe 10 friends and hundreds of acquaintances. And four of these friends I've known since 1959, that's a friendship. And when I made amends to these four men and when I talked about the nature of the harm, when I asked him, is there anything else that I've done to harm you? The same thing rang back from all of them which was, I didn't know where you were and you were important in my life and it worried me sick for a long time. And all of a sudden, I started to connect to something. See, I was so damn selfish, it never even occurred to me, and Joe said it well, these people loved and cared about me. And when I'm on one of my six-year runs, and oblivious to everybody, that they're literally worried sick about me and don't know where I am. They asked me in terms of amends that I just stay in touch and let them know where I'm at. They discovered over the years they needed to keep my address in pencil, though. Just before I came down here, I just got a call. A good friend of mine named Clark. I've known Clark since 1959. Just amazing to me. This is a man who saw me in my worst and people are so forgiving. he loves what's happened to me because of Alcoholics Anonymous tell you something about when you make amends to people if they didn't know about AA boy they get real interested because he knew me when and he knows me now and uh any he has nothing but glowing things to say about AlcoholicsAnonymous because see he looks at AA as a vehicle that saved the life of a man he loved. See, and that's what it is. God, that's what it means. We owe something back to that, you see? So I had a lot of those kinds of things, a lot of friends. A man named Jerry Johnson, closest friend, just basically abandoned him for years. Didn't have a clue where I am. Then when I do show up, what I'm doing is asking him for money and all those kinds OF things. You know, how you clean that up. Interesting story about that. It's funny how we're never content with who and what we are. He married his high school sweetheart, bought a home, raised three kids. He's never left humble Iowa his entire life. You know, he might have been out of the state five times, I don't know. And I've often looked at that and said, why couldn't I be like that? Some of you can relate to that, right? So I talked to him over the years, and I remember one time we were talking about this, and he looks at me, and he said, it's a funny world, Mark. He said, you lived in nine different states. You've had four different wives. He said your life seems so exciting to me it's beyond belief. So I guess he looked at the same thing. But you get to reestablish those relationships. Every so often I give him a call and ask him about he and his wife and his kids and all those kinds of things. And I have tremendous respect and admiration for men like that. Joe talks about heroes. He's a hero of mine. While I'm out there indulging in my selfish, self-centered ways, he marries this woman, and he has three kids, and he works for the same company for 30 years, and he pays his taxes, and he coaches softball, and loves his kids, and what am I doing? See, that's my hero. Guys like that. Women like that It's not these big mystical spiritual teachers It's the men and women who are slugging it out Day in and day out, right? Trudging along day to day Those are the people who get my attention You know Those are my teachers God, what great strength and courage he had See, he gave up so many things that I went after He gave all that up See, to love this woman To raise this to raise these kids, to stay in that little community, to give back to that community. You know, amazing, amazing stuff and I get to see that and I'm going to be a part of that. 1999, I went back for my 40th year reunion. See, I graduated in 64. I don't know if you've ever experienced this but I had this experience. You know you have your perception of yourself and I don' t know how mine got so twisted but it got twisted. but when I went back to this reunion, I think there were 105, 108 people that graduated. I think about 60 of us showed up, something like 20 of them had died. And I'm sitting there and I'm talking to these people and they're talking to me about how they perceived me in high school. And I remember thinking when I left that night, I don't have a clue, how did I get so distorted? in terms of how they viewed me and how I viewed myself. They talked about a man who they saw as being very gifted, a man Who had some confidence in himself, a man Whom they felt would go places in his life. And I'm thinking, what? Who are they talking about? Because all I remember is I'm like 5'6", 140 pounds. You know, I am packed full of fear all the time. Women terrified me. you know I don't have a clue I view myself as dumb and I'm thinking to myself how do we get so skewed see I looked at what they presented and I looked up and I had to drink see I had the drink God that was fabulous that experience and hooking up with those people again what an amazing deal so you get to go to all those business acquaintances you get to go to all those friends. You get to clean all that stuff up. That was an unusual event because, of course, a lot of those people understand I hadn't seen for 40 years. So they asked me to share for a while. So I got a chance to basically stand up in front of all of them and said, listen, it's been a long time since I've seen some of you. Your names never showed up in inventory. And I just went and asked if there's anyone here I've ever done any harm, I'll be waiting afterwards to clean it up I had three people come up but I gotta tell you there was one other thing there was a guy he went on to be a doctor his name was Kyle when he was in high school I had forgotten this pretty nerdy kid and he drew me aside and he gave me a hug and he had tears in his eyes and he says to me he says I gotta Tell You Something That You Did For Me he said you did it in my sophomore year of high school and actually it had to be my junior year because that's when I started drinking but the household that I was raised in my dad was a drunk so my parents would buy alcohol and we'd have parties down at the Houston house so all the rest of the kids they would come down there because they could be real and drink then they'd go back to their fake lives they had in their poems And he talked about spending the summer down there, and he talked that he had never felt so accepted and so open. And then we kept telling him he could do anything he wanted with his life, and he did. He went on to become an incredibly successful surgeon who lives in a Frank Lloyd Wright home. And he remembered that stuff. See, I needed to hear that too. I needed it here in all the years of all the stuff I had done. There were a whole bunch of lives that I was able to touch along the way. So that was a lot of the stuff that I had to do around friends. The book goes on and it talks about page 77, our real purpose is to fit ourselves to be of maximum service to God and the people about us. Middle paragraph there talks about the question how to approach the man we hated will arise. Talks about it's harder to go to an enemy than to a friend. The big book covers every kind of amends we have to make from friend to business acquaintance to an enemy, to someone we hate to the money we owe to domestic problems to crimes to people we cannot see people who passed on people who are dead there isn't a mend there isn'T a harm that I have not put out there that the book won'T give me some instructions on what to do with it and then I get some instructions at the bottom of 77 under no condition do I criticize this person or argue? Simply, I tell him I'll never get over drinking until I've done my utmost to straighten out the past. And I think that's that sentence that ties back into what Joe said. Do I believe that? Do I Believe That's True? Am I willing to go to my utmost straight now my past? I'm there to sweep off my side of the street realizing nothing worthwhile can be accomplished till I do so. Here's my experience with that sentence. Unfinished amends prevent me from being present to the moment, and the moment is the only place in which I experience conscious contact because unfinished amends pull me. They pull me back into the past, the memory of that consistently. Those of you who have made all your amends know what I'm talking about. My ability to be present to this moment, no longer caring who I'm with, where I'm at, and what I'M doing greatly increased as I was moved through the process of amends. See, there used to be a time that left with unfinished amends or unresolved work. I would be somewhere and I never wanted to be there. I always had where am I going to be Monday or Sunday? I was always obsessed with who am I, where am I at, what am I doing? No capacity to be present to the moment. A lot of that was tied to my unfinished amens, amends that I owed to people. Page 78 talks about owing money, telling them what we're trying to do. We make no bones about it. They usually know about it to arrange the best deal we can. We must lose our fear of creditors and how far we have to go for reliable to drink. So I'll talk a little bit about some of my financial amends. Biggest hit was Internal Revenue Service. I hadn't filed taxes in seven years. I discovered they really did want their money. I was terrified. I got good instruction. Instruction was, first of all, find all the paperwork and go to a CPA and have them put all it together, and we did that. Second instruction is, why don't you go talk to a tax attorney? And I did that Third instruction was, I had gotten married about six months or so before I got sober. And so now I'm married to this woman, and so my income is tied into that relationship. So the book says before I implicate another person, I have to sit down with them and talk to them. So I did all those things, and then it was time to go make amends, and I discovered their deal was simple. They wanted their money back. It took me 14 years to straighten that out. that is the longest and most intimate relationship I've ever had I can tell you that you talk about a sense of freedom when I sent them that last check oh my god and I have a CPA and I made a solemn vow to myself that I will no longer invite those people into my life and I am and I have not there was credit card debt there was family and friends I used to I'd come back and I'd steal checks out of my parents' checkbooks write checks whoa two drug dealers who along the way I developed a friendship with I did go to them these were not friendly guys in a crack house these were guys that came and broke bread with me and my family it was different then that's all I can say I got sober clean sober in 1982 it was a different thing in the 70s and they were like family and I went to them one of them wanted his money back felt that it would be helpful to my recovery that I pay him every dime the other one didn't funny story about that about probably about two years later and he sold off his franchise and