The Professional Newcomer – 12 Steps and Service Workshop – Part 6 of 6 – Don P. and Jerry E – Don Pritts and Jerry E

My sponsor hit me with that, Al, at the very beginning. He says, we've been talking, because there were three of them, and we don't even think the truth is going to work for you. Because you take the truth in and your ego catches it, and by the time you use it, it's all warped. So he said, what we suggest for you is that we suggest you forget everything you think you know about anything, particularly spiritual matters. If any of it worked, you wouldn't be here. And I fought a little bit. I said, come on, I must have learned some truth somewhere along the way. He says, it's doubtful, but it is possible. He says all granted it's possible. But anything that really is truth will be truth when we're all through too. And the rest of it's all garbage. Just lay it down. And that really helped. It focused right back on us. If I'm wanting to argue with you about it, it' my opinion. The truth never has to be defended. It just is. I still like to argue there's nothing like a good game of Zorro with an intellectual idiot I heard what you said and I really like it maybe people at the level of their understanding I can put up with the one that's turmoil, angry, fearful whatever I understand I have a difficult time they know everything about everything whether it's a big book or whatever I just turned 15 years sober and I feel like I'm brand new ask 100 questions get somebody else that they know everything that's another question two years ago an old timer in Denver 33 years sober at that time came to me to go through the steps because he'd never done it and nobody else would talk to him 33 years of not doing anything about untreated alcoholism It makes you a painted ass. We went through weeks where most of the sessions we were in was me helping to unlearn him so he could get down to this. Got to the third step, had a wonderful third step experience together just prior to Christmas two years ago. Sent him home to make a list, and I haven't seen him since. called me once and said I got busy and haven't got the list done and I said one name counts as a list you know haven't seen him since sometimes you just give it your shot I'm still here let me tell you a quick one I just had I'll tell you about the good ones I won't tell you all the bad ones I was in California a week or so ago and there was a fellow that came up to me that he introduced himself like he was showing his merit badges by how many chips he picked up. You know, that he said, I'm a professional newcomer. And so I just decided to just sort of take him on just a little bit. And he was trying to get me to respond to that and add to his merit badge or something. And I said, well, let me just suggest one thing to you. Why don't you quit being a professional newcomer and become a real newcomer? And it took a while, but this guy had a cliché for everything. You know, he'd been around the program so much that his mind was just filled with meaningless platitudes and clichés for every situation. and so what I did with him was head off every one don't put that on and it took a long time to get through that riddle of stuff that was in his mind and get down to a real contact with who he was and what he was about because his mind was filled with all that stuff and I know he didn't like the conversation But he engaged in the conversation. If he had not, I'd have quit. But he engage in the conversation. And he came to a point where I knew that he had heard it and connected with me. The next morning the guy came to, not that day, but the next morning the guy came to me and said, man, you'll never know how much I appreciate that. Because what it took was to get past that litany of stuff to where he was a real human being connecting with a real program of recovery. And see, he was so caught up in that kind of mess of stuff that he couldn't even hear what was going on around him. Now, he may be like that guy who knows what will happen, but he left that day and he went out and did some stuff and he came back the next morning really pleased with what he was doing. And I think that's part of our effectiveness is how do you cut through that stuff and get down to real issues. And it does. It takes some hard-nosed confrontation sometimes, but whatever it takes, you know, it's a real deal. Let me mention just a couple of real anecdotes he reminded me of that maybe set the stage for what we'll come back to. Plus, I just wanted to share this thing about effectiveness really does have to do with where you are and how you engage it. I never did go to Russia, but I had some Russians over here one time. And I was visiting someplace and they had a contingent of Russian folks that were going around the country trying to learn stuff, I guess. And they said, would you go over and meet them? And I said, yeah, sure, I'd love to meet them. And so I went over there and they introduced me to the Russians and gave me a lot of names I couldn't pronounce. And then they said would you just speak to them a little bit? And I says, why, sure. So I proceeded to lay a real heavy sermon on them for about five minutes. And so, you know, in a conversation, you kind of pause and look for a response. And so I got to the appropriate point, and I paused, and there was two women in the front row. One of them pointed at the other one and said, psychologist. Well, okay. They didn't speak English. They had stood nodding and grinning the whole time. I just assumed that everybody in the world spoke English. They didn't know that, you know, so that was probably not effective. They knew I was a very charming, friendly fellow, but not a clue about that. And the other thing I was thinking about this business, about accepting people where they are and having meaningful kind of relationships, like your Russian buddy you were talking about with exchange about family. I was a guy, he's a researcher fellow. He's not an alcoholic, but he's a world-class, eminent researcher. And some people kind of engineered us to get together because they knew we were polar opposites on some beliefs about stuff. And we had a wonderful time in a good debate, a really good debate. And this guy really and truly, his name's Wexler, and he's an eminent researcher. And he'd done some studies about alcoholism, and he was just profoundly unimpressed with AA. And he said, I will never understand. I go into those meetings, and I listen to them, and none of it makes sense. It's disorder and chaos and junk. And so we were participating in a program, and He was lecturing about substance abuse. Jesus. I mean, it's the thought of that term just makes me want to gag. And so I listened to him patiently, and about midweek, we were going to be there a week. About midweek I said, man, I had enough of this stuff. And they had planned a big dinner. And I found a few other drunks, and I said let's go to a meeting. Man, I've got to get out of here. And so we went. Next morning, I read to the fellow, and he said, where were you last night? I was counting on continuing our discussion over at Derrick's. And let me tell you where I was. I got a few other drunks, and we loaded up in the car. We rode over to this next city. We went to the worst part of town, drove up to an old frame house that had probably been condemned in urban renewal, had a sofa sitting on the front porch, springs hanging out of it. I walked in, got a cup of coffee, and the stuff was old. It was green. And I walked into a room with a bunch of people in there fat-mouthing and talking and cussing. And we sat down around a table. The room was blue with smoke. And I sat in the middle of that, and I said, man, I am in the solution. He said, I'll never understand you people. i said that's fine but we respected each other you know it was a healthy each other it was a hell he didn't have to agree with me didn't have to agree with me but we were both people who were committed to our respect for each other and i think some of that is about this whole business of how am i going to be and it better write everybody everybody I've got a rod in a greedy I'm not good I'm going to be very effective very brief very briefly look like that one of the NSL this is an answer to your question briefly This, this, and two. Start, start, start by a mile. And you're waiting, and you're waitin' if you, if you can do that. Half ago, go, put my job, got me a new connection, connection. Three, three over, over, and so it sounds new. Way, way much. Just big silent camera. He was tellin', and he tellin' all the funny stuff, stuff for success. Sure, sure, sure. And I swear, your said, your probably got off when I wanna know. You know, it's right. You probably don't ever know a little of your drinks. It's two drinks. It's three with three with. It's a little bit of drinks. I didn't want stuff that they, you know, scripted this and scripted stuff. I mean, we're doing smart to that. And that was not enough. I wasn't smart enough to do that. Use that. And I don't want to use that rule. But that tells you one day. One day. Come do it. One day, yeah. Come be what you look. I don't know this little bit you look at around that eye on there. This on there is a bit interstitial. It's a bit into the citizenship function of it. Talk about it a little. It's fun to talk about that. That should be enough. It's about, uh, it's a big, uh... Zamp, uh. Zamp radio. And that's the Zamp 4. Zamp for about Zamp 5. Next, stay tuned. Y'all take one. Two seconds. A good have you. A good watch out. My name is Don, and I'm an alcoholic. And this here fella, Tom Ivester, an alcoholic, we're both members of Alcoholics Anonymous. In good standing today, we haven't had a drink. Fix that. of alcohol. We've never done this before. Tom and I have never done this before, so we're in for an interesting day. We hope that you will also find something useful here but we really don't much give a damn. We're in for an interesting day. Tom hit on it a little bit last night. I want to just lay a little bit of groundwork because there is a tendency in any organization and that includes this one that once you find a method or a way you lock in and everybody else is wrong And we don't mean to do that, but that's just the way the human condition presents things. At our noblest, they're not wrong, but I'll give them the right to be wrong. They're not quite right yet either. I'm probably closer to this man than I am my own brother. In so many ways it's hard to describe. We're kin. we have worked together both in AA and professionally our approaches are different but they're the same the easiest way I've been able to put it is that I came to the fellowship through the big book Tom came to the bigbook through the fellowship but it's the same thing the same place one of the concerns I personally have with me doing this over and over is that it's wonderful while I'm here and you hear what I say, but you never hear whatI say. And I come back and you tell me what I said. I didn't say that at all. So, and it's the same thing with individual sponsorship. We're all clear when we're in the room. But when one of us goes home, there's a shift on them. And that's just natural and normal and correct. One of the things that I would like to do this time, how many of you have been here in a room like this with me sitting in a chair right out of my mouth before? Haven't you heard me yet? It's like your favorite song, Don. Yeah, I know. See, I almost stopped doing these. I've been doing this for 30 years because this is what God called me to do. I have an ability to open my mouth and stuff comes out and people say, oh, that was wonderful. And I wonder, what the hell did I say? If they don't say it's wonderful, at least they stay. The only time I know it's effective, I'm being effective, there's two ways I can measure my effectiveness. Somebody gets up and leaves or somebody goes to sleep. And if I can accomplish that, we'll have a good day. But let's say it, I don't know any more than you already know. Please know that. Probably less than some of you know. I have to keep going over it and over it. And this is rigorous. I got up at 3.30 yesterday morning and got on an airplane and went through the stuff you go through now with security. I caught the fact that my ticket said I was going to Washington D.C. which is where my luggage went and that's as far as it got I managed to get here there are some rigors involved and then there's the rigorousness of sitting here I know what I have to do Tom knows what he has to do you know what you have to doing so all of this compounds and then I get tired of hearing the same thing I only have one story I have different approaches and different pieces of it he and I have been around so long there's a six hour talk in each one of us and that's just the beginning so I've been living with a sense of where I am God is for 34 years and that means every day of my life something incredible has occurred and I'm going to tell you about all of it we just don't have that much time Anyway, I was doing one of these things in New York probably seven years ago or so. And I'm a believer of being right out front. There's no levels here. We're peers. So I will tell the new person exactly the same thing I'll tell him. And if he isn't around, you're going to get it. And I was talking to one of my spiritual daughters, Ruth. I told her, I'm getting ready to quit doing this I was also just finishing up interferon treatment for hepatitis That makes you tired I just want it out I'm a private person My greatest joy is to just be by myself in my little room Looking at all the stuff I've got hanging on the wall And listening to Mozart I like it anyway I told Ruth I really am thinking you're not doing this anymore she said oh don't stop when you come we all get together and it's like having a grandpa or an uncle show up and tell us stories and that's why I'm here this weekend as long as that's all I have to do we're going to be okay in fact I catch hell, and I know you do, for not telling some of the stories. Why don't you talk about that one? Truth. I come from a family, an intact, functional family. I'm sorry, but I do. I'm the only alcoholic in it. We now have five generations in my family living on this planet. and there's no sign that my mother is giving up. She's finally gotten a cane but my sister says that isn't so much for walking it's that she's getting cranky. So be careful when she's got her cane in her hand. She has attitude. She has to wear hearing aids and if she's sick of listening to you she just turns them on. That's functional. but I never fit in that family there's always that sense of alienation I look like him but that's because the space people who dropped me off were good modelers I didn't feel like him didn't act like him Good morning, Shelly. You all know Shelly? Now you do. She's from the Old Denver Young People's Group. We were front pew sitters. Yeah. Oh yeah. Tom talked about process last night. Part of the process is becoming a member of the family. Now, I see AA as a big family But as in any family There's kissing cousins And there's immediate family And it's the same here In this spiritual family of ours Immediate family are those folks That you kind of do the same things with My brother is a professor of music At the University of Colorado and one of the foremost synthesizer musicians in the world. Just got back from Russia. They take him over there every year to teach in the summer. And I love him dearly, and I'm proud of him, and we're close. But we don't do much together. He has, in our talk when we put our lives back together when I was making amends, he pointed out that he and I do the same thing. Our goals are the same. We are trying to touch people at a depth that is so deep that when we leave, they have been changed. That's what we're supposed to do here, you know. This isn't about just chatting with each other. This is about profound changes in people's lives that are so profound they don't even know they've been struck for three or four weeks. He says he makes his music the way he makes His music, and I make mine the way I make mine. But we're both just singing our song. We're co-owners of a cabin in the high country. I never go. That isn't how I do high country that's how he does high country but one of the ways I had to make amends is that he wanted that cabin so bad he could taste it and I'm one of three of the siblings we all chipped in and got the cabin Okay, I can use it any time I want. I've got people I fish with and I've got people that I bowl with. And I need to pay close attention that I don't take my bowling partner fishing. It just doesn't work. We had Jackie and I love Epcot. We go every couple years. We're part of a group of people circulating a petition to ban children. I got your own place next door so a couple years ago we had occasion to make a big mistake and didn't know it at the time her sister and her husband and Jackie and I and some dear, dear friends from Lafayette, Louisiana and some very close friends from Houston, Texas the four of us went as couples down there you can get a villa for a thousand a week and when you split that up among four people it's nothing and we almost destroyed the friendships our rhythms are different we like one another but when I'm at Epcot I don't want to be fooling around I'm on a mission and those damn Cajuns were just way too laid back for me and I was just way too anyway you hear what I'm trying to say so our recovery process has some basis and truth in that there are different ways of doing the same thing and I must be I'm a big book person because I came to AA, they put me immediately into the big book. We did the steps and then they immediately took me out of the bigbook and put me to work. In five weeks we had completed the step work out ofthe big book I personally had a series of spiritual awakenings. Not everybody in my same group did. I caught the fever. In the sixth week they gave me the next group of people and it was my job to sit there and do the same thing that had been done with me. And that's still how I do things. but let me read a piece from this because it's kind of where I'd like to go with some of this this weekend I use this book because it's a guide these are people who did certain things made some bad mistakes and killed some folks, did some things right and other people lived just like me but in it they describe not my personality not my style but what do I look like I get a guide here for doing the work and please understand I don't think working steps is doing the work that's preparation for doing work the work here is to help others so on page 18 and I looked it up I don' t memorize this He tried to ask me if I was sure that was a page, and I'm sure because I looked at it yesterday. There's a description of when I'm through here, or if you're approaching me as a new person, this is kind of how I should look. The ex-problem drinker, that's me, who has found the solution, I have, who is properly armed with facts about himself, I am. see I can check this off before I go trying to kill you can generally win the entire confidence of another alcoholic in a few hours until such an understanding is reached little or nothing can be accomplished Tom hit on that last night the process of finally identifying I am an alcoholic I am one of these can take a day or it can take months and I have a young fellow that I'll tell you about that it took over a year before he felt this identification. So this is what I'm supposed to bring to the table. It's a man who's making an approach that has had the same difficulty, not been in the same place. My first sponsor was doing a natural life sentence for a double murder he'd committed when he was 17 years old in a jewelry store robbery. That's high drama. I'm a sneak thief. I didn't do that. There's no way I could identify with that. Don't give me a gun. I know something about guns. If I have one, and you have one I might get shot. Me? No, I'll throw up on you. I won't say that. But he described the morning that that occurred. He told me what was going on in his head and in his emotional state. He said he woke up with a feeling that nobody cared whether he lived or died. And the pain of that was so great that he started drinking to kill the pain. You can't live with that pain. Only this morning it didn't kill the painfulness. It didn't cause any pain. It intensified the pain, and there's only one honest emotional response to feeling alienated and set apart. That's outrage. my spirit knows that as good as you are and as bad as I am I'm as good as you are as bad as I am I belong here and I know that so I get outraged I create the loneliness by the way it doesn't look that way from in here but that's where and in that rage he decided to hell with it I'm going to go get mine and he went down and robbed a jewelry store and in a shootout with the police killed some people on the street 17 years old so I could identify with I've had the same difficulty the drama doesn't define the alcoholism I've met people in the penitentiary doing life sentences who were not alcoholic they're just bad behaviors I've met people who did crimes and weren't even drinking In fact, I challenge you with this I came in here thinking at one point I did what I did because I was drinking No, most of the time I was drinking so I could go do what I did In my sickness I'm a moral coward A lazy, moral coward I lived by principles all of my life and my principles were screw you that's a principle get yours first otherwise you won't get it what I did to do that of course was get yours I thought yours was mine anyway the man who is making the approach has had the same difficulty I listened closely to this man did you listen closely he kept coming back because of the spirit that was there but the movement to where he's sitting here this morning came as a result of finally understanding oh, you had the same difficulty I may be weird, but so are you thank god same difficulty and what are some of those difficulties drinking is not a difficulty for me it's a way of life something i will do it's natural from the first drink it's national what are the difficulties that we have to face How about getting out of bed in the morning? Tough one. Tough one, because the minute I come out of the dream state, which is where I'd rather spend my time because I went in there, my mind never ever stops, ever. I've got a hunch with my mind that three weeks after I'm dead, it's still going to be working. trying to figure out, uh-oh, I'm in trouble. So I wake up in the morning, and as I'm waking up, I realize I'm in trouble, I have to go to work. and I don't want to go to work because I don' t like my job it's beneath me or I don''t know how to do it or I won''t look at it any number of a hundred reasons shows up I don'T WANT TO GO and if I do go I'm going to be in trouble anyway because I'm going to be late. That damn old car of mine, I'm gonna have trouble with it and the traffic's gonna be, I'mma be late and my boss is gonna give me hell early in the morning I don't like him anyway and I know me pretty good I'm going to say something dumb and get fired so why get out of bed sounds funny but you're laughing because you've all done something else. What are some of the other difficulties? I want to be a good father. I had one. A good one. Didn't always like him. In fact, a good part of my life I didn't like him, which is kind of a shame because he was a good man. he went through changes my dad and grandpa back in the late 20's and early 30's were the head of the Colorado Ku Klux Klan so we had some kind of funky ideas in the house for a while they both had spiritual awakenings put the robes aside spent the rest of their lives undoing some of that I never took the robles off of that was part of the problem that was the separation I never took the ropes off of them after they did we do that to people so I missed a good deal but one of the things I remember about my dad mostly, was that he was there I didn't always like that but he was there I have a model of what I would like to be I would love to be there for my kids and for my family. And what's my difficulty? I'm so obsessed with me, I can't be there. Even when I'm in the room with you, I'm somewhere else. And so you, as children do, you want my attention. You become an aggravation to me. I'm busy doing something else. Sitting quietly in this chair, doing something else. That's a difficulty. How do I overcome that? Well, first I have to identify with it. And we could go on and on. The man has the same difficulty. Big difficulty that's the same. When I start drinking, I can't seem to quit. I had to work around the idea that if when you want to stop entirely, you can't. It never occurred to me to ever stop entirely. I didn't even know I was alcoholic when I got here. One of the reasons I think God put me where he did is because immediately upon entering AA, I was taken to the description of what alcoholism is because I was certified as a sociopath type 2. Bad stuff. Don't know for sure what it is, but you don't want it. A federal man said I was a psychopath and a doctor said I'm a manic-depressive drug addict. because I had learned what keeps folks back. That'll do it. You get a little cramped because there's too many people around you, throw a couple little mood swings, go back on that. You've got to get good at it. If you do it too much or too loudly, they'll put you in an institution. and if you don't do it quite enough they just invite you to the parties because you're the entertainer same difficulty I'm self-centered spending all my life in here and this is what they're talking to me about so I can identify and if I take a drink I can't not take another drink as we begin to describe that I found out why I went to the penitentiary when I was 19 years old I took a drink in Long Beach, California on a 24 hour liberty and what's described in this book as a phenomenon of craving which is just a big word for I can t quit the next drink becomes paramount to all other and what a relief that was because my sponsor helped me understand that doesn't mean you don't love your children or your family or yourself or anything it's just they are now seconds your body is craving something and your mind is craving something David Huff, God bless him fought that I went in to have a couple beers I just changed my mind and we just let him keep saying it until he finally heard what he said I changed my line my mind got changed and he got and I could begin to identify with that I'd missed some appointments because of the alcohol over a 14 year period I also used a lot of speed and acid but I'm not a drug addict So we won't go into that. I'll just look at my alcoholism. Long before any drugs entered my life, it was five years of just drinking. The main reason I started using amphetamines is because it made drinking easier and possible again. See, drinking wore out for me. Same difficulty. I want to be like him. The human condition is a wonderful thing. When you find a newfound friend or a peer You want to be just like them. What are you laughing at, Marcy? The problem is we all have clay feet. I had good sponsors. He didn't want me to be like him. He wanted to be with me. He wanted me to be like me. Anyway, we made some identification with a number of people. There were three of them that I stayed close with, and I began to recognize something even then. There's some fakes in AA. Did you know that? Yeah. There's Some People Who Sound Really, Really Good. But if you watch how they live, be wondering, this doesn't quite match up. And I bitched about that once. I come from a line of sponsorship that says if you don't like it, bitch about it. To me. So I can set you straight. He said, dummy, that was my name. Well, before I met you, I was 38, 984. That's a pretty good leap up. Dummy. He says it doesn't make the slightest bit of difference what anyone else is doing. What are you doing? That's clear. I'm bitching. Well, quit it. If I bring a new person to a meeting who's already confused and frightened and who's looking for something new and he comes from an environment where the F word is every other word and we're complaining about the state of life is the conversation piece and hate is the motivator and fear is the motivator, and if I bring them to a meeting and all you're doing is bitching and cussing complaining about everybody else, why the hell would he stay? I wouldn't. I wouldn' And I have to create that arena where that will occur only minimally. It's bound to occur. There's days when I've earned the right to bitch. In fact, I've reached an age, Tom, where I think I'm going to become cranky. And I'm not even going to have to work out. Very lonely. Yeah. I tried it for about two weeks and you're right. But he obviously knows what he's talking about. I've been continuously sober since December 26th of 1967 that statement should tell you something I know what I'm talking about when I say simply if you're an alcoholic you don't ever have to drink again I can show you a way in which you can live a life that will make sense to you without alcohol and I know what I am talking about and I hang around with guys who are 45 and Yale is 51 now. And if you want to see some examples, we know what we're talking about. I'm sure you're, what, 34? 33, yeah. Well, we count from the old down to the young people's group. We were something to be honed. About 15 of us. 15 of them. We had a meeting on Tuesday night. It was ours. You were welcome to come if you could stand the heat. You know, young people have confrontation meetings and work steps like their lives depended on it. And then Sunday night we sponsored a meeting where the whole town was there at York Street. It was a call-up speaker meeting. Nobody knew who was going to chair it until they walked in the door. And nobody knew who was going to speak until they got there. We thought that was pretty nifty, and it really was. Nobody had time to figure out what the hell they were going to talk about tonight. And the rest of the week, we went other places. We came to your meeting. We went to Greeley and Fort Collins and the north side of Denver and hospitals. We were a very busy, involved group. We met in homes back then, too. I can remember clearly we had an old dog a big old black dog and we'd meet in our home and the dog would just lay there and the minute we started the Lord's Prayer the tail would start we did things together we know what we're talking about can I meet that? yeah, I can meet that not from here but in my heart I can tell you I've been married to the same woman for 25 years. Living in the same house. I know what I'm talking about. Don't come to me with your relationship problems. I've never figured out how to have a healthy-sick relationship, so I can't do you any good. But if you want to know how to having a healthy relationship, I can show you how to be in a relationship with God and that will translate into everything. Anyway. that his whole department shouts to the new prospector he's a man of the real answers. People don't listen much to what we say. Words are good carriers, but because words in the English language words mean so much they don't mean much. So in order to overcome that that we have developed a storytelling way of presenting our message. I can show you a technique until it's running out your ears. It won't. I save that for the really sick ones that come to my house because it keeps them busy while we try to figure out how we're going to keep them alive for one more week. My deportment That means how I conduct myself If I sponsor you, you will show up at my house At six in the morning Although there's a couple of guys Since I've retired That have pushed me to seven But I like six A couple of reasons When I was working That was the only time I really had available But mainly I want you to see How a recovered alcoholic and his family He prepares for the day. It's the toughest time in any alcoholic's life. We think it's the afternoon. No, it isn't. In the afternoon, we're getting ready to drink. That's the easy time. It's this early morning stuff. And that's what was done for me. And I came out of the prison and had a little hotel room, and then I moved into a little apartment with the toilet down the hall. And then I finally got one that had the toilet in the same room again. Well, it had its own door, but it was in the safe room. And I wanted to be a family man. So I picked a man to sponsor who not only had an answer technically, he had a family. And I just got in Gary's back pocket. And watched how he did that. And he wasn't very good at it, but he was better at it than I was. At least his kids talked to him. Had a job. Let me tell you a real wisdom from a sponsor, a big book fanatic. He gave me this. He gave my two things. First of all, he said, are you tired of being arrested? And I said, yeah. He said, then quit going where there's cops. Oh. Okay. Profound. He said do you want money? I said yeah. He said, well, get a job. Then once you've got it, show up for it. Kind of regularly and on time if possible. And while you're there, you might even consider doing some work. He's a smart mouth. And at the end of a given period of time, they'll give you money. and it'll never be enough but it'll always be enough now that'd be smart if I hadn't been watching him he had a job even in the penitentiary he had another job which was liaison with the administration so we could have our meetings and he had an other job which was wandering the tears talking to noodles like me in fact that's one of the things that brought me a step further in the process. When I was locked down at night, because this is an environment where if you're not doing something, they put you back in your cage so they don't have to worry about you. And when I was in my cage, he would come by and visit with me. And I realized one day, he can't do that. Inmates are not allowed to wander the tears. You're either on your job or you're in your cave. I want what he has. He's getting out of his cell whenever he wants to. I want it. I want the one he has, and I finally got it. That was his main job, was going around talking to the people who were coming along in the process. In the school we did this, and the rest of the time it was by example. His deportment, he was clean. You've got two kinds of people in prison in terms of dress. There's the ones that just have the clothes That go to the laundry and come back And they look kind of shabby We don't have very many tailors there And then there's the players And their clothes are always needle sharp pressed Avoid them If you're not through drinking here You'll end up in a penitentiary Remember that one Stay away from tightly pressed clothes people he exhibited the same thing I'd seen in my dad he was there so I began by watching examples to understand one of the things that I must develop in me is to be there my dad gave me a little piece of wisdom It didn't come out of here, I'm sorry. It's in here, but you won't find it in these words. He said, Don, all a man needs is two things to live a good life, honor and wisdom. You need enough honor to keep every promise you ever make despite the personal consequences and enough wisdom not to make too many promises like that. It's a principle that suits me It comes right out of here If I get rid of all the self-interest And all those things that are going on in my head And I keep making promises I can't keep Because it makes you feel better You know, it's the old con game If I can get rid off all that I can just show up I don't have to go through all that stuff in my head about am I pleasing you or not I don' t much care I know I won' t do anything to displease you if I can help it but if it does displease you well okay talk to me about it then and then get the hell away from me he was always there not at my back end call but he was always there somehow he showed up just when he needed to show up and he was available that's another aspect of being there he was able folks who know me know that I'm very easy to reach if you need me there's an awful lot of people who say they can never reach me well it's because they don't need me is that esoteric Tom? So I'm watching and beginning to develop, I guess you could call them skills, to develop internal, they're not even principles. They're not intellectual things. Ways of being. If I give you my word, I will keep it. Know that. That's where I stand. don't ask me for my word unless you intend for me to keep it because I will if you don't really want it we got conflict he has no attitude of holier than thou today that concerns me I must tell you the truth lots and lots of places I go have a holier-than-thou attitude some of them come from people who use the big book and some of it comes from the action folks and someof it comes from the who cares folks. Holier than thou. My effectiveness is the fact that I know I am you and you are me. That was my big spiritual awakening. How can I be holier than you are? Sit around and listen to the war stories. And it's not the high drama stuff. It's the really chicken shit stuff like stealing a kid's piggy bank because you need a drink. and I know that and I can project that and I don't come down to your level and I won't raise you to my level when we meet where we are and that's good enough for me I expect the very best out of everybody I meet I also know that whatever you brought to the table today that's your very best I'm not going to make any judgments on that nothing whatever except a sincere desire to be helpful can I fit that or do I have an agenda if I decided you should be in your fourth step in your sixth week if I have I'm not matching this you need to tell me how to work the steps I don't need to tell you the pacing is different for everybody I need to be talk quickly about Chuck Chuck softened me I was a big book fanatic of the kind that got rigid for a while if you weren't doing it exactly this way you weren'T doing it right and oh God I cherish those days I don't want to ever return to them oh, horse's ass and God sent me Chuck five foot two mean as a snake dangerous It was so dangerous when he walked in the room, didn't even have to say anything. People just backed up. It was clear this one would eat you alive if you said the wrong thing and not even use a toothpick afterwards. Just bad to the bone. He'd been sober eight years and worked at Hazleton and drank. Had several two-year periods of sobriety and then he drank. And he was done and he was trying to drink himself to death and couldn't and that made him even madder. So they sent him over to our group. In Denver, when you got one that you just can't do anything with, send him to us. I think it's probably revenge. Anyway, Chuck got right up in my face. He'd been told to talk to me. Got right up to my face, just dared me to say anything meaningful. And he said, don't give me that big book crap. I've tried that and it didn't work. What am I going to say? He tried it. It didn't worked. And I love that because then I pray, which means I get into a state where I understand I don't know what to say to this guy. Either put some words in my mouth or get me the hell out of here. And I heard it come on. I said, well, Chuck, what do you think of God? Oh, I hate the son of a bitch. I understand that someday we each get a couple minutes with him and I can't wait for lunch. Tell him what I think of this shitty deal. And I'm going to hell with my friends. And I thought, good. He believes. We have an attitude problem. But he believes. This man was so deeply wounded. by life and by alcoholism. And by life, I mean he came up in a family. He was wounded. This was a wounded animal. And I knew that there's no way I can do anything except nurse this guy if he'll let me. And I did the only thing he needed. He needed a friend first. He needed to feel somebody on this planet cares about me even though I hate everybody. So I just had him come by my house every day and I was in a business that I traveled around town and he just rode around with me spewing hate. I don't care. That just goes right on through. There's nothing to worry about there. Almost a year before we could do anything except ride around. The change occurred in Chuck because of my wife, not me. We stopped by the house one day and she'd made chocolate chip cookies. And she gave us each one. They're really good, by the way. And Chuck ate his and said, that was good. Which to a cookie maker means, well here, have a bag. And we got back in the car and it broke my heart because he described his condition to me. He said, why would she give me a bag of cookies? I was able to say, it's because she thinks you're a member of the family, Chuck. And I watched the change take place. Then we could get into clearing her way. There's no fees to pay. I'm going to challenge you on that one. I'm sorry. I go to a lot of meetings where right in the middle of somebody's talk, which is very rude, somebody starts passing a basket with no explanation whatsoever. And I got into a new guy's head one day watching that happen. I thought, wait a minute now. I'm new here. I'm still shaking. I've got 57 cents in my pocket. some other idiot has told me make 90 meetings in 90 days that's a setup I'm sorry, I don't believe in that you should make