Toxic Experience of Self-Consciousness – Foundation Stone 12 Step Workshop – Part 3 of 4 – Chris F.

Hi Chris. How about we give it up for Andy and Andy's crew for putting this thing on. Oh my god. This is really something. Thank you, Andy. My name is Chris. I am an alcoholic. You know, I'm really grateful to be here. There's something going on out in this area. I've been out here a couple of times and i always enjoy it and today is just the two speakers that we you know today's starting off really good and uh and you know um i'm really really happy to be a part of this now now my uh my job today is going to be to start to talk on step four um step four Here's how I see step four today. I see Step 4 and 5 as incredibly deep today. Like when I first approached Step 4 & 5, it was about, you know, yeah, I'm mad at Harry because of this, and I'm afraid of the police. I see, you now, I look into the spiritual principles and exercises of step four today. And they hit me where I am with, you know, multiple decades of recovery. And it truly is kind of amazing. I want to tell you a little bit about my alcoholism so you know that I'm in the right room. I drank. And it was of concern to a lot of people that I was drinking around. From the get-go, I understood that I drank different than most of the people that I was hanging out with. I was always the drunkest guy. I was also the person that was in trouble. I was the person who passed out. It was a mess and I had a relationship with alcohol. the very first time I got drunk the very first time i got drunk it was me and two of my buddies and we decided we were going to cut school and we're going to go back to my house and we were going to get drunk this is going to be this is gonna be cool I'm like 13 and we do that we go back to my house I pull out a bottle of dusty bottle of four roses liquor and I pour out three water glasses a warm four roses to this day I would have a Pavlovian retching response if you put that underneath my nose because what happened next was not good but what happened was we all sat down we started drinking and and the two guys that I was with had I suppose what would be a normal reaction to alcohol I don't know anything about that but they had two-thirds of their glass and they pushed it back they had had enough now what happened to me was I finished my glass I grabbed their glasses I did as much damage to the bottle as I possibly could and I came to in a field with like six missing hours it was my first blackout I'm 13 years old I go into a blackout trunk any blackout drinkers in here yeah Lou's hands so so this recording is gonna go back to my home group so so I just I want to make the announcement that all 1,200 people here raised their hand. Now, so blackouts are disconcerting, aren't they? You know, like where was I, you know? How did I get to Pika and where's my other shoe, you know, it just, and from the get-go, that's kind of how I drank. So right out of the gate, I started to figure out I've got to learn how to manage this alcohol, right? So I'm not going to drink Four Roses anymore. I'm going to, you know, I've Got to look around. I've GOT to figure OUT HOW TO MAKE THIS WORK because not drinking was immediately out of the question for me because alcohol did something for me. Alcohol did something FOR ME. i i only realize it looking back in retrospect but but i was disconnected in a way that was very profound from you from my world from the spirit uh i i there was a disconnection there and and what happened with that disconnection is it made me it gave me a toxic experience of self-consciousness i and i i believe i believe at heart that's what alcoholism is it's a toxic experience of self-consciousness and why i think that way was i was always uncomfortable with myself in my environment from kindergarten on right i never felt connected to i was always worried like well what are they you know uh what are you gonna say you know maybe you know maybe they're gonna pick on me oh i hope they don't call me for an oral report oh the cops are behind me oh yeah i mean just everything was this this this uh experience of self-consciousness and when i picked up that bottle of four roses whiskey it was the first time i was free of that it was it was in its on now this is great this is greater my two new best friends you know this is a coolest place it's a coolest time you know we're gonna do this tomorrow you know i mean i just I felt larger than life all that self-centered fear was off me and so so giving up alcohol wasn't wasn't an option so so because because it was the the freedom from Chris potion you know so so I start moving along trying to manage alcohol I'm sure everybody in here has done it whether they've done it consciously or unconsciously we do it with pot we do with cocaine we do it by changing brands like I went from hard liquor to beer you know and I mean all the other all these machinations to be able to continue to use alcohol without going into a blackout in 60 minutes you know so so I'm moving I'm moving forward with with my life and what I see again in retrospect is the The alcohol, although it offered me temporary reprieve from the bondage of Chris, it made the bondlage of Chris worse. So what I mean by that is the toxic experience of self-consciousness in between drinks was getting worse. And so I was drinking more to escape it. And it got to the point at the end of my drinking where it wasn't working anymore. It wasn't giving me the escape that I was looking for. I used to have this beautiful, beautiful escape between drink six and drink nine. And what it would look like, it would looks like this. And alcohol stopped doing that for me. Instead, what I was turning into was a psychotic lunatic, you know, which ruins the atmosphere, you know, anywhere you are when you try to kill people and stuff, you know. They don't like it. So it got to the point where there just wasn't anything left in alcohol but now I'm so deep into it I can't separate from it. I would come to in the morning wearing the clothes that I had passed in the night before you know I'd stagger you know up to the bathroom because I got to be at work in half an hour I'd throw some water on my face do a couple vomiting calisthenics you know stagger out to my to my hundred dollar car and go off to my terrible job and the whole time you know for years I used to think that I had hangovers but looking into it more deeply what I found is I wasn't suffering from hangovers I was suffering from alcohol poison in like when you're in toxic end stage alcoholism it's not a little hangover you know you don't take a couple of aspirin and everything's good no you've compromised your biomechanics with ethyl alcohol and so I'd stagger off to work I'd drive off to work swearing to God that today is the day today's the day I'm gonna give up drinking I'm going to give it up. I mean it. Listen, I know I've said this 973 times, but there's something different about this time. I mean It this time, and if you'd put a lie detector on my wrist and ask me, Chris, are you going to Give Up Drinking today? Yes. That needle would go. This guy's telling the truth. Las Vegas would put odds on it that I'm never drinking again, but what would happen is slowly over the course of the day, I'd get rehydrated. I'd have a sandwich down. You know, terrible day at work. They were all terrible. And quitting time's coming, and I'd start to say, you know, that decision this morning about never ever drinking again, that's kind of an overreaction, I think, to this whole thing. And that decision might need to be modified a little bit. As a matter of fact, I'm going to modify it right now by going to the liquor store. Now, that's how deep I'm into alcoholism. Like, I swore I was not going to drink. That's a sane and sound decision. Knowing what I know about what alcohol does to me and the risks involved with that, not drinking is a sane ин саунд десижн. How do I become insane over the day enough to drive right to the liquor store from work and start the whole cycle over again? That's alcoholism. They describe it in the book Alcoholics Anonymous as the obsession of the mind. You know, we don't have a sufficient defense against the first drink. We are powerless. lives so i've got i've got this toxic experience of self-consciousness every single waking moment you know my thinking mind is it's not in the now it's it's rehashing you know things that had happened to me when you know those bastards you know i can't believe you know that my boss said that do you know and if i'm not caught up in all the turmoil and the resentment of the past, I'm caught up in the anxiety of the future. You know, I know what's going to happen tomorrow. I'm going to go in, and the boss is going to give me words, and I'm going to probably have to hit him. And if I hit him, I am going to lose my job, and then if I lose my jobs, I won't have any money, and I won�t have a place, my driver says, And this goes on constantly in my head. This being trapped in this experience of self-consciousness. And I'm an alcoholic, so my reaction is always going to be to find some alcohol and just to try to maybe quiet all those voices. Now, I show up sober in Alcoholics Anonymous. What had happened was it was in between Christmas and New Year's of 1989. I was living with mom because of just how amazing I could handle the world. You know, I'm 32 and back home with mom. And Christmas is happening there. So my brothers and sisters and nieces and nephews and cats, they're all coming for Christmas. And I go into a blackout drunk and threaten all their lives. Now, talk about Scrooge. I mean, I'm going to kill all of you! You know, and that's usually not the festive atmosphere people are looking for over Christmas, you know. And so they knew I would feel terrible after killing them all, but they better get out of the house. So they did. They all took their Christmas way upstate New York where I couldn't find them. and uh and i come out i come out of this blackout like and i start making phone calls where is everybody where is everybody it was not good and uh and i started and for three days i started to fish flop you know end stage alcoholism a lot of times what'll happen is you'll you'll be thrown into the delirium tremens and if you've never experienced delirium tremens you know that doesn't mean you're not an alcoholic only as only a small fraction of people do but if you don't know what they are I can describe them like this take terror take convulsions and and take hallucinations and put them all in a blender and press 10. You know that that's what that's the deliriums was so for two and a half days I fish flapped on the floor and there was there was animals running around and there were there was maggots on me and there were big things scratching on the house to come in and I was hearing marching bands you know it was it was really it was really not good I came out of that I'd had some exposure to Alcoholics Anonymous I wasn't sure a it was gonna work I didn't think it would but i had run out of plans there was just no plans left for me and i think i think each of us during these these moments of clarity i think a lot of times what will happen is is the grace of god will kind of direct us if we're open to it if we've surrendered enough and done enough the grace of god can become uh available and i believe that that's the power that got me to these aa meetings now now i start showing up in uh in aa meetings it's like you know it's like brand brand new into 1990 and i don't know i don' t know what alcoholism is i don''t i don'T know anything but i grabbed a sponsor because you were told to get a sponsor and this sponsor said Chris, I'm going to tell you one thing. I'll give you one instruction. I want to see you at a meeting every night until I tell you to stop. So I did that. I didthat for my first eight years. I mean, it wasn't like my day timer was filling up with an agenda at that point in time. So I started going to meetings. And here's what I realized, again, looking back on it. Massive amount of meeting attendance was able to keep me separated from alcohol, but it wasn't able to keeps me separated alcoholism. And thank God I was sober, right? And I'm going to all these meetings, but I'm crazy inside. I'm nuts. And I got to tell you, I had learned the technique of looking like you're not insane. We're really good at that. You know, we can clean up, you know, and show up sometimes. But so I'd be sitting in an AA meeting, you now, and it would be a discussion meeting because I went to so many discussion meetings. I'm rarely in a discussion media anymore, I'll tell you. but I went to mostly discuss, because that's where all the drama is and the crazy people and, you know. So I'm going to all these discussion meetings and I'll be sitting there in a discussion meeting and I remember this happening and I'm like, you now, I'm listening to the shares and then all of a sudden I look over and you know who is raising his hand, right? You know the guy, right, and I am like, oh no! I am saying this in my head, oh no, he has raised his hand! He has raised, oh my God, please don't call on blowhard oh no call on him oh god they called on him now i'm gonna have to sit here and listen to him talk about sadly for like five minutes oh oh oh now he's grateful oh that's wonderful oh that war is the cockles of my heart that he's grateful i think i'll go outside right now and slash all four of his tires and then I'll walk out of the meeting with him because I want to see how that gratitude holds up, you know? Oh, thank God. Thank God he's done. Thank God. He shut up. You know, now I can't let you know this kind of stuff is going through my mind. You're throwing net over me, right? So so I'm just sitting there like a good day. Thanks for sharing. Thanks for Sharon. i i i swear you if this is the kind of turmoil and insanity that's going through your head you've got a toxic you've Got a toxic case of alcoholism you know and and I believe the steps I believe The Steps are specifically designed to treat that type of crazy because because if I don't become comfortable with you and comfortable with this thing called Alcoholics Anonymous and comfortable, comfortable with spirituality and spiritual principles, I'm not going to make it, you know? So, so, so somewhere, somewhere along the line, some people gave me some big book workshop studies and, and my sponsor came up to me and he knew I had those sensitive newcomer alcoholic feelings, right? So he was always very careful with me. Chris, you know, it might be coming time, you know, when you should be thinking about doing a four-step, you knows, sometime soon. You know, that's how he'd have to handle me like that. I'd be like, what? And so it came time. It came time for me to look at it. Now, I said before that the fourth step and the fifth step, it'll hit you where you are. But it also has incredible value for wherever we are on the recovery spectrum. You know, where it hit me in the beginning was I dumped things that I never thought I would ever admit to. You know? Tallahassee 77. You know what I mean? I put it all down on there. And I put down things that, you know, patterns in my behavior, you know. And I, I put everything I possibly could on this and then I went out with my, my sponsor and, and literally he took me to a park because he liked to multitask so he could walk his dogs while he was listening to the fifth step. I do that myself today. I'm all about multitasking. Anyway. Anyway, you know, I have this thing. It was on two pieces of paper. I still have it today. The writing was so small. It would have been like negative five font. I can't even read it today with my... But there was a ton of stuff on a couple of pages. And I remember we walked in. We're walking through the park. And I'm like, And I dumped all this stuff on him, right? And he's just walking the dogs. You know, there's not a lot of reaction from him, you know? Like, that's really unusual. Do you want me to speak louder? You know? And at the end, he goes, is that it? and I go, yeah that's it and he goes, huh that's not so bad we can work with that and I was insulted you know what I mean because I have to either be the worst or I gotta be the best you can't put me in the middle somewhere and I thought he'd be horrified with this stuff and I started to hear some of his story and he was right he crashed more cars than me so so anyway um anyway that experience you know being as transparent and as authentic about my life as i could possibly be at that point in my sobriety and and sharing it with somebody was was transformative for me because i walked into the park with my head down like oh and and i walked out with my head up and it was the first time i felt like maybe i'm not such a such a pathetic scumbag you know maybe i have this illness called alcoholism and a lot of these things are our reactions from alcoholism and symptoms from alcoholism. Maybe I'm not really a bad person. And it was the first time I started to feel like that. Now, in The Fourth Step, I later learned how to actually do a fourth step instead of just dumping a whole bunch of stuff on a paper because I started listening to some really, really good workshop people. So I learned that you kind of got to use the book Alcoholics Anonymous you know instead of your own head and uh and but but listen i come from a period of time where nobody was cracking the big book nobody was taking sponsees over their house and taking them through the steps it was unheard of in 1990 they would have they would've called the cops if they heard somebody was doing that i mean it was just different so so anyway i hear these workshop tapes and, and they kind of broke it down for me. And so, so the fourth and the fifth steps that I've, that I had done from that period on were deeper and they were more, more of a profound experience. So the first thing, the first things that I did was, the first, the thing they asked me to look at is my resentment. And, and, you know, the funniest thing is I've worked with a lot of guys and they'll go, I'm not resentful at anybody. you're so resentful, you don't think you're resentful. You know? So the first thing I need to look at is who and what am I angry at, right? I mean, I've got, I am really unhappy. And at core, my life has not worked out very well. I've lost, you know, my driver's license, nine cars in drunken blackouts, a whole family. You know, I could give you the laundry list. here i am with moms with a bad job and a hundred dollar car no money and uh and that i just i just can't take full responsibility for that not in a toxic experience of self-consciousness so i'm mad at all of you because i'm not getting what i think i deserve i'm Not getting i'm NOT getting the fair breaks you know the world the world is not you know offering me what it should so i'M mad at everybody and everything. And it asked me to go really deep into this. Not only does it ask me, why am I angry? It explains to me that I can't be angry unless something I want or something I have is being harmed, threatened, or interfered with. So it asks me to look at those things. What are the things in your life that can become harm threatened or interferred with? And I look at that. And then there's a prayer and then there is a line of demarcation and it asks me to ask myself, putting out of the minds the wrongs others have done, where have I been selfish, dishonest, self-seeking and frightened? And that was mind blowing for me. There were resentments that i had that when i looked at that they were gone the resentments were gone because because honestly looking at my mistakes and my faults brought me to a realization that they they probably acted appropriately considering the circumstances you know what i mean so so so that was profound for me. The second thing it asked me to look at is my fear. I believe that if Bill was writing this particular chapter in 2023, instead of using fear, he would use anxiety because that's how fear presents in alcoholics. It's not like we're cowards. quite the opposite you know watch this you know what I mean we're not we're not cowards but there's a general level of uncomfortability you know deep within us and and the inventory asked me to look at this like why am I uncomfortable you know why do I not want to do anything I don't want to do does anybody relate to that how screwed up has your life been because you didn't do anything you didn't want to do you know like sometimes the sins of omission are worse than commission so so it asks me to look at this you know what what you know where's this fear coming from it's an evil and corroding thread the fabric of my existence is shot through with it it creates all kinds of circumstances that blows Chris spot up. That's a direct quote. So I need to look at that, and I looked at it really, really deeply, all right? Then there's, they call it the sex harms inventory, right? But really what it is, is it's a conduct inventory. How have I been conducting myself how how thusly do i comport myself and and you know what how do i treat people how do i treat the people i care about the most and there's like there's you know review the relationship nine questions uh put an ideal for my future life together all that stuff was profound for me because I'll be honest with you. If a week after I got into Alcoholics Anonymous, you came up to me and said, well, Chris, what do you think about women? I would have said, you can't trust them. They're all crazy. And I would've had this whole litany of stuff, right? I do that inventory, and I'm the one that's crazy. You know, listen, I was treated way better than I deserved 99% of the time. You know, ladies, I wasn't a restraining order guy, but I was pretty close. You know what I mean? You got the hell away from me as soon as you saw a couple of things, it was like, you know, see you later. And so, but I didn't realize any of this stuff until I got deeply into the step four. Did anybody, when you were out there, did anybody ever ask you this question? What is wrong with you? Anybody that ever heard that question, raise your hand. Let the record show 800 of the 1,200 people raised their hand. So when you would say that to me, because I heard that often, you know i'd say what's wrong with you man you know i mean i'd have to like boomerang it back on whoever was asking me because that's a difficult question you know i mean what is wrong the fourth step shows me what's wrong with me you know I was in a meeting the other night I just moved to a new location there's a small big book meeting with about 12 people right and we're going through the fourth step we're talking about the fourth step and you know i'm going on and on about you know how the fourth step has helped me and then at the end i make the mistake of saying this and if you're working with me i want you finished with your fourth step at least in the first couple months oh my god this one person's like oh it took me four years to get my brains out of hawk oh And I'm thinking, who the hell wants to walk around for four years with your brains in a pawn shop? The fourth step is what gets your brains out of hock. You know what I mean? So anyway, not that I ever judged. Far be it from me. So this fourth step, it's revelatory. You know, find yourself a sponsor with a lot of experience going through this and it'll be revelatory to you. Prior to doing, I want to talk about this for a few minutes. Prior to Doing the Fourth Step, there's the third step and the third-step prep material, right? And it's really hitting me where I currently am at a deep level now. Now, when I first went through it, it was about the prayer, you know, and about the willingness and the preparation. But I'm reading deeper into it these days. And Bill Wilson says this. He goes, we're examples of self-will run riot that we usually don't think so. Selfishness and self-centeredness is the root of our trouble. Self manifested in various ways was what had defeated us. Now, I think he was serious when he was talking about this stuff, right? And I'm thinking about this. I'm Thinking, self has defeated us. What does that mean? Aren't we self and us? I believe today we're us. And I believe self is a condition. that's what i believe i believe it's a condition because i'm slowly recovering from it you know what i mean so there's this book there's a book out there i think it's called chasing the scream and it talks uh in this book it gives an example of something that i found really fascinating and this is the example um there'sa parasite that lives in the stomach of a cat It's happier than a clam in the stomach of a cat. That's where it chills. And when it lays its eggs, the eggs get defecated out and mice eat the eggs and those eggs hatch inside mice. But the parasite doesn't want to be in the mouse. Parasite wants to bein' the cat. So all of a sudden, the mice start doin' something really unusual. they start becoming attracted to cats and they start running around where cats are and the cats kill them, eat the mice and the parasite's back where it belongs there's an outside entity that doesn't belong in the mouse that's causing it to act against its own self-interest and I see a lot of parallels to alcoholism There's something about alcohol and alcoholism that causes us to act in ways that are not in our own best interest, you know? And how do you get to all this stuff? How do you recover from self? Bill talks about it, And there's no way of entirely getting rid of self without God's help. And I believe the whole program of Alcoholics Anonymous is based on this concept, this concept of an outrageously toxic self-experience. They ask us to inventory our behavior and our thoughts And I start to see that I've misperceived everything. I've Misperceieved you. My attitude and outlook on everything is being viewed through a prism of alcoholism and self-consciousness. And that's how I see my world. and so what I'm seeing is it's not accurate yeah I'm saying what's in front of me but my relationship to it how I behave in it the value I put on things is is wrong it's it's a it's an misperception and the fourth step continues the fifth step continues to reveal more and more about this to me you know as I as I I continue my path in recovery so way back when it was I was like maybe 19 years old for a short brief period of time I started to feel like there's an answer there's a connection out there there's something that's going to give me comfort in the spiritual world and I started to read spiritual books because they would kind of make me feel comforted comforted for five minutes and uh you know i would read the carlos castaneda and alan watts and everybody was passing around these books back back in those days uh and and somebody handed me this book it was called in search of the miraculous it was uh it was by an author named pd yaspensky who worked with uh and in it, the whole book is talking about vibrations and talking about octaves and talking abut resonance and dissonance in the spiritual world. And another thing that I think the fourth and the fifth step helps me to do is it helps me by showing me closer to what actually is. It enables me to change my perspective and change my behavior, so that I can become more in harmony with my environment. I am telling you, I was in dissonance with everything and everybody when I was out there drinking. There was nothing I was harmonizing with. And today, I really truly feel that with an awakened spirit, you know, that's the brass ring. With an awakened Spirit, I'm much more in harmony with the world and the dynamics in relationships and understanding my true purpose here. And all that brings me to a profound sense of gratitude to be experiencing my life the way I'm experiencing it right here, right now with you. You know, I am basically a biological being having a spiritual experience on this planet with you right now. And the way I see this planet is, this planet has been God's playground. God built this planet and put us on it and we're on recess. You know what I mean? And listen, we're learning how to get along. Remember in second or third grade you were on recess, you had to learn how to play well with others. i'm still doing that you know i'm learning how to play well with others i'm learn i'm learning how be a good employee with an employer i'm learning how-to-be-a-good home group member with the home group i'm learning how to be a good husband in a marriage i'm learning how to be a good brother in a family and i'm still on the learning curve of all that but what's unlocked the key and let me out of of the bondage of Chris was the third step, the fourth step, and the steps that you're going to hear more about as we go on. I'm going to end in a few minutes, but I want to tell you what I'm doing now. So I retired. What happened was COVID hit, and I retired, When COVID hit and I got furloughed and the company never unfurlough me, you know, they kept saying, oh yeah, you don't, you know, we'll be, we're bringing everybody back. So, so, you know, I got on social security and all that stuff. Right. But I'm sitting around the house and, uh, I gotta tell you my favorite thing in the world to do today, you know, being spirit as spiritually sound as I am, you want to know what my favorite thing in the world to do is nothing nothing and so my wife will come in and she'll go what are you doing i'll go nothing and she goes nothing you know and she started listening all the things that i could be doing uh and one of them was get a job right so it's not like we got it we get we need the money or anything but but but this job came up right this job became up and it's like a really cool job. My career has been in the facility management business. I started out as an electrician, a drunken electrician. If I wired your house, sleep by the door is all I can tell you. I was not a good electrician you know what I mean? I was forever blowing stuff up. My hair was forever out like this because I'd electrocute myself at least once a day i would electrocute myself so my boss god damn it i told you that so so anyway i you know i went from there and i got sober and i i started getting promoted it's funny i started to get promoted because i became promotable who would have thought and uh and i ended up i ended uh the the end of my career was i was running uh i was joining the facility business for pharmaceutical research and manufacturing sites. And so huge, huge buildings, million square foot buildings with laboratories and energy centers and vivariums with primates. I mean, it's just crazy the stuff that I was in charge of. I always kept wondering when they were going to figure out, you know, they had the wrong guy. but uh but i did pretty well with that and then you know i i took it i took another job and then i got furloughed and uh so last two and a half years or two and half years ago i'm chilling i probably saw a lot of you on the zooms right i was doing like three zooms a day you know seeing everybody and it was uh it was nice uh and i was Doing a Lot of Nothing and so that became an issue and so I took a job and I found this facility management job that is so perfect for me and here's where it is it's a hospice organization now, I'm in charge of all the buildings I don't do any of the clinical you know, I don'T engage every once in a while but you know what I do every once and a while I give somebody their last meeting that's what i do uh i did that last week now we show up uh and it's easy to it's easy to spot us lung cancer kidney disease you know it's not you don't have to be a brain surgeon you know to spotus when we show up there and a lot of the people that are coming in have been sober for years but but we do damage folks we do damage and we pay for that damage sometime later. And I get to do that. And that's really, really a cool thing. I get To come out to Pennsylvania and hang with my buddies on a Saturday, you know, and I've got a terrific sense of gratitude. I love Alcoholics Anonymous. I love all of you. Thank you. Thank you, Andy.