The Second Surrender – R., Charlie P., Katie P. London PPBBS 6/26/10 Workshop – Part 2 of 3 – Chris

Raise your hand if you're not back yet. We're going to open this meeting up with a moment of silence, and then we'll do the set-aside prayer again. Let's take a little bit longer moment. Please help me set aside everything I think I know about myself, my disease, these steps, and especially you, for an open mind and a new experience with myself, my disease, these steps, and especially You. All right, we're going to start off with the seventh tradition. You know, and it's funny, I always, I can't stand it in meetings when they just fire the basket around without making the seventh step announcement because the last thing I ever want is for a new guy in his first meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous to feel uncomfortable about money or feel like he's been put on the spot for money, you know. And so our seventh tradition states that Alcoholics Anonymous is fully self-supporting, declining outside contributions. And what we're going to send around are these baskets. If you're new to AA, if you're brand new, welcome. We hope you come back and become a part of our family. If you've been around a while and you can handle a couple of bucks, it really helps the fellowship, you know, it helps us. I've got to tell you, before we get going, Katie and I were talking about it. I am greatly impressed. I couldn't believe it. They said that a group of ten people, they're saying that that primary purpose group in London has ten people. For a group that small to put an event like this on, I think is phenomenal. Thank you. We've been very fortunate enough to get to travel around and do some activities in the Fellowship of Alcoholics Anonymous. And once you've been around, you know that it's not like this everywhere. And deals like this don't just come together. There are a few people that went to a great deal of trouble to make something like this come together And if it's like the groups that I attend, there's also quite a few people that didn't do a damn thing. But we've got some ideas about how it could have been done just a little bit better. So for those, we have a position on the committee for next year. I just really – I mean, it's interesting to me, you know, and I don't know. I've never been to the London Primary Purpose Group. But, you know, if this event aroused your curiosity, maybe go check that group out. You know, it sounds like, you Know, if there's 10, they could be nice to have 20 or 30. Our primary purpose group in Austin started off with 33 and we're at about 150 to 175 now. But it's funny because studying the big book is I remember when I first told this friend of mine about what do y'all do at primary purpose groups? I said, oh, we study the big book line by line, word by word, you know, and really look. And he goes, and what do you do the next week? You know, it's like, oh well then we study the big one line by line, you know, word by word. But I mean, it is, it is unbelievable to me. This book is 500 feet deep. And the more I go into it, you know, any form of spiritual literature, whether it's Sermon on the Mount or the big book or whatever, it will meet you wherever you are. And I always see stuff, I have a sponsor that we were riding along the other day, he He goes, guy, you know, I hear you talking about seeing all this new stuff in the book. And he goes, it makes me wonder what I'm missing, you know, because he's got like six or seven years. And he goes, I know it can't be anything big. And I was like, really? All right. Get back to me on that one. We got a lot of ground to cover. And I just didn't stand up here and joke around all afternoon. But we got heavy, heavy stuff to cover, and we've done one, two, and three this morning and you know that thing about three it's funny when i talked about the big book taking a big right turn on page 60 i missed it for 17 years i talked about this a little bit last night but if i take a guy right from are you willing to believe to let's get down on our knees and do the third step prayer i can wind up working a program based on abstinence from alcohol and you know where the whole deal is about not drinking and i missed this whole piece that's not really very important except for that what katie talks about it lays out the root of our problem you know the whole basis of the rest of our work and what we're going to do it was big news to me that the problem in alcoholism wasn't alcohol somebody with a problem with alcohol can just stop drinking but a problem with alcoolism is it turns out it's all driven by this selfishness and self-centeredness, which is at the root of my problem. And it says above everything we have to be rid of this selfishess. Mark Houston used to like to look you right in the eye and he'd go, what does above everything mean to you? You know, I mean, it doesn't say above everything I've got to stop drinking vodka. Above everything I've Got to get a job and a car and a girlfriend. You know, it says above everything i got to be rid of this selfishness because it turns out that alcohol was my what i used to treat my problem alcohol was the only thing that i ever found that would treat the pain of trying to live a life based completely on self and the levels of self we were talking about thursday night at my kitchen table it's just like the guys are just going my god the level of self in us is so blinding and you know like katie was saying the reason i can't i can see self in somebody else but the reason I can't see it in me is because it's filtered through my motives which are always just wonderful I'm trying to create utopia for everybody and my delusion so when you show up with I can' t see how I'm being selfish you know how could that be selfish trying to make life wonderful for everybody you know and that's why you know so So when we roll in, and that's why that line was such a big one to me when it said the first requirement is that I be convinced that any life run on self-will can hardly be a success. You're like, what? I mean, I didn't see that line for a long time. And consequently, I'd worked a program based on not drinking. And I'd done the confessional style fourth step where it's going to make me feel better. And when I feel better, I won't have to drink. And then six and seven were just, you just kind of found those in. You know, I mean, they're just this big. It didn't touch me. And then eight and nine is so I won't feel uncomfortable out in the world and then I won'T have to drink. You hear a little selfishness in this form of the problem. I had no idea what the problem was. And, you know, the guy, I become that guy that's going, well, you Know, I left, I went to work two hours, screamed at my wife on the way out of the house and slapped a couple of the kids and kicked the dog, and I got to work an hour and a half late, and then I looked at two hours of Internet porn while I was at the office and left to work another hour early and gambled for an hour-and-a-half on the Internet. But I didn't drink today, and that makes me a winner. And you're like, no, that kind of makes you a Nimrod. But that was the deal. And so when this program becomes about reduction of self and removing what's blocking me from this power, if I believe in here that this power is my only shot, if I really believe, when I talk about step one driving everything, when we've had that step one experience, it's going to drive me through the rest of the work for at least 25 years. That's all I can testify to. It will carry you through the resto of the world. Do I really believe that taking inventory has anything to do with whether I drink or not? Do I believe that making amends, all of my amends has anything to do whether I get drunk or not. Do I think it's important to pray and meditate or do I think it's something I can do without, you know, and I can stay sober without it. I always say if you want to see what I really believe don't listen to what comes out of my mouth. Watch my feet. If you want see what i really believe watch my feet you'll see what i believe do i act like a guy that believes he's convinced that his life run on self-will can hardly be a success so what we're going to transition into now and it's funny i don't know how i miss you know when i talked about how i used to read the book and look for things that i agree with and everything else you just kind of go they just you know go right over here like this that's so what did i usedto do when i'd read that sentence that says the first requirement is I'm going to be convinced that my life run on soft will can hardly be a success. Just kind of, eh, next sentence please. You know, and then when you start really believing that, look at what it talks about that we're about to do in the fourth step. And I'm not going to let Katie and Chris do the fourth steps. I was just supposed to get up and do the seventh tradition and open us up. But look at how it works. Look at what this says. You know we talked about, you get a lot of people saying, Katie and I were doing a workshop up in New Jersey, and this woman said, Are you some of those people that believe in working through the steps really fast? I was like, No. I mean, not really fast. I mean a week, three days, a month. I don't know. It depends on time constraints. But if you look at the way the book rolls it out, I don' t see a lot of places where it talks about Stalin. and he you know and well i mean for example the book has promised me it says later on clear-cut directions are given showing how we have recovered right how did we do it and then so if it's promising me clear- cut directions look at what it says after this third step it talks about it and then it says is there any timing reference on when to do the fourth step there's two it says next we launched out on a course of vigorous action the first step of which is a personal house cleaning which many of us have never attempted though our decision was a vital and crucial step that third step decision vital and crucial it says it could have little permanent effect unless at once followed by a strenuous effort to face and be rid of the things in ourselves which have been blocking us so in my mind you can do it next or at once or anywhere in between you know and still be going by the book well what are we doing in this strenuous effort we're going to try to face and be rid of the things in ourselves which had been blocking me if you're telling me that my only solution is this power what's between me and this power i usually draw up a little pipeline up there and i got me on one end and god on the other except my pipe is full of junk it's full of resentment it's fill of fear it's filled with self it's full of guilt and remorse and what we're going to try to do in this is just remove enough of what's blocking me so that it can be some contact between me and this power you know so when we're talking about a self it says it's a fact finding a face finding fact-facing process i'm gonna let katie and them talk about that but listen to this i don't know how a dope like me could miss the self piece for so long and i used to feel really embarrassed about it till i figured out i'm not the only one that did it you know as i go around the country i've had people come to me go my god when you said the book takes the right turn on page 60 i had to go back to my room and read it last night i had never seen that and what does it say here it says but i mean what did i used to do when i would read lines like being convinced that self manifested in various ways was what had defeated me am i convinced of that am i convince that self showing up in various places what it defeated me and if i am it says we considered its common manifestations so we're back to self remember we talked about what manifestations mean the way something shows up so when you look at it like that the fourth step is a consideration of manifestations of self if you're telling me that self is the problem i don't know what that means what are you talking about how does it show up what is it you know when you say self it's kind of nebulous to me but when what isit how doesit show up and then it says resentment is the number one offender you know and that's what you see what we're looking at here are manifestations of self and we're trying to remove what's blocking me from this power i'm going to turn it over to these guys who's going first you want to roll keep going well i don't you know i mean i'm rolling but katie is so good at this stuff too i'm gonna let katie roll because we're going to try to cover four five six and seven but i just think i'm just going to say one quick thing. Is it at this treatment? Have you heard that one before, I think? We were doing a workshop. She'd pass over a little piece of paper and it goes ten minutes. And then I'd go a little further and it'd go five minutes. Then I'd keep talking and she said, I looked at her and it says, you're done. Yeah. I think, I've gone out to this treatment center a lot and a lot of times they'll go, hey man, would you come out and hear my fifth step? And I go, absolutely not. I won't come out and hear your fifth step. I'll come out and do the first five steps with you. But there's no way that I'm going to assume that you understand what the problem is in step one, that you know what we're looking for in step two, that you understanding what the deal is in Step three, that I've got to quit playing God and it's my problem itself, and if I stay close to Him and perform His work well, all that stuff that Katie was talking about. And then I've done a proper fourth step, and I know what I'm looking for on the fourth step. And then, I'm ready for a fifth step because if you just say, Yeah, I'll come out here for your fifth step, you're going to be able to walk into anything. You know, you walk into a life story. So I'm real big on the way this program flows. And the more time I spend in this book and I spend working with guys, the more I really like to look at the flow of this program. And it seems to be step one is almost like this ski jump and then just kind of vroom from there. Once I understand the real problem and the depth of the problem, that's going to catapult me into the rest of the work. And so that's where we're at here in this fourth step. And then, but I think if I don't understand what that real problem is and it's, you know, there's a treatment center that we work with and, you Know, it's real important that the guys do the first five steps before they get out of there. But I can't tell you how many times I've seen guys that are grinding away on a fourth step and they don't have a clue what the deal is in step three. And they don't even really understand what the problem is in step one, you know. But they know they're supposed to be writing this inventory. And so I think this stuff, when you're working with a new person, is real important to lay out to them. Katie, do you want to go next? Yeah, but I'm going to just take a little walk because I want Chris to step up here too. Okay. First of all, I've got to tell you guys something so funny. The whole self piece, right? now that we even have even more heightened awareness, you know, if I tell you to go out and see how many white cars are outside the predominant color of a car is white. Did you guys know that? Just FYI. So all of a sudden you start looking around and you go, my god there are white cars everywhere Well the white cars have always been there but you just have heightened awareness and that's usually what happens after these workshops. You're going to have heightened awareness of self I have to tell the sandwich Okay, I'm standing there in somebody's seat. Now, I kind of at one moment know I'm in somebody'S seat, but I'm talking to two guys intently about the work, right? And this gal comes up and she sets a sandwich down and she looks at both the guys, I observe that, and sets the sandwich down and I have finished my sandwich and so we're all talking, talking, and I really wanted to get another sandwich and I saw that sandwich sitting there and I looked and I said, did she bring that breather, you too? And they go, no. And I thought, oh, she brought it for me. And so I started to eat the sandwich. She walks up and she goes, are you eating my sandwich? It never occurred to me that that was her sandwich, that that wasn't even her chair. Do you see that? Well, if it isn't for you two, it's clearly for me and oh my God, when she said, are you eat my sandwich i mean all of a sudden you just go oh my god it never even occurred to me that that would have been your chair and your sandwich it's unbelievable thank god she was so kind um so uh okay i just want to say that the fourth step oh my gosh you guys page 64 is so powerful. It is so powerful in everything it's going to tell us about this fourth step. You know, you can get down to, this one statement this guy once said, you're picking the black out of the pepper. We didn't really like that statement when he said it to us but I'm going to say it to y'all. Is that this page is so power packed full of study information clear cut direction all of that stuff, but don't get too crazy to where you're picking the black out of the pepper. But the bottom line here is there are several things it says. Charlie just talked about the inventory process is about a fact-finding, fact-facing mission. That is the searching and fearless, fact finding, searching, fact facing, fearless. Because what we're getting ready to do is we're getting ready uncover some bad, bad, trash about us. Yes? This is not about feeling good. This is a life or death errand. This is damn serious business. This is no about me getting in there and going, well I know you didn't mean to hurt their feelings. The truth is we're getting ready to uncover some ugly behaviors, some ugly belief systems, some old ideas. You can call them what you want. The book says old ideas, prejudice, belief systems whatever you want but that's what we're getting ready to get down to and it says that this is what has been blocking us and i use the same terminology as charlie and the truth is is is um i mean you could even really kind of get gross here and talk about uh colon blockage right that's a problem right constipation serious problem as a matter of fact they can kill you can't if that toxin backs up that stuff is toxic that's the exact same thing that resentment that'sthe same thingthat's blocking us it's toxic it's so toxic that if you've been sober a while you'll actually kill yourself because your pride won't let you drink that's some bad blockage man you know what i'm saying and so that's what we're talking about here and so what is that the colon honey no we're back to the pipeline it's gonna spare me and but you know when i'm talking about so what we got to do is we got to get you unblocked man because if you couldn't hear God if he were sitting there with a bullhorn you know people are like well I mean I don't understand this about God and I don'T understand this about god and if you're trying to understand it you're not going to you're blocked from it now you may have moments of clarity we all know what those look like right where you have that moment of clarity but we're talking about unblocking so that you get into these promises well here's the other parts that they're so incredible it says this was the four step of business which takes no regular inventory right there telling you you don't get take one inventory the word regular and one are very different yes so you're going to be taking some inventories and if we're talking about the new guy which is kind of what this whole thing's geared to we're going gonna take the new guy for me this is what i do with you you you're doing an inventory within a two-week period i'll tell you you got one week so i'll sit you down and i do steps one two and three takes about an hour and a half, right? So I do steps one, two, and three with you. If a new guy is 24 hours sober or 48 hours sober, I don't say, well, let's hook up next week. Man, what a bullet to their head. What a self-centered statement that is. You know what? I'm so busy. I'm going to, you know, baloney. You better be with that person within a 24-hour period. Man they have just asked you for help, my responsibility in Alcoholics Anonymous is to make that time for you or find somebody that can if I can't. And so I've got, I've set you down, I do steps one, two, and three with you, right? Then I line you out on the fourth step and I give you one week and I only give you a little bit of time to kind of work you into my schedule, right, because I know we're going to sit down, it's going to be about a four-hour deal and I can just lob out four hours tomorrow. So I give you one week, but it's not going to take you the full week, right? And the truth is, it's probably going to end up taking you three hours and you're going to do those three hours the night before we have to meet. Correct? And so I give you that one week and I say when I'm doing steps one, two, and three with you lining out on the fourth step, I go, okay, we're goingto meet Saturday at noon. There's no backing out. You back out, you will get a ration of shit from me if you back out. If I put my world on hold to meet with you, you don't get to lob out, oh my kids had a soccer game I had to go to or anything like that and I let them know that ahead of time and so we're going to sit down for a long talk right? And another thing I've got to walk away from this for a sec The best way to get a four step This is a colon A lot of colon You've got a spiral notebook, right? You just open that notebook up, and you put a line here and a line here. Got it? And so that you've got four columns. That's all you need is four quick columns. The idea is to not do a lot of writing. So then you flip the page, and we have two more blank pages in a line to line, right? And then you just do like mom, skip a line. Dad, skip a line because it says you're making a list, and a list is always written down. A list is not written across. And so then you write your list of three things, and what are those three things? People. We're not going to now. People. And principles. There you go. So you write them all down, right? You know, CPS, IRS, men make too much money, women don't make enough If you want me to, I'll write some stuff up there. Okay, honey. You can be my banner. Okay. And so that's how you're doing it, right? An inventory does not take that long. These people are like, well, I'm still working on my four-step. I go, baloney. You're not working on your four-stepped. you're not doing crap right you obviously are not driven by that first step or you'd be writing that thing and getting it done are you with me on that i mean we're not asking we're not asking for war and peace here we're just asking for you to write the darn deal now it says in here under uh mr brown listen to the three things that mr brown had going on it was his attention to his wife how many of you guys are gonna upset pretty badly oh you, if any of you girls are hitting on my husband, it's going to be a problem. Right? Okay. That is not true. Okay. Told my wife of my mistress, oh my God, would you be upset if somebody went and did that? Yeah. And then Mr. Brown wants his job. The best AAT shirt I've ever seen, is that Mr. Brown needs his ass kicked. Is that the best? But, I mean, and he got 19 words. I don't need you up there, honey, I'm sorry after all that, but she looked very cute. I know a woman could have done that job, but we needed a man. So, now, you know, I plan. Please hear that I am playing. I do have a lot of challenges behind all that stuff, but I am playing. So 19 words is what he got. See? Now when we sit down for the long talk, these things are going to trigger plenty for us to talk about. But we're just talking bullet points is what we need here. Then the fourth column now you get into, and I don't want to spend a lot time on the four step because we've got to do four through seven. But I'm just going to kind of give it to you quickly. the new guy really struggles I think everybody struggles with this but especially the new guy with what this terminology self-esteem security ambition pride personal relationships I mean did you guys wonder that it was like well yeah I guess that affected my self-esteem made me unhappy I mean I really didn't get that and really it's pretty simple you know your self- esteem is how you see yourself And so we kind of need to know how that affected you. How did you see yourself in this circumstance? Your pride, how did you think others saw you? Your security, what you want, your ambition, what you need, right? Or vice versa. Personal relationships, I love that one. That is belief systems. You know, men shouldn't, women should, children should always. You know the government should. All of this stuff and so that we're getting down to what are the causes and conditions. What is it that I believe that's got me so upset with my mother's behavior or my father's behavior? And the fourth column, which is the magic column, has got to make columns number two and three a lie. You've got to see a hypocrite, which is really what you're going to always see in the fourth column. How many of you guys held your parents absolutely accountable for certain parental behaviors they should have done because they're always the first two on your inventory, right? Mom and dad, immediately. However, if you sat your children down and they put you on there, you'd go, what the hell? What the hell, man? I did the best I could. Oh, but not my parents. See, it's all hypocritical. That's what we're looking for. We're just looking for the hypocrite that you better not treat me that way. Now, I can treat you this way, but you better don't. You better not take me that away. so it's such a devil standard call the word whatever you want and uh so the the fifth step is where we we bust through this deal and uh and i once again too i don't want to take up too much time uh in in talking about this but you know when you're sitting down with a fear inventory too a fear inventories pretty doggone simple you're just looking for the um self-reliance failure The failure of self-reliance, right? And so the fear inventory is you write down the fear and why you had it. Isn't that it? You know why? Because everything's pretty much out of our control. Wouldn't you agree? Absolutely. You could lose your job next week. You know, why? Your company could go under. You got any control over that? Absolutely not. No, I don't. So, I mean, you know, we're talking about fear. So Charlie calls it a hula hoop, a sphere. Anything outside of here is out of my control. You're just letting that take off down the road. And some people spend a lot more time in fear. I'm kind of like Chris. He doesn't spend a whole lot of time in the second step. I don't spend allot of time and fear. What am I going to convince you not to be afraid? How well does that ever work for you? Yeah, because I'm usually delusional. And then the sex inventory, this gentleman and I were having this conversation when I ate that girl's sandwich about the sex inventory and the sex inventory and the harms to others, right? The book can get a little wordy here and I love Mark's take on it and it's my take too. I get somebody to write a sex inventory, however the book calls it a harms list also, right and so the truth of the matter is if you're working with me you're going to do a resentment inventory, a fear inventory and a sex inventory and then when you do an eighth step you're going to do a harms list, right? You're going to make a men's list in the eighth step. Some people do it in the fourth step but I just think before you know what the new guy's head is going to blow off. Man, he's just trying to absorb what he can and I don't like to overwhelm him. I really believe it's such a responsibility on my part to just kind of come on, come on walk through the door come on come on you can do it you can do it and then they get through the door you know and then they start seeing things and it clears away but i just don't want to overwhelm them and uh so that's what i do so the um uh page 75 well wait a second wait a minute before we go there i want to say one other thing about um on page 64 this is a common thing i see happen and that is where it says that a business which takes no regular inventory usually goes broke blah blah blah it is an effort to discover the truth about the stock in trade yes we use an example of if you have a stereo store and you still have a track tapes on your shelf you know even though you love 8-track tapes do we really think they're coming back okay that we need to move them on right we need to just move this stuff on and it says one object is to disclose damage or unsaleable goods those eight tracks would be unsaleables goods but it says to get rid of them promptly and without regret now this is what i think happens in an inventory you are pretty self-righteous in your resentment wouldn't you agree i have been done wrong you know this is how i have done wrong so you are completely self- righteous well when you get to that fourth column it is very easy to turn into self-pity oh my god i can't believe i've done it that way now that you show it to me that way that's god i'm looking bad i am really looking bad do you see that self-pitty did most of y'all experience that yeah so and that line right there says get rid of them promptly and without regret you've just switched one one level of self to another level itself you just went from self-righteous to self- pity we don't want you to be full of self-pity because you're of no use to anybody you're still in self and so it says it there and it also says it over here on page 75 in the promises second paragraph down and then i'm going to wrap it up because i'm gonna let you guys jump into six and seven says we pocketed our pride and go to it illumining it illuminating every twist of character every dark cranny of the past once we have taken this step withholding nothing we are delighted see so if you have self-pitie you're not going to be delighted right so it's telling you right there be very careful of that self-trap that you step right out of self-righteous right into self-pity and it's still about you are you with me on that and so whenever i'm working with the guy man i am beating that into him hey hey yo yo yo back it up i'm seeing you looking at that as self-pitty we are going to uncover discover and take it to god in that hour in that sixth step right that hour in the fifth step and then into the sixth step which by the way I like the terminology I'm very much about semantics because I believe we need to keep this program whole for in 50 years and in a hundred years are you with me on that one say yes so if we start muddying the waters with what step says what in a 100 years this deal will be gone and so the fifth steps is about talking to another person about it following through on that fourth column and taking an hour then we go to six and seven so most people said well i did my fifth step and went home to do six and seven you're still completing the hour in the fifth step yes i think it's very important because we got to think about this in years to come and so that's those are really my uh my biggest deals and this is the one that where it begin it says in one of the promises that we may have had certain spiritual beliefs but we're going to have a spiritual experience that's the first part of the book that says that and i will caution you to tell the new guy let me tell you buddy your window's about this big right now you're you're on you're cresting on a wave because of these promises and these promises are great right we will be delighted we'll be able to look the world in the eye we'll get perfect peace we'll start to have a spiritual experience and then what happens they fizzle out man they don't do they don' t do eight nine they're they're on such a high they're like going my god i did my fifth step man i'm feeling great done my six and seven and then they just stop and that window closes and they're back pissed off at everybody again you know what they want to do another inventory now whose responsibility was that it was i think it's a sponsor's responsibility damn sure is you know they go well i hadn't heard from them. Oh, oh, oh. So your phone doesn't call out? Oh yeah, man. I mean, I'm tough. I'm tough in that area. I am like, whoa, yo, Terry, it has been three days. What the hell? Where are we on that inventory? You are going to tell me you are still writing a letter? Bull. And I always take them back to step one. Either you got it or you don't. And I swear my sponsees always tell me, thank you Katie. Now come on guys, how hard is it for you to see my personality? People do not come to me because I'm touchy feely. They come to be because they know I'm going to be the one calling them going, I love you so much I will ride your ass. Right? I left my son in jail i asked the judge to keep him in jail for 14 days and that judge looked at me and goes 14 days was like absolutely i'm not taking that boy home i am so pissed and when i left out of there i mean i fell apart because that's called the tough love is not for you the tough love is because it's hard on me to be that hard see we don't like taking these arrows it hurts but I care enough to be the one to say okay God you picked me I'll come do it okay that's what I'm going to end on Chris Kramer of Covered Alcoholic if if anybody is doing the work this is the place that you're going to crap out you know as a newcomer Nine times out of ten, we see these guys come through treatment. We see these guy go through our AA meetings. This is the place that they're going to stall like a big dog between the third and the fourth step. It's like one of the problems that we see is that we've compartmentalized the steps. We've divided them all up. And, of course, we reinforce it. The steps were put in order for a reason. But Bill Wilson exactly has been already pointed out, not to repeat, is that they give us little instructions after each step telling us to get on down with this thing and finish it. After the third step prayer, it says we launched out on a course. Obvious what they want us to do. So who gives us the right to sit on our butts for six months? I'm sitting in a meeting not long ago in San Antonio and this lady says, I don't know why you guys get in such an urgent rush about this. I was two years before I could even begin to do a fourth step. Wow, again, but this is somebody sharing an opinion with us. The little newcomer goes, phew, I'm with her, you know. Except, again because this lady may or may not even be one of us. maybe she could wait two years to do that. But most of this stuff, guys, when I take the alcohol and the dope away from me, the one thing that made me okay inside, I'm going to start coming out like Yopala. It's like the spiritual malady comes back when I stop drinking and all that internal discomfort is kicking buttons. So if I don't do something to change that, I am in trouble. I want to mention one thing real quick in the third step. There is a little line down at the bottom that says that God is going to remove our difficulties so that what? So that we can bear witness to god's power to those that we would help thy love that you're with us you'll remember the line so that's what that's about basically that third step obligates us to go back into meetings and share hope with a newcomer you follow buddy your life may become an un by god ravel you know how it gets in sobriety sometimes you know but you've got one responsibility to go back in that meeting and tell them give that newcomer some hope you follow i just just visited with a guy about this. And it's like, yes, but we have problems. You're telling us that we're supposed to lie and not tell that newcomer that we're in a bad spot? Pretty much is what I'm saying. Pretty much. Yeah. You've got a sponsor. You got some close confidants, some friends. Talk about your stuff. You follow? But in the meeting, we're suppose to be there to pull the newcomer. Get little guy in the back fixing to commit suicide, right? And didn't know if he wants to stay or not. He's going to sit here and listen to you complain about your day. You all follow? I'm going to go ahead and say it because I didn't get to say it last night. Primary purpose says that we have one primary purpose. I know a lot of y'all disagree because you've had plenty of opportunities. I've done it, go into a meeting, dump, puke all over the table, let everybody in the room clean it up. Oh, let's just all hug. I feel so much better. How cool? You with us? But the little alcoholic or dope fiend sitting in the back didn't get the hope that he needed to stay in the fellowship. Y'all understand where I'm at with that? I'm not saying you don't need somebody to talk to. That's what good sponsorship is about. But we've turned this into a problem-solving thing in our meetings. And again, Charlie said it last night, we should set aside one night a week. Ah, no shit. We'll set aside three nights a week that you can come and whine about your day. Three nights a weak, you can talk about it. But the other four nights, we're going to talk about the power, the solution. How's that sound? Yeah. This afternoon, we get a chance to talk, and my big promotion is to change some formats because the newcomer is going to share the way he's been instructed to share. And if it's in a meeting when everybody's puking, he's going to puke. Make sense? The meeting should be there for him to pupe. Anyway, bottom line, because she covered it so great, what we're trying to do in this four-step business, guys, is keep our ego right size. We were talking about it. And I don't know if some of y'all are real – you see the little plus and minus that I wrote? You get a little guy coming into the meetings and he's all full of himself and he's loud and obnoxious and F this and F that. And this guy says, Boy, this is an arrogant little pissant over here. Obviously, he's full of himself. You follow? And then over at the table sitting all by herself is this lady and she's all sitting beside it and she sniffs in the whole meeting because she's crying and she didn't want... Can I help? No, no, I'm okay. And she's just pushing everybody away. You with us? It's all the same thing. It's this ego piece. And the reason I'm saying it because I know this one. And underneath this is a big V tattooed. I'm the victim from hell, y'all understand? And I learned it a long, long time ago, and it works well. This little guy can use his little brashness to keep people at bay, and you can also use the victim stuff to keep them at bay. And I've done it all. You know, I mean, you wouldn't want to go to a bed with a guy with an eye patch. I mean. If you play it right, guys, and you say it with enough sadness, there will be... Well, of course I would. She probably won't be the most attractive one in the room, but you'll still get... We manipulate the world with this stuff, guys. And that's what Harry Teabelt wrote in the 30s. He talked about this resurgence of the ego. This is why we work and rework the 12 steps so that we can keep this ego right size. You'll follow? How many of you guys have watched people with some sobriety under their belt get so full of themselves they just drank over it, you know? They just exploded. It's like, what happened? Their ego got away from them. You'll following? They started thinking they were something because they had some sobrietty under their belt. Oh my gosh. Again, I talked about it last night. I don't want to be worse than you and I don' t want to be better than you. I just want to be like you. I just want to be a brother. That's all I want to be. We were laughing before about people that put us on the pedestal. It's a little unnerving to sign a book or get your picture taken. All of a sudden you think you're a rock star, but when people begin to start thinking that, oh my God, I'm the first to shoot a hole in that because you need to hear me because there's no such thing. Y'all understand that? We're all bozos on this bus. Next week y'all can get up and give a talk. You follow? Don't put me on a pedestal because I can assure you I'll let you down in the long run. It's human condition. And that's what the fourth step does for me. I sit down with this thing, and I write this four-step. The thing I'm going to ask the newcomer to do, just exactly what Katie said. We're going to set an appointment to do a fifth step. Immediately it's going to be a week out, and then we're goingto give you a week to do this work. Treatment centers have killed us with making this into a big, long deal. Y'all know why treatment centers want you to take so long to do it? Do a four-stepped? Because rock on. Come on, brother. Why do I want youto take two days when I can have you do it three weeks and charge you for it? I'm not knocking that. I have more power to you. But what we're trying to do is get down to causes and conditions. This is a fact-finding mission. What I want you to do is get done with the main stuff that's choking you. I don't want you just keep splitting hairs. I get quiet with God, and I say, God, show me the people, institutions, and principles I'm pissed at. You with me? All of a sudden, the names start coming, and then the names stop coming. A couple of days, I'm looking at it, 30, you know, a day or so, and the names stopped coming, and it's like, okay, that's time to start going. Let's go to second step, third column, fourth column, fifth. Let's finish this business. I'm working on my four step No what You're putting names on the list That you haven't thought of in 30 years Are you This is not therapy We're not looking for deep seated This stuff is the stuff that we're laying awake at night Choking about I'd rather see We're taking an inventory I don't take inventory of stuff I've already thrown away Six months ago I'm taking inventory of the stuff That's rotten in the freezer today That's what I'm looking at People get, oh, you should see the room change when I did that. I worked for six months on my four-step. I can't believe the pain of having to listen to that. I understand that. The relief you got was not because you had 400 names on the inventory. The relief your got is because you finished it. You all understand what I'm saying? I don't care. I hear people talk. They call us little autotrons around the steps. And they think, well, this has got to be this way, this way. I've got to tell you this, folks, because I had lots of talks with Mark about this. I don't care how you work the steps. You're not relapsing because you didn't do an extended third column or, you know, an elongated eighth. You're relapsed because you did not do the step period. You'll follow? I did not doing my fourth step right. I just do not think unless you left a bunch of stuff out that you were conscious of, I do not thing that you can screw this up. The book gives you some pretty simple, you now, directions on what to do. But a counselor at the place where I worked for years, he was one of those big deals. If you don't have at least 600 names on your inventory, you're not doing a thorough four-step. Again, it's somebody's opinion. I didn't know 600 people on earth. I mean, I didn'—what? You're pissed off at every person you came in contact with? Come on, guys. Significant others are going to be on there. Your family is going to beat on there, your employer is going to be there, the government is going to be out there, you know what that is? The cops maybe, whatever, some institutions. Let's move on with this. I want you to get the big stuff out and let's go. I'm going to do the little inventories, the four columns. I'm gonna do a little two column, exactly like Katie said, fear inventory. Sex inventory is real simple. It's got nothing to do with sex. It's gotta do with my behavior towards the opposite sex. If you were doing an inventory out of the book, asking the specific questions of what they're asking you to answer in the book or in the sex inventory, I could sit down and hear your fifth step and never blush. And you could do it and never flush because we're not talking about pokey pokey. We're talking about how do I treat the opposite sex. That's exactly what this book is. Y'all follow? Buddy, I tell you, guys that come to me says, oh goody, now we get to do the sex inventory. I say, buddy, yeah, and guess who you're going to do it with? When the fifth step comes around, you're gonna do that piece with my wife. Kind of changed the complexion of the room real quick. You know? Because when you start thinking about how you treated your sisters in this, it'll take your breath away. Truly. We get to look at that behavior. Yes, your name goes on the inventory. The book says sometimes it was remorse and then we were sore at ourselves. I hear people all the time, don't put your name on the inventories. The Book is telling you to put your name on the inventories. A lot of the resentments that I had were against myself for the crap that I pulled. I wasn't hating this my landlady. I was hating myself for screwing this landlade. And I just got to look at my business on that. Y'all with us on that? Oh Lord, It's okay. It's remorse, and we were sore at ourselves. It's very top of the page. But I tell you, it's a great place to look at this. Great place to Look at This. What we end up with is a completed inventory, and I get with my sponsor. We sit down with a fifth step, and then the sponsor, and I'll say this real quick, is the guy that speeds this up or slows it down. You follow? Guys, I've got to tell you. There's so much misinformation out there about this fifth step. Some of you guys did these 10-hour fifth steps. Just put your hand on your head like this and go, no, no for just a few minutes. And then I'll be finished, okay? Oh my God. Page 62, we've hit it to death. Selfish and self-centeredness is the root of the problem. And now we're going to sit there for 10 hours and talk about me for 10 horas. It's like, come on guys, let's go. Let's get it done. It's going to be very fast. Once you find your truth in the fourth column, I'm going to go next. No, I don't want to hear the details. I don' t want to here all this stuff. You all with us on this? It's not important. As long as you see your truth in the fourth column, my part. Where have I been selfish? Where have i've been fearful? Where have been dishonest? You with us? Those are the areas I'm looking at. And once I can see that, next. And I'm not going to treat the major crime any different than the little petty argument you had with your wife. Next. Next. Next. And before you know it, what happens, just like with Mark, we were laughing our butts off. That's how you know you're in a healthy fifth step. If you're shrouded in a blanket and you all lit some candles and there's lots of tears, you are not in a healthy fifth step. A seance perhaps. No, because this is why everybody misunderstands what this is about. Oh my gosh it was the most traumatic thing I did. Why? Looking at your truth? Y'all understand we're not going to swim in it I just want you to see your truth so we can move on and not do it again. How cool is this? Come on guys we just moved through it real quick we get to the other side we get to hug necks and we get to move on. You with us? It says an hour later we're going to go back through the first proposals exactly what Katie said, an hour later we're gonna do six and seven. Real quick guys, when I'm sitting there doing a fifth step with a guy, I got a piece of paper in front of me and I divide it in two in a little piece of paper and I put eight step on one side and I puts six step on the other side. You with this? And as this guy's giving me his fifth step because that's what the book says while we do this fifth step, I'm pulling some character defects. I'm hearing this guy got his arrogance, jealousy. Anytime you're judging somebody, you're being selfish. Do y'all agree? I think I know what that person is doing. And so selfishness is always down there, fearfulness. And I'm making a list of the six-step character defects I'm also making a lista of people that I think perhaps maybe he owes amends to. It's not something we're going to discuss now, but I'm helping him with this eight-step list. He says while we did our fifth step we get this list. You follow? So after this is over, we're ready to go. He's going to go home for an hour. He's gonna sit quiet with God, go through the first proposals, make sure that he hadn't left off anything. You know, like how many times have we done a fist and the guy calls back up and says, listen about that chicken, you know? And it was, oh, okay. Cause he wasn't going to say anything. And now he's finally, okay, that's fine. And that's what that was about. And then we go to God in six and on the seventh step. You with us again? I hear people, they do these weekend workshops on six and seven Jesus book. The book is two paragraphs. I don't know. I'm going to ask God to remove the character defects that stand in the way of you and me and my usefulness to you and God and my fellows and others, the character defect. And I think I know what I want God to move, and God may not remove that. You with us? Guys, I've said it from a gazillion podiums. I've asked God to make me a very quiet, sensitive young man because I had a counselor one time that could just sit and was very nice, and he never raised his voice, and hmm, oh, hmm, he hmmmed a lot. and I remember him. But it was kind of a nice deal and he never took any errors and he just, hmm, nice, hmm. That's what I'd like to be like that guy. You with me? It just never has happened. You follow? Some people need hugging. That's the beauty of this program is that some of you guys get to work with people and you're as kind and gentle as you can possibly be and God's going to use that in you. And sometimes you just need to be roughed up a bit and God is going to used me to do that and that's just how that works. But God's changed me a lot, guys, in the last ten years. I can tell you, character defects, He continues to work on that. I hear people in meetings all the time. And listen, if you're saying this in a meeting, I'm going to ask you to do one thing, please. Don't say it anymore. Because you sound so stupid when you say it. Don't stay there. Say it. I don't want to do six and seven because if I give God all my character defects I don' t know who I'll be. Don' t say that. Don' T say that just say I pass just say I pass let me be the first to tell you what you will be better some of you are griding your teeth because you're saying it in meetings today come on guys it just absolutely takes the breath away y'all understand this good God katie said it last night and referred to it this four-step business fifth step business this is not about confession folks i think there's a wonderful piece of this that letting another man into your life or another woman into your wife and sharing some some truth about yourself there's there's There's a piece of that that's very, very uplifting and very very healing in lots of ways when we find out we're not alone. But guys, if this was just about confession with me, then I mean the churches would have a lot more sober people out there because the churches have been doing confession for years and it's not changed us one of the big movements in texas uh for a long time was don't do fifth steps with people in the in meetings do fifth sets with priests or people that can't tell anybody i remember a guy in a meeting one time he says i went to a to the bus station and got up found a bum and did my fifth step with him because i knew i'd never see him again well i bet he found a lot of truth out in that fifth step talking to this bum you with us if it was just about confession i suppose that would have sufficed but that's not what this is about you with us i need a sponsor to help me see my truth in that fourth column because exactly what they were saying earlier sometimes i can't see my stuff you with this well i don't know what i've done wrong here and a sponsor can show you an outside entity unaffected by what's going on can clearly point out in the fourth column what your part was does that that make sense and we just get a chance to do it i think somebody in the program that's why i disagree with doing fifth steps in treatment I think fifth step should be done with the sponsor in the fellowship. We don't need to be doing AA's work for them. Thank you very much. It doesn't do any good for me to be down and hunt Texas and do a fifth step with somebody that's going back to Ontario. Why? I may never see them again. I know them better than their own family knows them because of the fifth step, but I can't see them. You with us? And they come into the meeting, hair standing straight out, eyes look like zombies, you know, and it's like, oh my shit, what's wrong? But I'm not there. I'm in Texas. You all understand that? And I think it means something important to be across from somebody. What takes place after that, I don't know about you guys, I didn't see any wild sparks when I did a fifth step. But I'll tell you what did happen to me after I finished it. I left my sponsor's house and for the first time felt a part of Alcoholics Anonymous. I felt like I was not on the sidelines talking about something but that I'd actually done something I knew a lot more about myself and an hour later I had a clear idea of the character defects but the coolness of it was I got to be a part of this I thought she was talking to me I didn't hear anything I know I know Again, the biggest mistake we make is we try to make this thing too complicated, and the truth of the matter is you can't screw it up. Six months from now, some other stuff starts to percolate up. Sit down with a piece of paper, jot it down. I go through a fourth and fifth step a year so I can keep current. I also do 10-step stuff, but I stay really current on fourth and sixth step, and it's pretty cool. I usually sit down with one of the guys I'm sponsoring. He does a little fifth step with me, and I do a little sixth step with him, and we get to know each other a little bit better, and we just move on down the road, which is called staying current in the work. And I guarantee it will crack you like an egg if you do that. No cool? Why don't we do that, and then we'll go smoke real quick and come back and do this. We're just kind of scatter shooting here a little bit, and you can tell we're not working off of a format or note card and stuff. So I'd like to go back through and hit on some of the points that we were talking about. But, you know, it's funny. Chris talked about some ofthe stuff that you hear in the meetings, And, you know, one of the things that I'm always looking at, if I'm doing meeting-based sobriety, there's things that I'm going to hear in the fellowship of AA. I don't know, maybe they don't say this up here, but one ofthe things that drives me crazy is when I hear people in their rooms go, well, youknow, this is a selfish program. You know, have you heard that? I mean, is that, yeah. And,you know, ifI'm the new guy and I hear that three or four times in an AA meeting, what am I going to think? I'm going to think it's AA, you know, because I heard it in an AA meeting and they said, you don't want the selfish program. And if it's a selfish program, I can't find that anywhere in the book. I can' t find it anywhere in a book where it says this is a selfish program. So that's where I think we run into trouble. You know, it's all about reduction of self. It's like take away my difficulties. Why? So I can chill and watch a hockey game? It's not like that. It's kind of like, no, I see a change that I usually see at a football game. I would never watch a hockey game. But, I mean, I don't get it. You know, I just, I do not know. I would have to be sponsored through a hockey game, you know. But it does not say take away my difficulties so I will feel better. It says so that victory over them can help other people who have had the same difficulty, you know. And when it talks about, you now, removing my, all that stuff is about so I can be of service and be of services. and be of service even when it's making me feel better it's so i can be of service so that's why we get nervous when when you if the problem is self if my real problem is based in self and and you know i got self on me so much you know the problem with being when we talk about being blind to self when you get a guy like me to try to look for self it's like trying to ask a fish to search for water I can't see self because it's on me, you know, like that monster in Aliens. You know, I mean, one of my favorite examples is one time I walked into the A.A. Club and there was a guy sitting in the card room, and I swear to God I'll never forget. He goes, hey, Charlie, how you doing? I go, hi, it's good, man, how are you doing ? He goes , we need to go back to Vegas sometime. And I go , yeah, yeah, right, yeah we do, man. right on and i walked out of the room and i go i got zero recollection of ever being in vegas with this guy you know and i'm then we're talking about like 15 years sober and it took me a while to figure it out and the reason that i didn't remember being in Vegas with this guy is because I wasn't in Vegas with this guy. I was in Vegas with me. And this guy and this guy just happened to be there. You know? But I'm like, where are you Steve? You know, and that's the way my whole life is. We could talk up here for hours about how self-centered I am, but you know, the new guy a lot of times can't hear it, but my God I call it the second surrender in Alcoholics Anonymous. The first surrender is the surrender to drugs and alcohol, and that one's usually pretty easy because it comes fresh off an ass-whipping. You know, it's real easy to surrender when I've been beat down. But this surrender to self a lot of times doesn't come for a while until I've tried to do this deal sober for a While and I'm hitting the wall with self-will. And if I'm lucky, I got somebody in my life going, you're running up against manifestations of self that's what blew up that marriage that's why you're overdrawn at the bank that's What Blew Up That Business You Know And Because Otherwise I'll Back Off And Then I'll Take Another Run At It With Self-Will And I'll Hit The Wall Again A Couple Of Years Later And Then That Sort Of Thing So When We Hear A Guy Saying I Want To Put Myself On My Inventory It Makes Me A Little Nervous Sometimes Because If It Is A Disease Based In Self Who's The First One I'm Going To Want To put on my resentment list me and what happens when we get to the ninth step, the amends list. Who's the first one I want to make amends to? How about me? You know? I mean, maybe a new Cadillac would make me feel better, but you know, so I'm always like, we're going to get to that one a little bit later. But the thing I wanted to come back is that in the inventory, one of the things that I missed for a long time was I understood, we talk a lot about the mechanics of how to do an inventory, but some of the real power in these in the inventory process lies in these prayers that are scattered throughout the inventory process. And I've never, there's one in particular that I've never seen one four-step guide that addresses. And it's the resentment prayer at the bottom of page 66. And, it talks about when we're between the third column, and it's no coincidence that it's between the third column and the fourth column because in the first column, I'm talking about who hurt me. In the second column, I'm talking about what they did, and in the third column I'm talking about how it affected me. Now, I've been doing that on barstools for a long time, talking about who I'm pissed at, what they dead, and how it effected me. But if we're going to roll into...what we're gonna do now is gonna...I've got to recenter my spirit, and I've gotta change it. Well, I love the way Katie usually says, it says in the book, we were prepared to look at the list from an entirely different angle. And she's only one I ever heard that will sit the guy down and go, are you ready to look at this from an entirely different angle? You know, because am I or am I not? Because I know this angle, right? I've been looking at this angle for a while. But now all of a sudden we get to this prayer and it says, we realize that the people who wronged us were perhaps spiritually sick. Though we didn't like their symptoms, which is column two, and the way they disturbed me, which is column 3. They, like me, were sick too. And you know, you hear a lot about praying for the person you resent. It's not what it says in the book. It says it back in one of the stories. But what it say here is I'm asking God to help me show them the same tolerance, pity, and patience that I would cheerfully grant a sick friend. And pity, if you look up in an old dictionary, doesn't mean this condescending bless his little heart type of thing it it means compassion and empathy you know so i need a lot of slack when i screw up but when i grew up it's all run through my motives and my delusion i knew what i was trying to do i wasn't trying to hurt anything i was just trying to you know you know but when you screw up it is outrageous right are you with me on that you know because you know we'll we'll you know we'll give no quarter on that you know but so now it's going am I willing to give them the same kind of slack that I want when I screw up you know and it's saying ask God to give me that same tolerance pity and patience and I'm going to tell that story about Roy. I was sponsoring a guy that had a resentment against his father. His mother was crazy and they had a lot of problems with his mother And one day, Roy's dad came home, and Roy was sitting on the front porch. And there were two other brothers, and he goes, your mom killed herself today. And he walked on into the house. And Roy was so pissed off about how could his dad be that heartless? I mean, how could he just dump that on him like that and walk on into a house? And we're doing a four-star. He's told me I can tell this story. and there's some powerful stuff in these prayers I'm doing an inventory with him and we get to this fourth column and I go Roy you know when it talks about being inconsiderate for me the reason I say inconsidered is because I never considered it I was like did you ever consider that your dad was like a 40 year old man at this time His wife has been putting him through hell. She's been in and out of mental institutions. She's talking about hurting herself for a long time. And on this day, his wife had committed suicide. He comes home now. He's got a wife who just committed suicide and he's got to plan a funeral. He's gotta tell the family. He's gonna tell everybody about it and he got to figure out how he's gonna work a job and raise three kids by himself. And is it possible that on that day, given his tools and his background and what he had to deal with, Is it possible that he was doing the best he could? And Roy goes, never occurred to me for a second. I never gave one thought to what my dad was going through that day. All of my childhood memories are of me. That's when we talk about being selfish and self-centered. And when he sat there and looked at it that way, I said, are you willing to grant your dad the same patience and tolerance that you would grant yourself if you were going through this? Is it possible he was doing the best he could? And I watched as a result of this prayer, a 42-year-old resentment melt away that day. When Katie talks about the fourth column turning the second column into a lie, it is magic stuff. I mean, this is stuff that has been driving me for my whole life. And all of a sudden, if I have good sponsorship through this fourth column, not some bum that speaks a foreign language at the bus stop, If I've got somebody pointing out this stuff to me, my God, the magic that can happen in this stuff as a result of these prayers. So when I do the fourth column, in between the third column and the fourth volume, I've Got a Little Place for a Checkmark for this guy to put down, Did you do that prayer at the bottom of page 66? Are you willing to look at your ex-wife with the same tolerance you would grant her if she had some sort of brain damage? If somebody says F you to me and they've got Tourette's Syndrome, you go, oh well, bless his heart. You know, stuff just blurts out of them. But, boy, you let it, you know, the circumstances, am I willing to grant this person that tolerance? And before, and the other thing I wanted to talk about is in the fear inventory. If we're looking at manifestations of self, how does self block me? How does self show up for me? I love the thing, and Katie talked about it, in this fear thing is this fear of control. The reason when we get to look at this, and all I like to point out, I don't do a big four or five-column inventory with a guy in a fear list. It talks about we listed our fears, and we asked ourselves why we had them. The main bulk of the – because sometimes I see people doing these 900-page fear inventories, and I think the illusion or the delusion is that we can gather enough information about our fears that one day we'll be able to manage them, right? If my life is based on self, can I get enough information about these fears and get enough knowledge and analysis that I can handle this fear? That's not what the book is going to imply. What the book istelling me is that in me trying to manage him, I got no shot. So the main thing he needs to see in that fear inventory is that he's got them and that it's the failure of self-reliance, right, because if I'm relying on me to control everything there's this little sphere of control that i have these are the little things that i can control in my life what kind of sandwich i'm going to have where i'm gonna sit there's a few little areas that i Have control over right but there are things that are way outside my and it's amazing how many times when you're doing a fear inventory with somebody if you send them out you go okay this little area of control this fear you just wrote down here inside your area of control or outside your area of control. And they go, okay, whether you're going to get cancer, is that inside or outside of your control? They go, outside. Whether your wife's going to leave you or not, inside or out? So they go well it's outside my area of control The things that are outside of my area of control are what scares me because I know at some level when I'm living a life based on self that I can't control that So that's where God comes in real handy, is in all those areas. And if I've made this deal back in step three that I'm going to quit playing God, the most beautiful part of that is where I go, you know what? I am no longer in management, and that is a management-level decision. Whether or not I'm gonna get cancer, God, you now, Mark Houston dying of a stomach aneurysm was not my idea, and I don't think it was his. But if I'm out of the God business, it's like, you kno, that decision is above my pay grade you know and so all this stuff that i'm trying to get scared about is the stuff that I got to give over to God because it says wasn't it because self-reliance failed me so fear is always the failure of self-reliance and then we get down to this prayer here where it says on 68 we're now on a different basis the basis of trusting and relying upon god we trust infinite god rather than our finite selves we're in the world to play the role he assigns just to the extent that i do as i think he would have me where'd bruce go remember when we were talking about you know if i just do what i think god would have me do and humbly rely on him and rely on means to lean on with confidence if i lean on god with confidence that he's going to run this deal better than i can do it he'll enable me to match calamity with serenity and then when you get down here and it says instead we let god demonstrate through us what he can do so whenever i'm doing looking at the difference between god reliance and self-reliance this is amazing we use a 1936 dictionary it's primary purpose group and we look up a lot of words and to see what they meant at the time they were writing the big book shot was one when it says fear the fabric of our existence was shot through with it i thought well i know what shot means we looked it up in the 1936 dictionary it says a method of weaving using warp and web where the fabric takes on a different appearance depending upon the viewpoint of the observer and i'm like mark used to call him Cheech and Chong moments, where the whole room goes, whoa. You know? And this thing about let God demonstrate through me what he can do, you know what demonstrate means when you look it up in the dictionary? It says to prove beyond a shadow of a doubt, to prove to the point where the opposite viewpoint is rendered absurd. So if I let God do this deal, It says he'll prove that God reliance works beyond a shadow of a doubt. He can prove it to the point that it makes self-reliance look absurd. But the thing with all of us is I always think that God's going to jip me a little bit. Am I the only one that feels that way? That if I turn my life over to God, that he's going put me in God's clothes with a bullhorn and a Bible down at the corner? Or that God is going to Jip me? I always feel like I can get myself a little bit better deal than God's going to give me. Although I have very little evidence to prove that that has worked out very well. And there's been a lot of times where I've gotten, didn't get what I want and it turned out to be pretty cool. Or, and there's also been times where i got what i wanted and it was awful so i'm not necessarily even a good gauge of what i need but i'm hesitant to turn this deal over. So when we talk about being convinced that my life run on self-will, the book is going to take me back to that and back to that and it's going to restate that third step deal over and over and again through the work. Reminding ourselves many times each day, thy will not mine be done. And reminding ourselves we're no longer running the show. It's going keep taking me back with that deal I made with God in step three about I got to quit playing God and stay close to him and perform his work well. So, you know, those are just some little scatter points on the inventory process. But, you Know, after that fifth step, it gives us some direction on who we're going to do it with and the requirements they need to be able to hear my fifth step. It says it's important that he be ableto keep a confidence, that he fully understand and approve what I'm driving at, and he'll not try to change my plan. Those are the three requirements, you Now, for hearing the fifth step And then it talks about how we roll into it. But I love the way Katie talked about those fifth step promises. But Mark Houston changed that hour for me. He gave a talk one time at my kitchen table. I think I probably caught about 5% of what he was saying that night, and that 5% revolutionized my look at this whole hour. I used to just kind of go home and sit for a while and maybe read a little of the book and stuff. And, I mean, he went on a rant. Have you ever heard him do that? It's, whew, this guy could bring it. And, again, I'm not sure if you've heard him talk about it, but he talked about going home and taking this book down and going over these first five steps and all their implications. You know, everything that it looks like. Do I believe that I have a hopeless condition of mind and body? Do I know what it means to be an alcoholic? Do I have physical allergy coupled with a mental intercession? Do I believe that my only shot is this power, and have I made a deal with this power? Do I know what the deal is in step three? You know, am I convinced? Am I convinced that my life runs? Do I act like a guy that's convinced? What would that guy look like? What would it look like if you followed a guy around that's convinced that his life run on self-will would hardly be a success? Would you have to press that guy to do an inventory? Would you make that guy call his sponsor? Or if he's convinced, he's going to be going, what do I do next? You know, I did what you told me. What do I do next? So, you know, all that stuff, and I'm taking it in there. And have I done an inventory? Have I looked at the things in my path that are blocking me? And have we really shared it? Have I left anything out? I mean, it's on and on and off because then we roll into six and seven. And, you Know, at Primary Purpose Group in Austin, we close our meetings with the seventh step prayer because I think it's the purest AA prayer. It doesn't come from anywhere else. It doesn't have any Christian influence or outside influence and stuff. So at our meeting every day, we close with my creator, I'm now willing that you should have all of me, the good and the bad. I pray that you now remove from me every single defect of character which stands in the way of my usefulness to you and my fellows. Grant me strength as I go out from here to do your bidding. Amen. And it's like then we've done step seven. But I mean, the problem was when I'd done a fourth step that was just a confession, I had squat to take in the six and seven. But when I've done a real fourth column, and I've had a sponsor that's just sitting there pounding me with selfishness, dishonesty, fearful, you know, inconsiderate, self-seeking, all that stuff over and over and it's in this resentment and this resentment and this resentments. Now I've got real stuff to take into 6 and 7 and go, God, help me be less of that. Help me be more like this. You know, it wasn't just some bullshit churchy-sounding step. It was like, my God, I've really got all this new awareness of this stuff from the fifth step, and God, helped me be lesse like that and give me the strength to be more like you want me to be. Does that make sense? Katie, did you want to tie anything up? If you don't want to do any Q&A, we've got about five minutes for Q&As. And I want to thank you guys, because I know what it's like to try to listen right after you eat. I nod out like I'm on methadone right after I eat. So I appreciate y'all hanging in there. But anybody got any questions for anything we've just covered? Matthew from Covered Alcoholics. Matthew. I know you steal and steal. Can you touch on that a little bit? I think he asked, the question was what about steel on steel? And that's something I think we're going to have to talk about after the meeting or something. Steel on steel, short version is an accountability format that Mark came up with and it is a way for people that are really, you know, if they have spiritual consent with each other to check how you're doing, you Know, but you've got to have a crew of guys that you feel really comfortable about, You know, sharing that stuff with. And I'm a big fan of it, but it's a little bit outside what we're talking about here. Anything else? Yes, ma'am. the question is or what she's saying is that she knows you're supposed to get out of self and help others but some people say you don't have anything to give yet um i've got guys that at two months are sponsoring other guys you know and once a guy has gone through this work and had that spiritual awakening i had a guy call me he goes they said at the meeting today that you got to have a year of sobriety to sponsor and i said what does the step say i said first of all we don't go against group conscience if they say their group conscious decision is we don't you can't spot then don't stand up when they talk about sponsors there but away from that what does the steps say and he goes well it says haven't had a spiritual awake i said have you had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps and he goes absolutely i said do you think there's anybody that was in that noon meeting today that has over a year of sobriety that has not had a special awakening as a result of the steps and it goes probably i go probably about half of them you know if you've had a spirit of awakening as result of this steps to me you're ready to carry the message and even if you're still going through the process if you got ten days you've got something to tell a new guy. There's a lot of forms of that stuff, but I don't find anywhere in the book where it says you've gotta have X amount of time before you're ready. I like to get a guy through the work and I mean I've had several guys that I can think of that at a couple of months of sobriety were ready to sponsor and it's funny because sometimes you see guys and they go well I kind of really was thinking of somebody with a little more time you know and but the other thing is always tell people when you're looking for a sponsor and we'll get to this in the 12th step i think it's a fair question to go have you had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps you know because the guy that goes well i'm like rock on dude um i'm gonna go get some coffee you know but um did that answer i just yeah i mean because people oh yeah here comes chris bottom page 129 we'll talk about in the last hour up here we got one one more to go but look on the bottom page129 so you know some great chapters we were talking earlier some of these are forgotten they call them the forgotten chapters because we just skip over them a lot of times it's but it's some wonderful stuff and the family after and chapter of the wives they've got even last couple sentences in there. It says, even if he displays a certain amount of neglect and irresponsibility towards the family, it is well to let him go as far as he likes in helping other alcoholics. During those first days of convalescence, this will do more to ensure his sobriety than anything else. See where we're at? For years what they did, the standard procedure in Texas was you come in and you sit and you go to 90 meetings in 90 days and you just depend on the fellowship to kind of keep you sober. What happens when Chris Raymer, the pain starts to go away and I'm sitting there with us and everybody's talking and sharing some really good stuff. I ain't listening. I ain'T hearing a thing anybody's saying. All I'm thinking about is all the crazy stuff going on in my life. And I'm so, so turned inward. And the deal is that this last time after that suicide attempt, they said, Chris, come on, help us carry this message. And he said, we're going to go to the halfway house tonight. And I said, buddy, I don't think I'm ready to share in a halfway house. He said, no, we didn't ask you to share. We asked you to bring the books. You know, so like, all right, but y'all understand what we're talking about here. And in the process of doing that, I'm sitting in there and a little guy slides up to me and I start telling him a little bit about my story and about how, you know what I'm saying? We're talking and visiting and all of a sudden I leave that place feeling a part of what we were doing here. That's the thing that separates the room is that there's people that feel a part of the fellowship and people that are just coming by for a visit. And it's like, buddy, until you start doing the actual work, 12-step stuff, you're not going to understand what this is about. Huh? Yeah, I will tonight. I want to take time out. But that answers the question. If you think you can help somebody, help somebody. We hear it in treatment until the cows come home. You're too sick to even help yourself. How can you expect to help anybody else? Hold that thought. You're pretty close to the truth there, you know. It's pretty good. Go work with somebody, and it'll blow you out of the water. Who else real quick? Everybody needs to smoke. You all good? What have you got? Lisa, I'm a multi-ethnic. I just want to clarify that point. Do you have to wait for somebody to come into the room to help them? For example, I saw somebody else on my building last night who was really, really hurt, and then I know there's a meeting just one block away, and I wanted to say something to him. I'm like, there's a meeting down there. You know what I mean? In my heart and my soul, I wanted to say something, but I didn't feel comfortable. I thought it was safe, but I wouldn't want to do that. We're going to hit it hard in the last hour of this. The book says we tried to carry this message. We were rampant in Texas. Everybody's sitting around waiting for the newcomer to come in, you know, and it's like, that's not what Bill did. Ebby didn't do that because Ebby got on a bus and found Bill Wilson. Bill Wilson didn't just sit there in a meeting waiting for somebody. He went to, he connected a bunch of dots and found Dr. Bob And, you know, it took effort to do this. And if you go out of your way to do that, absolutely, absolutely. Wherever you can help. You'll never know who you're going to help because you might not see immediate results. The guy that showed me where that meeting was, where I finally got sober, did it three years earlier. And I looked at him and said, I ain't ever going to go into that meeting, you Know, because I'm not ready yet. You know what I'm saying? And three years later, by God, I was ready and knew exactly where to go. That's a pretty cool deal. Anybody else? Chris, do you have anything for Chris? My name is Leo, and I'll call. I felt like this, because I'd like to hear what you have to say about it. Unless people are like this step and somebody is a victim as a child, how do we help them find their part in their court policy if they become a victim? Y'all ready to go smoke? Yeah. I'm going to go ahead and answer it anyway, guys, because it's a tough one, and you're going to get asked the same question. Listen, guys, people are victimized every day. It's just some of you guys, the stuff that you've been through, it's a wonder that any of us are alive. You'll follow? But the truth of the matter is you look in that fourth column, there's a piece of that. Most of this is around secrets and dishonesty. If you can see one little spot of this that you might have changed or been able to, did you share this with anybody? Did you go to an adult? Did you talk to them about that? No, absolutely. Well, there was some fear in there, right? Yes, there were some fear there. And you check that off, and that's the little piece you look at and you move on. people believe that the fourth column is all about what it's it's our part our mistakes i understand that but if you can see a little piece of that that that you perpetuated this then then you can you can get free of it this is not about this is Not About Justice This Is About Mercy and a lot of this stuff we starts to come out in that little piece and so if you could start seeing of course it wasn't that person's fault they got hurt as a child y'all understand this in subsequent years when did that happen 40 years ago and you've been carrying it 40 years and haven't talked to anybody. That's exactly right. Don't you see that there's a little place in here where you could take some responsibility? Could you have owned it? Could you have gotten it cleaned up? Could you have gone to somebody that knew, oh my God, bless your heart. We're not blaming anybody. But at that point, you can get free of the resentment. And people say they'll never, but try it and then you can see what we're talking about. This again, this is about freedom folks and it's a, there's some tough stuff that we get to look at. You with us? But I don't give that one any more attention than I do the shoplifting at the H-E-B store. Make sense? We just go next, next, next. We're looking at truth, truth. We are not looking at drama, horrible as it was. We aren't looking at that. We weren't trained to do that. We are looking at just truth here. Make Sense? You all good? Let's go smoke.