Practicing the Presence of Higher Power – Workshop April – Part 5 of 8 – Sandy B.

Well, this is the part of the weekend that I enjoy the most, are the questions and answers. We've got time today and tomorrow. And before I start on that, it's important to understand that all you're getting is what the answer looks like to me today. And there's no final answer on any of these things. If you take this answer and go back and tell your sponsor, well, isn't that, and your sponsor said that's wrong, then go with your sponsor. You follow what I'm saying? These, hopefully, we'll put maybe a different slant on it so that as you think about it, you'll see it a little differently. And as we talked about, seeing things differently is the ticket home to get out of the locked-in view that we have on everything. Because we've been there all our lives. That's where we live. We live in our view of everything. That would be a good name for the ego. Our view. The view. Wasn't there a show? The View? Yeah. so anyway and I appreciate can you tell us about your 11th step practice especially as it relates to prayer let's see my 11th step practice I still practice those four breaths that I was talking about as the most powerful thing that I do. I try to do that as constantly as I can. I was greatly influenced by a book that I think is from the 15th or 16th century called Practicing the Presence of God by Brother Lawrence. And if you've never run across that, probably on that reading list, it was a this man was not educated enough to become a monk so he had to stay a brother and he mostly repaired shoes he was kind of crippled and so he worked repairing shoes making leather work and he just devoted his whole life to experiencing God's presence all the time. And so that's why he called it practicing the presence. And so you can see there's quite a difference between that and a traditional view of prayer and meditation where time is set aside. This is a constant thing so that you could just be sitting here and go, well, God, I'm having a cup of coffee and I'm sitting here and I am thinking of you while I am having a cup of coffee and I so glad you are present in this room do you see there is this constant awareness or a constant attempt to keep the channel open between ourselves and our higher power so it is I just like to have my mind think about God as being close to me. In my own case, I really related to the movie Harvey with James Fonda. I don't know if everybody, that's a long time ago where he had an invisible six-foot rabbit was his best friend. And wherever he was, he said, well, Harvey, here we are. And in the movie they actually had, you could see a rabbit, I think. And there was a Broadway play but he was never alone he always had this friend that was with him everywhere and so for me meditation and prayer is a try to have a constant friend that is with me that I can talk to or think about or be aware of rather than setting aside a time for that activity. Myself, for years I tried that and didn't get the results that I get from this idea of simply practicing the presence. And to this day I can remember a line out of Brother Lawrence's book where he's talking about God and I'm trying to remember how he said it I think about how wonderful God is and I realize why He is because He's God and I'm not and remember that I went well that sums it all up He's god and I're not it took the ego and made it disappear. And in this book, he writes to nuns who are having spiritual problems and gives them advice. Well, sister, I wouldn't worry about that. I would simply talk to God, spend the afternoon with him, go about your business. And it all had to do with being aware of God as much as you can throughout your whole life. so that would be the direction that I go in my own life I was never good at the long sitting I also like the phrase simply allow everything to be as it is which is, we got that up on the wall down in Tampa it captures everything about letting go because if you are going to allow everything to be how it is you can't start forming opinions about it And you hear about it. You can't make a judgment about it, you just go, that's fine. That, you know, in other words, that's it. No judgments or opinions. So that would be my answer to that. Sandy, could you say the name of that book again? It's not on the book list. Oh, Practicing the Presence by Brother Lawrence. yeah we probably added things since I brought there it's a little tiny book it's real easy to read but it's so simple and of course simple is where it's at these little simple sentences would you please talk about your concept of God thank you that's a good question I was brought up in the Catholic church with a very clear explanation of who God was, who his son was and so I knew a lot about God I had intellectual knowledge about God but after I got in AA I began to ask something to help me that was what really happened I never got that desperate when I was attending church and then once I started drinking I stopped attending so I'm off godless and I'm in charge. And so when I got here, it really was, my sponsor really helped me with this. I said, well, step three, turn your life over to God, as you understand. I hate God. I mean, I'd learned this thing and he was very mean. He's looking for me. The confession they were gathering evidence to use against me later on. I'm really nervous about turning over. And so Bill said to me, well, why don't you turn your life over to whatever will take it? And I found that a rather interesting concept of God. Whatever will take him. So I said, all right. I remember that feeling. All right. I'm open to whatever happens. and of course once I started down this road things started happening that couldn't be explained in any other terms than spiritual so if I were to give you a definition of my God I would have to list all the experiences that I've had that I attribute to God and those experiences would be my definition that would be the end of the definition that's my concept are the total experiences that I personally have had in my life now my own self I mean, I also believe that this is just me because many of us go back to churches and go back through this I do feel that all of the principles that we got came from Christianity. I mean, I think the Oxford group and so on down, that those are the principles. And I haven't studied enough about other religions around the world to see if the same principles are there. But it seems to me that that's where our steps really came from. But my answer is, my concept of God is the totality of the experiences that I've had as a result of surrendering to whatever will take it. And I haven't put a label, I don't have a name, I don' t have a history or anything but that's a very real thing to me and I think it can be real to anyone. Okay? oh how does Sandy meditate well I think I answered this that I tried the conscious contact all day approach so that was kind of the same question in running a business or participating in the business world How can one let go of plans, goals, etc. most effectively to live in the now but still be able to be successful? Now if you haven't read New Pair of Glasses, I mean that's Chuck's whole thing in that book was he didn't change the way that he ran a business he changed his perspective on running the business and if you aren't aware his business was putting refrigeration and designing and laying out supermarkets and that's what he continued doing it's just that in his mind the only purpose of his business was to help these people it had nothing to do with making a profit it had Nothing To Do With Anything so his goals were to make his customers as happy as possible and they became aware of it they became aware of It right off the bat he talks about this one example where the owner of the new business changed his mind in the middle of this layout and said he really wanted the freezers all over on this side. And Chuck said, okay, I'll move them over there. And he says, well, how much will it be? He says, I'm just going to move them over to make you happy. We would have lost money on that. So it sounds like a terrible thing. The guy wouldn't let him do it. No, no, no. I insist. Couldn't believe that someone would just put his interest ahead. And of course, once he did that, then that person is talking to his friends. is you won't believe what it's like doing business with Chuck. And later on, Chuck got business that was never bid against any of his competitors. He just got it because the people knew they would get the best possible deal from him because that's what they felt when they were with him. So his shift was on what the purpose of the business was. It went from bottom line, we've got to make a lot of money, to we're just of service to the customers and we'll let God see if we make money or not. He made more money than he ever made before. So you can see it's like, yeah, but I don't see that in black and white ahead of time. It doesn't follow a traditional business plan. You've got it, but then superseding everything is going to be being of service. So that's what, I would just read that book or listen to Chuck's talks on the new pair of glasses. And I never ran a business, so I can't tell you that. I was just flying airplanes for the Marine Corps or trying to get people to change their mind in Washington. are you speaking the language of the heart or the language of the mind I'm trying to speak the language of the hearth but there's no doubt that the mind doesn't like that and wants to improve on it and interrupts and has much better ideas than my heart has and whispers in my ear, nothing can be that simple. Let me give you the full explanation of those things. So you're probably getting a little of both, but I hope you're getting mostly the language of the heart, which is very spontaneous. I've thought about this over the years, is that because our perspective on things is changed, your wisdom increases. It's not that you have more knowledge. It's just that when you look at things, it's like if you're trying to describe what's out in the ocean and then somebody gives you binoculars, you suddenly are a lot wiser than you were because you can see more. and so as you get rid of character defects as you talk to other people so they help you see things differently when you're asked a question you're going to give a different answer than you would have five years earlier and it'll be much wiser it'll connect with people it won't be intellectually superior but it'll have that resonating that people relate to And it happens to everyone. You'll find that as you give answers or comments, I think I talked earlier about trying to get my pigeons to reduce four paragraphs to two sentences when they're commenting on something. And this is trying to get to the essence rather than write a book about the topic. And that's what I think happens with the language of the heart. These are cool. You're not going to believe the answer I'm going to give to this. I'm curious to know what you personally do for fun. I hang out with me. I'm crazy. I just go, I can't believe you thought that up. I can's believe you said that. Fun. Well, you know, I used to play golf and now I can play golf and my body is falling apart and I used to run all the time and I use to do this and I us to do that and once I said okay I don't do that anymore it really wasn't a sacrifice at all so I think fun for me is I don' t think I have more fun than going out to dinner or lunch after an AA meeting with a small group of 6 or 7 people and just let the spiritual conversation wander wherever it's going to go that to me is heaven it's a world we never dreamed existed and I was talking about it earlier when we share our imperfections and how much fun it is to be imperfect and how much we need each other and how many times how much we need God so yeah you get old although I do have a new girlfriend so I won't go into that Nice, right? I guess that comes under the category of fun. Okay, isn't a person who speaks of his own humility not humble? I would say the answer to that is yes and no. It depends how it's being spoken of. if we're speaking of our own humility with a great deal of gratitude, that this gift of learning about humility has been given to us and we see how valuable it is in our life. I mean, I'm not making an ego statement when I say I desperately need help. You don't see any criticism of saying that. Well, that's an act of humility. Now, if I'm saying humble in order to say that I'm more spiritual than anybody in this room, then I'm not humble. I've lost it. I've gone all the way right over to pride. And so I still defend the fact that we can talk about humility without losing it. I mean, we've got to be able to talk about it. So that's my take on that. I know that there may be differences of opinion on that, but I'll stick with that one. How does one live in the now when they live with someone who constantly lives in the past? this sounds like it was written by everyone in this room and bad things that happened as he's constantly worried about the future ignoring it does not work don't you dare give the answer ignore it. Simply ignore it The answer lies in this is how I would answer that It lies in achieving the power to not have it disturb us Okay And so what I tell some of the people I sponsor is say imagine that the scene that happened at home last night is a play and we type down all the lines that were said and then we get actor and an actress to play those roles and so the woman says I love this and I can't believe it and then the actor over there the director says look you got to get upset over those lines. Those are disturbing lines. So you see, the actor, since he's not connected to that person, has to actually get upset over the lines. He has to act upset. So the lines themselves didn't upset him. They're words that are being said and there's emotions that are getting said or being emoted by the actress in the play. And so if we realize that they're just words and they're simply being said, we can start having a little test. And we'll have the same line said night after night and measure how much they disturb us. Then go back the next night and see if we can have them disturb us half as much and see si fwe can have him disturb us h alf as much again. and we're conducting a spiritual experiment of acceptance to see if it's possible to listen to that and not have it disturb us. Now, it sounds impossible, but it really isn't. It is the only spiritual answer other than moving out or something like that. It is all situations that... In other words, what is the heart of the problem? that these words are being said all the time? That's not a problem. Somebody talks about the past all the time. That's NOT the problem. The problem is, it bothers me that they're talking about the past all of the time. You see, that's the essential ingredient in that problem. It's driving me crazy that they talk about the past all over the time." Well, do you think it's possible for somebody to talk about it and not drive you crazy? maybe just irritate you a little and then well how about irritating a little less so it's a understanding that the answer lies totally in me and not getting anybody else to change and so now I ask for the gift of allowing this to not disturb me which is that spiritual axiom that we talked about so I want to see it differently, maybe our sponsors can say, now wait, let's put yourself in her shoes. Let's look at this. Let'S look at that. But the goal is to somehow minimize the disturbance or if the disturbance comes to get rid of it as soon as possible. And there's a constant state of forgiveness, forgive, love, forgive again, forgive again until it works. And we go, wow, I'm on the other side of this issue. So that would be my answer on that one. So I didn't say ignore it. Do you believe we have a spiritual enemy other than ourselves? Myself, I don't. I think that adversity is absolutely necessary in order for this whole plan to work and I talked about the prodigal son I just love that story because this is what I think the essence of the proddigal son is and all of our lives have been prodigal son journeys that we're children of God and it's absolutely beautiful how can that wonderful loving experience be made better even better than that you'll lose it and then get it back that's how you make it better than it was. So, it's almost an act of love to force us through this journey and then to come back with such an appreciation of God that we may never have had had we not gone down this journey. So, when I look at things that way, I don't see an enemy I see that this was an interesting way for me to end up having something I never could have had unless I lost it suffered and got it back so it's all an act of love and sometimes we have to use hard love with our kids and they don't say they don' t see it as love but later on they're glad that we went through this or if you have a mean sponsor like I did. Terrible, terrible, terrible. God rest his soul. So I don't know. I don' t feel I have a spiritual enemy other than myself. I know there' s a lot of other views on that. Is the inability to live in the truth my greatest character defect? well that's very close to Chuck's statement that conscious separation is the only problem that we have and clearly the inability to live in the truth is caused by conscious separation it's not by my not knowing what the truth is and refusing to recognize any of those things It is, it's impossible for me to live in the truth until I awaken. Until I end the conscious separation. It's impossible. I couldn't possibly know what the truth is from a self-centered perspective. There's just no, I couldn'T possibly experience it. And so, yes, I would say that's right up there and it's almost synonymous with the only problem we have is conscious separation. What do you recommend to do or say when you know people are not sponsoring as intended they shame wow, I may not be reading this they shame any boy, I'm having a problem can whoever wrote this they shame any no, okay they I don't know if that shame any something withdrawal of their suggestions aren't followed. Isn't any... God damn. It's all about something. I'm having a problem reading this. I can read the first part. What do you recommend or say when you know people are not sponsoring as intended? Alright, I would infer from that that it's bothering someone that other people aren't sponsoring as they should. I'm going to assume that that's the heart of this thing, that we're in the group and we're looking around and boy, that person has taken that person in the wrong direction and this is happening and that's happening. Something about if their suggestions aren't followed. Okay, so we have clearly someone in a group who is sponsoring in a way that appears to be not in the interest of the people they're sponsoring or not following AA or something like that. And it's bothering the person who wrote this or they probably wouldn't have written it. I'm going to assume that that's the heart of this. The key thing to remember is that we can be of no use if there's any role for us to play in sharing a different perspective on how to sponsor, we can do nothing until we're totally undisturbed over this. Because any conversation about this with someone who can pick up our resentment will be destructive. It'll just go nowhere. So any conversation like this has to come from love or it'll be a waste of time of even having the conversation. And then even then, there may be no role for the conversation This is certainly something to talk over with our sponsor and say, you know, I'm observing this, do you think? When I run into situations like that, I try to follow this approach and that is that it's a program of attraction. And so maybe if there's a topic at a discussion meeting that is somehow remotely connected to sponsoring, I'll share about how I handle certain sponsoring things with the hopes that a person such as this will overhear it and might be inspired to talk about it or to consider it, which is entirely different than a confrontation. We're saying it. As a matter of fact, if I hear something that I think is way out of line at a discussion meeting by a relatively new person and I do want to have the group hear a different perspective, I always wait three or four days and then I happen to bring up this particular topic so there's no way the person will think that my comment was in response to what they said do you follow what I'm saying? but I'm still giving a comment and if you've been around a while and your comment has some of that authenticity it'll be well received because it's not being done in response to something so that the person feels confronted, put down, disagreed with, or anything. There's a way of getting our message out without causing friction. So the big thing with these things is never do anything until you're totally undisturbed and you're acting out of love and you've considered this carefully and talked it over with somebody else. ok time for one sip what is the point of a relationship with another human man did you do this Sam Did nobody cut you any slack here? It could have said, what are some of the points in a relationship with another human being? But no, what is the point of a relation with another person? Another human. Well, if we follow Chuck's guidance, it would be to end the separation. to end the feeling of separation so that we both feel we're part of something bigger than each of us. And then we have quite a different relationship. And you see that in marriage counseling sometimes, that the marriage is what we're in. We're partof something bigger than either one of us and so there isn't me and you. We're part of this. And so relationships are to be part of something bigger than the two of us. So that would be my guess at what the main point would be, is to achieve that. There's many others, but that's my best guess. And I bet if we got other people they could name five that are more important than that. But that would Be one I would certainly aim for. These are very interesting. Many people in recovery speak of the value of creating a vision. Is creating a Vision running your own life or manifesting your own personal ego or is it actually inviting contact with a higher power? and clearly the value of affecting a vision would sound something similar to setting a goal or to do the list of things that I was talking about that would take us out of the now and yet Bill writes about this and I'm going to have to rack my memory where he talks about setting spiritual goals, envisioning a spiritual goal. And the reason I think that this is different than setting personal goals is that the only way this can be achieved is with God. This can't be accomplished. I can't accomplish a spiritual vision on my own. Everything spiritual has to be done with God acting through me. And so when I said to myself, why are you limiting yourself by not trying to be awakened? You could say that that was a vision. I had a vision of, but this can't happen except through God. So I think when we're creating a vision, now I'm keeping this spiritual, a vision of running your own life. I'm not talking about a business plan. I'm talking about being spiritual throughout a business planning. In other words, the vision that we talk about in here is attempting, some people write about trying to think God's thoughts with him. In other words, it's to improve the connection of guidance. So all visions are a result of being guided. It's very similar to turning our life over to God. Even though it sounds like we're creating this vision. But the highest vision you could have is to do God's will. so I don't know if that sounds like double talk but if it does I grew up with a lot of double talk it must be showing through but I know it seems contradictory to not setting goals what is the fourth dimension step two chapter four wow does chapter twos talk about step two step two well the fourth dimension the step to step to start at chapter four it does chapter two talk about Step two I I don't know what that, step two start with you. I wrote that question. Yeah. There was two different questions. The first one is you kept on talking about the fourth dimension and I heard different people say different things about what it is when we step into the fourth dimension. Question number two dealt with I was listening to one of your tapes one time, and you talked about Chapter 2 talks about Step 2. And I've always been under the impression... Oh yeah, no, that's the wrong number. The Chapter of the Gnostic. Or Chapter of Gnostics, right. Chapter 4 talks about step 2. But there are times when I'm reading my Even in the Doctrine and Covenants little story, and there's a solution because I'm getting part of skepticism as well. Oh, yeah. No, I don't disagree with that. I was just making a general comment on the chapter of the agnostic is a really wonderful description of changing our mind about a higher power through the necessity to have one. And what is the fourth dimension? I suppose we could give different answers that all amount to the same thing, which would be conscious contact, living in the present moment, finding our true self. They're all the same thing. It is the emergence from our own story into God's story. It is finally shattering the old ideas enough so that we can see what our true nature really is and try to go after it. So that would be my best guess on that. Is that all right? Okay. Oh, what was Dr. Datcher's response to your email? he conceded that he thought I had a point but he thought his point was better he just wanted to stick with his point we're all addicted to AA and we haven't done much to get free of our addiction and I see where he's trying to go and I would have some sympathy with him that there are some AA members who totally rely on AA in meetings that's their whole method of staying sober and then there are those that are trying to seek beyond that and have their dependence not be on AA but be on God and so you know he makes a point concerning some AA members but I like to think about this room as being exceptions to his point totally does he not know it? I don't think so I didn't do much research but he sure is a good writer he makes some damn good points in there for somebody outside of this and I just felt it was interesting he used A.A. to make his whole point we just can't leave this guy alone we got to get him a zinger one way or the other I'm going to go back and email him again I was at this retreat, doctor, and I ran your paper by 140 guys. You're freaking wrong. He could be wins. Let him know he was in a fight. Okay. Bill W. had a terrible fight with depression sober. Have you had struggles with other compulsive habits sober? do you send sponsees to other programs like BA if needed let's see Bill, well I agree Bill had a terrible fight with depression sober he was really in the middle of one when he wrote the 12 and 12 it was just amazing that he was able to get that thing out and I think it's in step 11 he's talking about prayer and meditation he writes he's trying to comfort us when our program seems to fade and we just suddenly aren't doing anything spiritual at all and then we feel terrible about that and he tries to let us know that that's very human that that can happen to anybody we might even go so far as to refuse to pray I don't know if you remember that line the reason that's in there that's what he did this just he got him so upset that this thing he just said well I'm not even going to pray anymore how do you like that and of course he went back to it and so he's trying to share his humanness with us have you had struggles with other compulsive habits sober of course I mean we never do anything in moderation anything I ever got involved in was compulsive I went out to do a little jogging I think I'll just get a little I'll get a new pair of jogging shoes and I'll run around and get myself in a little better shape and as I came in from the Marine Corps marathon with both knees needing medical attention I realized I was struggling with compulsions we constantly are finding something that we think will solve this core problem other than God and we just come across and I thought running I'll never forget the first time I had runners high there's probably plenty of runners in here you know what I'm talking about where you just push the distance up a little bit more and then suddenly you don't have a problem in the world. You don't even feel pain. Your body doesn't feel anything. You are literally in the now, floating along. I was floating along the Potomac River and I remember going, man, I think I found the answer to everything right here and running. And it's almost like I went to God and I said, thank you, God. Like, I won't be needing you anymore. But I wanted to let him know that I appreciated him showing me about running and I literally shifted the focus on the running and it can be on or women. I know there's no one else in here that has had experience with women. So if there's a question in here on relationships, I'm just going to set it aside. So yes, and generally you have to hit bottom on these things. That seems to be the general thing. You find a new addiction, a new compulsion to get involved in and eventually your sponsor or some friend says, what the hell is wrong with you? There's something wrong with me. What's going on? Well, I thought I'd drop out to the racetrack. I like horses. I hadn't seen horses in a long time. I went out there. A friend of mine owns a horse, and I went out, andI just was looking at his horse. Yeah. Oh, you're there every day, and you don't have the rent money. I mean, finally it comes out because any of these will lead us to having symptoms that can be picked up by our friends, and thank God for friends so that they can see that there's been a. Do you send sponsees to other programs like DA if needed? Yes, I would send them if needed. So far, I've been able to have them handle things just within AA, with the 12 steps. I had a guy who came up to me, been in and out of AA four or five times, and he said, God, I really need a sponsor, and I listened to you. I really want you to sponsor me. I've been out for the last four months on crack. And I said, okay, I'll be glad to do it if you never say the word crack again. And he never did. and he's got about four years. He runs a post office and he had the steps transform him and he just identifies himself as an alcoholic and goes on with living the 12 steps here. The next guy, that may not work with and he may have to do that But I've so far had the 12 steps work on, not on manic depressive, not on clinical disorders. I mean, those are beyond my capability. And so you need medical help with those. But I have, oh, I've sent people to Al-Anon. Absolutely. So they go to AA and Al-A-Nan. I went to Al-Anon for 10 years up in D.C. I was in a relationship with a sober alcoholic, and somehow it got off track a little bit. You familiar with that at all? And we had a little poker game at my house. We played for nickels, but it was mostly to tease each other and have fun. There were seven of us. We were there every Wednesday for like nine years. And one day I came in, and I, you know, okay, guys, all right. And I got the cards out and everything, and they were all looking at me real serious. And they said, we're not playing poker tonight until we finish talking to you. And they extracted a commitment to go to Al-Anon. All right, all right. So with 25 years, I go to Al-Anon. And I'm sitting in there. And I think the second meeting, I went, I like this. I'm new. I'm not the expert. I'm brand new. Somebody would ask me, I'd go, I don't know, I just got here. I don' t know. No, you don't ask me. I just get here. I just came out here. I just come out here and so I went I didn't see much value in the beginning but as time went along I really looked forward to going there and this is what I I'm off on a different tangent I guess but this is how I got out of that I would sit there and a young woman who's married to a practicing alcoholic would come in devastated just devastated and then she'd relay what her husband did that devastated her. And I went, well, I used to do that all the time. I considered it very minor. You know what I'm saying? So? Some little offhand remark or something like that. And I'm hearing her share it and I'm going, holy cow. The damage I did to my first wife was a lot more than I was able to see in my own personal inventory. And I remember calling her up years later and said, you know, I've really had a chance of going to Al-Anon. And I said, God, I had no idea. And she said, I know you didn't have any idea, but you do now. And I'd say, yeah. Wow, it was really awful. And she'd say yes. so there was an example I think that that's my own experience I do try to use AA as much as I can for other problems myself that's my own way alright Can you talk about impatience with our perception of our spirituality and about discomfort with our spirituality? What are these symptoms of in your experience? What are impatience, discomfort? Well, first of all, in order to stay within the reference point of Chuck's concept that there's only one problem, then we would say impatience is caused by being too far away from God. we always have to go back and see that getting closer to God fixes everything there's no exception it's not like discomfort oh discomfort is in a realm of its own it has a different solution than getting closer to God now as we're getting closer to god we may want to do something about impatience or do something but the overall importance to realize is impatience is caused by being too far away from God. You see what I'm saying? All of these are caused by that. That's the root cause. And until we get closer, then impatience. So now we're talking about it on a different level than getting closer to God, which is done all the time in our fellowship. We talk about these things. And I would go back to Dr. Paul, who's another one of our heroes. Acceptance is the key to everything. That is a mighty powerful statement. Acceptance ist die Key to Everything. It's very similar to the sentence, simply allow everything to be as it is. and so we see that these are both manifestations of willfulness the situation we want the situation to be different than it is that is what I call my way my way is something that we manufacture all the time we have a way that the day ought to go this is the way the day should go I had to drive down there in an hour, not two hours. And we have the way. And then what is the problems that occur to us? Things didn't go your way. Wouldn't you say that's the basic problem that we all discuss? Whatever it is, it didn't going your way? One way to fix that discomfort is to have control over everything so that it does go your away. And the other answer is to not have a way. which is what the third step is. It is, if you didn't have a thing called my way, nothing could ever not go your way. There wouldn't be anything to go against. And so this, whatever the problem is, it ties back to willfulness, not acceptance, and not being close enough to our higher power. When I say close enough, close enough for our higher power, I'm trusting that God will take care of me. so I don't need things to happen faster. I'm going to be taken care of fine, whether they happen fast, slow, or never happen. I am fine. So it's all tied in with the awareness of the now and that God is the only power that can take care of us. We can try to take care OF ourselves, but it doesn't work. it would never have enough so that would be sounds like a broken record doesn't it no matter what the question is the answer is you're too far away from God and I think I brought that up yesterday that if we really lived this the discussion meetings would be very boring no matter what was raised too far way from God Next? Okay, too far away from God. Okay. And our ego would go nuts with those answers and would soon join a group, Alternate Solutions to God. Where we could get some creativity in here and come up with something. I mean, damn, this is... Can't stand the boredom of hearing the same answer. Okay, so just to play a devil's advocate on that, you say, well, there can't be one answer. Well, let me ask you this. You're back in your drinking days when your drinking buddy comes in and he says, oh my God, my boss just fired me. I don't know about you, but this is what I would say. Let me buy you a drink. Let me Buy You a Drink. Now, the next day, a different friend comes in. Oh my God, my wife just left me. That's an entirely different problem, right? We don't come up with a different solution. We say to him, let me buy you a drink. No matter what problem they came in with, we said, oh God, let мне buy you a drink, remember that? So we're already familiar with one solution to all problems one solution to all problems and that's what we're trying to do over here is to we can talk about whatever we want but we've got to come back to the ultimate solution is letting go and letting God no matter what our ego is telling us that it can't be that simple when you have no questions, are you in oneness with God? I would say you're damn close. To get rid of the desire for knowledge is a remarkable spiritual spot to be because it means that we've abandoned the dead end search of trying to understand things and we simply want to experience them as they come up. You're experiencing a weekend here then going home you're experiencing going home and when the storm comes you're experiencing the storm but we don't have to have questions about them and try to understand or find a meaning in them I appreciate not asking very personal ones isn't an awakening really just a beginning yeah, I can't argue with that one of the comments I heard about an awakening that I really connected with was the reaction I can not believe I forgot all this I really can't believe I forgot my true nature that I forgot that I was a child of God and I'm connected I'm just part of I can't forget I can never believe I forgot that and went off on this story of mine meaning that the story was so powerful I forgot you know it would be like you traveled to Egypt and while you were over there, you forgot you were a U.S. citizen. That would be pretty hard to do, wouldn't it? And when it was hammered home to you, you'd say, geez, I can't believe I forgot I was a U。S. Citizen. That would have been quite an amazing thing to forget. And yet we seem to forget through this story process our true nature. And so awakening could also be described that way. Wow, I Can't Believe I Forgot That. All right? And again, all these questions, they're trying to be answered with words. And you can't put words to that kind of an experience. We can attempt to, just like I was saying, try to describe what drinking does. Words are inadequate to actually having the experience of the awakening. When you first felt God's presence, you can try to put it into words, but it'll be totally inadequate from what that transformed your life. A few years ago I asked Clint to sponsor me. After asking me a few questions about myself, Clint told me I was unsponsorable. I left the group, and this is my first time back. Is it possible to be unsponsorable and open to God's will for me? If not, how do I become sponsorable over without feeling self-satisfied? Without feeling self‑satisfied. well I have no way of knowing anything about this so leaving somebody's name out of it we can come back to the idea is there such a thing as unsponsorable I'm trying to think of any time when I may have said something similar to someone do you follow what I'm saying I may have said I remember telling one guy he said I have some advice for you don't call me for 30 days now that's a very unkind comment and it was meant just to shock him it was made to make him feel alone and it worked and he got sober but for the rest of his life He won't stop telling that story, you know, that he got this phone call and called me up, and I told him, don't you call me for 30 days. So the context has to be part of the thing. You can't just have that it's one of the great things to do is to tell people not to call you for 30 Days. Now, is it possible to be unsponsorable? you could choose to not be unsponsorable and not do anything that anybody tells you. I mean, you could make yourself unsponzorable by refusing to do every suggestion that you get. So in order to be unssponsorable, you have to label yourself unssponzorable. That would be the only way I could think where you've decided you're not going to try AA and you're just going through the motions. I just, since I don't know the background on this, I just am going to have to let it go with that. And here we go. And we're just about at the time. I cannot put an honest day of work for my employer or myself. I mean well, but the same old inertia and negative self-talk cripples my efforts. How can I break free of this crippled behavior? I can't believe one of us is not doing an honest day's work. That isn't what this is asking. This is asking, I'm my own worst enemy and how can I stop being my own worst enemy? And I know this is going to sound oversimplified. Hardly anything a therapist would say. I would say you make a decision to not do that anymore. Now the problem with that answer is the response is much more complicated than that. This problem is much more complicated. And yet, look at our third step. How do we go from not having God in our life to having God on our life? We just decide to. Well, I think I'll have God in my life. That's it? A decision? Isn't that remarkable? Bill Rice, remember that one I talked about yesterday? God's either everything or he's nothing. He either is or he isn't. What's your choice to be? Like you're choosing whether God exists. Well, if you don't choose it for yourself, he doesn't exist. You see how important the decision is. So this is a decision to work hard. What we're doing is we are going over our feelings with our actions. I don't feel like working, but I'm working hard anyway. And so I would narrow this down to a decision. We simply decide... Okay, we have two more and then we'll stop. Is this roughly... I can't even see what that says. Is this rough? Can you say something quick on what you were just talking about? Do you think that that decision has anything to do with loving yourself? I think you could work that in but I think a decision I mean that is analyzing and I'm sure 90% of the time that's probably absolutely accurate I just want to emphasize the importance and the simplicity of decision and the power of a decision it's I remember when I tried to stop smoking it went on and on I was eight years sober trying to stop smoking and one day I decided to stop that was the difference between all the other days I don't know, maybe I was just lucky I have no idea but I remember I just decided and it was all over it was the end of it there was no more debate left Does this connect with the rigorous honesty question, you know, at the beginning of the big book, which is the first step, you now, where you have to be rigorously honest? It's something I ponder a lot about, you knows, rigorous honesty. You ponder rigorous honesty? No, I pander about it, you kno, what does it really mean, you kow, to be rigorous in that? To me, we're on rigorous honesty, I always involve other people in helping me be honest in other words number one I know that I'm lying I mean that's simple and I don't want to tell the truth where were you last night okay that's a lot simpler that's really not what we're talking about rigorous honesty we're inviting this is why we do fourth steps and everything we're inviting someone else inside and get their reaction this is what I'm thinking my real problem is well tell me about it I don't know, it sounds more like this suddenly you can feel we're getting close to the mother load because this guy's pushing us that way and we overcome our rationalization or whatever it is. So I rely on other people to help me be rigorously honest. As a matter of fact, when I'm asked how you stay sober this long, I say constantly receiving help. That's my answer to long-term sobriety. It's constantly receiving health. I've got to have help every day. Normally you talk about giving help. I'm talking about receiving help on a steady basis. Help his feedback and all those things. So, all right. I have... When is this supposed to end? Huh? Are we past? Okay, but we can save them for this afternoon. We got more... Yeah, we need more questions. I'm running out of energy. You guys run out of time. All right, allright. Let's break and we'll come back here. Thank you.