The 10th Step and the Bondage of Self – Bronx Big Book Step Study – Part 1 of 3 – Adam T.

am an alcoholic everyone can hear me i want to uh thank the group for inviting me to come talk to to this evening it's it's uh you know we're three hours earlier in los angeles it's not it's an honor and a privilege to be asked to participate in alcoholics anonymous it's a responsibility to give back what was so freely given to me uh welcome to anybody that might be new if you're trying this again if you don't want to be here today if you If you don't think Alcoholics Anonymous will work for you. I didn't get to AA because I had a bad weekend. You know, I had a couple of really bad decades and you know, to get to the 10th step really if you look at 10 there's a lot of work to get to 10 and there's a saying if you can't find the temple in your heart you will never find your heart in a temple and it's a very lofty idea but what I didn'T understand is that this idea with 10 is to clear away again, the things that continue to accumulate between me and myself, me and God, myself and others. And I really didn't understand that. And if you're not motivated at this point, you know, if you tell a five-year-old kid, go in your room and straighten out your room, he doesn't want to do that. You tell that same kid, Go in your room and throw out all your old stuff. We'll buy you brand new stuff. How long would that take? And when I start to look at what is possible, what it would be like to really have a quiet mind, what are the benefits of having a design for living, this roadmap to spiritual success? It really starts to culminate itself in this part of the 10th step. So just a little history and we're going to get into this and kind of circle around this if you're new. Like I said, I stood up in Alcoholics Anonymous for 17 years. I live on the Rehab Riviera, the West Coast. Before COVID, we had 3,000 meetings a week in the greater L.A. area. And I did that walk of shame over and over. I had so many chips and key tags in AA, I could have played poker with them. Absolutely ridiculous. I remember one secretary saying, give them back. And looking back at that experience now, being new and living in untreated alcoholism, even in the Fellowship of Alcoholics Anonymous, I really look at and have great gratitude for the old timers. A lot of the old-timers in AA that aren't with us anymore that used to say things to us like, don't even bother taking chips. Just sit in the back. Shut up. But in a loving way, right? But they made it really clear to me, and if you're new, I hope you hear this. They made it real clear to be that if and when I was ready, because they could see it by my demeanor, my lack of interest, my fidgety nature. They could see that it wasn't right now. But those old timers made it really clear to me that if and when I was ready, that the doors of Alcoholics Anonymous would always be open to a drunk like me. And I think looking back at that experience now next to my parents, AA is probably the closest thing to unconditional love that an alcoholic like myself, a drunk like me will ever experience. No matter how many lives I destroyed, how many people I burned, how any jobs I lost, how cars I wrecked, how hearts I broke, how despicable shameful things I did and if you are in fact an alcoholic because a lot of people come from other areas into AA but if you're a drunk it is the most shameful thing in the world to be the family drunk especially if you come from a large family the transparency of you know the rubber room one more jail cell the horrific phone call from the night before I mean does anybody relate to being paid not to come home on the holidays just the price we pay this high price we pay as alcoholics for this just this distorted low quality of life and despite all of that shame the doors of AA have always been open to people like me If I live to be 100 years old, I could never pay Alcoholics Anonymous back for the love and kindness that some of you people have shown me. Not all. I mean, I hate to say this, but if you like everybody in AA and the fellowship, you know what it means? It means you're probably not going to enough meetings. And my sponsor had said to me, Adam, you don't have to like anyone in particular, but you have to learn to love everyone in general. You cannot afford to accumulate resentment. And it will happen. That is part of the process of this 10th step of mindfulness. Wilson talks about in his story, the idea of testing my thinking. I cannot afford to have resentment. One of the things that happened to me, and you never see this anymore, but eventually I started coming to meetings drunk. Now, the interesting thing about AA 2020 is if you actually see a drunk person in an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting these days, people say things like, oh my gosh, what's he doing here? You don't see a lot of wet alcoholics in AA. And I don't want to bash the therapeutic community, but, you know, because of this event called treatment, which we all know now is a $35 billion a year industry, right? It's listed right next to annuities in the Wall Street Journal. You don'T see a LOT OF WET ALCOHOLICS IN AA. I mean, treatment kind of swoops us up right in our most desperate moments, throws us into yoga class, right, that'S THEIR SOLUTION, CRAFT HOUR. I'm making like belt buckles and bongs, nature walks. You know, how is it? I'm walking out of a $5 hit crack house and three days later I'm complaining because the infinity pool's not warm enough. So in and of itself for me, treatment was counterproductive to understanding what the problem is. If I don't understand what the program is, this solution's not gonna work. And you know, what I'm doing is I'm going to 7-Eleven, I'm getting a big gulp cup, I'm filling it up with liquor, I'm putting a little Coca-Cola on top so no one will notice. And I'm walking into the late night Hollywood candlelight meeting, you know, doing some of my best sharing. And then I start going through treatment centers. And by the time I finally got sober and Alcoholics Anonymous, I'd gone through residential treatment for alcoholism 28 times, not 28 days like the movie, 28 consecutive times. And I wore that like a badge of honor. I thought, you Know, that became my identity. I thought that's what made me an alcoholic. And I remember telling my sponsor, I'd gone through treatment 28 times and he looked at me and he laughed. And then he paused and he said, Adam, going through treatment, 28 times that doesn't make you an alcoholic. And I thought, you're kidding. He says, Oh no, that just means you paid half a million dollars for a big book. See, treatment was a great place to fatten me up for another run. Treatment has its rightful place in recovery. Even Bill Wilson had gone through treatment. Treatment may have even saved my life. Dr. Silkworth recommended treatment for certain alcoholics. Some people don't go through treatment, but in and of itself, if you're new here, treatment never solved the problem. And as an alcoholic, I always thought the problem was alcohol. I thought it was liquor. And I remember someone in AA saying to me, Adam, if alcohol is your problem, that drink, that shot glass, that 12 pack, that little glass, that fancy glass of Chardonnay. If that's your problem, you're probably not an alcoholic. And then he paused and in the very next breath, he said to me, and if you are in fact an alcoholic, the type that's described in the doctor's opinion, in the big book of Alcoholics Anonymous, your problem is an alcohol. And it took me another decade, 10 more years to understand what that man was trying to tell me. It was almost like some kind of cruel riddle. I drank over that for years. But what happened to me is I got around a group of big book enthusiasts, people that took the statements in the big book of Alcoholics Anonymous, turned them into questions and directed them at me. Questions like, was I incapable of being honest with myself? Did I drink because I liked the effect produced by alcohol? Was I restless, irritable and discontent by nature? Was that my natural state? Was my greatest obsession that somehow someday I would control and enjoy my drinking at the same time? Did I pursue that to the gates of insanity and death? And as I went through those considerations, I started to see the truth. And see the most obvious truth if you're new here is that I was never able to live successfully with alcohol. Even as a teenager, I was peeing in my pants, drooling on my desk, passed out under the bleachers. My nickname in eighth grade was space cadet. I couldn't find homeroom. People are picking high schools. I was already picking rehabs. But if you'RE new here, alcoholism comes in people. It doesn't come in bottles or six packs or 12 packs or glasses of wine. It comes in People and the greater aspect of this spiritual illness, as Bill Wilson describes it centering in my mind, the mindfulness of the 10th step. What it really means is that an alcoholic of my type cannot live without alcohol, not successful, not successfully, not happily. I mean, what it really means for me to be an alcoholic, and this is really the setup for why I need to do this, is that I have a mind that will continually take me back to that first drink. That is the fierce misunderstanding that people don't really understand about alcoholics. What it really mean to be alcoholic is somehow I have mind that finds life so inexplicably difficult when I'm not drinking, that my own mother looks at me and says, for God's sake, son, drink. You were nicer. So what it really means to be an alcoholic is I have a mind that will take me back. And it's very interesting because all of my life, just to say this one thing, if you're new, all of My Life, I was one decision away from a drink. And today between me and that decision, there's this whole world called recovery. It is about people like you, it's about the rooms of AA. It's now about this new platform called Zoom. But more important than that, it is about a deep and effective spiritual experience. It is about a set of spiritual guidelines, a set principles that stand between me and this decision. It is about this mystery we call God. And when these things in me are removed, the things that are blocking me from this power, blocking me from you and from my true self. Suddenly somehow I become empowered and people say they're powerless over everything. If I was powerless over anything, I'd be responsible for nothing. And if I'm responsible for nothing, I'm a victim to everything. And I don't believe that. And then we'll talk a lot about that if there's time today because it is very, very important for me to be able to differentiate the way I think things ought to be in the way they actually are. So what it really means for me to be an alcoholic is I have this mind. When we talk about powerless, it doesn't mean I can't drink again. It means I will. That I cannot, like the book says, and you know it's cliche, bring into my consciousness with sufficient force the pain and suffering of a week or a month ago. When we talked about sanity will have returned, when we talk ABOUT that 10th step, I always thought insanity was doing the same thing and expecting different results. That's just one form of insanity. but see the other kind of insanity is doing the same thing knowing exactly what's going to happen and doing it anyway and that's what it really means it means that see the the first type of insanity at least there's some hope there but this thing that i know exactly what'm gonna happen but i get in so much spiritual pain when i'm not drinking that again my own mother looks at me and says, for God's sake, son, drink. You are nicer. And unless I can establish and achieve that sense of comfort and ease that I am seeking from alcohol through this process, a drunk like me will never stay here. That is why it is so imperative that I develop a spiritual life, the life in 10, 11, and 12 to clear this channel, to be rid of the things that are blocking me. So what it really means if you're new to be an alcoholic is I have a mind that continues to take me back to drinking. And it's almost like my default mode, like on a computer. And I've had the privilege of sponsoring a lot of really smart people, people that build computers, that write code, that build apps for phones. And we talk about the language, they write code. And we talked about the languages that Bill Wilson uses in 1939 and how really advanced it was for that time period, because we use the word program today all the time. One of the definitions of a program, if you look it up in the dictionary, is very simple. It is a sequential set of instructions designed to bring about a result. Now listen to the language. What do you do when you get a corrupt file on a computer? Well, it's obvious. You install a recovery disk. And what's the function of that disk? It restores the program to an earlier point in the process. Step two, it never occurred to me that steps 10 and 11 by design are like a viral scan. They are designed to show me how to be rid of the things in me that are blocking me promptly and without reservation. We'll talk about that word removed because it sits right in the middle of the 10th step. It never occurred to me when Wilson says principles before personalities, that it was the intention of our founders that these spiritual principles, these guidelines would have more impact than the untethered hysterical opinions that you hear in the fellowship, which in many cases have absolutely nothing to do with Alcoholics Anonymous. And I I love the fellowship. I come from my mommy's step party with 300 people. I was surrounded by fellowship. I was an only child. I was like in the middle of all of this fellowship. And here at the Rehab Riviera, BC before coronavirus, we had 3,000 meetings a week just in this area. I could walk out of my house. I live on the beach. We had three meetings within two blocks of my home. my house. And in the midst of that fellowship, I continued to live in untreated alcoholism. I continuedto live in spiritual pain. I continued to suffer. That's why we say surrender or be dragged. So what it really means to be an alcoholic is to have this mind that continues to take me back to drinking and see the fellowship, like it says in the second step, the second chapter, it says the fellowship is but one element in the powerful cement that binds us. And that's a clue because the fellowship gives me enthusiasm. It gives me inspiration. It gets me encouragement. It brings me hope, brotherly love, compassion. Some people actually find relationships and employment in the fellowship of Alcoholics Anonymous. But if you take an alcoholic of my type and you unleash me into a large group of people, without spiritual principles, I mean, I get sicker. My character defects thrive in the fellowship of Alcoholics Anonymous and I slowly become more spiritually maladjusted. And what that means is somehow I become more separate, more different, and more alone. And if you haven't heard that terminology, it means separated from God. It means different than every single person here. That's what we call terminal uniqueness. And alone, you know that loneliness, that ache in the heart of every one of us that we can't talk about? Even in the middle of my own wedding, my own birthday, I can be surrounded by people. And at the core of my spirit, I feel alone. The bigger the crowd, the more lonely I am. That loneliness at the corner of my heart, at the center of my soul, at the heart, at my heart of my life, at that core of my spirit that has nothing to do with the proximity or closeness of other people. it actually has to do with my inability to connect. And you put a couple of drinks in me, I'm calling people from fifth grade saying, I love you. I go right into amends. Get me loaded. All of a sudden, I'm at one with the universe. I'm standing on the roof of my building, howling at the moon. Put a couple more drinks in Me, I'll be at peace with self. Get Me good and drunk, and I lose interest in selfish things and suddenly gain interest in My fellows. And unless I can establish and achieve that sense of comfort and ease that I have always sought from alcohol through this spiritual process, I will never thrive in my life. I will always feel like I'm on the outside looking in. It's been said by many people, the perspective from the center of that triangle, recovery, unity, and service, from the Center of Alcoholics Anonymous is entirely different than it is from the outside. And it said that I can fall off the edge. I can't fall off the middle. So that is a description of the problem. And here's the solution. What I really need is to feel protected by some kind of God. I need to be accepted by self and I need to be connected to a community. The three pillars of recovery. That first piece, we ask for his care and protection with complete abandon. We say it every time we read chapter five. What does that mean? My good friend who just passed away, Clancy said, safe, sane and sober. That first piece, a sense of safety. It's fascinating because if you go to the ocean with a little Dixie cup, you get a DixIE cup full of water. You go to The Ocean with your whole life. Take all of me, take my will, take all of it, my relationship, my career. That looks very, very different. When it says with complete abandon, I can't abandon a ship and then climb back on. All of this leads back to this faulty idea in the first and second step. Without that, it's like building a Lamborghini Kutosh on the foundation of a soapbox. If I don't have that foundation in the First Couple of Steps, and it happens slowly over a period of time that I go back and I develop that. But that first piece, and the second to be accepted by self. And what accepted by myself in steps four through seven means is I no longer need internal or external validation. Over a period of time, I develop what's called an internal locus of control. And the third, to be connected to a community. Protected by God, accepted by itself, connected to a community, and someone like me, the scourge of generations in my family. Suicide, mental illness, and alcoholism, to 22 years later, the strongest link in that family. That's why I know if you're new, when we say that alcoholism is the only disease, it's predicated by the word spiritual, the only spiritual disease when treated that would actually leave the sufferer in a better position than if they never had the disease. I never believed it. I would have never believed that until I got around a group of people in AA that said, just like the last speaker said today, how free do you want to be? You want to be free enough to survive this thing where when people ask you how you're doing, you can say, I'm hanging in there. Or you want To be free Enough to chase your dreams. Free enough to navigate around the drama. Free Enough to have relationships at work. To have a program. To have a power in the 11 step and then to have a purpose, to be able to reach back in the community and help another trunk. And that in many ways, like it says in the book is the bright spot of our lives. I never ever thought that that would have any kind of significance to really understand what they're saying. And in manyways, when I really look at the four step, when i look at the design for living the way of life, this roadmap to spiritual success, I start to look at a continuum of that fourth step, that I'm looking at resentment. I'm looking at relationship conduct. I're looking at this faulty relationship with God based on self-reliance. You know, I tell people, really, thank God we don't look like our stories. When I look back at my failure in AA and they use the word directions in the end of the 10th step, the original manuscript in Alcoholics Anonymous, because you'll see that word direction if we've carefully followed directions right there between 10 2011. The original manuscript in Alcoholics Anonymous said, rarely have we seen a person fail that's thoroughly followed our directions. Now, if you're like me, I don't like directions. In fact, I Don't Like Being Told Not To Do Something I Already Don't Want To Do. That is my nature, the oppositional defiance disorder of the alcoholic. I will argue with anybody about anything at any time. You tell me it's black, I'll tell you it's white. You Tell Me It's Big, I'll Tell You It's Small. You Talk To Me To Go Left, I'LL Go Right With An Attitude. that's why we say denial is an acronym it stands for don't even notice i am lying think about it you could tell an alcoholic you can't tell them much oh you don't believe it try sponsoring somebody and what that means is you can lead me into the gates of hell but you can'T push me into heaven and if you're new when we talk about attraction rather than promotion what that means is eventually i will come to alcoholics anonymous on my own terms not because sober living wants me to, not because my parole officer sent me here, not because DCSF thinks it's a good idea. I mean, I live on the west side of Los Angeles. We only see people in AA when they're trying to maintain their trust fund. But hope doesn't matter to a drunk like me until I'm hopeless. You think hope matters to me when I got a half a million dollars in the bank, brand new sports car in a driveway, little boat down in the marina? You think I need hope, please. And if you're new here, because this is really the catalyst that will propel me to the solution. God doesn't matter to a drunk like me until my back's against the wall. There's a saying, God cannot use a man till he comes to the end of himself. And in essence, that is what we agnostics is. I remember I got shot in a little argument right through the center my back it came out my chest it just missed my heart coming out and I'm laying on this gurney I'm on the gurney I'm looking up on my back and I've got the two paramedics over me with the paddles all I know is God I mean if you've ever been like in front of your mortality at the level that I was I was still conscious there's only two things people cry for mommy and God and that's just the way it is and if you've never been there you own it this is like a foreign language to you but you might remember this every morning I had my head in the toilet puking my guts out with the dry heaths for the addicts it's like being dope sick and the reality is who prays more than drunks like us if you don't relate maybe check out Al-Anon but what's so fascinating is I get three or four days away from that last drink And now you got to write this elaborate chapter called We Agnostics to try to prove and establish to me there just might be a power. There just mightbe a power in this universe other than me. It is absolutely astonishing that which blocks me from a spiritual experience. Dr. Harry Thiebaud, who's one of the contributing members to our literature, another board certified psychiatrist in the third appendices of the book. He says the four qualities of an alcoholic are grandiose, sensitive, immature, and omnipotent. And those are our finer qualities. I tell people, stick that in your next Tinder ad. Right next to selfish, dishonest, resentful, and afraid. And I start to see what is it that's blocking me. Besides wealth, health, youth, and brains. those four before selfish dishonest resentful and afraid are the things that block me from early recovery but all of these are impediments to recovery every one of these could be a chapter in the book it is critical that i understand this now just as a little history and a point of focus in 1939 when the big book was published and i don't want to go too far in this direction but When the big book was published in 1939, the Oxford Group, also known as Moral Rearmament, and you can look it up in your phone, met at the Hollywood Bowl the same year the book was published. 30,000 people went to that meeting. That's how big the Oxford group was in 1939. And these are non-alcoholics that are suffering from so much spiritual pain that they wanted to find out what these guys were talking about. That's how big the Oxford group was, and they had a theory, and some of you guys know the word enthusiasm. The word enthusiasm means theos. It means God within, and what they felt was that people were blocked, and if they were unblocked, they would get free, and these are the four things the Oxford Group thought blocked a human being. First, a dubious luxury I will not forego. Two, a secret I will not confess. Three, a restitution I will now make. Four, someone I will not forgive. And what they believed is if a person was clear to those four things, the light of God for those that believe and for the atheist or agnostic, the life of the human spirit would shine through them like a beacon and they would be forever changed. And what they called that in 1939 was a conversion experience. And that's what Evie had. When Evie came to Bill Wilson after spending time with the Oxford Group, these four ideas, surrender, catharsis, restitution, and service, the fundamentals of what actually becomes Alcoholics Anonymous and what we're going to watch for in the 10th step, selfishness, the luxury I will not forego, dishonesty, the secret I will not confess, right? Fear, the restitution I will not make and resentment, someone I will not forgive. These things I am going to ask to be removed in step 10. It is a significant point here and if I don't believe in spiritual principles when I take people through we agnostics and Bill talks about it in his story he talks about the evolutionist, the chemist,the astronomer and we all know about Galileo. We know about the science of chemistry. We know about a lot of these things. We know about centripetal force, velocity, inertia. Anybody that has any simple fundamental ideas in the scientific community know that there are immutable physical laws. They are undisputable. And after going through those suppositions in the material world, if you're new in Alcoholics Anonymous the conjecture and the question always remains, why wouldn't there be spiritual principles? Why wouldn't this magnificent creature we call man, the greatest thing that is on this planet, that which is really, really the custodian of this earth, why Wouldn't there Be Spiritual Principles That Govern Us? And my experience is when I started to implement these fundamental ideas into my life. And I'm not talking about belief. I'm talking about experience. That's why we say a set-aside prayer. God, help me set aside everything I think I know because of the arrogance that stands between me and those actions. And the arrogance is the belief system, a belief system. Now, my friend Howard P., great, great guy. He used to talk about baby elephants in Africa. And they train these beautiful creatures is when they're little, they chain them up to these trees so the baby elephants can't run away and what happens when the elephants grow up they grow up to be monsters we know what full-size elephants grow up and what they do after these elephants have been trained is they just take a little wooden stake and they hammer it into the dirt and they put a little rope around the elephant's leg when they have fires in the jungles in africa you will see these full-grown elephants lying dead next to their little wooden stakes. Because of a belief system, when we say relieve me of the bondage of self, the chain that binds me to these ideas. If you're new, alcoholism is the only prison where the key's inside. It never occurred to me if the problem is alcohol, the solution is abstinence. That solves the problem for half of the fellowship. The doctor's opinion is very clear that many of us are entirely normal in every respect except the effect produced by alcohol. They are normal, able, friendly people. They have the phenomenon of craving. Once they drink, they can't stop. But the question, the question that begs from that idea and the opposing idea of the restlessness, the irritability and the discontentment, which is the other personality. is if the problem's alcohol, again, the solution is abstinence. But if you're new here this evening, if the Problem is Spiritual, if The Problem really is this distortion in my perception of God, myself, and others, the solution has to be spiritual. And if you are new, as simple as this can be, part of the word spiritual is ritual. And what Alcoholics Anonymous is asking me to do is it's asking me to take some very simple, direct actions. Actions that over a period of time change my perception of reality. Because in truth, in the essence of what it really means to be an alcoholic, if you're like me, it's not how much I drink or how often I drink. That's not what really differentiates me and distinguishes me from other people. It is the effect produced. And although everyone drinks for the effect produce, the effect produced by alcohol in me is very different than it is from other people. It changes my perception of reality. Alcohol is described by the AMA as a depressant. Nine out of 10 people on this earth have a couple drinks, and they say stuff like, oh my gosh, I got to slow down. I'm feeling it. I have work tomorrow. I Have A Couple Drinks, and honey, I want to get married. I have a couple of drinks and suddenly I want to go to Vegas. I want to go to Vegas right now. I'm trying to find the car keys I hid for myself before the first drink. You see, for me, alcohol is a stimulant and that's just the beginning of what makes me bodily and mentally different. It does something for me that overshadows everything it does to me and that is what the Al-Anons can't figure out about us. They can't figure out why we drink. We can't figure out what happens with this process leading back to the 10th step because unless I understand what the problem is, the solution is not going to work and now we're going to start to get to the real idea here. What the real problem for someone like me is when I stop drinking, the outsides get better, right? But the insides get worse. And the longest bridge I'm ever going to cross, the longest journey I'm never going to walk as an alcoholic is that little dash between the first and second half of step one. It's telling me I got a body that can't process alcohol. But more importantly, I have a mind that cannot process reality, not to my liking. So I got a bodythat can't drink and a mindthat has to? You don't think that's a dilemma? So now I start to get this idea. Have you ever noticed when an alcoholic's not having a good day? When I'm not havinga good day, it's actually when I'mnot getting my way. Think about it. That's the unmanageability. We're all like five-year-old kids in AA with old people's faces. You don't believe it? Cross one of us. I'll resent you for decades and your grandkid. The problem with resentment in Latin is it means to re-feel. It means that I've taken an event from my past, consciously or subconsciously, I've attached an emotion to it. And then I start to re-feel it, re-create it, reinvent it, replay it in every area of my life. My life becomes like spiritual groundhog day. And unless I can be rid of that, I can never be free. Now, going through treatment 28 times, this is the other piece. I started to speak a foreign language. I don't know if you guys know what the foreign language is. it's called victimese, right? And what that looks like is I don't understand how the drink bone connects to the jail bone. It's like I need a class for that. I think we call it relapse prevention, right, in treatment. It''s kind of like I met her in rehab. I can't believe she drank, if that makes any sense. I knew he was a crackhead. Can't believe he stole my iPhone. Met her at the strip club. Can'T believe she cheated. See, what the book's saying is how I make decisions based on self that later leave me in a position to be hurt. If I do not connect those dots through inventory, 10 is going to make no sense. If i cannot connect those dots continually where i make decisions, based on cell so that's the dishonesty if i do not understand the dishonest fee i will never get there it's the lies i tell myself so those two ideas the the resentment and the dishonesty become a critical part of me understanding. Hold on, I'm losing my spot here. Really understanding the point of this exercise. My mom had moved and didn't leave a forwarding address. And when I came back in her life, five years sober, I had a job, I Had a home, I Had a car, I Hat a relationship. I came back to give to that woman. But one of the things with my father is I had a huge resentment against my dad. My dad was never there for me as a little boy, and you know, if I had treated him the way he treated me, I probably would have told him to kick rocks, but what happened is one of the exercises that I was asked to do in the four-step is where it says we realize the people who offended us were also perhaps spiritually sick. Then it says although we did not like their symptoms, right, which is column two, and the way they disturbed us, column three, like ourselves were sick too. So what I was asked to do is I was asked to look at everywhere I had a resentment and ask if I was capable of the same behavior. So if I resented a friend for gossiping, did I ever gossip? If I resent someone for stealing, did i ever steal from them even if it was their time? Even if I diminished their life in a different way, it doesn't have to be money. If I present an employer for exploiting me, did I ever exploit an employer? So start to look at this idea now. I resented my father for abandoning me. Here's the question to prove that statement. Did I ever abandon anyone I love for my true love alcohol? And there it is. If you can't see it now, maybe it'll apply in a different area of your life. But what I discovered is that peace opens the door to eight and nine. And really, to understand that idea, there has to be a lie. And this is the dishonesty that maintains the resentment. The lie is my father's love for me should have been more powerful than his disease. I have to believe that. So in order for me to get to forgiveness, which is the point of the exercise, okay? I have To Have Compassion. And in order to get To Compassion, I have The Have Empathy. So now you've got two of the three. You can see the dishonesty. You can See The Resentment. We agnostics is all about a faulty relationship with God based on self-reliance. It is the fear. and the selfishness when i really understood going through inventory the way that i was taught to do what's called an extended third and fourth column is that selfishness is an attitude and it has a lot to do with me painting the red flags green which we all do in different areas of our life we might do it with contracts we might doing business we might deal with our family right and it's really easy to be spiritual and everything's going your way but what happens when you're in a contract dispute? What happens when you are in a custody battle? What happens when your in a probate hearing with the people you're supposed to love and they are killing each other over the inheritance from your grandparents. What does that look like? So I start to see now the selfishness, the dishonesty, the resentment, the fear and I have to understand by not just by rote in the four step. I have to understand how they're blocking me. So one of the things I ask my sponsees to do, where it says selfishness, self-centeredness, that is the root of our trouble, driven by a hundred forms of fear, self-delusion. It uses the word rid of. It says we must be rid of this selfishness. We muster it kills us. There's no way of getting rid of self without his aid. And then it says step three has little lasting effect unless at once followed by a strenuous effort to face and again be rid of the things that are blocking me. If I use the word remove, no way of removing these things. The word rid of means to purge. It means catharsis and so does remove. So I start to look at what these ideas are. What are the fundamental ideas that I'm trying to be rid of? It's like when they asked Michelangelo, how did you make the statue of David? Michelangela said, I never really made the statue with David. What I did was chipped away everything that wasn't David and there he was. so fundamentally this idea to be rid of the things that are blocking me if you look at the big book on the first paragraph in chapter six it states the fifth step again very differently it says we admitted to god to ourselves and another human being the exact nature of our defects it doesn't say wrongs it says defects so i'm starting to look now when i'm coming into six and seven when everyone says, well, why is it only two paragraphs? Because if you've done what the big book says, where it says we've written down a lot, you're walking into your sponsor's home with a body of work. I've got all these resentments, all these fears, all this relationship conduct. And I'm going to put that thing down on his table and I'm gonna go through it. And I'M GOING TO DISCOVER THE THINGS THAT ARE BLOCKING ME. The things he says that are objectionable, the things that have no value, the Things That Are Causing Me Spiritual Pain. And what happens in seven is I start to remove the things that are blocking me from freedom. They may be the same, but I'm looking at it from a completely different angle. One of the things my sponsor said is he went through the steps backwards so I could understand the concept that if I was stuck in the ninth step, this problem was never in nine. It was that I was either unwilling to make the amends or I'd never actually made the list in eight, which means the problem's never in eight. It's that I was on one of the four things. I was too selfish to make the amends. I was Too resentful to make The amends I was to afraid to let them know what I did or I was To dishonest to admit that I owed The amens which Means the problem is never in seven it's in six And you can even take the seven deadly sins i'm too proud to make THE amends I'm, too angry to makeTHE amends i'm, Too Afraid i'm afraid i'm Too whatever it is too slothful to Make THE amens i'm too deceitful to make the amends but still so if the problem's in six it's never in six it fundamentally is something in five that i never discovered the obstacles in my path i never put my finger on the weak items in my inventory i never asked for those to be cast out so again if i'm stuck in five just if you're a newcomer the problem is never in five it means that i ever did a fearless and thorough moral which means conduct inventory which means the problems never in four. It means that it was a faulty third step decision, that I never made a decision to turn my thoughts and my actions over to inventory, which means the problem's never in three. It said I never came to believe in a power other than myself. I thought I was the alpha and the omega, which really goes back to the second half of step one. And what that really shows me that now that I'm not drinking, I don't really need to do anything else. So the first half of step one is me defending my right to drink. The second half, me defending my right-to-play guy. One of the ways that we go through the book is prayers, promises, warnings, and directions, taking four highlighters all the way through the book. Prayers, promises warnings, and directions. When you get to step 10, it's very interesting because I'm going to read a little bit. I tell people, if you didn't want me to talk about the big book, why did you sell it to me? So it says, with this thought brings us to step ten which says we continue to take personal inventory and set right any new mistakes, that same order of the four steps as we go along. I wonder what as we goes along means. Does that mean at the end of the day or does it mean throughout the day? It's like I've learned all the features of the car, the power steering, the power windows, the cruise control, the climate control, and now I'm learning to operate that system at 100 miles an hour, not at the end of my day, throughout my day. It says we commence this way of living as we cleaned up the past. That means as soon as my sponsees do their first nine-step amends, I have them operating in 10 and 11, immediate. It says we've entered the world of the spirit. Now, if you're new, if it says we entered the spirit, what if we exited? It means we've exited the world itself, okay? Our next function, there's a mathematical term, function, is to grow an understanding of effectiveness. It's not an overnight matter. It should continue for a lifetime. time. Very, very important for me to understand what this means. That really what my experience with 10, 11 and 12 is, is they are a constant. They become a constant in my life. So I start to look at this very differently. It is not an overnight matter. Continue for a lifetime. Continue to watch. Now these are the four things that I've been talking about. Now I'm watching meaning vigilant. Vigilant means to stand on guard. It means that I become an observer in my life. There's three prayers, contemplative, centering, and petitionary. This is the beginning of the contemplative type of prayer. There is one prayer here, and then there are six prayers in the 11th step. I probably should have spent a lot more time doing this than doing the setup because this would be another hour to go through just this portion, but it's still important. I can't give you anything but hope if you're new. I could walk you through this. It might be proper to do it with the sponsor, but it is critical to understand. So I'm watching for selfishness, which I explain this attitude that I can do whatever I want and not pay the consequences, an attitude that you hurt me, I'm going to hurt you. Dishonesty, the lies I told myself, which i explained. Resentment, which is an attachment to an idea, a belief or conduct. And then fear, the faulty relationship with God. It says when they crop up, not if they do. There's four actual questions here. Pray, talk, amend, and help. So it says we ask God to remove them, right? That's a prayer by the way, okay? We discuss them with someone immediately. I wonder what immediately means. Does that mean at the end of the day immediately? And I'm being rhetorical, okay? And make amends quickly. I wonder when quickly means. does that mean at the End of the Day? Right? If we have harmed anyone, then we can resolutely turn our thoughts to someone we can help. My sponsor pointed out that someone might be the guy standing right in front of me. It might be the guy I just sent that nasty email to. So when we say promptly, we continue to take inventory and when we're wrong or like I said, in defect, he uses the word wrong and defect interchangeably. That's why I brought up that fifth step idea because if I look at the defect in my thinking in step 10, it becomes much more clear to me that I am to test my thinking. Okay? And that person I might be helping is the person that I've just slighted. Okay, then we readily turn our thoughts to someone we can help love and tolerance is our code. And these are the 10 step promises. I'm not going to read those they're self evident. Every one of those in is really much more lofty than the nine step promises But at the end of that, in the middle of 85, it talks about this is how we react as long as we stay in fit spiritual condition. A lot of times I think about fitness like the lobby of a gym. If you go into the lobbyof a gym and there's a bunch of people sitting in the lobby talking about working out, that's a lot of what mainstream AA tends to look like. And I ask people, if you strip the fellowship away from your recovery process, what's left? what's left without the fellowship? Then I have to master 10, 11 and 12. And if you're new in the middle of this pandemic, most of us have been forced into really developing a 10 and 11 practice. It's like when St. Francis said, Lord, make me a channel of thy peace. 10 clears the channel, 11 fills the channel, 12 empties it. And I become a conduit of this love. So it says it's easy to let up on the spiritual program of action okay and rest on our laurels people ask me why do i keep going to meetings why do i keep doing 10 11 12 and it's fundamentally like why do you keep going to the gas station why do YOU KEEP GOING TO THE GYM because the shower i took yesterday won't keep me clean today if you're new part of the word spiritual is ritual and the ritual in aa is go to meetings work steps help others go to meanings work steps up others go two meetings get a job, work steps help others. Go to meetings, get a job. Maybe get married, help others go to meetings, work, steps help. Others go to meetings. Get a divorce, work. Steps help others but I do this ritual so that's what it means if you unplug the refrigerator everything goes bad. It doesn't matter if it's 30 days old or 30 years old. I am still maintaining and developing these are the growth steps okay we are headed for trouble alcohol is a subtle foe it means it's an enemy It always stands there. My friend Anthony H., another famous guy, he says it's like there's a cliff at his heels and everywhere he walks, the cliff follows him. Okay? We are not cured. What we really have is a daily reprieve. By the way, reprieved means stay of execution if you're new. Maintenance of our spiritual condition. So again, part of the word spiritual is ritual. We could talk about the triangle and these actions and this plan, this almost holistic play of mind, body, and spirit. Because what I didn't understand is when Silkworth, the double board certified physician, talks about restless, irritable, and discontent. What I didn'T understand is the irritability is the mind. The restlessness is the body. The spirit is discontented. And if you look at 10, 11, and 12, 10 is the mine. the centering prayer 11 sits between the mind and the spirit which is 12 the discontentment so 10 11 and 12 are designed to remedy those three ideas it never occurred to me till much later how really synchronous these ideas are mind body spirit the mind 10 the body 11 so so while we have the daily reprieve continuing on the maintenance of our spiritual condition Every day is a day we must carry a vision of God's will into all our activities. It becomes critical that I understand my spiritual life versus my material life. Again, it becomes very, very important. I know that we're just about right on the edge, right? On time? Okay. Just going to finish this. How best can I serve thee? Thy will be done. All these are thoughts which go with us constantly. We can exercise our willpower along these lines as much as we wish. It is the proper use of the will. It is about alignment if you're new. What I didn't understand is all these ideas align my spirit, and once that happens, my life works. My life, I get what's called a quiet mind and a loving heart. Big deal to have a quiet mine and a living heart, and all of that sets me up for purpose. So I guess I said a lot. I don't know if that helped at all, but like I said, there could be another hour just right hear going around and around in this part of the book. I don't know if I did it any justice at all, but I thank you guys so much from the West Coast. God bless all of you.