The Oxford Group Lineage That Taught AA How to Do Inventory – Jay S.

President, I hope that helped. Okay. Mr. Cleveland? What is the correct way to write inventory? Obviously the right person has the question. I just don't know. Oh, yeah. False humility. The correct way here's my opinion and it should be your can we say that again I hope that's on the tape in the book I believe it's very clear it's looking for three things resentments fears and broken relationships or the sex list people call it the sexless there's an argument within Alcoholics Anonymous as to whether or not the resentment list is three columns with a separate faults and mistakes list or is it four columns i'm a four column guy i understand people that talk about that fourth column being a separate list of faults and mistakes but usually what they'll tell you is that you can link it to the resentments because you're looking for your defects of character so they've essentially got a weak fourth call you know to me there's four columns the fear list is a separate list, and the relationship list or the sexual relationship list, where have I instilled jealousy caused bitterness and so on and so forth, the sex list there it is. Now the secrets, we all talk about the fifth step of telling secrets, it doesn't seem like in that body of that that it's asking for that but if we look at it like putting yourself on the resentment list, the feelings that I have towards myself, the resentment that I have towards myself. You can kind of fill in that gap there. There were things that I did where no one else was present. One of them involved a vacuum cleaner. Should I show them the picture from the museum? No, no, no pictures. We actually we were in Den Haag in The Hague and we found a vacuum cleaner museum and we went to him and I and took pictures. We're just weird. He says they're strange. Yeah. But where was I? I'm glad that's something you don't involve other people. There are some things that don't evolve other people A lot of it has to do with childhood stuff that we carry around with us and we think we're the only ones that are that weird or that sick and we have negative feelings about ourselves because of that. We think that's who we are. In that category of resentments towards myself, that's where that stuff would lie. And when I exposed that, when I told those stories, the power of it went away and he told me there will come a time where you'll share all of this from the podium. A lot of it's not appropriate to do that but it has no more power anymore And I've heard enough fifth steps to realize that I'm not the only vacuum cleaner person. Small appliances. Small appliances, and I never molested my pets like some of you have. I want you to know I'm NOT molesting your pets. We are in the South, so there's probably a lot of that. What's the phrase, that's not my particular form of sin? Yes. so I mean I think that that's the correct way now when you say that that is the correct way that eludes to that evidently there is an incorrect way to do the inventory and the only times I've ever rejected an inventory that somebody has brought to me is when they've written down a life story and they haven't separated the resentments and the fears and stuff, they haven'T really looked at it in the context of which AA looks at it, which came really from the Oxford group. You know, that historical lineage. This is what these people did that seemed to work. I believe in that process. Now, that doesn't mean that you can't write a life story. That's fine. And you can even read it to me. But I want you to do it like this. Let's really look at the resentments because what I'm looking for is I want to make sure that you're doing it right. I want them to finally take responsibility for your behavior. The end result of doing that inventory is that we take responsibility we stop blaming others and we look at what our faults and mistakes are. And that particular structure of the inventory really drives that home. Should you stay sober for a long period of time, you're going to do more inventories and you're gonna be really focused on that fourth column because that is where everything lives. I'd like to kind of chime in. I got some stuff on the sex inventory that I'd like to I'd like to speak to you first of all I live with a spectacular and very active alcoholic she's over a long time sponsors some very special needs people and Adele when she has the people that she works with write their sexual inventory and one of the things that we do now is making sure that you know you write down everybody everybody you know and it can only be I think she was a brunette in 1973 at the J&M if you can remember that much you put it on the list and and that you with each of these people that what you do is you go through the questions specifically, not just did I arouse jealousy, but how did I arouse jealously? In other words, yes, I knew the woman was married. You know, that kind of stuff. And the more you can flesh that out, the more you are able to experience the power of redemption. the second thing is that I want to mention I talked about this at 14 years it was very important Bill was around what were you, 9 when you did that one? 9 or 10 Matthew I don't remember Matthew hasn't reached that and he's worked the steps correctly but he's benefited from our knowledge and experience but my wife, God bless her another time that I did a really thorough house cleaning and really cleared the deck I think it's really important that we acknowledge the significant times in our lives so at 5 at 10 15, 20, 25 get a brand new big book sit down with somebody that you are not in charge either as a peer or a mentor and go through the steps again. Go through the experience. Do it with a different aspect of your life. And my fabulous wife did it on her thinking at her 20th year and had an amazing, she went through a step group with a group of people and had just a killer experience. and when it came to her inventory her sexual inventory because one of the things is we've been together for 17 years I mean there's only two people on the inventory anymore there's me it's really kind of sad I mean monogamy is not even a list of an institution that I ever resented against anymore but anyway so but it came part to the thing about our sexual ideals. And she came to me and she said, can I read you my sexual inventory? And, you know, she sat down and went through it with me. And there's only one way that you can... She said, is there anything that you'd like to say after she read this to me? And there was only one thing I could say. I could ask her, I could have two weeks. because the only thing that I could possibly do with her sharing with me about, you know, the reality of her side of our relationship you know just things like making sure that I knew that she was asleep when she wasn't when I came home sometimes from the meeting because she didn't want me trying to have sex with her you know things along those lines the only things that I can possibly do I know nobody's ever done anything like that in California it's an art form but But anyway, what... Roll over. I'm not dead yet. But what happened was that she... So I had to go and write a sexual invitation so that I could sit down. And then what we did is that we actually sat down together. Now this is me at the time. I got 31 years of sobriety. She's got 20. We've got half a century in the deal together. We've each done at least 10, 15 inventories. We've heard hundreds, maybe thousands between the two of us. And for the first time, we're sitting down to shape our sex life together. like I went around to a bunch of people I thought this is really I don't remember hearing anybody talk about this and what happened is that we were able to talk about the things the little nickel and dime stuff that over time turns into resentments justifiable ones and about how it is that we could not only learn to communicate sexually together but also how it is that you can grow more closely together. And how do you do that? Well, tomorrow I'm going to talk about actually doing the 11th step. But here in the big book I got it on the phone and it talks specifically about shaping our sexual ideal. And it's not just about who's on top. But it's really about how is it that we can express affection to each other in a way that we can both have as much fun as possible, and also that we an learn to serve each other. Because part of the difficulty is just trying to pretend that we're both going to be ready to be intimate at the same time. Now, that doesn't happen that frequently over a month's time. But how is it that I can come to you and say, baby, I want to play in such a way that you don't feel that I'm using you. You don't know that I am demanding time, that it's, you know, how can I do it at a time of day that's comfortable for you? Those kinds of things that unless you sit down and have the adult conversation, all you do is you don' t ask because you think you know what's going to happen, which means that I just walk around frustrated and angry or you know I go off and take care of myself and I've got a spectacular life that he loves so you know it was really a marvelous marvelous thing and if you're fortunate enough to share your life with another person that's on this path or one that at least appreciates what it is that you do and would like to be involved more intimately in shaping something that can be a whole lot of fun, I'd highly recommend it. All I can tell you is I have more fun with my wife today than I did 10 years ago, and that's generally not what happens with people. We've been together 17 years, and part of it is, for me anyway, was that when I started courting her, I said, I want to be chasing you around the table trying to pull off your girdle when you're 81 years old. And so every time that I see we're getting I'm a little bit older, I know what I'm looking to do. Next question? Okay... What do you do with the amends that you know will damage more than if you don't do it? I'm going to put this together with this one. So what do you do with the amends that you know it will do way more damage than to not do it, but you know you cannot move on if you don't? And the other one is I'm unsure of making amends to someone or a couple because it involves my knowledge of their participation in a partner in their business. Cheating them, I receive no part of the money. So this one, both of these are discussions with your sponsor. This one about that I've received no part in the money, If you did no harm, you owe no amends. If you're ratting somebody else out, that's not an amends You make amends for people you harm If you played a role in the harm Then you owe an amens That's what I would say But I think this is a particular situation That needs to be discussed with somebody Because clearly this isn't all the detail What do you do with the amends You know we do more damage I need to do it to move on It says in the book we don't unload on people to make our conscience better and actually Jay and I and Bill were talking with someone at the break about situations where you owe amends and you don't know how to pay the money back or there's a weird situation and this may help with this a little bit is that if you feel you owe the amends but it's going to hurt somebody you can make the amens the universe And my situation wasn't that it was going to hurt somebody, but I couldn't find this girl. She let me move into an apartment and she let me float on the... She paid her deposit and I didn't pay the deposit. And she said, just pay me when you can. And I've searched for her. I've used Zabba search. I've tried every internet search I can find. And I owed her like 350 bucks. So, you know, when a guy would come along and he needed to get into a local rehab and it was 100 bucks, I paid it. and then when I paid $350 in the universe I thought, I'm finished with the lease if the lease pops up in my life I owe her $350 but I'm 18 years sober and I've been trying for a long time to find her so that may help in this situation you really don't do more harm than good so you can move on so that's those two On the fourth step I put people who I hate fucking can't stand that's a specific category yeah actually crossed out hate they crossed out hate but fucking can't stand got it some go to my amends list what about people I harmed but didn't do anything to me eighth step eighth step now at the eighth step it says that we have a harms list we made it when we did the inventory so there's something and I've actually done it this way I don't know that it makes any big difference but you know when you're really looking at the big book like a bible and you're doing a chapter and verse and you are looking for the secret code to really extend your life if you really want to do it correctly you start breaking all this stuff down and evidently we mysteriously made this harms list I actually got an email from a guy that was a page long quoting chapter and verse trying to find the instructions for the harms list and I had to tell the guy sorry there aren't any you're just going to have to kind of figure out what a harms list is I hope he hears the tape people I harm I think go on the list what's a harm but this if I understand this correctly on the 8th step list you take all the resentments and you put them on that list because the goal of the 9th step is to rid us of resentments but also there's another category there's liquor stores I robbed people I stole from that don't necessarily didn't do anything to me. I don't have a resentment against them. I just took their money. And that goes on the eighth step. That's a separate category. You know, there's emotional amends. There's financial amends or spiritual amends, you know, those kind of categories of amends and, you know this would be something that you would just put on your eighth step because you did it. Here's another one that kind of goes along with it. If I sponsor seemingly if a sponsee seemingly, refuses to do the four step what should a sponsor do? You can't make them do it but you can make them really uncomfortable. You can get them to where they'll actually quit going to meetings for fear that you might be there glaring at them across the room. I don't know of anybody who really hasn't balked at the four-step. I've had a couple of guys that actually showed up with it done after like a week or two, and I thought, this guy's not out there. That's the same thing. That's way too efficient for an alcoholic. But mostly we all balk a bit. I did. I took a couple months or something. I probably was more efficient than most. I've been doing it for a long time. I've met guys that I've known for years that just haven't done their fourth step. I've got some guys that are five, six years sober that I've never done a fourth step with. Maybe they came from another sponsor or something and I told them, well, you need to do this. And we read the book and we got to that point and we stopped reading. And they're just going, hey Bill, how you doing? They just haven'T done it. And what are you going to do? I can't make you do anything. I just can't. I'm not a hard-ass sponsor. There's an allusion to that. You've got to amend it. Okay, the follow-up on this is, the answer is, you know, you just can't do it. No, wait, wait. Okay, go ahead. Just to interject, you can't make them do it, but you also don't have to listen to them to complain anymore. Exactly. Because then when they come to you with she and this and my job, you go, well, dude, I'm sorry, you're not doing what I do, so you're nicht getting the solution. If you did a fourth step and a fifth step and ninth step, these things may take care of themselves, but I am not your therapist. I am your sponsor, not call us. Very good. Very good, very good. step 5 what exactly should a sponsor do or say during a fifth step my feeling about the fifth step for me personally is that when you come to me with your fifth step it's time for you to talk and I try my best just to keep my mouth shut and let you finish this is an evolution monumental abortion this is part of me listening to you and it's your turn now you've done the work let's have it you know if you ask me a question or you want some feedback from me I'll do that but usually my experience with you know somebody that's got some time it's kind of a different experience because you're dealing with somebody that maybe you've known for a long time and this maybe is the second or third inventory you've done with this guy something like that's kind of a different animal you know that's a sit in the backyard smoke a couple of cigars and take a whole afternoon and really talk about life and i love that i mean i love that relationship with you and i and the fact that the honesty comes so easy and it's so open and you're not threatened and you'RE NOT EMBARRASSED the new guy is a different he's walking in with fear and trepidation he's got some stuff on here that makes him nervous and And my feeling is the quicker he gets through it, then we can talk later sometime about it. Because I'll take notes. I'll make notes about stuff that I want to talk to you about later. So let's just get her done. Get her done and get through it. And that's kind of how it is. But I'll tell you something about this. Every person you work with is different. our neuroses are really uncannily similar but each person is really different some people are very outgoing and big talkers other people are quiet and reserved frightened and fearful I've heard many fifth steps that just weren't good enough and I've told people, that's not good enough I've looked right at guys and I said why don't you just trust me and tell me the whole thing. You're not sleeping with me, you're not working for me, you don't owe me any money. We're just here because we're doing Alcoholics Anonymous. Why don't you just take a big risk and just trust me? I have to know that I'm trustworthy. This is all about six and seven now. If I say that to somebody, am I trustworthy? Can I be the keeper of your secrets? Can you trust in that? And today I can say unequivocally, yes, you can trust me with that. So, you know, I'll try to get the guy to really drag it out. Maybe he can't write it all down. Maybe he just needs to talk to me. Some guys just can't right it down. And I'll let him, okay, talk to me. Tell me. You know, let's go over these resentments. Some of them you have to ask him questions to keep him going. You know? Well, then what happened? You know. He'll write down, well, I hate my father. You know he was just really an asshole how did it make me feel he scared me and what was my partner I don't know tell me about daddy you know like when you say is that what kind of an asshole did he beat you did he rape you did you know what happened some guys you have to kind of drag it out with mostly though it's your turn to talk a couple of really quick ones on this our friend Clint Hodges said, you know an inventory only takes two weeks. Only takes two weeks to do it, to write a first step. Some people it's two years and two weeks, some people it is two months and two week, but it only takes 2 weeks to write. The other great story about the fifth step that I love is we have a friend Tom Weston and his sponsor is Monsignor Ritchie and Tom's a Jesuit. So anyway Tom is just filled with shame and remorse comes and does his fifth step with Terry Terry listened to it and it was long doctoral thesis and Tom gets done and he's waiting for you know the judgment of the uber Jesuit to be visited upon him all the wrath of Roman Catholicism throughout the ages to be funneled down upon his shoulders now and Terry looks at him and he says I think this shows that we both need Alcoholics Anonymous desperately and got up and left got one here do you have resentments that come back to haunt you in different forms I believe that in the it says I can switch from brunettes to redheads I can date only natural blondes yes of course I mean it happens it happens frequently until I deal with the fear underlying the resentment until I'm willing to amend and change my behavior in such a way that I don't keep manifesting this in my relationships one way or another. Yeah. If what I'm bringing to the table is resentment and fear, how can my relationships be anything other than traumatic and dramatic? That's such an important point. The resentment is the circumstance of your problem. That circumstance could be anything. it's if the problem is yours so yeah did they come back and haunt me with different characters yeah i will fill in the blank if i'm not mad at her this week it's him next week you know and that anger that whatever that rule is that they're breaking it puts them back on my list is my false rule that the world has to live by and that the all of this is about freedom All of this is about freedom. So you can justify and stay in pain or take a look at yourself. And then the circumstances tend to become not so tied up in that. That's my experience. Here's a really good one. A really good One. Does mental illness, specifically bipolar disorder, really affect a person's ability to get and stay sober? yes I think it does my experience is that it does I think most people that you talk to that are willing to work with people that have mental illness or bipolar disorder whatever however that manifests at whatever your definition of that is is that I think they have an extra monkey on their back I'll tell you one thing for sure these people should not drink I have a story about that that I love to tell because it was my personal experience I think the worst thing that happens to these people in AA is they get rejected there's a lot of people that will not work with people that are on medication whatever that means and they'll come up and ask somebody for help and they're showing you know i'm on medication and they'll be rejected i don't work with people on medication for a variety of reasons the best reason i've heard was somebody that i was quite close close to for a long time that told me my mother was schizophrenic i was raised by an insane woman and when i get around those people that have those kinds it just freaks me out i can't i can'T deal with them it's not a rejection of them because they're on medication or something that she just personally can't deal with it. It makes her too nervous and anxious to be around that. I've got a handful of people that are all medicated and drooling and stuff, and I have one guy, Kevin, that called me today, and I haven't called him back, and he's very anxious about that. And Kevin is a walking physician's desk reference. And when I get somebody that's on medication, I'll say to them, what are they giving you? And I list it. Then I call Kevin, and I go, what's this? Because Kevin's on all of it, or has been at one time. And he's very smart. He's not stupid. He's just crazy. And I had one guy one time who was in the show. I met a guy, John, that I was dragging around. God, this guy was a drooler. This guy was messed up. I mean, he made me nervous. And it's a longer story about John. But anyway, John's in the car, and he's just really spaced out, clearly loaded on something. And I go, what have they given you? What are you taking? He goes, Respiradol. Okay, so I called Kevin and I said, what's Respiridol? And Kevin went, whoa. I said bad stuff. He goes oh that's some heavy shit man. And he said to me, is he drooling? And I said kinda yeah. And he said what's it for it. He goes, well they give that to schizophrenic people to hear voices and stuff, to stop the voices. Jeez. So next time I'm with John right? And I say do you hear voices? He looks at me and he goes, not anymore. And I said what do they say? And he goes I can't quite make it out but I listen really carefully. I just made the hair on the back of my neck stand up, you know. But here's my thing about it. We said earlier, I can't be your therapist. If you have especially interesting neuroses, I will try. But I'm no good at it. My experience of trying to be your therapy, trying to help you work through some other stuff, has not been good. I'm not a professional. And I know a couple of guys that are professionals that are very good at that. You know, that's what they do for a living. And if that's what you need, that'S what you NEED to go. But I can't do that. That's not my job in your life. I can be a spiritual guide. I can BE somebody to help you, guide you through the process of the 12 steps, try to put you into touch with the power. There's a lot of things I CAN do for you. There'S also quite a few things I CANNOT do. And I CAN NOT prescribe for you medication. I can come to understand what's going on with you, though. If you explain it to me, I will retain the information, and I'll be able to use that later. Well, I'll understand you better. You're bringing this to the table, and if I listen to you, I can find out what's really going on with you, like what the history of your problem is, whether you think it's real or not, whether you think you should be on medication. We can have that discussion. If you want to try to get off the medication, my wife and I both will help find a doctor that will help you do that and see if that works for you. I'm not going to tell you to not take the medication. You know, I can't do that. I don't know what the hell I'm talking about. And sometimes I think I know what's best for you, but I'm convinced that isn't true. You know? This tells me that I might know, but I really don't. One of the best things I think Adele told me we were talking one time about people on medication and whether they should be taking it or not and whether their over-prescribe it and stuff. And Adele said something to me she goes, it's really hard for them to recover if they're dead and some people when they don't take their medication they die they kill themselves or take somebody else out and then we've all probably been close to something like that happening people have demons i don't have and when i don'T have them it's hard for me to relate to your demons that's why i think it's more difficult for these people to recover they have extra demons here's my role in all this and i believe very strongly about this is my opinion but it's one of my better extra special good opinions it should be yours god i'm loving this i'm taking you people home with me here's the deal when someone walks into alcoholics anonymous and they ask for help, they should never, ever be rejected. Ever. If I'm responsible for the hand of AA being there for anybody that reaches out for help then I need to take on that job. I have no idea why you've been sent to me. I'm really clear on why the medicated bipolar people have been sent in here. What I'm trying to do to me is to educate my ass because there's so much of it going on. Should everybody be on medication? Absolutely not. Is it over-prescribed? Absolutely it's over-proscribed. You're reading more and more about it all the time now. They've overshot the mark, like they always do. They overshoot the mark. Every time some alcoholic walks in and says, I'm depressed, they give him some medication. They don't know anything different. When the alcoholic walks up to me and says I'm stressed, I say, you ought to be. You've been a fucking pig for years. you know depression is the appropriate emotional response for a loser like you so let's work on getting you out of the depression let's work some steps Alcoholics Anonymous is the best antidepressant known to man and it's flu this is what I believe and this is my job for you I don't care if you're on medication and if it doesn't work out between you and I we'll find that out sooner or later it's not up to me to determine whether you're correctly alcoholic enough for me to work with that's arrogance beyond even my ability to deal with it you know so i need to sit and just do my job and whether or not you're on medication really doesn't matter my experience with it however has not been very good you know i've got a few guys that have been sober for a while, you know, that have, that have had a hard time and they've been on medication for a long time. But I, I see these people kind of struggle in my opinion as it's a harder struggle. There's other stuff going on that can be organic or emotional, I'm not sure. And they aren't really AA, engaged AA members in the same way that you, you know when I think of John and Kevin and a lot of these guys that, that I've worked with too. Well it's not their fringe, it's just their ability to engage they don't have the same skill set so they can't be involved in the recovery process in the same way and yeah lastly about this it doesn't prohibit you from getting sober, Bill Wilson's struggle with depression is addressed in the book, the doctor talks about it, it's a very common thing so I think we can talk about these extreme cases but bipolar bipolar. My father was bipolar. The medication can be quite effective and not too dramatic and you certainly have the ability to be honest, constitutionally honest and it's available. And we're very fortunate that at the last general service conference we re-edited edited the AA member and medications. And so there's going to be some new stuff coming out that will give a nice guideline to help us with all of that. I got into an argument a bit with another heavy hitter AA guy that professes that these people that are on medication are not capable of having a spiritual experience. And he actually said that in front of a large group of people and I started to twitch me and it wasn't but anyway I said really do you really think that how do you know that how do we know that somebody can't have a spiritual experience or hasn't had one what does it look like you know I don't think we can know that I don' t know what your spiritual experience is you know I've never had an experience where the room turned white and stuff but I've had spiritual experiences and how do we know that people on medication have this veil over them that they aren't connected somehow what do we now about the higher power so the higher powers say oh people on meditation I'm not connecting with them really let's make that kind of an edict what good is that going to do us I don't know what your spiritual experience is going to look like. Well, I had an experience with Bob and this is back in sober man days when I knew all and there was a guy who came to me and he asked me to be his sponsor and he'd been sober for a little while and he said I'm on medication and I said well I'm not going to be able to sponsor unless you get off the medication. And he called his doctor, and his doctor called me at 11 o'clock at night and just excoriated me. And I said to the doctor, I said, to the best of my ability, given what it is that I know, I can't work with this guy. So, I mean, I was straight up about it. And anyway, ten years later, the guy comes up to me and he says, you remember that? Oh yeah, I've never forgotten it. And he goes, well, I'd been off the meds for about 18 months. And he said, I can pray and I can meditate. He said, but I wasn't able to all that time. So all that times I was not hooked in. so you know again this is just one guy and I mean yeah I love this guy because his depression came from he moved in with his mother and drank a quart and a half of vodka a day and watched a little black and white television I think I'd need medication hey this kind of piggybacks on that last statement is he you can pray and meditate. So this question is, what if you pray and pray and invite, etc., and you still don't feel or know God at times? Just keep trying? So I think one of the nice things about this question happening now is that there's a lot of other steps that make the prayer and meditation a clearer channel and if you're praying and meditating and you owe the money still and you sometimes feel connected and sometimes you don't that might be the problem if you are praying and meditating and you are living a certain way or you are praying and meditating or this is probably more likely in the groups that I attend a lot is people do the steps in their circle in their room in their home and they go to their meetings but they haven't talked to another alcoholic who is in trouble in 10 years and your prayer and meditation life will shrivel on the vine because God is outside so you've got to get off the couch so Jay might want to feel some of this too oh no you good? yeah I'm good were you done? do you think it's right to say the Lord's Prayer after an AA meeting now my oh stop now there's an elegant article if you are an AA member I highly recommend that you get on get a subscription to aagrapevine.org because there's all this stuff all these wonderful articles written, and there's a wonderful article that Bill wrote about saying the Lord's Prayer and where it came from and all this. Interesting that the Lord'S Prayer is a rabbi's, it's a compendium of Hebrew wisdom. The Serenity Prayer is written by a Lutheran minister. It's a Christian prayer. The Lord's Prayer is not a Christian prayer. It's a collection of Hebrew wisdom, yet it's identified falsely as. But anyway, I judge no group. But the thing is that one of the things that has been a very interesting change in the post-modern era is that the people that I come in contact with have no relationship at all with traditional religious training. And I kind of, just for my own thing, I mean, I think bad religious training is a lot better than none at all. I wouldn't argue. And And that this particular compendium of Hebrew wisdom is probably one of the most elegant and important pieces of information that can be imparted to any human being, especially one who's in trouble. And that if somebody can learn that particular compenium of wisdom, that they got a much better shot at staying sober. And, you know, one of the pieces that really informed our society was Emmett Fox's The Sermon on the Mount. And in that, there's the breakdown of the Lord's Prayer. There's also another thing, Glenn Clark's I will lift up mine eyes that both Bill and Bob read that has a very, very elegant exercise of going through the Lord's Prayer in the beginning that had a profound experience when I was exposed to it. And so I believe that it's a very important piece. I think that if we eliminate prayer from the meeting, I personally believe that the prayer with which we seal the meeting is probably the most important thing that we do. I'm very fortunate that in my group, which is filled with pagans, but that one of the things that we doing is we invite people to ask the group to pray for folks. And it's very interesting that a couple of the leading pagans are the folks that are the ones who use that the most and who have found that to be the most consoling part. So again, I think that prayer is a very, very important part of the experience of Alcoholics Anonymous and of the meetings and so I think that the Lord's Prayer is fine and people generally that are talking about it are people who have a corollary resentment in other words like my wife who is Jewish who was very very frightened that the Jew police were going to find her praying on her knees when she was getting sober that was supposed to elicit a laugh it does when she says it I'm sorry Adele, I won't you didn't know there were Jubilees yeah they were all they think they're only in Beverly Hills but we're not necessarily rural Louisiana but anyway I believe that the Lord's Prayer is a wonderful tool in our set of spiritual tools. And, yeah. Well, and the thing, like I agree with Jay that there's a resentment behind that question most likely. And then I had a friend who's a Buddhist and he would say, you know, that's a Judeo-Christian prayer. And I said, yeah, AA didn't come out of a vacuum. You know, it came in the 30s and did everything it could not to tell you what to believe spiritually. but prayer and meditation as we like to say, it's Jay's phrase but the 11th step is not extra credit it's a step and it just happens to be that the Lord's Prayer is the best known prayer in the United States and otherwise you've all heard of the Tower of Babel right? We could all just say whatever prayer we want it's the way for us to pray together it's just like if you have a problem the best argument I heard is a guy in front of ours, Mike B I mentioned him earlier, he's a comedy writer and he said, oh yeah, if you have a problem with the God thing, I had that. My advice is get over it because you want to get well and if you don't have a God thing and if they have a problems with the Lord's Prayer again, it's a circumstance. It's about you, that problem. You'll find another circumstance in AA where they're all over. It's a way for us to commune together so they're just words. In India, they don't say the Lord'S Prayer. No. I mean, AA's it's cultural thing and it changes when you travel through it you'll see it be different in different places and they say different things I sponsor a lot of the pagans in the meeting we're the pagan crew and my advice to them is resign from the goddamn debating society that's what he told me this isn't your program, it's ours you need us, we don't need you he says here pray let's pray I don't give a shit I really don't it's irrelevant your concepts are. I'm not sensitive to them. Nobody was sensitive to mine. He almost hit me. Yeah, a couple times. But we're doing AA now. We're doing AA. This is AA. I was involved in general service and at the area assembly one year this was some years ago, they had this huge debate about whether we should say the Lord's Prayer at the end of the area assembly. Our local area nine area assembly it was really interesting it was i mean people brought up some good stuff and that was i was probably five or six years sober so this was all kind of news to me and i'm watching this debate and i had a specific opinion about this believe it or not and i thought it should not be said i mean it keeps people people are offended by it and you just shouldn't say it you know i mean this is clear to me. And so there was a bunch of guys getting up there stating that position quite eloquently you know then there were guys that were opposed to talk about the tradition of it which is what bill wilson said it's become a tradition it's just a tradition you know it's like relax relax it's not a big deal and they had this big argument and then there was a vote and they voted and it was voted that we would say the prayer but it was very close margin so in general service they let the minority speak again i go this is ridiculous we already solved this problem but you know maybe we'll win so the minority gets up there and spoke about it again and people said some great stuff and they voted again you know and it was still just narrowly passed you know that we're gonna we're going to say the lord's prayer right so at the end of the meeting and this was hot and heavy and it went over like an hour over time you know we're all holding hands and the guy that chose the prayer said the lord spread he's gonna do the serenity prayer and people, the whole place roared at the end of it. And I remember thinking how serious these people were and what a great argument this was and at the End it ended with laughter. It ended with laughter because there are much more important things to discuss than that. And this brings us to a very good question that we didn't answer before but it's a good place and it's probably behind this question too. There was a question do you think AA is a cult? And I'll tell you have I ever thought that first I'll tell you the reason this is a place where through a phenomenon if you read the book things came together they put together a set of surrenders or spiritual exercises that have proved to be almost airtight if you want to overcome the problem of alcoholism I've never seen anyone truly honestly and truly working the 12 steps get drunk. I've seen people have issues and go off on fall in love and stop going to meet but somebody who's really paying the money back, they're really working with others. I just don't see that. There's usually an underlying thing happening so that's what we found right? A miraculous thing happened one day when Ebi Thatcher for some reason, thank God he said this, said to Bill Wilson why don't you choose your own idea of God and then the whole world could come that's why I never give money to those damn people outside of Target, those Christian Brotherhood to help drug addicts? Eh, that's all right. I'll help drug addicts. I'm going to walk right by them. You don't have to be a Christian Brotherhood. So there's this we don't tell you what to believe. We do have structure. We have 12 steps. We don'thave a hierarchy. Does it sometimes feel like a cult? Yes, the inmates are running the asylum. Yeah, you know. Yes, yes. There are meetings where it feels cultish, you know, because if we're sick or help the sick here. And I'll tell you, one day I was in the Monday Night Men's Stag, our home group. It was probably 10 years ago, about eight years sober and they called on me and I was going to tell them Alcoholics Anonymous transformed my life and blah blah and I just wasn't believing that at the moment and I said, you know what? What I think right now is all of you people are completely full of shit and alcohol is harmless. And then I stopped sharing because that's what I believed and I went home and by the time I got home there was a message on my machine from Jay and it said, we are completely full of shit and alcohol is harmless but you can't drink. So where do I go? I've got to go back to the cult. That's my two cents. Well, I shaved my head. No, I think that a couple things and also dovetail with this thing about We are the furthest thing there is from a cult, and I think for us even to give it a laughing assent is as misguided as people calling zealous members of Alcoholics Anonymous Nazis. which is the most, and believe me, I was guilty of this in my sponsor, the first time he heard me say it, just grab me by the, they used to be able to do this to you. They would grab you or they'd pound on your chest. You did it for me too? Yeah, he said, there is nothing further from Alcoholics Anonymous than Nazism. Don't you ever, ever use that. Gee, what do you mean, Greg? But, you know, and he was right. He was right about that. And any time that we use that word to describe a zealous member of Alcoholics Anonymous, usually it's a backhanded compliment and it's something that is so spiritually misguided that I really ask you to please, whenever you hear anybody say it, to just stop them for a second and say, You know what? It's not right. And a cult, the Oxford Group was a cult. The Oxford Group had the leader that could not be questioned, that had a direct and very interesting connection with the power, that people followed him to all kinds of interesting things. And I'm a member, man. I mean, I'm with these guys. But that's a cult. One of the interesting things about it is that it actually survived the death of the leader. In cults, that doesn't happen. In Alcoholics Anonymous, you and I are heir to the most amazing form of democratic representation that has belief in a power as its central fact and is set up in such a way that there cannot be politicking and there cannot been a hierarchy. Because when it goes to the third vote and it's too close, what do we do? We go to the hat. We go the hat how can that possibly work and yet it has and the man who developed that walked away from his creation in 1955 walked away for him and he lived another 14 years walked away from it. So for us even to backhandedly, cutely say oh AA is a cult horrible horrible crime against the spiritual legacy that you and I should be cognizant enjoyers of and if you excuse me one more thing and ifyou haven't been a member of general service yet god damn it do it you need to put your two years in And if you're going to be an AA member, excuse me, rant, you've got to spend two years in H&I. You've got a minimum of two years of general service. If you got sober at the Alano Club, you got to be on the board, which is really tough. Okay? You got to go to the Senate. You got it. You got be involved with the central office. That's eight years you can't drink at all. and then you know that's you only do that after you've been a treasurer and a cleanup person a cop so you can't drink for 12 years that's just it okay thank you so I did not back Henley keeps he called the cult I want to be clear I said does it sometimes feel like a cult yes the inmates are running assignment some groups have made this into a cult they have a leader who cannot be questioned and he's followed completely okay watch out that's not a a okay does Does it sometimes feel like a cult? Yes, it does. Because we are imperfect people that turn this into something else. That's what I say. Special underwear and secret handshakes. And you're absolutely right. Thank you. The biggest difference is here at St. George's School. Well the truth about AA is it is probably the single most significant social movement of the 20th century. David Hawkins I mean this is true I'm not kidding this isn't just a rant there's a lot of people that believe this David Hawkins in his book, Power Versus Force, he says he makes an estimate, however good this is but you tell me if this isn't your experience that probably 50% of the population of North America has been touched by Alcoholics Anonymous that's close to 300 million people there's nothing else that's done that in the 20th century nothing comes even close to it you can't talk to anybody that doesn't have somebody that's in an AA program, and there's close to 300 12-step programs now that have all spun off of Alcoholics Anonymous. There's every kind of 12-stepprogram you can imagine. We were sitting out here earlier today talking about churches. Almost all churches now have scenes like they do, have some sort of a 12-step group they put together that everybody can come to, the overeaters, the gamblers, the sexual problems, whatever it might be. They're all trying to incorporate this because they've seen what's happened. it has changed the face of psychotherapy where the whole concept of group therapy came from is alcoholism so if you look at it like that, you travel around it a little bit you'll hear people say that AA's lost its edge that we've kind of lost something somewhere that we used to have a 75% success rate now it's 5%, this is all bullshit there was never a 75 percent success rate most of the people in the stories in the first edition of the big book got drunk or committed suicide, a couple of them killed themselves I mean, it's hard sobering you assholes up. It doesn't happen very easy. We do this whole presentation where it talks about the slow growth at the beginning and then how it exploded. And right now the way they do the statistics, they have no idea how many members there are. We use the figure 2 million. It could be 4. They say 150,000 groups. It could 300,000. It's definitely not less. If you study, you can download this from our website I've got some cards here. If you send me an email, I'll put you on my little quote list and stuff and I'll give you the website and you can download this information from the website if you want. It's really interesting. When you study how they compile the statistics, the first thing you realize is that they have absolutely no idea how many of us there are. But look at the young people coming into AA now. You know, if it's happened to you... I mean, recovery is accessible at all levels of society for any kind of problem you can imagine. It has grown and exploded on a level that no one's ever seen anything like this before. And that's where you and I are today. Is it a cult? It's a movement. It's an social movement. And it transcends just the not drinking thing. There's a lot of other stuff going on here. And having heard what Bill and Jay just said about the power of this thing and the magnitude of it, who cares if we say the Lord's Prayer at the end? You know, is that what we're going to fight about? are we going to fight about how to be vital and alive so that people keep coming and you know the reason it's not a cult point is we don't come and get you we never come and go you come to us yeah you come with us you know that's what i it's when somebody's yelling at me about working the steps i'm like i'm sorry i thought you asked me to sponsor you and now i'm getting f-bombed on you know so you ever got on a 12-step call and you had the guy tell you how you should you should adjust your approach to him. I've had that experience. I looked at one guy and I go, I'm making this 12-step call, not you! It was Saturday night. He was just lonely. You know, it's like, you call AA, we'll show up. They know that. Did anybody have a question? Are we ready for a fire? All right. And then I asked a friend if he'd play some music for us. would you end us up with a song again just so that we don't do the Lord's Prayer? We're going to lose a member. He's going to sing the Lord'S Prayer, you know? Our Father who art in heaven The Catholic Scripture. I don't know.