The Type 4 Alcoholic Who Only Has Two Alternatives Left – Joe

I don't have to have a drink. And then my schoolmate or somebody is going to visit me and I'm going to fully equate this person with my problems and my deficiencies. I'm gonna make a list of all the people I've hurt or toward whom I felt resentment. I'm goin' to express my entire willingness to approach these individuals admitting my wrong. Never am I to be critical of these people. I'm going to write all such matters To the utmost of my ability Get on the internet Make phone calls Go to any links to find these people To pay this money back To the uttermost of my abilities And now I'm gonna test my thinking By my new God consciousness Common sense will become Uncommon sense I'm Gonna sit quietly when in doubt Which is a fairly consistent state Of consciousness for us and I'm going to ask only for direction and strength to meet my problems as God would have me never am I to pray for myself except as my request bore in being useful to other people then only might I expect to receive but that being great measured and my friend promised when these things were done D-O-N-E now you're going to get some promises not half done It says, I'm going to enter upon a new relationship with my Creator. Those of you who have been sober for a while. A new relationship With your Creator. You would have the elements of a way of living Which will answer all my problems. Plural. Plural, that's plural. All my problems, plural. Belief in the power of God Plus enough willingness, honest humility To establish and maintain the new order of things were the essential requirements. And then they summarize what's going to happen to us in this exciting thing we get to do. Simple but not easy. We all got to pay a price. Here it is. It means destruction of self-centeredness. You don't think they mean destruction of self centeredness? Destruction. it destruction of your self-centeredness. But we're told all the time that we can smash our ego and bring about our own surrender. Oh, just go home and surrender, honey. That makes me feel like when somebody says go home и just don't drink between meetings. Or all I need to do is smash my ego. Holy shit! If we could smash our egos, wouldn't we all be doing better than we are tonight? I'd be ego free. Ego-less. I'd have an ashram in India, you'd all be coming to visit me rather than me coming to Queens to visit you. Just get rid of your defects. Smash your ego. Just surrender. And we must then turn in all things to the Father of Light who presides over us all. I think that's incredible. Now that new man that raised his hand who said he was in his first year go back and when those people ask you if you're willing to go to any link don't you think it would have been kind of nice if they had sat down and gone over some of this with you so you really know what you're answering see I'm not here to soft sell the program of Alcoholics Anonymous as outlined in the big book you drink enough whiskey this seems like a fairly easy set of propositions but if maybe you haven't drank enough whiskey and you still want to run your life on self-will, they may seem fairly drastic. But I think it's important that when you're going to sit down and take someone through this process or they ask you to be a sponsor that you be very clear with them what this looks like. Take about 20 minutes. Get real clear. Turn to page 58. Go through these steps. Talk about these three inventories. Talk about this third step decision. Let them understand from that point on their life's not their own business even if they think it is. Talk about this fifth step. You're going to sit down, we're going over all this stuff. You know your deepest, darkest secrets. Of course, their sphincter is going to start twitching then. You know that's what 12-step calls used to be? 12-stepped calls used to be people going out, usually with a bottle of whiskey in their back pocket to meet a drunk and lay out the program of Alcoholics Anonymous. Now it's a big deal to drive across town to pick somebody up to drop them off at a detox place and they're really an addict, pump them full of alcohol and tell them to go in and start their recovery that demands rigorous honesty based on a fundamental lie because they don't cover drug addiction and let them start their recover based on the lie that they're an alcoholic. That's a 12-step call nowadays. So you get... Sorry. You get done. he and I work well like Cheech and Chong, you know what I mean so I think it's important that we have a sense of what this means am I willing to go to LinkedIn when I went let me say it this way when I got taken through the steps again this year I had to sit with that stuff my life is pretty good today and i'll tell you something else i'm a little bit awake i'm not uh naive to what's going to happen through the process of the steps i had to sit with this a littlebit why do i say that because this has happened to me before and i wound up living in another state working doing a whole other job and didn't know a single human being that's why because i know if i go back through this again most of the belief systems i'm operating on taking action on are all going to get smashed and destroyed i know you can't pour old wine into new skin i know that what i've been doing 10 11 is going to get shaky i know i'm going to be real real uncomfortable i don't know what's going to happen my life is good you know when i went through the work 13 years sober i was in santa monica i had uh five years in denver colorado from 82 to 87 10 years in los Angeles from 87 to 97, and five years in northern India. If somebody would have said to me the last time I went through the work before India that any lengths was going to mean and describe what would go on in my life for the next five years, I would have had some considerations to make. If somebody were to have said my fourth or fifth time through the Work in Denver that I was going leave Denver, move out of his house, sponsors down the street, service commitment serving on the areas committee and that i was going to be moved to california this is what i was gonna be doing the next ten years i would have had some considerations so as far as those of you that want to lay out the assignments that i would give somebody i know mark does the same thing first thing i would given and i don't tell them how to say the set aside prayer anymore my sponsor pulled a joke on me not too long ago when i called him last time i called You can imagine this one, Matthew. He said, and I thought he was being serious. He said you know you stuck me with something son that I've been blamed for for a long time and I though some horrible thing I did in Denver or something and I said what? And he said the set aside prayer. Because to me the set side from him it was a comment to a maniac that he heard share his experience and he said my God son you know enough about yourself alcoholism and how you feel to be dangerous to yourself and everybody around you, why don't you just say a prayer for an open mind and a new experience? That's where that prayer came from. He hates that. We've ritualized it, formalized it. It's in the workbook. It's written out. I just say to people, please, are you here for a new experience with the steps? Yeah. Try a prayer in your own words, in your way, to whatever you believe in. Krishna, Mohammed Christ whatever you believe in say this prayer put aside what I think I know for an open mind and a new experience 99.9% of the time when they come back in a week or so those get this one those with first step reservations that are going to come out in a little bit they will have changed the set aside prayer to this they even did it in this damn workbook from Santa Monica They'll change it to this. Dear God, please help me set aside everything I think I know. All of a sudden, God's the helper and I'm the one that's going to set the stuff aside. Old Dan, Dan Sherman's changed it into Dear God enable me. Now God's an enabler. God's a dysfunctional enabeler. Gandhi has an eating disorder. right and dear god enable me to set aside everything i think i know no no no no no god's not just a little help of your pull out of the closet you know when you need a little health with the stuff that's getting a little rough just say to whatever you believe in please set aside what I think I know for an open mind and a new experience and whatever you want to put there in the middle say it from your heart about this this day was ever in your heart that time say it in the morning say it during the day when it comes to you say it at night say it when you sit down to work on whatever assignment you're working on so I give people some sort of prayer to do from their heart then the four questions is this work what I want to do Don Coy is the Native American teacher I had who's 30 30 years sober now I think he always said even the first time. He always said two things that have always stuck with me. If you're doing the work for the first time, enjoy it because you'll never do the work from the first time ever again and you'll never do it without power. You know when you're doing the first work the first time? This is a long way back for me to remember but I do remember this. Remember when you were doing the work the first time and you're just getting enough from each step to just barely do the next? you've gotten the first column out, you've got in the second column out and you just got enough to be able to do the third column. And then when you're done with the third, I've always said this, there's a miracle at each step, but the real miracle is when you are in the action of the next. And then he would also say with the question, is this work what I want to do? It somehow involves the ego that's right there, that's currently there in the process of doing it and quells it a little bit because answering the question is this, work what I want to do involves the ego to the point where the ego will be involved in you starting the process and it'll get smashed. It'll think it's a part of it because it helped you decide is this work what i want to do? Your ego will get right behind it. Yeah, this works what i want to do. Are you willing to go to any length and i don't think whether it's the first time or the umpteenth time you ought to add something to that even though i might not know what any length might look like I don't think when they say any length they mean any length that I can currently dream up at this time I think when They Say Any Length they could possibly mean any length and I always thought that meant I'm not going to be asked to do anything out of the parameters of the first 164 pages then you're stuck you're worshiping the book God is everything or He's nothing and that spiritual stuff that's outside the program, that's how you're referred to it. I don't see inside-outside anymore because I'm not inside-outside. You're either living a spiritual life and everything you do is spiritual or you're not living a spirit or you live a spiritual life and everything you do isn't spiritual. What are we like? What are мы like? The minor stream and somewhere out there in the city is the mainstream and this is the unreal world and now I'm functioning. Let me tell you this, if that's the real world out there and you all know it a lot better than a lot of other people in this country, if that is the real word out there, I don't want to be a part of it. But we are. They ain't separate. Is this work what I want to do? Am I willing to go at any length though I might not know what that might look like? Then the most important is why do I want to do this work? Do you think if somebody came to Mark Houston after answering the third question and said, I want to do the work to get my wife back. Get everything straightened out and feel better. He'd say, time's up. Because he uses a timer and he's a busy man, right? People call him and he said, you got three minutes, timer set, go. Why do you want to do this work? I don't want to give it away but for me if it doesn't have a little something to do with life and death you might want to go somewhere else for people that can You know, there's people that can help alcoholics. I'm not one of them. Let me say this. This will get you to think. I do not look for people I can help anymore. I used to think that's our job, isn't it? We're supposed to go out there and look for alkeys that we can help. You know what you end up with? Hard drinkers that a human power can help You know who I look for? I look from mad dogs that nobody can help and I point them to that which already is helping them and they don't even know it. I point them to God. I quit helping people. It takes such a strain off you sponsors that feel so overwhelmed by all your pigeons, babies, protégés or whatever demeaning name that you currently call them call and tell you about. Just point them toward God. Is it working? Keep doing it. Is it not working? Try this. But point them towards God. Be a pointer. But don't be a sponsor that points them this way because then all you're doing is collecting dependents. You can claim on your income tax to God. Your spiritual... How many dependents do you have? 17. Consider this one. I gave this one to my friend that I'm helping with the work right now. I used to also believe that too, Chris. I can take people through the work. Holy shit, I must have thought I had a lot of power. what I have now I don't have protégés I don' t have babies I don''t have sponsees I have friends that I watch see God we do it together I'm a human I'm right there with them you're fucked up I'm fucked up you did that I did that let me tell you what I did when I was 15 years sober right my sponsor accuses me of being crazy sometimes when I told him how I ended up going to India he said how could you not how many people ever get an invitation like that But I've had some times where I was just a little bit off track, you know. What are you doing out there in California with that kind of lifestyle you're living? I remind him, and this is going to be said, this is gonna be said. It's gonna finally be said so when you meet him, you can ask him, right? My sponsor, Don Pritz, when he was seven years sober, moved to South Utah, married a Mormon woman, got a second wife. They all lived together. he was taught by the saucer man how to call the saucers of John Smith and make it appear and he would take groups out into the desert and call the sorcerer that John Smith is in seven years sober having done the work. He took groups on the desert to call The Saucer of John Smith and then he had what he calls his desert experience and left those two wives and came back to Alcoholics Anonymous. Now, don't tell me going to India was crazy. So, is this work what you want to do? Do you really want to go to India? Do you want the 10 steps to be able to do this work? I had a couple of times. I haven't been through the work in two years until I asked Mark in March. A couple of time I decided, no, now's not the time. To have the freedom and the grace and the power to beable to do it. That's what the 10 Steps are about. Because if you've done the work before, you're not doing the work by yourself without power. You're doing the work with power, using 10 and 11 to do 1 through 9. We learned about that from Don Coyus and Don Pritz and all of our heroes. You're using 10, 11, and 12 to do 1 through nine. You're deciding proper use of the will. Is this work what I want to do again? If you've ever gotten past your first set of amends I'm only talking to two or three of you in the room. I saw you when your hands went up. Everyone else? You're halfway through a minute, three-fourths. You live in Texas. You live в New Jersey. I don't give a shit. You live у Harlem. You've had a spiritual awakening as a result of one through nine and a half. This could be amazing, but you haven't had a spiritуal awakening as the result of the steps. The twelfth step tells you. What's the other question? Is this work what I want to do? Am I willing to go to any length, though I might not know what that would look like? Why do I want tо do this work? And why with me? Because when you leave my house, the kind of people that come to my house that's what I'm going to ask myself. Why me? They better have a good reason why they've asked me. You're famous. Celebrity. Tapes. Fuck you. Get out of here. Right? Why? Why me. And what areas are you currently being dishonest about in your life? With yourself and with others. and look at every area of your life. IRS, you're giving your employer a pair of days' work. Relationship, significant other relationship, relationship with yourself, your physical body, your emotional state, your mental state, whatever it is you're being dishonest with yourself and others. You know, it's funny. I was doing our laughing the other day. The consciousness says, let's take this back to the steps again. But you and I were laughing because what's happened as a result of that, when that begins to come up, we both kind of begin to suffer from PTSD. I mean, we were living in Denver with a great life and begin to go back to the work, and the next thing he knows, he's out in Los Angeles, right? And that kind of deal is going on. And I wind up in Texas, and then I've lived in four places in Texas and jobs start and jobs end. And I don't know if he's thought about this, but he had begun the process of going through the steps and then ultimately winds up down in India, which is, that's a little jaunt. He's down there, and I think what maybe two years ago started the steps again And now here he is sitting in Queens, and he's not in India anymore So so when we sit down and answer these questions We really like to sit with him for a little bit because we have a lot of experience what that could truly mean is at somewhere in the middle of these steps I could be in the other side of the continent and And we know that today. And the ego will want to answer them right away. Sure, I want to do the work. Then you've just shut off. Here's the deal. If you're posed with a question and you answer it right away, you've stopped any experience you can have with the question because you've already gone to what you already know. Sit with the questions. Let the experience come. Don't answer it. Don't ask for it rightaway. Give yourself and always look at every question that we're going to pose at the first three steps that are these first four ones. Look at a question as a coin. Every question has two sides. Those that have been around for a while, you will get much more benefit like from the first question. Is this work what I want to do? Don't answer it. Look at maybe I don't. Am I willing to go to any length to do this work again? Maybe I'm not. That's how you look at a question like a coin does your experience abundantly confirm that once you put alcohol in your system something happens which makes it virtually impossible for you to stop sure then you're done with the experience of it you've stopped the experience by the answer and that goes so much against the way we've been programmed the answer stops the experience the consideration Mark should talk now about three types of people that approach the work Yeah, I want a couple of the comments on you approach the work. Those of you that know Chris R., walk up and ask him about the changes in his life as a result of reworking the steps. Walk up and Ask Mike Lawrence about his life. You know, I'm telling you, ignorance is bliss sometimes. But there's probably reasons in the big book why they tell you, you know, you really ought to consider this or why prior to the third step they say you really need to think about this, making sure you are ready. Making sure you're ready. It's one thing to say you want to go back through the process again and experience a revolutionary spiritual experience when you don't have a car and your life's upside down. It's a whole other deal. Maybe when your life... You know, there's a line which I think sums this all up and which at times will kill us. We become victims of the delusion that we will be happy and satisfied if we only manage well, meaning do we think we know what our life should look like, who should be in it, where we should live, where мы should work, et cetera, et cetera. And that has descended on me many times in my sobriety, And I've suffered the consequences of that. A guy from Denver moves to L.A. I'm 12 years sober. I put myself in a position in my own home group where a heavyweight moves from Denver to L,A. Now all of a sudden he's the only one I can go to qualified to take Joe Hawk through the work. Whoa! Right? Mark had already been the one that told me after I was there two years when I had an inventory and I said to Mark, Don Pritz is the only person that can hear this inventory. Mark said, how many years have you been in Santa Monica? I said two. He said, where does Don Prits live? I said Denver. He said could Don Prit's die at any time? I said yes. He said what if something happens to Don? You better let some people get to know you where you live. And I had done many fifth steps with people in Santa Monica in my home group and with women. If you're a man and you miss the experience of ever fifth stepping with a woman you've missed it. If you're a woman and you've missed the experience of fist-stepping with a man, we're going to get into that later too. Multiple fist-steps. The book says it. So he moves from Denver to L.A. I go right to him. I got to do one through nine. He said great. He said let's go to the liquor store. I said cool. I thought we were going to go to the liquor store. He said no, no, right here in my living room. I said cool. He said okay, you're 12 years sober, He took me right there. I was there. I said, you know, I'm not feeling much at all. I'm a little bored. It ain't too exciting and it ain't Too Depressing. You know, that's the place I hate. I can handle severe depression and I can handle mania, but don't give me a mediocre day 12 years old. Don't give Me Mediocre. I've got to be doing something. I'm taking people through the work. I'm speaking all over the country. I'm controversial, right? It's a mediocre day. I just pulled up to a liquor store, 12 years sober. He says, how does it feel? I said, blasé. He said, walk in. He said where is your wall? He said is your walls brown or is it clear? I said my wall is clear. It's vodka. He said what kind do you want? I said citronelle. I heard about it. It's flavored vodka. They didn't have it 20 years ago. I got to have some because I drink kamikazes. I drink vodka. And I heard there's some new vodka that's flavored already. Give me some orange whatever it is, Stoli. He said, what size did you buy? I said, a liter. He said you didn't buy a half pint? I said what the hell is a half pipe? I hadn't had a half pine since I was, unless it's all I got, you know. I hadn' t had a beer since I 17, unless I had to. He said I bought a liter, he said now you're buying it? Yep. You're out in the car? Yep. How does it feel? Nah, not much. Nobody's going to know. He said, now tell me where that first leader would take you. I started into this long, elaborate story like you'd tell at one of these nauseating, like Chris Warr story meetings. I had a big, elaborate idea of where that First Leader would take me. The man laughed in my face. He said you better go home and pray about that. Come back next week, same time. I woke up one more... Have you ever woken up laughing? I know you have. Have you every wokenup laughing at yourself? I woke up one morning laughing at myself and I realized you know what I don't have a clue where that first leader would take me maybe nothing would happen what if the grace of God protected me from the physical craving God's everything oh he wouldn't be there for that we're going to talk about that this weekend too what if nothing happened just get drunk, come back tomorrow I don' t need to tell anybody just show up at a meeting I'm still 12 years sober maybe I'm dead the next morning Maybe I'm in Tijuana. Maybe I am calling him. Maybe I is banging on a treatment center door. I don't have a clue where that first leader would take me. I went back and I told him and he said good. Then he gave me one of these questions I thought along the lines of these four questions we have been talking about. I thought it was a Denver trick question. And a Denver Trick question goes like this. If you say you are willing you probably won't have to. But if you say your not you probably have to." So here was the question. Would you be willing to quit working with people and speaking or sharing anywhere until you're done with your next set of amends? And he got up and he went in the bathroom. And I thought to myself, okay, he's from Denver. If I say I'm willing, I won't have to. But if I have any resistance at all, then he'll say that I better. So then my mind went off. He stayed in the bedroom long enough for me to realize if I wasn't willing to put that stuff aside, I was going to drink. because you know what my mind started saying? What will happen to those poor people that I sponsor? How can I not carry the message? Because I think working with others and carrying the message once again are things that keep me sober. He came out, I said, yeah, you know, I just watched what went on in my mind. I'm willing to do that. He said, okay. It wasn't a trick question. He said quit working with people and don't speak and don' t share until you are done with this next piece of work through amends we both knew it would only be a few months and he didn' t want me to quit doing that stuff to quit do' n that stuff he wanted me to quit doin' that stuff to see the subtle shift that I had turned those things into and you know what I had turn those things into you know how all of you that do what' s in the big book make fun of those people that don' T do what' S in the Big Book because they got their own little list of illusions I just don' d drink I go to meetings 90 meetings and 90 days. I choose not to drink, but your ego is so slick. You got a neat, shiny, bright, cool sounding list of new things. I read the book. I work with others. I take others through the work. I worked the steps and he wanted me to see that I had turned those things into my little list of what I do to keep myself sober rather than what you and I get to do to seek that which is already keeping us sober. And it's a big shift. It's a Big Shift because I had my little list, 12 years sober, of what I do to keep myself from pulling up to that liquor store. Think about it. And I came back to those two things with a new attitude and a new appreciation. So the first step, you answer those questions and then you begin the path that Joe's talking about. Look in the big book from the doctor's opinion of page 23, 33 pages designed to answer one question. The issue of if I take a drink of alcohol, can I control? Those of you who have experience with both alcohol and drugs, look at both. Look at them separately. 33 pages. This is how intelligent we are. 33 pages are designed to answer one questions. Mark, when you take a Drink, you have power, choice control over how much you drink every time, yes or no. And I got to spend 33 pages to answer that because unbeknownst to me there's a part of me finding every reason in the world why I do not want to answer that question in a particular way. Do you lose power choice and control over alcohol, Mark, when you take a drink? 33 pages. By the way, the mind that brought you to AA the mind that has you sitting here tonight at times that has you paralyze with fear. The mind, the internal judge, it's that quote, if you said to me what I said to you, I'd have to kill you. That mind is not the organ that we're going to go into to have a revolutionary spiritual experience. You can't use mind to overcome mind. Your self-will cannot eliminate your self-willed. Can I talk about a couple of things before we go any deeper into step one that I think... I'll give you an example. I was telling this to Mark yesterday. I was in Dallas for five months with Mark. March, April, May, June, July. Twelve people asked me to take him through the work. I gave twelve people the assignment we've been talking about. Just a simple prayer for an open-minded and new experience and the five questions. One out of four people went any further than that first assignment. Weed the people that don't want to do the work out before you waste any time. The book is real clear. If they don't like what you have to offer, let them go because you might spoil a later chance. We've all known people. Some of you in this room needed to drink again. Drinking again was a great thing for you. So there's another couple things. I want to talk about the difference between those of you who are in this group and those of the people in the room that have been in, and as we have, I want to talk about the difference between the grace of God and a conscious contact. A guy comes to me with 26 years. He had met Don Pritz and Gary Brown and Paul Martin at a thing in Nashville, Tennessee called the Music City Roundup. We had a small meeting up in the room. He heard something he'd never heard in 26 years I was there. We get back to L.A., I'm the one he's stuck with. I'm not the one he wanted to ask. I'm just the only one that does this work this way in L.A. at that time that he knew. He would rather have asked Don or Gary or Paul. He gets stuck with me. It was a blessing. Give him a prayer. Open mind, new experience. He calls me back in a couple weeks. He says, Joe, I have a serious problem. I said, I know you do. What do you think it is? Don't let old comers scare you. Care about them enough so they don't have to keep dying. I said, I know you've got a problem. What do you think it is? He says, for 26 years I've been in the grace of God. I said obviously. If you're an alcoholic and you're not drinking, you're in the Grace of God! He said, I've seen it in my life, every area of my life. I've sat with it. I've realized it. I've be in the Grace of God for 26 Years. Why do I need to do the work? I said you better pray about it. I made it six months in grace. And a lady in my home group once said this, because the big slogan... You know how every area has kind of their own set of other slogans? I heard there's one. I think Bob told me one time that one of the slogans up where he lives is, keep it green. And I said, what is that? Has that got something to do with your lawn in Westchester County or your garden or something? You know, he said, keep the memory fresh. I said but it says here that the memory of even a week or a month ago. They've got a couple in Texas I heard. Do the next right thing. That assumes I've got the power to do the next right thing. The knowledge of what the next right thing is, right? So what was the one I was thinking? When I moved to L.A., one of the big slogans in South Central was the grace of God is sufficient. It wasn't for this man after 26 years. He starts praying about why does he need to do the work if you're in grace? He calls me back and he said can I come over? I said sure. He came over and he says I know why I need to do the work. He said, I'm an alcoholic and I would like to have a conscious contact with that which has been giving me this grace for 26 years. And when he got on the other side of his first set of amends in 26 years plus his whole life, Clint H., he talks about it all over the country. Wonderful man. The people he's been able to touch with time that I couldn't have had any effect on. It's been amazing. He said the difference between the grace of God and a conscious contact was like night and day. And I think another important thing before you start the first step is to realize this. I've never said this to Mark, but he knows it in his heart. It doesn't start with the first steps. And I'm not talking about the pre-step one or step zero stuff we've been going over. It never started for you with step one. You know where it started for you? It started with you from someone across the room from step 12. Imagine in your first meeting if nobody had gotten past step 1. That's why people in treatment can't help other people in treatement. It never started for me with step 1 I thought for a long time I would have told him six months ago if he said, where did it begin for you I would probably have said step 0 but it only took six months to get out of step 0 and then it started with step one. It didn't start with step 1. It started with the twelfth step in another man's heart who cared. Another place I'd like to look at before we start one is this. We don't need to read it, but in one of the most unread chapters, the chapter to the wives, why do I need to reading it? I've never had one. I'm going to have one really soon. God told me. But I'm reading the chapter of the wives in that guy over there from Texas, his brother's group. And I had an awakening. And in that chapter, we don't need to read it word for word. It says this. There's four types of alcoholics. It says type 1 may or may not even be alcoholic. Type 2 has begun to get in a little bit of trouble. Type 2 is a littlebit worse. Type 3 is a littelbit worse Type 4, screwed. We think that only has to do with two things. They can't control it when they start and they can't keep themselves stopped. But the interesting paradox is who do they say has a better chance at AA? Wouldn't you think like one or two? They say type 4 has a greater chance at our program than the type that still have. You know why? Because those other types still have more than two alternatives. Type 4 is down to 2. So I'd like you all somewhere at the beginning of the work to look at what type are you. Then I'd Like You To Answer This Question. We had a nifty time, your brother and I, with this one. If there are four types of alcoholics described in our book and they're all around us in AA, what message would each type bring to the fellowship of Alcoholics Anonymous? And then you're going to see why you hear so many different messages. Type 1, hey, I just don't drink no matter what. I found everything I ever wanted in the fellowship. I quit drinking. My life just got better and better. Type 1 may or may not be alcoholic. Not our place to say. They need to find out. Doesn't matter what we think. Type 2, what would be their message? Well, you know, I go to lots of meetings. I'm a meeting maker. Meeting makers make it. I do a little of this. I call my sponsor every day. 90 meetings in 90 days. I dump. I get better. Type 3. I don't want to offend anybody. Type 3, 1 through 9 and a half, 1 through nine and three quarters, 1 through none and three eights, never finish amends, think they've been through the steps, everything's hunky-dory, they've bent through the 12 steps and they've had a spiritual awakening as a result of the steps and they're in delusion. Denial. Denial or what? Denial of alcoholism? How could they be? They're a type 3. They're in the denial of the grace of God. A form of denial that I don't hear any of you talking about in AA. A form OF denial stronger than the denial I came here with because I didn't have many alternatives left and I didn' t have a lot of denial when I got here, but I've suffered from this denial in AA, the denial of the grace of God taking the credit and thinking those unfinished amends don't have nothing to do with alcohol because you're taking the crédit, you're keeping yourself from drinking or you're blaming God on your unfinished amens, But we don't need to go into that. Type number four came, got worse. Just because he quit drinking, he didn't get better. One through nine once, didn't work. It worked. They hit another wall. Harry Tebow's theory. For Harry Tebo it was just a theory. For me it was a reality. The ego rebuilds itself if you're an alcoholic of my type. Maybe I'm the only type four in the room. Maybe Mark. Maybe Mark's a type 3 and 3 quarters, right? Maybe I'm the only type 4. No, I don't think so. I don' t think so I think there are some other type 4s. So look in the chapter of the wives. What type are you? Because Mark killed me with this. Type 4s can't do type 2 work. What type are you and which type what message would each type bring to AA? And if your life's on the line and you're a type 4 you better go to a type 4. And you better know the lineage you're joining. What if you ask somebody to be your sponsor? You know your life's on the line and everyone they've ever worked with has drank again. Because there's a difference between knowing the message, having done the work. There's a third component. Not everybody that's done the Work is meant to transmit it. Does our book talk about transmission? Yes, it does. Yes, It does. And not everybody that has done the Werk is meantto transmit the message. Transmission is a variant Look at the people around them they've worked with Look at their results they're getting What type are you? What message would each type bring to AA? And who are you going to go to? Let's take a 15 minute break five minutes more we're going to go uh this evening and that'll shut things down a few other uh a few Other Things That Came To My Consciousness I'll Call Them Traps In Their Own Way Here's One One, God keeps me sober. Why is that a trap? If there's nothing but God, there can be no God and is God a part of staying sober? Of course. But what is the trap in the belief system God keeps Me sober? The trap is this, if that were true, the big book would be one page and it would have five words on it, God keeps you sober, have a good life. unfortunately that is not what it says there's 30 pages that really really ask us to do a bunch of written work there are several considerations prior to the written work when the written works over we sit down and do a fifth step when we're done with that we identify a list of defects of character which have sprung out of a life based on self will We then ask God to take all of us, good and bad, assets and liabilities, if you will. We then make a list of all the people we had harmed as a result of being asleep, dreaming we're awake, driven by self-will, feeling separate and alienated from everybody and everything, which, by the way, leads to continuation and fostering of self-willed, that sense of separation. Then you make those amends and you pay all that money back and you begin to work with the disciplines of 10 and 11. And then the book is very clear at that point in time that you and I now drink alcohol one day at a time based on one thing and one thing only, which is called a fit spiritual condition. And you andI are given a daily repeat contingent on that fit spiritual conditon. We did the work and took the action in the first nine steps. and then 10 and 11 is very, very clear and it has very strict spiritual disciplines about how we maintain that fit spiritual condition. So a question maybe for some of you to ask yourself if you're not working with the disciplines of the 10th and 11th step, you might have fallen prey to that belief system because my experience is God will not do for me what I am supposed to do for myself. And I'm the one that has to get my feet on the floor in the morning. And I'm the one that has to read pages 84 through 88 and work with whatever meditation books consciousness has sent my way. And I am the one who has to sit in the silence, be still and know that I am God. And I have to sit and know that I'm not the one who has the one who has worked with the ten-step tools all during the course of the day. I get to do that. Pause, agitated and doubtful. Watch, ask, turn, cease fighting, sixth sense, vision, thy will, line of the will. Work with that all day long. conscious awareness of that, then I get to do an evening review and I get the dovetail the evening review into corrective measures for the next day. And that's how if I do these things, then the problem has been removed and I remain in a position of neutrality. So it's another trap. I fell for it. Who wouldn't? That's an easier, softer way, isn't it? God keeps me sober. I'm just going to a meeting. Right? That's the easier, soft way. I'll bet you every one of you in here has had periods of time where you've operated off that belief system versus the work of the strict spiritual disciplines. And so, I just see it as another trap that you can fall into. I've fallen into it. And if I have, I'll be able to do it. I'll get you. You have as well. It took me a long time to understand that when God is not responsible for my fit spiritual condition. God is everything. What isn't God? What isn'T God's will? But there are these disciplines I have to follow based on my experience to remain in a position of neutrality, fit spiritual condition. What does that look like? Am I willing to do that? Do I like the effect produced by doing that? I'll tell you a little story. The big book says, Joe and I were doing a lot of stuff, what I'll call preliminary to step one, which I believe is essential. And I believe if we did more of it, we probably would have more people move through amends and work with 1011 and 12. But the story goes like this. One day, a pal of mine, he's out hunting. He likes to hunt. And this dog shows up, bird dog. and he's out shooting ducks and the first time he shoots a duck and goes in the water, to his amazement this duck walked across the water and retrieved that duck. And he shot two more that day and that dog did the same thing and it was just blowing his mind. He's an AA and used to miracles so he thought, my God, this is incredible, a dog that walks on water. So he took the dog back home and you know, that kind of stuff. Well, he happened to live next door to an alcoholic who was still drinking who also liked to hunt. So the alcoholic stumbled over that night and he said, you know, are you going hunting tomorrow, Dale? And Dale said, yeah, I'm going hunting. And he said I'd like to go eat. And he says okay. So the next day, Dale and the drunk, they get in their truck and they go out to the duck blind. They got the dog there. Dale just can't contain himself. You know, he just can'T wait to see what this drunk is going to see when he watches his dog go out across water, right? And so the first bird comes along, and Dale pops that bird. And sure enough, that dog just walked across the water and retrieved it. And so they shot about six or ten ducks, and that dog did that every time. And this drunk didn't say one word. And he's drinking beer, and Dave's just looking at him. That dog's just walking across the river. He's walking across in the water, bringing them ducks back. Finally, Dale couldn't contain himself anymore. He turns to the drunk, and he says, Do you notice anything strange about that dog? And that drunk looked at him and he goes, you know what I have? He said, you don't know the poor thing can't swim? That's the mind I brought to Alcoholics Anonymous. I'm going to go into that mind to solve my problems and to live my life. Probably not a good place to go. Another book talks about, says you'll be known by the renewing of the mind and in the doc's opinion we talk about a psychic change. Someone asked me something outside. This has to do with willingness. I want to talk about this a minute. Life and death, see? If you're in this room and you've lost the connection between to drink is to die, if you have lost this concept, this idea that this is not life and death you're going to take an easier, softer way. Ladies and gentlemen, this is life and that. Why is this important? to not lose this connection that what we're talking about is life and death. Because it gets very, very important as you begin to get moved through the course of action the big book is going to ask you to take faced with writing three inventories or dying an alcoholic death. Let me think about that a minute. You understand? Obviously, we've been talking about amends and it isn't just unfinished amends. There's some of you not working, probably not doing much with the disciplines of 10 and 11. There's probably some of you that haven't taken anyone through the big book in a while. You know, there's probably some ofyou that haven' t written inventory in quite some time. And it's called, well, what is that all about? And my experience, my personal experience with that is I forgot that this is life and death. See, it's like this. Let's see. I can make all my amends for dying alcoholic death. Let me think. So you walk up to a normal person who doesn't have our illness and say, look, they want me to write these three inventories in AA. They're going to take a little bit of time. And you know, it's a resentment inventory, a fear inventory, and a sex inventory. Or they want Me to make these amends. There's 100 of them I've got to pay. And I can either do this or die an alcoholic death. What do you think I ought to do? They'd just say, get away from Me because you obviously are dumb as a rock. But you see what we do? And what does this take us back to again? This takes us back to surrender during the course of this week and I want to talk about this line in the book about being convinced to my innermost self in two ways. One has to do with my relationship with alcohol, a craving of the body, an obsession of the mind, and a spirituality. But I also want to take a look at how I want us to talk about this in relationship to self-will. Am I convinced to me innermOST self that living a life drunk or sober, regardless of how long I'm sober based on self-willed, cannot and will not work? And I'm going to talk more more about that. You know, Joe, those of you who ever showed up and I think Joe and I have done, we seem to always take a lot of time looking at the first step. And the reason is it's the foundation of the spiritual arch to which you walk a free man and a free woman. That's why one-third of the big book is devoted to the considerations of the first steps. Are you a real alcoholic? Are you that person on page 21 that you've lost the power of choice. That sober, the most insane thing you will ever do, you will do sober. Those of you that said you had the power or choice, I work with... I don't know if there's such a thing as reincarnation. But I just have to assume if there is in the last lifetime, I must not have been a very good man and I say that because I get to sponsor Conk Relapsers. And their four favorite words are I know and yes but. They know everything, you know, about everything. And I love to ask them this question. Were you involved in your last relapse? And every time, without exception, they tell me they were. And I ask them where they got that idea. And they'll say, what are you talking about? I say, where are you getting the idea that you are involved with your relapses? I said do you believe that you're involved in choosing to drink and they'll go well yeah and I'll say have you ever looked at the big book pages 23 to 43 do you not understand that if you're a real alcoholic you've lost the power of choice and the most insane thing you'll ever do you'll do it from a state of consciousness called sobriety and that is that there will come a time when you'll have no effective mental defense against the first drink, your mind will say, let's take a drink. And if something doesn't stand between you and that, you'll go drink. They've never understood that. See, that's called losing the power of choice. And I'm very, very clear on that piece. See, I don't have the luxury of not staying in fit spiritual condition even one day because that day I believe a guy like me is rolling craps. Now, I don't do what I do out of fear. I do it out of love because I like the effect produced by conscious contact with God. I do this for the same reason I drink. I like to do it for the sake of God. I like what I like, the effect introduced by alcohol. I do what i do with these disciplines because i love the effect produced by conscious contact with that which created me. That sense of separation is now gone from me. But this is life or death. This is not some little flu we got. It's going to go away. A little pill or a little bit of time or those kinds of things. So those are some things that I wanted to talk about. Ask yourself, have you been caught up in this belief system of God keeps me sober? The big book says, This is Fifth Spiritual Condition, Mark. Daily refree based on this. By the way, it says this is what you do. This is how you do this thing. So we've talked about those questions and those considerations. We've talked abut willing to go to any length and I think we have a much greater picture for all of us of what that looks like. Then you start looking at the first step. 33 pages to look at this issue of when I take a drink, Do I lose power, choice, and control? And by the way, use your experience to answer the questions out of the big book. Don't pay any attention to what your mind tells you. That's the same mind that has you doing insane things sober. So go into your experience to answer some of the questions in the big books and there are many questions and considerations in there. Let your experience tell you what happens when you take a drink. Do you lose power or choice or control? For those of you who do drugs What is your experience? When you do drugs, do you lose power, choice and control? You crackheads When you get a crack pipe And you got about nine hits And you're doing that first one Because you love the bouquet Ask yourself this question Based on your experience Do you lose control over how many you do? Pages 23 to 43 I believe based on my experience. Probably the least read and least understood pages in the book. Here's why this is important. If you do not understand 23 to 43, the rest of your time in AA... Joe brought up a great point of the four kinds of alcoholics and what are the messages. If you don't have a deep experience with 23 through 43, the rest of your time in Alcoholics Anonymous will look much different than mine, I can assure you. Because I'm a type 4. I'm an hopeless, helpless, chronic alcoholic who was a daily drinker. A daily drink. 24-7. That's what I did. You got in my way, you were gone. Period. End of statement. Alcohol was my master. I worshipped at the throne of alcohol. I may as well have had an altar God the truth of this hit me one day sober and I tell you what I wept like a baby about to hold that alcohol out over me I mayaswell have had an altar and knelt at that altar and say alcohol you do with me as you will cause you do cause you're more important to me than anything in my life anything in My life and I will serve you See? I'm here to serve you. And the unacceptability of that, to this day, is a piece of why I'm sitting up here. I got tired of worshiping at that altar. And it's an altar. And don't think any different. Every alcoholic I've known, to me there's only two gods. One's either alcohol and the other's the God of your understanding that you're going to serve. And that becomes that. But pages 23 to 43, I beg all of you, go back in with an open mind and read those. Read those pages. Look at your experience. To be convinced of what? That the truth is none of us in this room, unless we're in fit spiritual condition, have a clue what the day looks like when our mind's going to take us back to a drink. And there ain't nothing between us and that. There's no choice. There's nothing. and it's contained in those pages. And the sense of helplessness and hopelessness behind the realization of that is summed up. They describe, for those of you who think your mind can do anything about a drink or your beliefs, they describe in those papers something called a strange mental blank spot. And in a strange mental blank spot Every reason you have for not taking the drink Is unavailable to you Including your belief in God And if you don't experience That in fact you've been there Probably several times And by the way This is a place we get to experience sober Why would you seek power? Why would you need to work these steps? You follow me? See, I found myself in those pages. I was at the bottom of page 43. Once more, Mark, at certain times. That's the crapshoot. Mark, it's certain times I don't know what the time looks like. Mark has no effective mental defense against the first drink. Sober. They're talking to me sober, right? Mark's defense must. It doesn't say maybe. It says, must come from a power greater than himself. And my experience abundantly, abundantly confirmed this. That sentence and that experience with those pages took me from being an atheist to a seeker of God. Or let me say it another way. A seekerof the power behind the name. Not interested in the name, the name has been misused and overused and conjures up all kinds of belief systems. We're the kind of people, the name isn't important. See, Joe and I are sitting up here because of the name Stoli Vodka. We drank a lot of what was in that bottle. So I'm not interested in the name God, but I'm real interested in the power behind the name and having experience with that. And there's the question. Are you more interested in conception or consciousness? We talked about four types. We're going to find out it's good to look at, but it's not the major point in the first step. We're gonna start talking tomorrow about taking all the drama, all the trouble, the length of time, the amount. We're even gonna find where it says that hard drinkers could actually be worse than a real alcoholic. We're only gonna focus on two things. can you control it once you start and can you keep yourself stopped once you stop I brought up those four types of alcoholics because the book does to help you see why there's four types of messages in the program and if you don't know this it's going to hurt you we're surrounded by hard drinkers who were given a sufficient reason we're grounded we're not surrounded by them in AA A lot of non-alcoholics and Alcoholics Anonymous. It's not our place to find out. Every time my debate goes off on, you know, those people. We were talking about it last night. You know why I've had to write inventory about people that don't need to do the work? Because I want to be one of them. I resent them because they don't have to do their job. They have to work and I do. on the other side of the work I'm always really grateful because it wakes me up and it changes my life story about the mad dogs take a hundred people from Alcoholics Anonymous God forbid put them back in the bar you know what you're going to find twenty or thirty sitting at the bar right on those stools wallowing in their whiskey, crying in their beer. Because they don't know there's much more to find in alcohol. They just sit there whining and complaining and talking about their problems with their buddy, the bartender. Just like a lot of people in your groups. The bartenders in your group serving up drinks. Then you've got 20 or 30 come in the bar drink until they feel good, then they go home. then you got about 20 or 30 that seem to stand out in a crowd mad dogs don't settle for sitting up the stools wallowed in their whiskey crying in their beer because they know one thing there's more to find in alcohol won't settle for coming in the room drink till they feel good they usually have to do that just to leave the house right that's just where the night begins they're going there they're going here they're getting in fights they're going to jail they're gone for the gusto do it to the max bop till you drop they don't understand kind of sort of maybe little not even in their vocabulary now put those hundred people back in the program of Alcoholics Anonymous and you'll find they do the program about the same way they did it in the bar. Are you a mad dog? Now I've got to talk about something that I'm really disturbed and I feel sad for the new people who might only see the fourth edition of the big book. Not many of us collected books. You came in, I got a third edition. I always read the third edition I didn't come in before 76. I came in in 82. I always had a third edition. And they were not allowed to change that book since 1976. What were the other years? 39, 55, 76. I love when Chris Raymer talks about and a lot of people in Texas talk about the success rate when they were brought to recovery before they were bought to the fellowship. 50% boom right away 25% came back made it 75% tell me anywhere in the world that Alcoholics Anonymous success rate is 75% and you know what that taught me be really careful you're not doing what the majority of people around you in AA are doing because the majority of people in AA don't stay sober do what the minority does I'm proud to be a member of a minority, brother. Because the majority... You can't tell me more than 51% stay sober. So be careful you're not doing what the majority does because the majority in Alcoholics Anonymous drink again. Now, because I was an Indian, they didn't consult me before they wrote the fourth... They wrote a fourth edition in 2001. Now, does anyone else ever do this? You buy a book, you take the paper cover, you crumble it up, you throw it away. And I can't tell you how many years it was before this guy pointed out to me that on the papercover, on the third edition from 1976 where it says Alcoholics Anonymous 3rd Edition, the inside papercover that I used to throw away, not only does it say that up until then there were 300,000 copies of our book up until 55, 150,000 recovered. One for every two books. Is that anywhere close to the number now? No. But there's a much more important paragraph no one ever showed me. Because I would go to these service conferences and the big debate was trinkets, money, this controversy, that controversy. And some little person would raise their hand and say, what did Bill Wilson say service is? And somebody from GSO would say, service is anything that makes carrying the message possible. Then somebody would have the nerve to say, what's the message? And you would think the whole room was just going to go into an uproar. That's what they should have been talking about. But on the paper cover they used to tell us, and here's what it said in 76. The basic text, page 1 through 164, remains unchanged. This is the AA message, just as it was introduced in 1939. Let's look at what they've done in the only time they've been allowed to change it since 1976. They couldn't change page 1-164. There's a catch-22. Thank God. Because every one of us in this room would have had some major changes to make in 1 through 160. There's a catch-22. You've got to have a vote from three-fourths of all the groups to change page 164. But look what they did to the paper cover that used to say, Page 1 through 164 is the AA message. Now it says, The basic text, page 1 through164, which had been the foundation of recovery for so many alcoholics remains unchanged. They don't even say it's the message anymore. They say it used to be the foundation for many alcoholists. And they might as well have said, as far as the way it feels to me the way that it's written, they might has well have written this. Page 1 through 164, which had been the foundation of recovery for so much alcoholics, so many of those poor alcoholics in AA that's had to do it remains and still remains unchanged. But now they're saying it's something that had been just the foundation for so many of us. It's not even the message anymore. How about this one? Dear God, have mercy on Alcoholics Anonymous. They're going to change this. Forward to the fourth edition. The difference between a meeting online and the home group around the corner are the same. Modem to modem, face-to-face, AA speak the language of the heart. My God, help us. They're telling us that me online on a screen is the same as my home group around the counter. Now, they could have said that online you might get in touch with us. It might be helpful if you're outside the country or you're alone up in Podunk, Arkansas or some place, but to say that modem to modem or face to face it's the same and that your home group around the corner where you look in each other's eyes is the same as a meeting online is a sad reflection of what's going on in Alcoholics Anonymous. The only time they've been able to change it since 1976. We should all be writing letters to them. They don't even tell us on the paper cover What's the AA message Now it's something that had been 1 through 164 Is now a has been Another question to consider Before one somewhere in step one do you have more than two alternatives than the ones that are on page 25 start to consider see what alternatives come up maybe there's some new alternatives after 10 years that weren't alternatives at 6 months maybe you're going to find some new reservations after 15 years that weren'T even considerations for somebody that was new maybe lurking notions the book refers to lurking here's how anal retentive my home group is in Santa Monica. There's a line that talks about lurking notions. They actually would have a meeting where somebody would use as a topic and people would talk about what color would a new lurking notion be? Where would it be in the room this year? Would they change size? Would they changed shape? Would the look prettier? Lurking notions after 15 years that weren't there in the corners at 5? New lurking notion. Current agnosticism. Current unmanageability. The current manifestations of page 52. That's where I get excited. That's Where I Am. I just spent longer in the set-aside prayer and the first three steps than I have in 20 years. And you know what I saw? I didn't have to get fucked up in step one. I didn' t have to go crazy. 10, 11, and 12 work. I've been in the set-a-side prayer since November 2001. I've been in the first 3 steps since It's January. And I'm in inventory. I get to be here in inventory without saying, oh, I'm all screwed up, I am in inventory People in my home group now say things like this, Oh, I saw that I was all screwed up and it was time to do the work again. You know what I say to them? How could you be screwed up if you saw it was Time to Do the Work Again? People that are all screwed-up never see that it is Time to do The Work Again. You're awake. You're awake if you know it's Time to do the work again. Not many people get to do it again. I used to see the steps as separate. You kind of got one over here. Mark just talked about it. Step 1's over here, and you know what I used to think? Step 1 is only true when you're in it. When you're formally in step 1, that's the only time that truth is true. But shouldn't the experience go like this? Shouldn't 2 deepen 1? Shouldn'T 3 deepen 1? I'm talking the first half of 1 without any dash. Don't get stuck on the dash. They're the same. The unmanageability is a drink. There's no separation between the first. That's a mistake him and I used to make. The first half of step one. The second half of set two. Step one. The unmangeability is the drink with a name and a face to change you because you think you're innocent. There's not a dash. I used see the steps like circles. One over here. Two separate. Now I'm in hope. Three's over here. Four's over there. Three's here. Inventory's in the trunk, locked in a box. Nobody's going to see it. Can't show it to anybody. Don't share it with the closest person in my life. And the person I love more than anybody in the world, we keep our programs separate. Nuts! Let me get that right. Let me see now. The most important person in the World with the most important relationship you both have, which is with God, you're going to keep it separate. We keep our programs separate. I would like to have a wife that one day we go through the work together. Wouldn't that be something? I know couples that have. Do the work-together, go to meetings you like, but the program ain't just the groups you like. Let her go where she likes. Let her goes where she can complain about you. You go where you can complain abut her. Come together, do the work, love God together. We keep out programs separate, it's nuts. Then I started to see the steps as a straight line. 1 to 12, back to 1 to 12. Nobody in this room will ever be able to go back through the steps ever again. You go from where you are forward. The first step this time ain't going to be the first step from the last time. We're going to bring up considerations that are not valid for somebody doing the work the first time that we've had to consider with length of time. So how do I see the steps now? If they're not separate entities, they're nicht a straight line, the steps are a circle. Oh, if anybody in this room, let me ask you this. If 12 doesn't take you to a realization of 1, I don't know what does because they're bringing the first step to your house every other day. Check this out. Ooh, check this out! Those are the people that stay in 1 that are involved in 12. Why are you having trouble with 12? He mentioned it. It's not just unfinished amends that go back to step 1. Ah, I don' t need to do 10 and 11. I get a little flaky. It doesn' t matter. Pray in the car. You're having trouble with 10 and 11 because you've lost the consciousness of the first step, not the knowledge. You could go to the university, your home group, down to the detox. You give a great lecture on Step 1. Physical craving, mental obsession, spiritual malady. Do it on the board. Do it fancy. Do it jazzy. Do it rap. Do it rhyme. Do it however you want to do it. But you're having struggle with 10, 11, and 12 or 10 and11 or finishing amends. It's not because you have lost the knowledge of Step 1, it's because you've lost the consciousness of step one that reminds you, it pushes you into 10 and 11. It pushes you in to working with others. One more thing. Another question. Is grace sufficient? Do I want a conscious contact? Grace is sufficient only as long as ignorance lasts. Grace only lasts as long als ignorance. You see some truth, You better have some power to do something with it. You need a little bit more than grace when you start to see some truth. A few comments on the first step maybe some of you can take with this evening, bring into your consciousness. Maybe we'll come back tomorrow. But a lot of you raised your hands. You've got some time away from a drink and I think a valid question. well, how do you look at the first step of having time away from a drink? And then Joe's been talking about the use of 10-11 to do that and the useof meditation as a vehicle and that's how you do that. You use prayer and meditation as you begin to reflect on your experience with alcohol in terms of the craving of the body. Have I experienced this? and you begin to use prayer and meditation in the 10-step tools and 11-step as you begin to look at pages 23 to 43 and it describes several states of mind sober from which you drink from several states including ultimately the strange mental blank spot and it talks about Fred drank when there's not a cloud on the horizon and you go back into your consciousness and what starts to bubble up for me in the middle of all that is I happen to get taken back into, because my deal is current. See, how do I have a current experience with step one? How do I do that? And what I get taken into is I get taking and looking at a period of time and the number of situations I was in that a guy like me drinks in every time. Might have some problems at work. Might be relationship problems. Might be physical health problems, might be financial, take your pick. Could be health. And that stuff starts to bubble up again and I begin to see the amount of grace and the conscious contact that I had in the course of the time prior to where I'm looking at it now. I begin to see that I've been taking the times to that strange mental blank spot. Tell you, I just had a real, real profound experience with this area. I'm going through a thing of smoking, not smoking. And I'm not involved with this other than getting to go along for the ride. But last December, this is the kind of guy I am with anything. I went and checked myself into a place for a week to get past the initial DTs off that shit And I had about 25 days, and I was doing everything they told me in the program. And I'd given this to God, and I had three people in my support system. And I left work one day, and this thought came in. And I, of course, this is in conjunction with going back through this process. And the thought filtered through my mind, it would be nice to have a cigarette. And so I made the first call. I thought I'd try that. I've never believed in that because it wasn't my experience at work, but I thoughtI would try it. Maybe I'd miss something. I'm open-minded. So I call and I indicate that I'm having this obsession with this one, the cigarette. They give you all the shit, you know. Okay, yeah, thank you very much. Get that son of a bitch off the line. I get a little further down the road and it's just filling my car up now, part of me. My head's right down the row. So I make the second call. To make a long story short, I make all three calls and I zoomed into a 7-Eleven. I got me a cigarette and I got home that night and I'm sitting there choking on that cigarette and reflecting on me and alcohol. And that grace Joe talked about touched me, and I sat there and I cried. All these years in AA, and I think I'm doing something to keep myself sober. My God. And you lose that. See, I'm the kind of guy when I want a drink and nothing gets between me and a drink. And God removed that from me and I had to have that damn experience with nicotine to be shown, to be convinced to my innermost self once again and surrender to this thing called alcoholism at almost 20 years without a drink. Just sat and cried. And by God you can tell I still cry when I think about it. When I think of this grace and this power and what it's done for me. Because when a guy like me wants something and I want a drink, sponsored spiritual retreat person you know get the hell out of my way I'm going for it wow what an incredible deal so maybe give some thought to some of those pages tomorrow we're going to talk some more about unmanageability unlike Joe it's about drinking we are going to talk about it though some of the stuff on page 52. Bedevilements, great word I think. We're going to talk more about that tomorrow. So our session tomorrow first one starts at I believe 9 a.m. I'm hoping that with each step we can meet those hearts in this room that are doing the work for the first time. I'm hopeful we can make it happen and meet those who think they've been through the steps and they're stuck on nine and a half. I'm hoping we can meet those very few who have entered the world of the Spirit with considerations for each step. So here's a couple considerations. You're looking at the work for the first time? Two considerations. That's all there is. Do you lose control when you start? And can you keep yourself stopped when you stop? Those that have been around for a while and have done 1-9.5, 1-93.8, 1-95.8. Here's a consideration. Don't you kind of feel like a hypocrite when you say God is everything, but you know He wouldn't be there for the physical craving if you took a drink? And for those of you on the other side of a set of amends, here's the consideration. How can you still say you're powerless over alcohol and your life is unmanageable when you've been given power and the power to manage your life for a long period of time? I'm not saying you've got power over alcohol. I'm nicht sagen, du kannst trinken. Ich sage, wie lange kannst du hinterhauen? Ich bin kraftlos über Alkohol und mein Leben ist unmanageable. Und blamme es auf das Alkhoholen wenn du in den Welt des Geistes und du hast sich zurückgezogen. Du hast die Macht gegeben. Something's come between you and alcohol. And you're not going to find your first step tomorrow in trying to get back to what it was like. Those of you that have been around for a while should look at what it was like, what happened. Something came between you and alcohol many years ago, but what is it like now with alcohol? Is there any more freedom? Do I feel like a hypocrite when I say God is everything, but He's still my Master because I'm afraid if I accidentally took a drink the craving would be there? Do I have reservations? New reservations? God's everything or nothing. What does that really mean? i've ingested alcohol in the last 20 years one time i was at a party there's a glass of water i didn't take a sip i didn't smell it i didn' t taste it i thought it was water i took a big swig half a glass it was vodka god was there i didn''t turn into a werewolf he's been there for the mental obsession he's been there in every area of your life But now you've got some that we're going to call the current Gnosticism in your life that will make you feel like a hypocrite when you approach the idea whether God's everything or nothing. And if you've been around for a while and you're looking at these first three steps again, is it possible that when they say, fearlessly face the proposition that God is everything or Nothing, how can you go to the second step scared of drinking again? Because your fear of drinking against God is based in an idea that you can do something to keep yourself from drinking again because fear is about self-reliance. Anybody that's been around and done inventory knows that. And when they say fearlessly face the proposition, I think they mean fearlessly. Without fear. A friend of mine told me the other day the book doesn't mean without fear when they save fearlessly they mean with fear but you do it anyway. No, it doesn't. I've taken the second step without fear because I saw my fear of step one was rooted, it's the hardest one to see. Any fear you've got is rooted in an idea that you can do something about that fear without God on your own power because fear is about self-reliance. Let me tell two funny stories about people that want to keep you sick. People that wantto keep you in the delusion. You know those kind of sponsors. They don't point you to God. They point you them. Call me. You need me. I'll edit your amends list. Call me every day. I'll run your life. I know sponsors in Southern California, believe it or not, that have told people who they're going to marry. Can you imagine? Show up. Suit up. Come here. Go there. Do this. You point them to God because you can't keep them sober anymore than you can keep yourself sober. Sponsors that are like that don't believe they're alcoholic. They believe they've got power over alcohol and alcoholics. So, a guy goes to one of these sponsors. He said, you've been my advisor for many years. I've got two problems. He said only two. What are they? He said I'm in love with two women. He said tell me about them. He said one's beautiful. I love her with all my heart, but she's poor as a church mouse. What about the other one? Well, she's attractive, kind of plain, got all the money in the world. He says, well, don't you think you should marry the woman that you see as beautiful just the way she is regardless of what she has or doesn't have? He says I knew you were going to say that. I'm going to marry her. He's walking out the door. The sponsor goes, excuse me, could I have the number of that other girl you were talking about? Here's another one about those that want to keep your delusions alive. They want to keep your lies alive. Newcomer to the neighborhood just moved in. It's a newcomer. It's walks down to the local bar. He's walking in. Drunk's walking out. Drunk gets in an imaginary car, starts an imaginary engine, drives off. The guy thinks it's a little strange. The newcomer goes in the bar, has a few drinks, goes home. Next night, same thing. He's going in. The drunk's coming out. Imaginary car, imaginary engine drives off in the imaginary car. He says what we should be saying. He says to the bartender, you know the barteller in your home group, he says tothe bartender the guy serving up the stuff, right? He says to the bartender, why don't you tell the guy the truth? He says, are you kidding me? He pays me $100 a week to keep his car clean. That's what they're doing. Thanks. Let's go rest. We'll see you at 9 o'clock in the morning.