The Healthy Relationship That Starts With a Leap of Faith – Scott R.

so I'm not sure if the bell's still ringing or not. It's always ringing for me. Well, I hope we described the first three chapters of the book pretty specifically there. I don't even think we cracked the book. I love talking about we agnostics. The most important thing in my life today is my relationship with God. although I have a terrible time acting that way. And I didn't just make that up because it sounds good. It's really the purpose of our book in a couple spots, but one of them is page 25, and there's a solution. It says in the middle of the page, The central fact of our lives today is the absolute certainty that our Creator has entered into our hearts and lives in a way which is indeed miraculous. So that's going to be the central fact of my life that's almost as important as the line above, that the great fact that we've had these spiritual experiences. And then in the We Agnostics it says that's exactly what this book is about. Its main object is to enable you to find a power greater than yourself which will solve your problem. And I would note that it does not say problems. I got one problem. that's this idea this feeling that I can be separated from the God in my understanding and so you know if I were a lot of you guys read Richard Rohr I love Richard Rohre he talks about the two halves of life if I ever talk about my two halves of sobriety the first half would be coming to that truth that my relationship with God is the most important thing in my life now before I started to believe that and try to practice that I still had a belief in God an understanding that I needed God but maybe like kind of a co-pilot deal let's do this together I'll get into more of that in the third step but I believe when we get here we are all agnostics that's why I love this chapter so much when I talked earlier about burning my life to the ground that's when I met Scott I called him up from a thousand miles away did my best to surrender and I was like man I need your help, I gotta do a four step my life's a mess he's like let's just do all the work, let's see if we miss something which was I don't think he was that smart to know to do that I mean I you must have read it or something but and thank God we did because we had a neat fourth step experience and it was great and fifth step experience but what going back through the work with a new perspective with a lot of time we've not exchanged my life. And I'll tell you, the first 18-19 years of my sobriety, we'd get to We Agnostics in a book meeting and I read it with the same attentiveness that I read to the wives. Didn't apply to me. I believe in God. Why are we reading We Agnostic? I'm not agnostic. I'm believing God. That's a waste of time. If we had to vote what chapter we were reading, I'm now voting We Aggnostic. That's for the non-believers. Not that I really had much working knowledge or believe you know but why I say what we're all agnostics when we get here is a Gnostic is somebody with working experiential knowledge of a Gnostic g-n-o-s-t-i-c and Gnostic you have working experiental knowledge of so when we got here new in sobriety we do not have a working effective experiential relationship with God a power greater ourselves. Because if we did, we wouldn't have wound up here, right? Things would have gotten a little out of control and we'd have gone to church or mosque or synagogue, wherever we find our God. And we just said, hmm, things are getting a little rough. I'm going to tap into this working relationship and I'm gonna go the other way. Off I go. And some people do that and God bless them. That's not my experience. So we're all a little bit agnostics when we get here. and what I've found to be so profound about this chapter so many things but one of the things I like to point out is seven times in we agnostics bill talks about getting rid of our prejudices and my sponsor for a long time was this this old black guy and I remember saying Charles I'm not I'm that prejudice what are we even reading this for like you know like he's like dummy like we're not talking black and white when Bill talks about prejudice he's talking about our old ideas about God. All of this, all we're going to talk about this whole weekend, at least by my perspective, is removing the things that block us from God. Each step is divinely designed to remove a piece of the puzzle of what's blocking us from god or put a put a new piece in the stained glass window so when that light shines we see it in a new way. That's what each step does in in my experience and what's blocking me in the second step is these old ideas about God tell me if this sounds familiar God's not powerful enough to fix my problems or I've done so many terrible things God's not gonna give me another chance right how many times we've made that deal that Scott talked about God get me out of this and I will never do it again got pulled over for DUI I was 14 years old and the cop was getting ready to arrest me and I said God get me out of this and I'll never do it again a cop let me go 15 minutes later I'm on the beach drunk out of my mind buying drugs I mean there was there was no thought of so I thought all those deals all those lies I've made to God had consequences I had this old idea that God was keeping score you know and why am I gonna play like why am i gonna jump into a football game down 38 to nothing in the fourth quarter. I'm not going to play. One of the other old ideas I had about God was that it was merit-based, that I had to be good enough long enough to experience this forgiveness from God. And my conception of God has changed dramatically, certainly in 35 years, but even a lot in the last five years. And I hope it grows just as much in the next five days. I hope in the Next 15 Minutes it grows. I think one of the worst things we can do is think we've got God all figured out and in this little box, and now I've got it figured out. One of my favorite passages from our book is, I think it's page 11. Scott, tell me if I'm wrong, but when Ebby comes to see Bill and he says, man, what's gotten into my old friend here? And Ebby says, I've got religion. And Bill says, I was aghast. And if you got thrown out of high school like I did, you don't know what aghaste means. It means you threw up in your mouth a little bit. Like the idea of tolerating that concept is just disgusting. and that's the way that's what i got here with you know and because it was a lot easier just to discount this idea that i'm too broken for god i can't be fixed and then to really dive into this and um and but that's that'swhat my problem was right when you hear i've said it or when you hear a guy you're working with say you know i'm really having trouble turning it over i just you know how do i do that that's not a third step problem that's a second step problem That is always a conception issue. And one of the great things our book does is allows us to come up with our own conception, right? That's what separated us from turning into a formal religion is when Ebby dropped that bomb on Bill. Bill, why don't you just choose your own conception? Right, because if he had said, Bill, you got to believe in little baby seven pound nine ounce Jesus in a golden fleece diaper or you're done. Bill would have remained aghast, right? And I like talking about this because we have so many new guys here. This retreat is not about getting you to conform to our beliefs, right. It's about helping you have your own experience. But I can't go on to the third step without some type of conception. I believe, right, and I kind of ignorantly for a long time when taking taking guys through the steps and in my own experience on 46 and 47 says as soon as a man says he's even willing to believe we assure him he's on his way and I thought that meant you can go from there right to step three say the third step prayer but I don't think you can because still in that chapter a few pages later somewhere 52-55 we read it right? We have a decision to make? God's everything or he's nothing. Bill wants you to ask yourself that question before you take a third step. Sam Shoemaker was one of AA's earliest best friends. He was from the Calvary mission, is that right? Do I have that history right? Yeah, in New York. He who's one of the places Bill would show up to drunk, and he had a common love for the drunks. And I read one of his books, and he said, you know, we cannot turn our will in life over to care of God unless we have some idea who God is. And I'm not talking about figuring God out. Our book clearly says we'll never fully comprehend or understand that's God, right? I hope I don't. I mean, what percent about God do you think you really know? I hope it begins with a decimal point. That's my experience. I hope I remain a seeker. And so when I talk about that, you know, the most important thing in my life today is my relationship with God, one of the things I like to take to meditation is that idea. Scott often says, you Know, priority isn't something you declare. Oh, this is my priority. When you look back on your previous week You can look at your calendar and say Okay, that was a priority Because that's what I did I challenge you this Most people here have an iPhone I'm sure the Android has the same feature Go into your iPhone settings And see how many times You picked up your phone in the day It's a frightening number I promise you it's in the hundreds Where it'll tell you every time you did this Just that motion. It'll tell you how many times you did that. How many times a day did you consider how can I get to know God better? My number is disgusting. I'm ashamed. I don't even know what my number is, but it's not a good number, right? How many hours a day did I spend thinking about my petty problems and my wants, my desires And so when I talked earlier about kind of the two halves of recovery, or at least this part of the journey for me is that first half is realizing that that's all there is, is developing this relationship with God. And the second half, once I know that that is the mission, then I am on to something else. Because before I recognize that fact, I am just running in circles. I am trying to use God as a co-pilot, as I said. And so, you know, how do I remain a seeker is the question. How much time am I spending in prayer and meditation and reading and other stuff, right? You know, Bill makes clear, makes it very clear. Be quick to see where religious people are right. Go see a shrink if you need to. Get some other books. I love our big book. I love my book. I love that book, right. There's so much more out there. and if I'm gonna if I expand my effectiveness and understanding that's what Bill calls us to do I got to get some more resources right and so I was I was invited to create a new conception and that and I'm going to let Scott talk about a little bit about that in more in more depth but I want to share with you a couple areas of how my conception has changed, oh my, in recent years that have really changed my life. And the one is I used to think God had a plan and I'm not disagreeing with you if that's what you believe. And tomorrow I might say that's stupid. I might believe something different but I don't believe God has a plan anymore. I like it better, it makes more sense to me that God has an opportunity and the one opportunity is that is to enjoy his love and to spread his love. That's the opportunity that God puts in front of us every waking moment of every day. I don't think God had this preordained plan, Dow's gonna be an electrician, Barclay's gonna be a teacher, and constantly battled us through the bumpers of life until we got to where he wanted us to be, this doesn't make sense to me. I remember during 9-11 hearing people come out of meetings saying, you know, I knew some people that were in New York saying, man, I was supposed to be downtown that day and I stopped and it took 20 minutes to get my dry cleaning and God must have had a plan. What? So the 3,000 people, that was God's plan? No, That wasn't God's plan, right? Or one of our friends overdoses and dies. Well, God had a plan. No, that was Mikey's plan. So my job is to align my will. That's God's gift to us is our free will, my experience. So that's one. And the other is that I don't believe that this is a dangerous statement. and I hope I get the context right I don't believe that God needs to forgive me I don' t believe and let me tell you why before you roll your eyes I don''t think the love meter of God has ever been off a hundred to be angry or disappointed or let down enough to need to forgive me it's been a hundred love all the time no exceptions in my darkest days in my worst mistakes Now forgiveness is something I need to feel And I want to feel From both the world, people in my life And I don't want to feels like God has condemned me for something But I believe that's a barrier I've put there And so if you're one of our newer friends And this just sounds like nonsense I'm sorry Alcoholics Anonymous does not care what you believe we do not have a dog in that hunt all the great religions Judaism, Christianity Islam Buddhism, Mother Earth-ism whatever you got-ism have one thing in common they send their drunks to Alcoholics Anonymous and so I just when we start talking about this stuff I like to make this very clear the group of drunks is a great place to start but I love talking about this idea of concept and it always changing, this perception. Because if I think God is too angry at me to help me, it can't happen, right? If he's not big enough to fix my problems, he can't fix my problem by definition, right. And so for a long time in sobriety, I'm putting AAA batteries into a AA remote. Not because my concept was wrong, is because i hadn't done this this work this examination like let's see what works let's let's try some new things which scott's going to talk about you know this kind of hypothetical experiment of trying some conceptions um i mean i could just fill it in for you if i can have the next half hour if that's all right um i can't wait to hear me okay sounds really good it was good um god i have so much more i want to talk about on the second who's going next barkley or scott uh i think scott's okay thanks john i'm scotley alcoholic hi guys um yeah there's way too much to cover we understand that we're just going to get some of it if you're new if there's some of these steps you haven't done i think our mission is to make you hungry for it if i could define it i'm on page 13 which is where the steps first appear in the book they're a narrative form and I'm just going to pick out a couple of pieces and kind of move on and turn it over to Barclay because I can't wait to hear what BarclAY has to say. So I'm going to turn it on. Yeah, I'm gonna steal a little bit of Barclays thunder here. 11 lines down on 13. Last word on the line, friend, capital F. That is a powerful piece of information in one word. Powerful piece of informatioN. the fact is if I get here terrified of God I can't do step three there's no way in the world to make a decision to turn my will and life over to the care of a God that's mad at me that hates me I'm already going to hell there's nothing I can do this idea of a god as a friend is one of the most powerful in here another one on page 12 which uh john always already referenced and i think i'm gonna ask for a show of hands somebody asked you a question in the moment before they asked you did not know the answer you open your mouth and not bs but a piece of the great golden truth that you didn't know falls out and three hours later you can't quote it sometimes you can remember what it was who's had that experience put them up put them on hold them up look at this look at this yeah yeah that's what happens here and i think this is the first instance of it in the book on page 12 because ebby says and it's in italics so it's so important why don't you choose your own conception of god ebony has gotten sober in the oxford group which is all through the lutheran church they have a very specific concept of god he's not here selling that and i think that happened to him there and he was able to open that door which saved people like me um and so what i do with a new guy is i'm going to ask you to lay aside what you leave up by not disbelief but just just for the purposes of this exercise lay aside would you believe lay aside which you're trying to believe and lay aside but they told you and i don't care how qualified they claim to be and let's just try what's working for about three million of your your closest friends and the way we're going to do is i'm going to ask you to give me a series of single words and very short phrases that describe the individual characteristics you would like for god to have i'm gonna participate like my suggestion is take him you don't like him don't take him and i had him write this in the inside back cover his big book because i'm wanting to read this last thing at night first thing in the morning for the next month to get it set in his mind usually the first one that says forgiving i tell him that wasn't good enough for me I'm too guilty I'd have a God that's eager to forgive forgiving one going to get it for somebody like me how about gentle doesn't force me to as well how about loving would you like to have a God that loves you how about available 100% of the time how about creative I'd like to have a guy that comes up with clever ways to get you out of the holes you keep digging in your own life how about how about sense of humor I want a God that laughs and dances yeah and if how about a god whose will is a good deal i got here scared of god's will god's well right and and man i can't work with that i need a god who's will is a great deal i don't have that anymore today i'm convinced god's world is the very best deal there is i i intermittently forget that but i believe it and if and only if i can have all those then powerful but many of us get here with a god i wouldn't want to meet in a dark alley and i tell the guy i'm not going to ask you to believe this you can't i'm going to asked you to test drive it how do you think you might conduct your life if you believe this conduct your wife in that manner for a while and we'll just see what happens our buddy joe crogan if you don't know that name do yourself a big favor get some of joe's talks he He said, his sponsor said, we're going to have to make it really simple for you, son. Great. Okay, well, I'm just going to steal his day. He said I got to make it simple for You, Joe. Step one, you're screwed. Joe says, wow, it's from Take America. I said, that's step two. Step three, he's fine with you. Try it for one. Joe says I don't believe in God. His sponsor says you don't have to believe in God to be successful here and you don t but you must conduct your life like someone who does. That for me is the best definition of spirituality I've ever heard conduct your life like someone does and we'll just see what happens page 13 John pointed this out to me I learned this from him last year something that was added to the book and I had not noticed it last paragraph my friend promised when these things were done I would never find a new relationship with my creator if you'd asked me a year ago today if I had relation it with God on my game I would have said no I was wrong You've already heard it. My relationship was 9-1-1. My tail feathers are ablaze. I check in, make a deal, and then don't cover my side. That's the way it is. And the way I look at it now is in those days when I prayed, I was trying to make him my God. What I've been taught here is how to make me his man. See, I had it upside down. But I had to get to this friendly God idea before that could possibly work. It had no hope at all. page 45 those have been around for a while know that Bill Wilson was asked on a number of occasions difference between shortcomings and character defects he said just didn't want to use the same words over again here we are in page 45 using the same single word six times in nine lines starting six lines down the needed power wasn't there human resources Marshall by the will were not sufficient they feel utter lack of power was our dilemma had to find a power by which we had live it had to be a power greater than ourselves obviously weren't to find this power exactly what the book's about main object debut to find a power greater than yourself which will solve your problem i go there's a a great thing to point out there if you notice the difference between the first three powers and the next three powers capitalize capital p yeah yeah thank you this last sentence i read can be ready with two ways i can either read it that the finding of the power solves my problem or that i find the power and the power solves my problem i think they're both right i'd like to know what does not say does not say i find the power when i use the power to solve my problem i do not solve my problems i am my problem so i don't need to be trying to solve it myself if i were to have a favorite page today in the book it'd be 46 because for me two of the most powerful and important concepts in the entire text appear on this first full paragraph of just we have agnostic term for them and have had these thoughts and experiences let us make haste to reassure you we sound that as soon as that means right dadgum now as soon as we are able to lay aside prejudice express even a willingness to believe in a power greater than ourselves convinced to get results this next phrase is one of the most important in the book though it was impossible for any of us to fully define or comprehend that power which is God so we talk about God as you understand we're not saying you're going to understand God you are not book says very clearly that you're not my sponsor says the teacup of my mind cannot contain the ocean of god and i think that lays it out pretty close pretty pretty close um while i'm doing important we'll go back to roman numeral 22 for what i believe is the most important phrase in the entire text it's in the reading um on the forward to the third edition get to the doctor's opinion just turn one page toward the front of the book and you'll find it XXII third paragraph the basic principles a program it appears hold good with individuals many different lifestyles just as the prayer brought recovery to those many different nationalities here comes the 12 steps that summarize the program we hear the word program all the time here's the definition the 12 steps we see on the wall are a summary of that program my sponsor said that's the cliff notes and if that was the whole program we'd have a pamphlet instead of a book and guys like Scott are too sick to start to get sliding by on the cliff Notes I was going to need the whole thing pretty important I think probably the two best pieces of news I've ever gotten in my entire life are in this book. I'm going to cover one of them now. I'll cover one of them later. Back on page 46, five lines from the bottom. We found that God does not make too hard terms for those who seek him. Let me translate that into Tennessee English for you. God ain't mad at us. That's some good news. That is not what I've been told. That some mighty good news to once again steps two and three not possible with an angry God literally not page 57 the very top save for a few brief moments of temptation but thought drink has never returned such times great roles have risen up in him seemingly could not drink even he would God had restored his sanity sanity kind of interesting word my third sponsored a guy named john bradford picked up the nickname rusty at the end of his drinking he was drinking mouthwash mixed with kool-aid and he wet his pants so many times his zipper rusted shut and we nicknamed him rusty in honor of the zipper and and he loves his nickname by the way you're lucky if you get one you like here in this outfit but i give you two pieces of wisdom from Rusty. One of them was, he said, I'm not responsible for what I think. I'm responsible for how long I think it. I can't keep garbage from showing up up here in my head. When it gets dirty up here, I can sweep. That is my responsibility. Sandy Beach said the same thing in different words and he was not talking about relapse. And he said the measure of my recovery is not whether I get off the path. We all get offthe path. The measure ofmy recovery is how quickly I get back on powerful powerful stuff the other one from rusty having to do with sanity he said in the history of planet Earth no human has ever been put in an insane asylum for being insane never not once they put us in there for acting insane nobody's been let out for being sane they let us out for acting saying so on those days when you're crazy if you don't act on it they won't know we know though don't don't tell them they're not ready pick up the phone tell one of us we're ready and we're not all crazy on the same day that might be the best piece of advice I ever got don't tell them what a continue on 57 right this but a miracle of healing yes elements are simple circumstances made him willing to believe in my case I worked my way into a hole I couldn't lie my way out of help me offered himself to his maker then he didn't say help me he said take me help me and take me are not the same prayer not the saying even so as God restored us all this so here's this promise of sanity and restore our right minds this man the revelation was sudden some grunted more slowly here it's maybe the most powerful promise in the book he's come to all that once we sought him I like the analogy of God's kind of like the mother but three-year-old playing hide-and-seek with her child where she hide? She hides where the child can find her. This is my heavenly parent, where does he hide? Yeah I think so. I'm sure something else will bubble up but I'm gonna hand it over to Barclay for a little while. I probably gonna want this back. All right cool, I'm Barclays, I am an alcoholic. And step two says came to believe right came to believe I want to tell you I mentioned a little while ago about kind of like I spent the last three and a half years of my drinking career literally I'd go to work I would come home I'd buy a 12-pack of Budweiser I know by I would put on credit card a 12 pack of Bud Weiser and I'd steal a a bottle of NyQuil and I would drink until I passed out. And, um, I, uh, there were a lot of things that went on. Uh, there was a whole bunch of stuff in my childhood that just, you know, we'll talk about it if you want to talk about if there's suicide, there's like my dad ended up giving, he was a veterinarian, right? Lots of dog dope. Um, he ended up giving everything that he ever made to his third wife that he'd already left i didn't get anything right my brothers and i split the money that he had on him when he died right i had me a resentment right um i i don't have this huge bottom that you hear a lot of times you know i came to and all the cops were around me with their guns drawn and all that stuff. I didn't even know what my bottom was until I'd been in, I got sober, my brain kind of cleared a little bit. And I remember yet another morning. It was a morning just like any other day in my life. I came to in the morning, my wife was pissed off at me. I was pissed off At her. I did know why she was pissed Off at me or why I was pissed off at her, but I knew that we were pissed off at each other, right? And I was leaving out the door and I was going to this job that I hated, getting in this beat up truck that I hated, she was at the back door and I hated her and she had my two kids with her and I wasn't crazy about them. And I got in that stupid truck and I remember this And I screamed at the top of my lungs, what in the do you want from me dude? You have been hawking with me my entire life. What do you wan? What do yo want from m? And there was no like or anything like that just as I started up that stupid truck and I went to that stupid job. And that was sometime in October, maybe November of 1989, when John was just racing ahead of me spiritually. and and that was sometime in November of 1989 and in January of 1990 I ended up going to Alcoholics Anonymous and I think that's what the he wanted from me I did not I did not have a good relationship with God when I got here. I was pissed at God. He'd been screwing with me my entire life, right? And so if step two had said, okay, so I'm powerless over alcohol, yep, and then there's the M-dash, don't forget the M dash, right, and then it's like, and if it had said, believed that a power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity. I would be dead right now. I know this in my heart. It doesn't say that. It says, came to believe. I come to believe I did not. And Scott walked me through that whole, um, you know, I'm, I have this, this theory that Like maybe there is a God. I don't know. I've never had a big, you know, spiritual lightning crash. But what I do know is that when I just try, and I love, again, I'm going to kind of go to the step 12 again. It says we tried to carry this message to alcoholics Alcoholics and practice these principles on all our affairs and when I'm just trying When I'm Just trying the God of my understanding is just is One My relationship with God. I truly feel I'm a different guy than walked in here However, many years ago and my relationship with god is completely different I truly believe, I thought God was a really good, what are they, Bush League pinch hitter, right? God, if all else fails, hey God, right, you were talking about your beliefs that you have today, right, the belief that I have in God is that, this sounds completely, God is love, right. God is love period the end right and I believe in my heart that there is only one power in the world and that power is love you can say it's the strongest power if that works for you I don't care what you believe because I am an alcoholic and if people told me what I needed to believe again I would be dead I would be dead but there is a power and when I I have tried running life myself not so good at it not so and I've tried this whole God idea right and I have come to believe I've come to believe and my sobriety has been way high way low I've burned my life to the ground john was 17 years at nine years i completely burned my life to the ground ended up losing my job ended up lose my marriage ended up losing a whole bunch of stuff never thought of drinking not once that's insanity man that's insanity and I ended up calling Scott and saying Scott I think I need to do a fourth step just like and Scott mr. four-step right what he said to me was I don't know how to do that I went what are you talking about your dr. fourth step right because I only know how go through all the steps and God tricked me into having him as my sponsor you knucklehead you my god does have a huge sense of humor a huge sense of humour I think when I'm laughing with you God is completely there when we're at what we are joined in that world so is that oh we are where is it nine right do we fantastic I'll share a little a little bit of my time a couple of pieces that came to me I was list I was thinking I should have been listening but I was thanking God God forgives me for everything I ever did and he loved me while I was doing it I heard that 38 39 years ago in a meeting my god got bigger that day not too long ago on a zoom meeting i would i seem to be doing a lot of those and a lady with less than a year said to me my concept of god has changed should that scare me i said i think it should scare you if it doesn't because what's happened for me is through the years my god has got bigger and better and more gentle more compassionate more loving more put anything else you can put in the plus column, more. That's been my experience. I also heard this and forgive it. It sounds like a cheap joke but I heard this in a meeting. Somebody meant it. Said I'm having trouble getting a grip on letting go. You can see how that might happen. I was also told that faith is just hope with a positive track record. You cannot have faith but you can have hope. So why don't you hope this concept of a good God is for real and conduct yourself that way and we'll just simply see what happens and what you will get is that positive track record page 28 it's already told me it's gonna tell me later that I cannot understand God yeah page 28 in the American numbers yeah thanks Aaron yeah just above halfway down the page if what we have learned and felt and seen means anything at all he said all of us whatever our race creator color are the children of a living Creator with whom may form a relationship upon simple and understandable terms as soon as we're willing and honest enough to try I cannot understand God I'm not trying but I can understand the relationship the Relationship is he's in charge and I'm good with that. And he knows what he's doing, and I don't. And I invite him in each morning. By the time I've been awake two or three minutes each morning of my life for a very long time, I've invited him in to run my life for the day, and forever. I throw that in quite often, but for today. I invite them in as CEO, as boss, as manager. I use all those terms. And I remind him, because he's old, I don't want him to forget, that I was not drafted. I'm a volunteer. I'm not surrendered in a very long time. Surrender is after the fight. I've got no fight left. This morning I did not surrender. I volunteered. It comes from a very different place but has a very similar result. and and uh i got one more thing i wanted to look at just because i think this is kind of fun page 25 john already read this um but i'm going to correct him no it's not true not true but there are two ways to read this sentence and i think they're both right but it really lights me up you're gonna expand it you're expanding expand yeah yeah that's right right right yeah yeah the central fact of our lives today is the absolute certainty our creator creators entered into our hearts and lives in a way which is indeed miraculous or has entered our hearts and lives, in a way that's indeed miraculous. I can read it both ways and I think they're both right. I think they're both right. Thanks Scott. Barclay was talking about what I claim to believe and I the kind of arrogance of that really struck me I want to kind of change how I word that those are recent conceptions I've been trying to prove wrong that I haven't been able to prove wrong I'm not arrogant enough to say that you know my belief is X and and and I know that's not what you were saying I just because that's what we do right we come up with some conceptions because our old conception didn't work right god hates me he's not big enough he's keeping score i'm in big trouble that's the conception when we get here for a lot of us um and so we're going to try this new conception and if you talked about it earlier i wasn't listening chances are good but we don't know we're not going to fake it till we make it and just pretend like these things we're doing a scientific experiment we're gonna come up with these uh conceptions and let's see if they're true and that that takes me from a I got here with a belief system this convoluted belief system I don't know where I got it from I never went to church as a kid unless someone was married or buried but I came here with this convolute of belief systems just a little bit of the Cosby show and a little bit of like some other television shows develop my you know I think people maybe this isn't true for you but obviously people who are raised in a religious background that's where they get a lot of people get their conception what I've noticed and this is just jailhouse observation is that people who don't have a religious upbringing typically get their Conception of God from their father it's typically exactly the same and again you can do with that what you will in in this page on 47 really struck me a guy that we love in our home group named Rahim who I sponsor for a while now about a year and a half I was with him in treat Paul and I took a meeting in this treatment center and he was in the back and I could tell he was like struck and we did we did questions and answers at the end and he had he had this question it says I'm sure I would work I'm sure it would work if I could only believe as he believes but I can't accept surely true the many articles of faith which are so plain to him and that's what I that's why I wanted to grab the bike the mic back to talk about you know the idea here is develop a relationship you know we're gonna act as if it's like let me give you an analogy for the new guys let's say you're three months over and you're dating a new girl she's got two months over right healthy relationship right you're you're gonna go into this hoping some things are true you're going to right you hope medically that she's cleared and you're act as if she's healthy you're gonna act as she's you're hope she's gonna be faithful that she honest that she cares about you that she not gonna just carelessly throw away your affections right you're gonna you're going to act as if these things are true and if she holds up her end of the bargain the relationship will build right you not checking on her anymore she's where she says she's gonna be you know she doesn't smell like a different guy's clothes like the relationship is gonna build but at the beginning you take that leap of faith you're just gonna hope these things are true and that's what I had to do and that what I would I asked my guys to do is Let's just hope these things are true. I'm not trying to sell you anything, that God has these characteristics, these concepts. What do you need in order to turn your will and your life over to God? And the third step, hey, poker players, all your chips, we're going to say push them to the middle of the table, and you are going to be required to say, I'm all in. So if that's the deal, what do you want to do? What do I need God to be? And it's got talked about. I need them to be loving, caring, forgiving, sense of humor, all these different things, right? And just walk through this process and see if they're true. One of my favorite pages, we'll go one more page, and then we'll take a break for the night. Oh, we're not? All right. All right, perfect. I'll leave that alone. 52, middle of the page. Can say this about my sobriety. This is not just the first 18 years of reading this I thought they were talking about a drunken state This can be said about our sobriete We were having trouble with personal relationships sober We couldn't control our emotional natures Sober we're a prey to misery and depression sober. We couldn' make a living. We had a feeling of uselessness uselessness, we were full of fear, we're unhappy, we couldn't seem to be of real help to other people. That's that's what I'm like without the 12 steps you know and in these next what is this got 36 pages there's a whole bunch of instructions and if you take those instructions you get to the exact what I think are the exact opposite some people use a different example but I like this example I think it's 88 is the exact opposite of those we are then in much less danger of excitement fear anger worry self-pity or foolish decisions we become more efficient we don't tire so easily we're not burning up energy foolishly as we were as we we're trying to arrange life to suit ourselves there's 36 pages of instructions between those two states you know again if you're one of our new friends we're not trying to sell you any of this we're just asking examiners the power that you're using is that working and if not hopefully willing to try something different I've been playing with the idea of the difference between religion spirituality religion says believe this spirituality says these are the actions we took and we like to result and we think if you take similar actions you'll like the result I talked about my relationship with God when I got here right and it really has developed into I I have if you go to page 568 it's back in the spiritual experience right and it talks about most of us think I have gone for my experiences is have gone from like I was not a fan of this guy he had always had it out for me too he is an ally he is a friend of mine I really I hang out with him most of US think this awareness of a power greater than ourselves is the essence of a spiritual experience our more religious members call it god consciousness it is it is a moment to moment i trust the guy that's the thing is i trust the guy that takes me to Roman numeral 16 X VI and they forwarded the second about eight or nine lines down bill is leaving the Oscar group you can take some but not everything with him says he could not accept all the tenants of the Oxford groups he was convinced of the need for moral inventory confession a personality defects restitution of those harmed helpfulness to others here it comes and the necessity I've always wondered if that was important the necessity of belief in and dependence upon God what strikes me as Bill separates belief in God from dependence upon god they are not the same I got here pretty much believing there was a God and not having a higher power it is as I learned this healthy dependence that I think I actually began to have what we call a higher power and it is it is based on my beginning of a quote good God on my team once was best for me and then allowing that to grow I want to share a personal experience because we talked a little bit about God's will that I had up an epiphany on that some time ago and I want to share with you I was sitting by a stream and I looked across the stream I saw a cloud. I'm sitting there just looking, and I thought, every drop of rain in that cloud's following God's will perfectly. There's no question about it. Sows that tree, sows the bird in the tree, sowed a little fish in the stream. Why can't I? And it was on me harder than what I just did. Why Can't I, they can't, why can't i? And I got my answer. The answer is, I am. I am convinced that God did not put me here to be perfect. If you think you're supposed be perfect i wish you a lot of luck you're gonna need it but if i'm not supposed to be perfect what's my job the answer is my job is to make mistakes they've sent the right guy and and i've been told in my life we learned from our mistakes really well in that case no one in this room has been arrested more than once uh-huh sure right so they got that piece wrong at least for guys like me yeah so so so here's a definition a mistake it's an invitation to a lesson the evidence is if i learned the lesson would not have made the mistake it's just a lesson dressed in his work clothes and the simple fact is i don't have the power to make a mistake so ugly that god can't turn it into something magnificent not fix that's who i am that's Who he is i regularly frequently watch him using the worst things I've ever done to still stop other people magnificent amazing stuff so here's the learning process as I understand it today one make a mistake to be notified I made a mistake I don't always know three on the mistake yeah I did that and if they only know 80% I have to tell them the other 20 that's how I own it for consultant spiritual advisor about how to make the amend usually not always but usually there's an amend to be made six embrace the lesson the lesson comes with making the amend not to making it a mistake that's where it comes that's why that's so critically important is that I take responsibility for these things because that's where my learning happens so so six is embrace the lesson if you hold this idea that that's how I learn half of our steps are about me embracing the results of my mistakes four or five eight eight, nine, 10 and 11 are all about me embracing results of my mistakes. That's what they're about. Half of the steps. So six is embrace the lesson. Seven, share the lesson, that's what really sets it for me. Eight, when I share the listen, I have to tell you I made a mistake. If I just share the less than I'm preaching and nobody wants to hear it. When I stand as a sinner beside a sinner, he can hear me. Nine, make the next mistake. I've discovered God's will, I have no idea what his plan is, discovered God's will. It's for me to make mistakes. That's why I'm here. If you don't have that peace yet, let me tell you, it is unbelievably freeing. It is so freeing I have my own permission to make mistake. We talk a lot about progress. I give you my own definition. Progress is making the same old mistake a little less often or making a new and finer quality of mistake. Anything beyond that is perfection and that is not my assignment. Yeah. But that's only half the freedom. The other half is that you have my permission to make mistakes. Let me define you. All my family members, all the men I sponsor, major politicians that I like and don't like, those of you who got your driver's licenses out of Cheerios boxes, everybody has my permission and make mistakes because if I'm going to be upset by what you do, I'm a prisoner of your behavior. I don't want to be a prisoner anymore i've been a prisoner too long so half the freedom has had my own permission mistakes the other half is you have my permission to make mistakes and those two things free me to be okay right here right now then i'd be upset i've discovered that the source of all of my anger i tell you where it all comes from comes from being sure i'm right never had been angry when also absolutely certain i was right and being right comes from having past judgment that's why I can't work on my anger because anger is a problem but it's really a symptom the problem is judgment judgment is anger's grandmother it's been right at 11 years ago that just came to me in a flash one time I realized that's the source of all my anger is judgment and I'm pretty sure God didn't put me here to judge and so I added to my morning prayer bless me I don't judge and I can report tremendous progress I don't want to judge people. I don' t want to judge their motives and I don''t want to judge any situations and I'm sure most of you are familiar with the Zen story about the old Chinese farmer way back when where the lord of the valley owned everything but the sharecroppers could own their animals and he had this one farmer who had this magnificent white horse and he woke up one morning and the horse was gone and all his friends said it was such a bad thing and he said I don ''t know if it's good or bad and I had a horse and now I don.''t Oh, it's good or bad. The next morning he woke up the horse was back in a crowd with six other horses just like him and his friend said it's great it's the best thing ever he's out of its good or bad no I had a horse didn't have horse now I got seven horses the next morning his only son was saddle-breaking one of the new horses and felt it was thrown and broke his leg as friends and said it so bad he said I was good or man had a horse didn t have over seven horse got the sum of the broken leg let's go to bed the next the army came through and drafted all the young men to go fight in a battle and none of them would survive they couldn't take his son because he had a broken leg and I'm trying hard to learn or that farmer knew, that I don't need to be assigning good or bad to any events either. Don Pritz, please, I hope you know that name. If you don't, do yourself a huge favor. And what he would do when things didn't go like he wanted, he would just stop and say, as you wish. Just a simple prayer of as you which. I've been working on that for over a year. I had a little bit of success. To be thankful for the little stones of the way. I was driving down Nolensville Road, and I stopped at my fifth traffic light in a row. And I'm sitting there thinking evil thoughts about this traffic light's mother. And it occurred to me that it was at least remotely possible that that fifth trafficlight was the one that kept me from being in a wreck with a gasoline truck and that maybe God is the God of little events too and that I need to take those things that don't go my way as reminders to check back in with him. You guys talk so beautifully about getting checked in and staying checked in is what this thing is about and I've been praying and doing the best I can and I pray about it every day if it's been well over a year of to learn to take these little stones of the way as just reminders to check back again. I can report some progress and I'm hoping for some more. are you guys here yep are you ready i think our hour's up really yeah well okay ours is that we don't know about you yeah well almost i'm almost one more little piece we you know the term at large when it came to us at large today i'm free the difference is when i was at large i was looking over my shoulder all the time what do they find out this and plan a and plan b and what lie am i going to have to tell a couple of live hours and i'm just it's always busy in here today i'm free i told you about about that freedom and if i screw up i tell you i'm not worried about what you're going to find out i already told you and that has made it very common piece on here thank you it's been a wonderful day for me guys um how are we getting out of here john yeah so um just a quick um little announcement um tomorrow morning breakfast is at eight in the same room we had dinner in um and that's going to be quick breakfast 8 to 8 30 we don't we don'T need 45 minutes eat breakfast um and then 8 45 will be we'll be right here so please get your nicotine in your eggs in and uh be ready for the first session tomorrow morning at 8 45 and breakfast This is at 8. Are we playing werewolves tonight? Go ahead. I thought it was going to be breakfast at 8, 830, and then we're going to start at 830 and run to 945 on this.