The Self-Seeking Engine That Feeds the Spiritual Machine – Scott R.

How was I able to do a lot of this stuff? My self-centeredness and selfishness was so powerful that it actually, the only thing that was real to me was not its impact on you, not your suffering, not how I presented in the world, not what was going to happen to my children, but my own suffering was the only things that was really to me. I don't believe in thieving, I don' t believe in lying, but you know what, I'm a survivor. And it's not pretty. The first thing I have to do is quit playing God. Now, part of the complication here as a sponsor and as a member of AA and as somebody who personally needs to experience step three in order to survive, there's also a line between playing God and being irresponsible. It's a slippery slope. It's an interesting thing. When a guy calls me and reports to me that his brother-in-law has kind of pissed him off and he thinks really the best thing for him to do is to get out in the middle of the night and cut the guy's brake lines on all his vehicles so that he dies in a flaming car crash. To not play God, to really not play Gott, I would just say, okay, fine, maybe after you kill him you'll write a resentment against yourself or something. or I can insinuate myself into the process in a loving way. There's a difference between being irresponsible and playing God and walking that line and taking a look at it. I, at this point, at 22 years of sobriety, I have erred on the side of not playing God a lot. I really have. I am trying to find a way to be responsible in a way, in a loving way. A guy called me one night and he was going to kill himself and I acted responsibly. I did what the citizens do. I called the police. That's what citizens do I don't you know I'm going to tell myself well, call me when you're serious about this thing. Click. I called The Cops. I go over there and The Caps said we just think he's had too much to drink and I go oh really? I go in, he stands up. The whole time he's talking to the cops, he's sitting on a butcher knife. The entire time, you know? So I didn't err on the side of not playing God. I took that kind of action. One of the things I love, and I've heard this from newcomers so many times, is a new gal will say, you know what, I was with some people smoking crack last night and I really felt comfortable. You know, it wasn't hard for me. And part of the insane thing there is we forget it's illegal you know I'm really glad you're comfortable when Jonah got out of the belly of the whale he didn't go back to get his hat there's a line of irresponsibility there we had to quit playing God it didn't work next we decided that hereafter in this drama of life God was going to be our director He is the principal, we are His agents He is The Father, we Are His children Most good ideas are simple, and this concept was the keystone of the new and triumphant arch through which we pass to freedom. And it talks about that I'm going to get close to him. I'm gonna perform his work well. I got on my knees with my sponsor. We said this prayer together, which I felt was embarrassing and unnecessary, but we did it. I thought, well, before taking this step, making sure we were ready that we could abandon or at last abandon ourselves utterly to him, I don't know what that meant. I didn't go out and buy a robe, you know, but I just did it as good as I could do it at that time. And I want to share with you something because it took me a long time to get this and figure it out, but it was just another gorgeous thing my beautiful sponsor did for me. I had a guy named Don M. He was my first sponsor for my first 10 years. We got on our knees and we said this prayer, and he opened his book, and we both held hands and we read the prayer from the book. And part of my twisted noodle, part of my brain said, boy, shouldn't you like know this? You know, you've been doing this a long time. I've asked, you know, I'm soliciting your aid here. I think you should know this prayer. Of course he knew the prayer. He didn't want to separate himself from me. He don't want to be more sober than me. He didn'T want to sit there and close his eyes and know it by heart why I had to read it. And he read it with me. And what a great, loving, generous thing. And he didn't say it to me. It didn't take me long. About eight years later, I realized it. But in that time, monkey see, monkey do, I had always held hands and read it with the guy that I was doing it with. The generosity in Alcoholics Anonymous. Next we launched, it says here, you know, it's a funny thing. I had this spiritual sickness, and the only way to get out of it, the only Way to Get Out of This Terrible Fix I'm In is Some Kind of Spiritual Experience. And in the big book of AA, there's just, it's like an internal combustion engine all throughout the book. You know, in step five it says, in steps three it says sometimes a great effect is felt at once. You know, at the end of step four, on the end of chapter five, it says we've, you know, chewed off and swallowed some big chunks of truth about ourselves. In step five, it says now we really begin to have a real spiritual experience. You know in the middle of nine, it says that we have no new peace and new freedom. We know freedom from fear of financial insecurity. This was written in 1937 to 1939 during global economic collapse. If there had been a PR department working with these guys, they would not have let them put that you will know freedom from fear of financial insecurity. That's the last thing they would have said. Guys, promise them anything. Promise them and do not promise them that. That is crazy. Nobody can do that in this world that we are living in. They promised it and they delivered it. And then in step 10 it says that the alcohol problem will be removed. We will know the correct use of self-will. We won't even be swearing off. The problem will be removed. In 11, it says the occasional hunch or inspiration will actually become a working part of the mind. And in 12, I have had a spiritual experience as a result of these steps and now I'm going to go talk to other people. You know, I was in psychotherapy for 18 years by the time I got to AA. I was going to be dead but I was gonna understand it. And I got no beef against therapy. I'm in therapy now. I get a tremendous amount out of therapy.I really like it. I don't use it to treat my alcoholism. That's like showing up at a gunfight with a knife. It's just a humongous mistake. And never once has any of my therapists, especially before I got sober, shown me a solution and then said, go talk to other people. They mostly said, try to quiet down a little bit. You might want to talk to less people actually. And you guys have always said to me, we don't care what you've got, give it away. Just don't give away anything you don't have. And I've made mistakes. I've given away, tried to give away stuff I don't have. It's not pretty. But you said if all you got is a car and a quarter, lend somebody a dime and give them a ride. So this decision that I've made to turn my will and my life over to the care of God as I understand him is a great decision. Next we launched out on a course of vigorous action, the first step of which was a personal housecleaning, which many of us never attempted. Though the decision was a vital and a crucial step, it could have little permanent effect unless followed at once by a strenuous effort to face and to be rid of the things in ourselves which had been blocking us. Our liquor was but a symptom, so we had to get down to causes and conditions. There are three sections to the inventory, as is explained in the book. There's a section on resentments that we're asked to write twice on. There's a section on fears we're asked to write wants on. And there's a Section on Sex, which we're asked to Write a Story on. The Section on sex, to me, has really become more about my life and the way that I want to be in the world, the kind of man that I would be. It says in Doctor's Opinion, Silkworth talks about that we long felt that some form of moral psychology was required. And I always wondered what the hell moral psychology is, you know, and I get it now. And I just got to tell you this story because it's a great story. I have a friend named Bobby, and unfortunately doesn't get asked to talk a lot in AA. He's quite a guy. And he came off Skid Row in L.A., which is a tough place to come off of. He had alcoholic paralysis. And he was going to kill himself. He climbed up to a bridge in Los Angeles and said, Pop, I'm done. What had happened an hour before is he had gone back to his house with his three daughters and took off his crunchy clothes. His wife let him come in to take a shower. And when he got out of the shower, he heard his five-year-old daughter say to his wife, When are you going to realize that you can't make a daddy out of that creepy man? And he put his filthy clothes on, and he walked out, And he walked up to a bridge in L.A. and said, just let me know because I got to go. And a wind came up and pushed him back off the bridge. And he walk down to a pay phone and called A.A., and he's never had another drink. He's a great guy. And he made this deal with God about his physical health, which was failing, about if he got better, he'd run the marathon in L!A., and he got there. And he went down to sign up for the marathon. He was a couple of years sober. and they had this card. The L.A. Times had people filling out a card to say why he wanted to run the marathon and he wrote down the reason. And the guys down on Skid Row read the article that was published on him because the marathon runs through Skid Row and the guys down there put together a cheering section for him when he ran through. Bobby came off a place called Harbor Lights, which is a Salvation Army deal down on the nickel in L. A. and they have a thing called the Hall of Miracles where people who've come off the nickel on 5th Street and have stayed three years sober they put them into the Hall Of Miracles they have this lovely little thing I went down there for his induction into the hall of miracles and one kind of heart breaking thing is there were no news cameras down there what a missed opportunity you know and there's you, you're there dressed pretty and smiling and comfortable, all these families and kids running around. And the Salvation Army guy said something about the kids there that just changed... I used to sometimes come into an AA meeting if there was a kid there, I'd do my traditional snubbing and glowering a little bit, you know, my prejudge. And, you Know, if a kid's whacking you in the back of the head through an entire meeting, it's probably not a good idea, but he just was, this guy from the Salvation Army was a tremendous help to me. He said that thing I said before, it didn't originate with me, he said today, if the children are difficult or maybe distracting, just remember that it's the music of families that shouldn't be together. And I've just loved that. So, sorry, apparently this child's been ejected, but But resentment's no big deal. It's just the source of all spiritual illness and the great destroyer of alcoholics. Don't be alarmed. It'll cut you off from the sunlight of the spirit, drag your ass out, and kill you dead. But work a step a year. Relax. It's going to kill me. It's going to eat my brain and my heart and turn my life black and throw me out of my own life. There won't be room for me in my own wife, not when I'm re-experiencing my hatred of you. And here's an added terror that somehow if I don't stay invigorated and having a robust, exciting experience in AA, it starts becoming okay for me to have certain resentments as a sober person. And I try to wish them away. I try and pray them away, and I start having recidivism. I start the same resentment coming up again and again. I start suffering from the same thing again and then, and start losing hope. and if I don't start expanding my experience, my spiritual tools and my way to implement them as a member of AA I start feeling like I'm on a spiritual hamster wheel and it starts going below the horizon and stop presenting itself as a real piece of business and I go mad. And one of the guys I sponsor have asked me do you still do inventory and I always say to him you'll know when I stop. I will not be particularly interested in what's going on with you I will not. I might act it, but you know when you act it people know sometimes when a guy is not so self-obsessed that he's really not paying attention. And the book is real clear about this. I'm resentful at Scott for being a terrible father. It affects my self-esteem, pocketbook, ambition, personal relations, and sex. again please don't take anything I'm saying as an indictment of what you're doing in Alcoholics Anonymous I'm just sharing my stuff I'm not sharing at you I'm sharing with you and I'm just here to tell you what I do I understand people use the phrase what was my part and I understand that it's very helpful to a lot of people, it's not a phrase that I use I'm resentful at Nazis for slaughtering Jews during World War II, what's my part No, I don't have a part. I don' t see it that way. Again, this can be semantics, okay? What the phrase my part is not even nowhere in the first 164 pages of the big book. And again, I'm not indicting it. I'm just sharing what I've required to see this clearly. For me, it says what are the defects in me that if God would remove, the resentment would be gone, right? The first thing that was apparent was that this world and its people were often quite wrong. But again, don't read the next page because what the next stage says is you're right and you're dead. You are dead because you experienced this in a way that is so injurious to you, you can't live your life while you're experiencing this thing. You know, I wake up, I think about it. I think of God. I think back to that guy. Would everybody join me in the Lord's Prayer? Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name thy kingdom come thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us and lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil for thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever amen do you guys use that prayer at your home group at all? Okay. You just said, almost everybody here I think just said the prayer. You said, forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us. I want you to do a 15 second contemplation right now. Okay, you can close your eyes or keep them open and ask yourself, is there anybody or anything in your life you're not forgiving? thank you if there's anybody or anything in your life you're not forgiving why did you say the prayer you just said forgive me my trespasses I forgive those who trespass against us why do I keep saying this prayer I say it at almost every meeting I go to now if you've never read the sermon on the mount I just want to tell you that Emmett Fox, the guy who wrote, it's a book called Sermon on the Mount. In the back of the book is this really remarkable section on the Lord's Prayer. And he takes each sentence in the Lord'S Prayer and writes a chapter about it. And the chapter that he writes about forgiveness is one of the most powerful, life-changing experiences I've ever had. He basically says, Fox says, if you're saying this prayer and you're not forgiving, He says, basically, you should choke on the words. And he suggests not saying the prayer until you forgive. Otherwise, why are you saying it? It becomes a very flat, empty pursuit, a hastily mumbled thing. It's not even a prayer. It's the end of the meeting. You know? And I don't want to live that way. I don'T want things to flatten out. I don't want them to be sucked dry of the possible spiritual growth opportunity that's there. So one of the things that Fox says at the end of the chapter on forgive us our trespasses, he says that one practice that's really helped him is he says that every day part of his morning deal is he forgives everyone for everything. I forgive everyone for anything. So I started doing it. No, I started trying to do it. and what starts happening in my head is, I forgive everyone for everything. And my brain goes, him? You're forgiving him? Her? That? That government? The people who are murdering people in Darfur? You're going to forgive them? And I started having to deal with this idea of forgiveness. Again, do I excuse the people who are committing genocide in Darpur? No. No. Do I forgive them? If I don't, I'm dead. Does forgiveness mean that I don' t take action? No. Does forgiveness means that I do not give money to operations that I hope are victorious? No, it doesn't mean any of that. The Bhagavad Gita is a wonderful, wonderful Hindu tract and if you have never read it, it's really quite marvelous. And there are these, the Bhagavad Gita takes place on a battlefield where two warring factions, most of them relatives. One of my favorite playwrights, Anton Chekhov, when he was describing what the theater should be, what his idea of the theater would be, he said, Theater should be like eating dinner with your family. Nothing is said during the meal except for pass the salt and more butter please, and yet by dessert, your life is destroyed. So welcome to my house. And so on this battlefield, a god, they don't know he's a god. And one of the heroes of the battle are talking. And the relatives are about to slaughter people. So it's about life. It's about being on the battle. and what the message is, what they say is keep your brain in the fight. Keep your brain in the sponsorship. Keep your mind in the group. Keep your head in the clouds and our feet on the ground. And I love that. I love the spirit of that a lot. So with forgiveness, as I've done this morning, that morning declaration, it points up to me where I'm not forgiving. It points upto me whereI'm re-experiencing and I'm denying rain to either the thorns or the flowers. I'm saying love is here. I'm a part of the big spiritual democracy of Alcoholics Anonymous, and if I'm not part of that democracy, I'm pretty much putting myself on an ice flow and I'm eventually going to die. How can I continue to do that? And again, there is behavior that's not excusable, but it's all got to be forgivable. I heard in AA that my parents didn't do a good job, but it was the best that they could do. And you know what, that's fine, but they really did a bad job. I was really injured as a kid. And they did the best they could, but I don't really am that interested in patting them on the back for that. This job at times just sucked, you know. And I forgive them absolutely and completely or I'm going to die. It's not excusable, but it is forgivable. I'm resentful at Nazis for slaughtering Jews during World War II what are the defects in me that if God would remove the resentment would be gone that's my part, what are The Defects blue skies, God's got a magic wand I'm not going to talk about if it's possible for these things to be removed I don't know I'm going to tell you what it is in me that if G-d would remove the resentment we'd be gone let's go back to Father I'm resentful at Scott for being a lousy father and I was no, I did good stuff and I did a lot of bad stuff. And at the end of the day, the bad far outweighed the good. My sons have received 22 birthday gifts on the day of their birthday that they wanted. Not once in 22 years have they received the day after radioactive guilt gift from the only place that would still take a hot check from me. Here's some drywall boys. Kids are loving the drywall. my younger son's birthday is in a couple of weeks and I spent the weekend with him last weekend and I had that great talk with him Jess what do you want for your birthday we had this great talk about it he wants a certain kind of belt buckle non-representational he doesn't want it to be like the portrait of somebody we just had this great time I did things on my son's birthdays in my house that I would not share publicly at an AA group. They were so injurious and so embarrassing. And God, I'm such a good parent now. And I'm not saying I don't make mistakes, but I'm resentful at Scott for being a bad father. It affects my self-esteem, pocketbook ambition, personal relations and sex, a five bagger for sure. What does it mean that if God would remove the resentment we'd be gone? Well, I am ashamed and I'm guilty. I'm not trusting in God. If I trusted in God, I would stop punishing myself the way I am. At the time I wrote this, I had to write I'm impatient because I'm nicht geben myself a chance to do the right thing. You know, I was pretty new. It was my fourth step. I was fresh out of being a bad debt father. So I was impatient. You know what it says in the chapter of the family afterward? We tend to try to get something done real quick because it's so awful when you actually stop drinking and you take the whooping, you know. If I really had gotten the enormity of a lot of the injury I'd done, if I really hade gotten it, I don't know that I could have stayed here. I think it just would have broke my back. I couldn't fit the pain in my head. Thank God. If I had remembered everything, I would have looked like an outtake from scanners. My head just would Have blown up, you Know. It came to me slowly and it came to Me and it was really revealed. It's like a dentist, you know, when a dentist takes that little tool and gets a pinprick and opens it, and it's like the Carlsbad Caverns in there. That's very similar to a lot of the inventory I've done where I'll take one item and it will kind of open a little world there that I've got to take a look at. And there's a difference between self-examination and self-obsession. If this stuff and this self- examination is not connected to changing the way I behave and finding and asking about solutions and finding people who in the problem seems to have been solved, then it's just going to become a self-fulfilling prophecy after a while. What are the other defects? I'm punishing. And you know what? Another defect is I'm irresponsible. I was an irresponsible father. It's true that I was a bad father. That's the truth. Why does it feel bad? Because it was. I'm dishonest I'm filled with self delusion and it's interesting a defect for me very interesting defect is fear of confrontation years ago my older son Micah I was I think about four years sober by this time so he was about ten and Jesse was seven and Jesse broke his wrist in a schoolyard accident and in a little kid it got broken in a growth plane which is cartilage that get that turns to bone and if it gets disrupted if it get set you can't mess with it because if it doesn't heal right it can be a bad permanent deal for the kid so he gets a cast he's a younger brother so it's a weapon the cast is a weapon and um he gets home and you know the playing field is a little more level now with the cast which he's delighted about so he just he wants to show his brother his cast up close and personal as quick as he can and you know they're boys they're beating the crap out of each other in about 10 minutes and it had to be zero tolerance i couldn't let him do this because if it screwed up his arm it'll be bad it wasn't something i could repeat 11 times uh you know so i got up in micah's face and i yelled at him and i just shut it down. And Micah, who's 10, turned away from me, stormed into his room and slammed the door. So he slammed the door, so I got the dad tick going now. I slammed the door, you know, and I go to the door and open the door before I can unload on him. He looks up at me and he says, hold on a second. I didn't say you were wrong out there. You were right about what you were saying, but a huge guy just got in my face and screamed and yelled, I didn't say you were wrong. Don't tell me I can't be mad. What the hell is that? What is that?" Well, it was something he had been watching his mother and I doing with varying degrees of success and failure. Ina had a repress, just crush it back down and wind up climbing into a clock tower with a high-powered rifle, you You know, I had a bully, a scream and yell or cry. Either one's fine with me. I've always enjoyed the tyranny of helplessness or the volume, volume or crying. Either one is fine in a pinch. But to stand up for myself and tell you how I feel without telling you what to do, to take no crap and to give no crap. Wow. That's overcoming the fear of confrontation. And that's what Micah did in that moment. he didn't say I was wrong he didn's a don't talk to me that way he said I get it it made me angry don't tell me I can't be angry I'm not telling you that you're not wrong I am I am respecting you and are you oughta respect me I don't know if you're gonna but you ought because I'm respecting me by doing this what what a remarkable thing that is You know, and fear of confrontation has appeared as a defect in my inventory many, many times. You know because there's times I need to really sit down and explain a few things to my boss and I don't want to overcome a fear of conversation. I want to give him a piece of my mind no matter how small a piece it might be by that time. I would like to share it and it's usually a pretty small piece by that or I'm not going to say anything, I'm going to suffer. But to tell you how I feel without telling you what to do, man, that is really an extraordinary thing. I'm resentful at Nazis for slaughtering Jews during World War II. What are the defects of character in me that if God would remove, the resentment would be gone? What are they? What is it specifically in this resentment that if God were to remove. Now, is it the same all the time? No. No. Is it similar? Quite often similar. But there's different elements to it. And I want to be I don't want to talk about how many Bill Wilsons can dance on the head of a pin. I don' t want to micromanage this thing. But I like to be specific. When I go to God in 6 and 7 or I go to him in 3 and I say Papa, I'm yours. And he says, well, yeah, I' m God. I knew that. that's awfully generous of you, but I kind of got that already. You know, I'm God. And I say, take me. And he goes, well, yeah, sure, what? And I go, well take this. Take this. Take this, what can I do? I need your help. What kind of demonstration can I make? How can I use this as a fire starting moment, a flash point, a doorway to change or to understanding or to love or to forgiveness. How can I empathize? Empathy is not excuse. Empathy, I used to think pity was pathetic. I usedと think that pity was patronizing. But the defect of being un-pitying is a terrible sickness. I can't be helpful to all people, but I must at least take a kindly and tolerant view of each and every one. you know and um so when i did this thing against nazis my sponsor told me that thing that gourd because i said i have let's try none i have no defects here we're talking about nazis what the hell are you talking about and don said to me he changed my life in that moment i had no idea how much he was turning my ship but when he said tome you you don't understand the question they're not asking if the event was your fault. They're asking if the resentment was your fall. Was the event your fault? No, was the event my fault around my aunt abusing me? No. Is the resentment my fault every time without a loophole and an exception? What would a normal person do if they were against Nazis or dislike my aunt for abusing them? They might do a lot of stuff in the case of the Nazis, they might work against the Nazis join political organizations that fight them They might contribute funds to those organizations. They might carry the good news. They might do a lot of stuff, but I didn't do any of that stuff. I just talked a lot along crap and never got out of the house. So what are the defects in me? Well, I'm an opportunist. I kind of use this for my own deal. I was filled with self-pity. Self-pitty is if you could bottle self-pitty, it would not crack off the market in a week. It's just better. It's more available. I get a little lump in my throat my eyes water up I lean forward it's good dope man you know and it really is a narcotic isn't that the truth for me for sure and as we talked when I say we I mean me as I talked about at the beginning of the workshop I've got to get rid of this selfishness I've gotta or it kills me so when I write this inventory I like to be as specific as I can with God Selfish, self-centered, and self-seeking. Selfish is kind of wanting it all for me. Self-seekings trying to figure out what's in it for me, and self centered is kind of figuring that it's all about me. So they're the same and they're different. They're a little spin, a little different English on them. And again, I like to be as specific as I can when I go to my father in that fire starting moment of six and seven. You know what I think I'm going to do guys, I think we're going to take one more break and then drive it through to lunch. Why don't we do that? And I'm starting to talk about 6 and 7. I feel a shift coming on here so why don't We take 5 minutes, try to keep it to 5 and then we'll have one more session and if you've got them, smoke them Good morning, I'm an alcoholic Please join me in the serenity prayer God grant me the serENITY accept the things I cannot change courage to change the things I can and wisdom to know the difference we've got some stuff in the basket I want to address that and we'll finish up by noon and I just want to talk about step four probably maybe wheedle my way into step five a little bit before we break someone wrote what happened with the AA group written up in Newsweek and why did they get written up it's in last week's Newsweek It's a group called the Midtown Group in Washington, D.C. I'm not breaking their anonymity. It's in Newsweek. And the accusations were they participate in sexual exploitation of young women and that there was – they presented – I thought it was such a well-written article because the writer says this is a splinter group from AA, which I'm sure that many members of the group don't view themselves as a splinter group from AA. And they say that this is outside of what's accepted as the mainstream tenets of Alcoholics Anonymous. So they don't present it as an indictment of Alcoholic Anonymous, there was a news story there because there was some accusations made by a young woman who said that she was exploited. The other thing that I think was attractive as a news item is that the report included the fact that they had cordoned themselves off, that people were throwing away people's cell phones. They were told not to call people. They were called not to attend meetings outside of that group. So that's the basic idea. It's on the web. It's out there. It's weird. In my area, there are some AA groups that have separated themselves from alcoholics anonymous, Both in Al-Anon and AA, my wife and I, a lot of people who have felt very deeply wounded by these groups have come to me and my wife for help. And some of the men I sponsor, I've had incredible experiences watching them open their heart and their minds and just seeing that there's a different way, just that there'S a different wAy. Many of the people who come to me wounded from other AA groups cannot bear being treated well. And they move on and when someone comes to me and says, I need someone to kick my ass, I go, thanks for playing, you'll be finding someone else because I can't imagine why I would want to be your ass kicker. Why is it going to be my job to rope in your superego and punish your libido and your id? I can come up with something else during the day I'd rather do, you know. But that's just me. I mean, this is why God made more than one of us. You know, I mean I've shared at meetings that this ass-kicking thing is something I've avoided and I've had people come up to me afterwards and say, well, it saved my life. I'm not saying you shouldn't do it. I'm just sharing my personal experience. Is there anything you would suggest to help with over sober? Yes, absolutely And I'll tell you exactly what I've done I'm resentful at the North Hollywood Group For being a bunch of sick Moronic Hurtful people It affects my self-esteem Pocketbook, ambition, personal relations and sex The North Hollywood group is a big Big AA group A lot of people go there A lot OF people say they're being helped there These meetings I have attended them And I have wanted to take my own life During the meeting My sponsor gave me three tools to make my way through unpleasant sharing. These are the three tools. He said, remember that everything in Alcoholics Anonymous needs to be said. You might not be on the list of people who needs to hear it. How many times have I taken a newcomer to a meeting, and it has been the worst meeting of AlcoholicsAnonymous ever held? And I think, well, so much for that 12-step call. They'll be running, screaming into the night. And we walk out, and the guy turns to me and goes, man, that was absolutely amazing. Can we come back here next week? And I'm thinking, sure. If you shoot me in the lips, maybe I'll come back there. Everything that gets said at an AA meeting needs to be said, even though don't make me the arbiter. you know um the second thing he said to me is he said are you willing to take the following chance with your life when the guy is sharing something you don't want to hear are you willing to go to the podium tap him on the shoulder and say shut the hell up and sit down because i'm going to talk now and so far i'm not saying i haven't wanted to do that but i haven'T been willing to TAKE THAT CHANCE WITH MY LIFE AND THE THIRD THING HE SAID TO ME IS When it's going on and you're listening to it, remember, they're going to stop. They're going to stop, it's going to end. And when I'm in the middle of it, it feels like it's not going to end. I was a long time ago in my home group, a guy walked up to this is a guy who when he shared people literally threw ropes over the rafters, they hung themselves while this was like, it was like that airplane movie where people kill themselves anytime the guys said this is what this guy was like. And he walked up to me at the end of a meeting, and he put his hand on my shoulder, and he said, you know what? You really haven't been there for me, and I need to move on with sponsorship. I had no recollection of him ever asking me to sponsor him. I hadno recollectionof him ever sponsoring him. All I got was the good part, getting fired. It was like all I gotwas the whipped cream. I just got the good stuff, you now. So at any rate, the way I have avoided being over sober is when I write these resentments against these groups or against people who I think are doing it really bad and people who I think misusing Alcoholics Anonymous. One of the defects that comes up over and over again is spiritual pride. Now, I didn't get spiritual pride until I came into AA and became a spiritual Goliath. I didn' t come in equipped with spiritual pride, I got it here. I caught spiritual pride here. So if I'm really going to get out of spiritual pride, number one, it doesn't mean that I have... Acceptance is not compliance. It's not. Acceptance ist accepting so that I can keep my head in the clouds and my feet on the ground. So I can keeps my head into fight and my heart at the lotus feet of the Lord. So I could overcome a fear or confrontation and express myself without having... I can make an evaluation without a judgment. I can move through the landscape of that thing with a good heart. You know, when I just told you about the Midtown group, I didn't say they were bad. I don't know that. I know what I want to be around and not be around. I know that I have been called by injured members of that group and I didnít believe them at first about what was going on and then I started. It was just, it was the testimony was, you know, I could only go la-la-la after a while if I didn't want to buy it. So that has been the main gateway to prevent me from being over sober is being able to write the resentments against them and then eventually the resentment's against myself. It says in our book when it was remorse, we were sore at ourselves. And I don't know about you, but the resentments against myself have been horrible. I do inventories now sometimes no one else but me shows up on it. I want to challenge an idea that you might have. Why, and I'm going to present it as myself, but I'm asking you at the same time, why am I so willing to believe the worst about myself? Why? I don't believe the worse about you. I met you this morning. I thought the best of you before you even walked in. I thought, oh, remember, this group's going to show up, and it'll be fun, and we'll have a chat, and, you know, we did. I thought the best of you before I met you why am I not willing often to afford myself that beautiful privilege, that opportunity why am i so willing? it's a bad idea it's an idea and i want to put it on the table nothing, saint paul said nothing can stand the light everything disappears when it's held up to the light Rumi, the great Sufi poet, says everything, the past and the future is burnt up by the light. Very few things can withstand God's truth. And I find in AA that once you start telling the truth, it's hard to stop. I'm not talking about hurtful truth. When people, Brent and I were talking about this the other day when I've had some amends made to me in AA that have been some of the most deranged amends I've ever heard, you know. I used to think you were a disgusting bozo, but I don't anymore. Oh, good. What book are you reading? I judge no man. Putting your partner in a relationship before yourself or selfishness. Well, I find this to be, for me, I believe in self-interested altruism. I believe that in this death of self I am being self-serving in the most wonderful way possible. I believe that if myself and whoever it is, my wife or my sons or my associates, if we both put 50% into the deal, that we're going to wind up with 50%, that the only way to do it is to put 100% in. One of the main ways of two defects that keep me from doing this is mind reading and not living in today. And also blackmail. Blackmail is another big defect of mine. If you do this, I'll do this. Or I would do this but I don't think you've done enough of this. I don'T think you had the right facial expression when you just gave that to me. It's like the Scott Redmond Mime Theater, I call it. But it's – so I believe, for me, that my demonstrations, my acts of charity, of love and of service are all self-serving in the most wonderful way possible, that it's self-interest and altruism. And for me to say that it is not, for m personally, is just simply not true. I've never seen people get more out of being good than I do in Alcoholics Anonymous. It's a perfect spiritual machine. It's an engine that's fed by self-seeking and opportunism the best kind possible, you know? So for me to put my partner first, I rarely do it anonymously. I might try to do it autonomously, but eventually the anonymous engine breaks down. By the way, did you see that at all? Did you notice that there were no dirty dishes? Chris Rock does one of the things in one of his routines, which I love. He says what a guy said to him, you know, I've never been to jail. And Rock says, you're not supposed to go to jail because the guy's kind of bragging about it. He says, You're not opposed to, you know, and, you know, I'll go, you know, I did the dishes. You're supposed to do the dishes. I think that it's some way that housework should equal sex, that there should be like conversion tables on the back of cleaning products of housework to sex. So that's how giving I'm being. Whenever I share that, there's always one guy who thinks marketing. You know, he really... The thing I have found about putting my partner first, about being of service and being helpful is, you know, one of the things I say to the guys I sponsor, and I really mean it as I say give me the whole story and spare me no details. I want to hear the whole storey. When a guy calls me and some of the guys I sponsor actually say how are you? It's not a common plight that they have but some of them I don't think I've ever gotten off the phone with Brent Swift and him not saying, how are you? Which makes me feel very cared for. Quite often I'll say, you know what, let's skip me and go right to you. I need you, pal. I need to know the whole thing. And I'll lay on my bed sometimes and put the phone next to me so I can hear it and I'll literally feel self fall away. But with no 10, there's no 12. I will eventually get over sober. I will separate myself. So what I'm getting to with my partner, with putting my partner first, is it becomes a great joy for me. It tickles me. It's a curiosity that I would do such a thing. My family, before I got sober, we were driving on a road called Rim of the World. It's an gorgeous road up in the mountains above L.A., and my whole family is going and they're looking out at this panorama, and they go, oh, that's so beautiful. And I'm going, yeah, it really is. And all of them realized all at once that I was looking at myself in the rearview mirror, that I Was not, I Was Not. And they just went, oh dude, dude, you are, you're in deep trouble. So it's a problem. But that demonstration of putting my partner first, First, I've jettisoned the idea that I'm good and that it's a delight to me. And I hope that's helpful. And you mentioned a Hindu tract that was a good read. Will you please spell the name? I don't know how to spell the game. It's Bhagavad Gita. And I bet you if you go to the library and you mention it, they'll know exactly what you mean. But I don't know. It's a weird spelling. But it's the Bhagavad Gita. It's part of a bunch of books that are the holiest books for the Hindus. And it's one section which is about this battle, this great battle. So what are the defects of character in me that if God would remove the resentment would be gone? I'm resentful at X for being an AA blowhard and big shot, affecting my self-esteem, pocketbook, ambition, personal relations, and sex. What are the defects of character? Well, I'm jealous. I'm a bully and a hypocrite because I want to teach them the lesson that they're trying to teach other people. I have spiritual pride, and I'm unwilling to accept the fact that another child of God could be spiritually sick like me. Now, if I could accept the fait that they were spiritually sick, I wouldn't resent any of them. I'd show them the same tolerance, pity, and patience I would cheerfully grant a sick friend. I'm willing to accept that X is another child. who could be spiritually sick like me. Why do I say could? Because it says I have to quit playing God. So I'm not going to say is spiritually sick. I don't know if they're spiritually sick, it's possible. And I'm unwilling to even accept the possibility. So they're not just one of God's kids that could be spiritual sick, they're a bunch of hosebags who should die in a flaming car crash. And when I have enough people in the lazy Susan of my mind who have to die, they have to Die, they have To Die or Be Exposed. They have To die, Be Expose, Be Punished. Either one's fine. Or a combination of the three. Punish him, expose him, then kill him. That's really the best. Because I don't just dislike these people. I re-experience the hatred. When I wake up, I water it like a little flower. I want to make sure it's good and it's robust and it is growing and well cared for. The worst thing for me is when I forget to hate something. And like a guy will go, Hi! And I'll go, Hi! Oh, I hate him. Why did I do that? Oh no! I'm going to have to redouble my snubbing just to get back to where we were, where I thought he knew I hated him. Isn't he reading my mind? It's a short read, believe me, but isn't he reading my brain? He's reading my mind. You have enough of this activity, I'm sorry, you don't have a life. Let me rephrase that. I have enough of this activity, I don't have a life. I just don't. So this defect of being unwilling to accept the fact that another child of God could be spiritually sick. Now, when I write it, I'm resentful at Scott for being a bad father, it's a little different. I know I'm spiritually sick, it says on page 65, we've not only been mentally and physically sick, we'd been spiritually sick if you're an alcoholic, you're spiritually sick I know i'm an alcoholic. So in when I right the defect about me, I say I am unwilling to accept the fact that Scott is another child of God who is spiritually sick if I could accept the factor of spiritually sick i'd show myself the same tolerance pity inpatients, I would cheerfully grant a sick friend. You know, I know that people use a practice. It's a lovely practice of praying for people they're resentful for. It has never been useful for me. I know it is useful. Guys I sponsor do it. It is just, I am not a suicide guy. I am a homicide guy. I have always vastly preferred your death to mine. I always have. You know? You first. The headline I have always seen in my head is Scott Redman kills wife, kills children and refuses to commit suicide. That's always the one. And I'm not, and this is not an indictment of the suicide people. I am not knocking the suicide people here. It's just kind of the flip side of the same coin, really, you know. But for me, you're first. And so I had a lot of resentment against people, a lot of resentment against people. And one of the things my sponsor urged me to do was to ask myself a question. When you write a resentment against somebody, ask yourself, do you have a resentment against yourself in connection with this resentment? Let's try to clean out the whole cavity. That's been very helpful to me. Sometimes, many times I don't. I don't, I just hate you. I'm fine with just hating you. But sometimes there's some extracurricular activity and I throw myself into the fire too, you know. The, I'm supposed to write resentments against people, institutions, and principles so the institutions for me were you know a lot of governments there was government South Africa government of the Soviet Union I had some banks some religious institutions some schools and principles are really interesting if we're really truthful and really step up to that you know there's the Christian ethical work ethic as a principal you know doing to others is a principle racism is a principle and the reverse of racism you know which is that all races are okay that's a principle I've I've had a sponsor a guy who used to have a picture of a Nazi flag in his room and I sponsored him and because I had done my inventory and I hadn't written the resoundment against Nazis and I had written the defects of character and I prayed about it and I forgiven you know and I started sponsoring me did an inventory read me the inventory there was a lot of really horrific stuff as you can well imagine on the inventory and a couple years later when my older son was bar mitzvah this guy called me and said what should I wear to the bar Mitzvah and what is inappropriate gift to bring I don't know how many places that's happening but I know it's happening at our house you know a couple years after that he asked me if I could marry him and his wife they had gotten here they got me I don' know what the word is but credited or I was a legally made a assistant a deputy commissioner of marriages in the county of Los Angeles for one day and I legally married them I don't think that went out on the Nazi Gazette that night and I got to marry legally anybody I wanted that day, I wanted to go down like Skid Row and just like marry everybody it was such a cool feeling it went to my head do you? you do? you're married but what a day What an extraordinary day, you know, that was. Without the inventory, that day certainly doesn't take place, you know. It says after we write our resentments against people, institutions, and principles, against myself when it was remorse, I was sore at myself, and I write the corresponding defects of character. One thing I like to do is I like write the resentments and they'll write an individual defect list for each resentment. They don't have to be 40 pages long. Again, I'm not talking about micromanaging or making this impossible. There could be three, four, five defects. Not a big deal. But the reason why is I like to read, I'm resentful at Scott for being a bad father, what it affects, what the defects are, and I liketo have it on a different piece of paper. I number them so the corresponding list is there because when I go to God in 6 and 7, I'm going to go to god with the defect list, not the resentment list. I like to put that resentment list aside and just go to him with the thing that's killing me. What's killing me is this spiritual tapeworm. What's kill me are these defects that I'm not only not getting rid of, I'm encouraging. You know, I'm watering them like a little flower. I'm so right. I'm mind shatteringly right. and then it says we do a fear list and we write a fear list, it's such an interesting presentation it says, we write fears not in connection with personal resentment now I'm frightened of the police but I'm also I've been knocking over 7-11's and I'm resentful at myself for knocking over 6-11 so the fear of the police is not a real fear, it is going to lead me to writing more resentments I'm frightening of success, I'm frighting of failure I'm frightened of AIDS. I'm threatened of hepatitis C. I'm afraid of the dark. I'm frighten of the light. I'm frightening of being alone, and I'm frightened of being with people. How do you have a life? Once you've painted yourself into that spiritual corner, there's no oxygen left. There is no air. There's no light. How do have a live? And I've heard these fears. Every one of them I've just mentioned, I've hear them on most of the inventories that I hear. Now, if we wanted to be nitpicking, and I find it so useless to be a nitpicker when it comes to the inventory process. I'm just talking about tools I've used that have been really helpful to me. I don't think it's the right or wrong way at all, at all. The minute I say, how can you stay sober and do that? You call that sponsorship? Then I'm over-sober. Then I better sit down and write those resentments so that I can be part of the deal again. I could make a case for every single one of those fears having a connecting resentment to it, but I don't want to. When it presents as a fear that I experience just as pure fear, I write it on that. And when I write the fear list, I write, I am frightened of. I am threatened of sex. I am frightening of success. I am frightened of failure. Now it says that selfishness, self-centeredness, not we think is the root of our problem, driven by a hundred forms of fear, self-delusion, self-seeking and self-pity. Now I've never heard an inventory with a hundred forms of fear. And that's fine. I don't mind missing out on that. If it's 25 of each or a hundred, I don' t care. It's a lot. It' s enough to kill me. And that' s the very simple second section of the inventory as far as I can see it. It doesn't ask me to attach any quantity or any defects that feed it. It just says I write down my fears. I made a list of my fears and then the incredible sexual inventory on page 62 for me, one of the great transforming pieces in all of our spiritual treatment, the chance I get to really implement this mysterious idea of moral psychology. It says that I'm going to write about seven points. Where was I selfish, dishonest, or inconsiderate? Unjustifiably aroused jealousy, suspicion, and bitterness. And what I should have done instead. Not what I could have done. Not what i could have done. Most of my love affairs look like the opening scene of a CSI episode. You should stop, Scott. Everyone's dead. You know, it was bad. bad. It was bad. And it's not what I could have done. What I could've done was what I did. What should I have done? And in the last two paragraphs, it describes a relationship, an active living breathing ongoing developmental relationship with God that I think is unequaled in our literature and in my experience. It says, in this way I try to shape a sound safe and sound ideal for my future sex life. I don't use the word sex. I just say for my my future life. It says that I draw close to God. I tell him what I should be doing instead. What kind of man do I want to be? What kind of organ do I wanna be for the ever advancing spearhead of God's will and purpose, which is a mystery to me. But I know what it feels like to take a step away from a drink and a step toward a drink. That's the acid test for me. This is all about not drinking. 100% about not drinking if that's the kernel of it. If the acid tests for me is it a step toward a drink or away from a drink? I've heard in AA, it's not about not drinking anymore. It's about living. I understand that. I don't feel that way. I feel that it's 100% about not drink. But I'm not focused on not drinking. I'm taking these seemingly disconnected, I am focused on it when I'm trying to get you through 24 hours when you've got a week and a half and your brains are leaking out the back of your head. You know. I ask God what to do in each individual situation. I ask God to help shape me and mold me and help me walk toward that. That's a process. That's the future. That's now. That is in the moment. Right here, right now. Because that's all that exists. My brain would have me not believe that. My brain is like a dog with a bone. You know that sometimes I get into my car now and I actually decide what I want to do. I actually sometimes get in my car and go, what do you want to know? Want to think? Think for a while. Do you want to work on this piece of writing that you got in your head? Would you like to work upon that? What do you want do? In the past, it was just I get in the car and I'm there for the ride. I'm going to do whatever the hell my brain tells me. My brain, I am ravaged by thought. I'm gonna do whatever my brain tell me to do, whenever it tells me to it, forever, how long. But I actually, because of my spiritual practice, and I've been practicing this spiritual stuff, I've be doing it since I'm six months sober and I'm not bragging. I'm just here to tell my story. I have not spent any appreciable amount of time in those 21 1⁄2 years not doing it. I just haven't experienced that of drifting away and stopping and then coming back. And that doesn't make me good. It makes me... I've had the Scott Redman experience for the past 22 years. But I at times use my brain instead of my brain using me. That's remarkable. If you ask a tree or an eagle what time it is, they don't care. That's psychological time. And what my spiritual teachers tell me, if you have a kid or if you have a pet or if your in touch with other human beings there's a peripheral vision. Sometimes if you're with somebody who has a child and you're mit them, they will perk up and leave the room because they've heard something you don't hear. You just don't hear it. They have a peripheral vision around that other being, you know. And it can happen with a pet. It can happen with all kinds of animals. It can happen in a lot of different things. You literally will hear, feel air move and you'll react to it. And what a lot OF the mystics say is what a great way to live. To be able to live in the spirit with a peripheral mission about these worldly troubles and bothers. To be able to have a choice of whether or not to engage those instead of grinding it, grinding it I show up at my home group and what I'm there to do right off the bat is take attendance and gather evidence. That's what I am doing man I walk in, let's go let's kill them all and we will sort them out later but I am going to start evidence gathering right away what a terrible defect evidence gathering is There's just no way. You don't win in that world at all, you know? And now I'm grinding it. I'm in reality. You're going to join me in reality, whether you like it or not, and we're goingto grind this. My gums are bleeding already instead of engaging in this incredible spiritual democracy. So what should I be doing instead? In this way, I try to shape a sound ideal for my future sex life, my future life. So the answer isn't always, I shouldn't have lied. I should have missionary-style position sex for the sole purpose of procreation for the rest of my life and then die. Maybe my ideal is I want to have a great romance. Maybe my idea is I wanna have a exciting sex life and I wanna do that in a truthful and honest way with my eyes open and be loving and charitable and giving and give pleasure. I don't know what it is. Maybe I want to be honest and be able to not bully you with my honesty. I don'T know what your ideal is. In the preceding page to that, it talks about something that I think when the book was written is kind of a mirror of the two schools. There were two AA camps in New York and in Akron. In Akron, they were still very, very steeped and very connected to the Oxford group and to first century Christian teachings. In New York, there were a lot of deranged intellectuals and artists. Big shock there. And, you know, Bill does this gorgeous thing. You know, he says, look, some of you might think that this is a function of our baser needs, that this should be one flavor and that's it, and some of you think that you should just be having sex with the world. And he says the beautiful thing. We will not be the arbiter of anybody's sexual behavior. We just won't do it. We've got to quit playing God. So years ago a guy came to me for help. He was engaging in a sexual behavior that was very injurious to him. And actually people were getting physically injured. And he came to me, heard me share, and I showed him how to do a sexual inventory. We did some work on it for a while, and he could not stop doing it. And he said to me I don't know what I'm going to do. And I said well let's try this. Right now you don't have God's voice in your head. You just have your voice in you head. So let's put another voice in my head. Now I'm gonna tell you if you do it again, I won't work with you anymore. And he did it the next day. And he called me and said, what are you going to do? I said, well, I'm not going to work with you anymore. And he said, you're a Nazi son of a bitch and hung the phone up on me. And I was wrong. I was right. I was so wrong. Here's the truth. The truth is it was too hard for me. That was the truth, it was to scary for me, I didn't know about it, I didn' t know what to do with it, and it was, I had some spiritual pride and I wasn't able to say to him the truth. Oh, I love you. This is too hard for me. It's too confusing and it's too hard and I can't do this with you. You know, maybe you can go to another 12-step program or talk to another person or get some therapy or go to a mental institution. I don't know what you need to do. But instead of telling him the truths, I volunteered to be the enforcer of his superego, right? Say, well, I'll put another voice in your head. So what? You know, it's just another thing he's screwing up. Another thing he is disappointing. Another thing that he is doing wrong. That's all it is, you know. So it's interesting for me to look at that. I had chosen, I volunteered to be the arbiter of his behavior. That's really at the end of the day what I did. And I did it in a lovely giving way, which is better. instead of having a finger in his face, you know. And the truth was that it was, well, what a great thing to be able to say that. This is too hard for me. It's just too hard für mich, you kno. Not that you're wrong and I'm right and this is the way to do it. So when a guy reads me a fifth step and he's going to – if he does sexual inventories and writes about – I put the name of the people who were injured on the top of the page. Sometimes I was injured and no one else was. you know sometimes someone else was injured and i wasn't sometimes i was injured my kids my wife the other person's family and there's a whole bunch of people i put the names of the people who were injured on top of the page and then i write about where i've been selfish dishonest inconsiderate unjustifiably aroused jealousy suspicion and bitterness and what i should have done instead not what i could have done the kind of man that i'd like to be and as i've developed in this inventory process when i write abut and look i don't have to have sex to write a sexual You know, most of my sex is a very solitary endeavor anyway, but I don't have to have actually contact with another human being. Thank God, otherwise I'd do very little writing, but this is about my relationships with people. You know it can be about a situation at work, it could be about the situation in my marriage, it could about the interior of all those things and I'm being selfish, dishonest, inconsiderate, unjustifiably, arousing jealousy, suspicion, and bitterness. Sometimes the jealousy is, well, I'm just jealousy of people who I think are having more fun than me or having a normal life, and I don't feel normal. I feel injured and misshapen and bad, you know. And it's just as ugly when I'm the arbiter of my own behavior, you now. so this when a guy comes and does his fifth step what I ask him to do is take all the pieces where he wrote what I should be doing instead just like I'm laying the resentments aside and bringing the defects of character to God I ask them to take all the instances where he says what I shouldn't be doing instead and put them all in one section so that in 6 and 7 and we're going to come back after lunch and talk about 6 and 7 which is really the big brass ring it's really the centerpiece for my my relationship with my higher power um uh is that he can bring that to god and then asked to be shaped asked to walk toward that in concert with god to have moral psychology you know normal psychology is uh you know if you're neurotic i don't know if anybody here has ever been referred to as a neurotic before but And a neurosis is, a couple of people are laughing, a little identification, me too, is if you have anxiety, anxiety, and then you come up with a way to resolve the anxiety. And it's a bad idea. It's just a bad ideal. It's like I swallow all the nitroglycerin and start smashing my body into the wall trying to explode. Actually, my solution is worse than my problem. Okay, I don't know if that resonates for anybody here. Like my dental problem that I was going to relieve with a hot needle into my gum. So I go to therapy, and what the idea of most conventional therapy is to uncover, discover, and unravel, to free associate, to delve into my past, and to come up with a better resolution for my anxiety. It works for millions of people. It's used all over the planet. But I have alcoholism. So I got to therapy. The therapist says, how are you? I said, terrible. Why? Well, yesterday I was too drunk to walk, so I drove. Well, let's talk about that. Let's talk About it. Let me ask you a question. What were you thinking just before you did it? Nothing. How do you feel? Terrible. I feel terrible. Why? Well, yesterday I sharpened a hypodermic needle on the back of a matchbook striker and sucked some heroin up through a fluffed-up cigarette filter and I injected it. I just feel miserable. What were you thinking just before you did it? Nothing. Nothing. And I'm telling the truth. I'm talking to you. I'm just telling the truth. My mouth flooded with saliva, the room spun, I went out for cigarettes and wound up in Baltimore and that's all I remember. Nothing. Treat that. Treat nothing. You would need a panel of therapists working 24 hours a day seven days a week to put my crap in a file and put it on a shelf. My alcoholism is so efficient and generating pathology, neurosis, difficult times, hurt feelings, broken experiences. You can't, it's not a fair fight. Absolutely not a faire fight. Boy, how did I fall down this rabbit hole? I'm usually pretty good. I don't even know how I wound up here. Thank God it's almost over. Moral psychology is to uncover, discover, and apply. that if with regular psychology to come up with a better resolution for my anxiety is a very successful thing to do and millions of people do it and what I have to do is uncover discover and have a moral application for my self discovery because when I go to you and I sit you down and I give you instructions on how to do a sexual inventory and I am a free man I'm a free men I've still got problems no no no really I've had problems in sobriety really really I I know there are people who haven't, and I'm so, so glad for them. I am not in their numbers. I've had plenty of problems with sex, with money, with all sorts of stuff in sobriety, and that's why I've hung out with people who talk about that later on in sobrietty. Otherwise, I'll be sober with a gun in my mouth. And it's so funny. Some of the guys I sponsor get very angry at themselves when they have to do a 10-step or they have a resentment. And one of the things I'm fond of saying is, you know, I get the common cold a couple of times a year. Why do you think you can move through this landscape of life and not get spiritually sick once in a while? I mean, my problem isn't that I'm spiritually sick. My problem is that I'M SEPARATED. I'M separated by a self-centeredness that keeps me in the loop of active alcoholism. I get really scared when a guy's never got anything, never got any business. And by the way, I don't have a jauntous view of that. I think there are some people who really just get free and stay free, and that's fine, and I'm happy for them. I'm just not in their number. I might be someday. I don' t feel particularly close at this point, but I live pretty free most of the time. At any rate, that form of moral psychology to me is expressed so beautifully in The Sexual Inventory about joining in a relationship with God and moving forward and being shaped. And in that partnership was my higher power. My sons are 28 and 25. They were 6 and 3 when I got sober. Years ago, when my son Michael was babysitting for a guy on this couple in the fellowship, and this guy said to him, he was about 19 at the time, said to them, what do you think of your dad talking in AA? And my son said, you know, I'm not a member. I'm awfully happy for him. I think it's great, but I, you know, and Micah said to him, all I can tell you is since I'm a very, very little boy, the men and women of Alcoholics Anonymous and Al-Anon have taken very, very good care of me and never once has any of them demanded that I believe what they believe. Wow. Wow. What an extraordinary thing. Talk about not playing God. Talk about not playing and God being mirrored in his personal experience as a member of an AA Al-Anon family. At any rate, you guys have been so attentive. You're either like on speed or just really, I can't tell you, you've really fed me beautifully through this morning. Thank you for your patience. I can'T tell you how much I appreciate it. Thank you.