Borrowing Faith From the Goofballs – John S.

Thank you, Charles. My name is Dick Martin, and I'm an alcoholic. Hi, Dick. Hi, everybody. The first part of March in 1977, Nobe Dorsey and I were up in Sioux Falls attending a conference up there, and there was a fellow up there by the name of Tom Grafton from Winnipeg, Minnesota, or WinniPEG, Canada. And he talked about they had started an AA group up there, which was very successful. And it was called, Oh Them Golden Slippers. And it formed to help people who were slippers in AA. And it Was operating very successfully. And I said, Well, what sort of a format do you have? And he said, We have a big book study. And I said, well, what is the big book study? You're studying the book? Yeah. He said, we go through it word by word. And he says, takes a long time to get through with it, but it works. And Nob and I both decided for sure that that was something we wanted to do. And so we very shortly thereafter, the end of March, started the Fox Hall Men's Big Book Study Group, which is the official name thereof. Somebody's dragging their chains across the floor. but anyway we started and i think there were 12 or 14 people at first meeting uh we have a book right here it says how many were no this still that's the first one but we have one somewhere amongst us uh a book that everybody signed and put their sobriety data in there. The last time I looked at it, it seemed to me there were two people in there who weren't still sober and active in AA. One of them turned to church, and the other one had yellow jaundice and hepatitis, and he died the next week before he could get to a second meeting. All the rest of them are still sober and active members of Alcoholics Anonymous. So what that will do, what that does to me, it tells me the validity of studying the big book. And I think it's a wise thing to do. And I suggest to people that I sponsor that they go to that men's big book on Thursday night until they have completely gone through one cycle, one full cycle of the book because it works. Not because of any other reason, not because I say so. It's because I'm pragmatic, not dogmatic, and I do things because they work, and this works. Speaking of things working, our speaker tonight is a friend of mine. I knew him. He had called me one time looking for a sponsor. I suggested that he get Jim Shaw for a sponsored. And he took him up on that. John and I remained friends after that. Not sure why. but uh but john stayed sober and oh poor old jim shaw got cancer and ended up dying on his deathbed he was a deathbed bequest he he gave me john and i've been sponsoring him ever since and so with that i want to tell you he's a sober active member of Alcoholics Anonymous. Give him a good welcome. And that's the truth. I'm John Scott, and I'm an alcoholic. By the grace of God and sponsorship And actions of Alcoholics Anonymous I've been sober since December 19, 1982 When Jim was dying He had cancer And I flew out to Palm Springs Where he lived Oh, he was in bad shape he was in bad shape and uh he was taking a lot of pain medication and and he was hurting bad he uh come on in the back bedroom here i gotta talk to you and with jim you didn't know if that was good or bad they always kept you on your toes pretty bad he was a fanatical alcoholics anonymous and and uh i got back there and he says uh i've been thinking about your situation and he says, I'm dying. You know I'm lying. And I want you to know, you don't have to do this, but I want your attention and I want to let you know that this guy I've been thinking about should be your sponsor and his name is... And Jim will go, pass out. They'll go, Jim, Jim! You know, oh, oh yeah. I've been thinking about your case and I'm in my mind you know, I've got an alky mind my mind is going a thousand miles an hour I'm going from the far left to the far right of people in Alcoholics Anonymous you know and he says the guy that you need to ask to be your sponsor is Jim, stop it And if you guys knew Jim, he starts going, ha, ha. He was pulling one on me. All he says is that Dick Martin over there in Omaha. And I'd already asked Dick before that had happened, but I didn't tell Jim that. So I want to thank you folks for asking me to come and share my experience, strength, and hope with you guys. And this is a special group. I want you to know that this, to me, is a very special group These are my peers, the people in this building right here, right now. My sponsors here. I mean, this is something I don't get to participate in much, and I really am always excited and glad to be here. Alcoholics Anonymous, if you're new, I got really good news for you. It is not stupid and boring and glum. I mean some of us just insist on it, but you don't have to be that way. Alcoholics Anonymous is the single most important event of my life, bar none. It's the singlemost important event in my life. Without AlcoholicsAnonymous, I have nothing. And the reason I know that is I came here with nothing. You know how we are. Most of us have this gray matter in between our ears that we... I call it my secret weapon because there's not very many people that can match it. And I know things that aren't true and just love to believe them. And the day before I got to Alcoholics Anonymous, I was fortunate enough to kind of been in a roundabout way 12-step by a guy several months earlier. And when the time came that I knew that I wanted to do something, I was able to go and ask him if I could go to Alcoholics Anonymous. I'd already asked him once before, and he told me no because I was drinking. And he said, we don't drink in AlcoholicsAnonymous. Alcoholicsanonymous are people who don't drinking. And me and this other guy named Johnny, we went over to – this guy, this Frank had a feed store, and we went Overland to sit down and talk with him and tell him that we were wanting to go to AA. and I was already drinking that morning because I'd been on a runner for about two weeks and that's kind of how I do it every once in a while I drink just once or twice one or two days and go home but usually I kind of build momentum and I'd end up drunk for a while and I know I've been drunk for awhile I think best I can remember my wife is not here so most of my story is hearsay I can remember going after bread about Thanksgiving, and this was December 18th, the day before I got sober. And I remember being at this bar – well, I went to the bar after I talked to this guy about going to Alcoholics Anonymous, and he says no because me and this Johnny was already drinking again. It's 8 o'clock in the morning. We're already knocking out our first six-pack apiece. And he says, you know, I'm not going to take you to AA today. He says, You guys just drink all you want to today, but tomorrow is when you sober up. He says I'll take you the meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous. And I just remember I don't think that I really – I don' believe that I felt like anything would really happen to me because I thought for sure – I didn't think I was Zaki. I thought I was insane. In fact, I was hoping for insane. because if you're insane, there's a place in Billings called Two North, it's the nut house, and you can go there and after you're there for a while they'll give you some pills and you Can leave and then you can drink again. But if you are an alcoholic and you are going to Alcoholics Anonymous, the people in Alcoholics Anonymous seem to have a solution for that problem and that means that you may never drink again, at least that was my first indication that there had been some people in that group that they'd never drank since the day they got there. Now not all of them, there is a lot of people that tried it over and over again And still, someone was still trying it by the time I got there. Still trying it today. But I got into Alcoholics Anonymous the next day after this little intervention that I had with Frank. And he had one of those deals of 20 questions. You know, you guys have seen the 20 questions? Nobody can pass except Al-Anons. And he gave that test to Johnny and I. and we looked at this thing, and I have this secret weapon, and I knew beyond a shadow of a doubt right there. I mean, come on, Alcoholics Anonymous, a name like that, you've got to be hurting for membership. So you've come up with this quiz that no person down on his luck is going to be able to answer. And that's how you get forced suckers like me in on this deal. I know the deal. I haven't talked to anybody about this, but I know it. I know what's going to happen is I'm going to have to pay $50 to $100 a month just for membership. And because they said, you know, and Frank says, no, there's no dues or fees, but, you know, that's the gimmick. You know, they'll do that to you. So I know these things. And anyway, me and Johnny left Frank because Frank said he wouldn't take us to A that day. So we left and we went over to the keg bar where I drank a lot. And at 830 in the morning, there was five of us in there. And you realize that in the kegg bar at 8.30 in the morning, nobody could pass a dang test. We tried and nobody was passing the dang test so I just confirmed my idea about Alcoholics Anonymous. The next day I was willing to still go and I remember going into this meeting before I got to the meeting Frank had asked me to come in early and he says, I've got a guy I want you to meet the guy's name was Richard and Richard wore a three piece suit and he had a bad back so he sat up really straight all the time and he smoked about four cigarettes at a time you know and and he was very nervous and he was a used car salesman and Frank says I want you to meet John I want to make it right meet Richard because Richard is my sponsor and he's really helped me a lot now Frank and I used to drink a lot together and it was amazing to me that Frank wasn't drinking he had about a couple months on me and I meet this Richard guy and Richard asked me some questions and one of the first questions he asked me if I felt like I was responsible for my own actions and I remember just like my mind just rolling I knew what I thought the right answer was and I said yes he says good now maybe you'll start acting like it and I didn't know what the deal was but I felt that what happened is my wife Cindy had been talking to Frank and Frank had been telling Richard his sponsor what was going on in my life But then Richard began to talk about things that nobody knew about. And he would talk about those feelings that we all seem to have and the way that we, just the way that we operate. And in a short period of time, he was able to convince me that at least he knew about what was going on inside of me. Now I didn't know what was going on, but since this is an anniversary of your book study. I'm going to try to stay as close to the book as I can as I go through this talk. You know, it talks about in the forward to the third edition, it gives a good definition of what an alcoholic, you know, one alcoholic talking to another alcoholic. This is the magic of Alcoholics Anonymous, I believe, is the ability for goofballs like us to sit down with some new guy and just tell them our stories. You know? Hot! You're losing your wife and your kids? so did I. No big deal. Come on. You've lost your business, so have I. No big deal. come on. Wife or no wife, job or no job, don't worry about that crap. You ain't going to make it anyway. If you don't do what we do, you're not going to make it, buddy. I know you're smart. You're probably smarter than most of us. But you just hang in here and hang up with hang around with dummies for a while and maybe maybe you'll start to get a little bit of happiness and joy freedom you know when i was new i heard that kind of stuff and it did sound like stupid boring and glum i mean i come on come on alcohol alcoholics are not i mean it just don't even sound right you know what you know how do you tell your friends i'm going to alcoholics Anonymous. You don't, you know? I can remember three or four weeks before I finally went to Alcoholics Anonymous, I drank at one or two places. I drank in the Northern Hotel, which is a pretty nice place at the time it's closed now, and the Keg Bar, which isn't a very nice place, but it's closed too. And I would have no problem in the northern hotel. The northern hotel was a really weird building. To go to the bathroom, you had to go two flights up or two flights down or there were some flower pots just right in there. I had no problem peeing in the flower pots in the lobby of the Northern Hotel, but I really had a problem walking into my first meeting of, you know, come on, I don't want nobody to see that I'm trying to get better, you know and I can remember just being so embarrassed and ashamed and you know it's like my god I'm going to Alcoholics Anonymous. It's like My Life is Over. And these guys are in there and they're laughing and they'RE joking and they'Re having a good time and I don't remember what was ever said in my first meeting. I do remember some things and mostly what I remember is people seem to know or at least they talked like they knew what the deal was and in a couple I ended up getting a sponsor the very first night his name was Johnny and Johnny within 40 days or so Johnny had gotten drunk on me and and he had seven years of sobriety and I couldn't I didn't I couldn'T put it together because I thought well you come to Alcoholics Anonymous you don't drink no more and I found out that that's not true for everybody I've been very fortunate I've never had another drink since I walked into Alcoholics in the arms I've never had a pill or shot myself up or did crossroads or nothing I just quit and I don't know why exactly that I've done that other than I've always been more afraid of drinking than not drinking at some place I cross this you know they talk about crossing an invisible line well I think I crossed an invisible lane on the other side I was terrified of myself when I was drinking, because when I drink anything, and I do mean anything is possible. And I begin to realize that my ideas of fun really weren't fun anymore. And that first night I was there, this guy named Johnny, he says, I'm going to be your sponsor. That was brand new. I mean, I was days old. Johnny would call on the phone you better get over to my house they're in my closet who are they Johnny well I don't know but I know they're there and he'd call up a couple days later they're outside and they're watching me I can see them, you better gets over here they're going to get me and I was new but I wasn't stupid I didn't go over to his house And he got real mad at the group and he got Real mad at his sponsor and he Got drunk And I was very very fortunate Richard came up to me the night After that had happened And he told me, he didn't ask me He told me he was going to be my sponsor And I told him I didn't really know if I weren't He said I don't care what you want He says I'm going to Be your sponsor. I need to sponsor somebody You need to be sponsored. And he was A fanatic. He was an AA fanatic And he really liked this book. Not this book, the old one, the third edition. And he would point things out in that book all the time. And we, you know, one of the first things that I have to realize, the first step says that I'm powerless over alcohol and that my life is unmanageable. And I didn't have much of a problem with the first part of the First Step. Yeah, I'm powerless over alcohol. Every time I get drunk, I screw things up. But this unmanageability, I had a little hard time with that. It took me a while to get to where I was. Got my arms around that. And he points to the doctor's opinion where it says that we have like an allergy. And I have an allergy to apples, bananas, cherries, and avocados. And when I eat one of those, I swell up really bad. And I can't breathe. And I had this adverse reaction. And Richard says, yeah, you know, that's kind of what happens when you drink alcohol. You break out in spots like Chicago and Detroit and Memphis and stuff like that. But with me, there's a lot of this. I mean, I've looked at this thing, and the difference between my problems that I have with apples and my problemsthat I havewith booze is, youknow, I went to the doctor about this dealI have with Apples Bananas, and the doctor said,the newest guy here can tell mewhat he said. He says,no,you know,don't do that no more. You know, I've had doctors tell me not to drink no more. I had these bleeding ulcers and the doctor says, no, you drink very much? Not much. Just, you know. He said, well, I think if I was you, I'd quit drinking at all because you're not much as killing you. And I was always going to get a second opinion but, you now, you just never get around to that kind of stuff. But my doctor says you need to quit this apple deal. He says, just don't eat it anymore. And I don't have the problems that I do with apples like I have the problem that I have with booze. I don't have that peculiar mental twist, that second part of the problem that we have. I mean, yeah, we've got the allergy. Once I take a drink of alcohol, it just tastes like more to me. I've just got to drink more and more and More. I drink for effect. I like passing out is what I like. I like to get to where I'm blacked out or passed out. And, you know, I never did just kind of party a little bit. I mean, I like to get with the program and go crazy. I mean I just loved it. I love being a jerk. And whenever I'm drinking and I'm a jerk, it's like, well, I was only drunk. You know, it was like somehow when I drank I had the ability to do things that I never had theability to do whenever I was sober. You know, and I finally started to put some of this stuff together. Whenever I take that drink, that's what happens. But when I stop, when I quit drinking, something happens. And there's like a little guy in the back of my head who keeps winding one of those toy deals, just tighter and tighter and tighter. and my wife gets weirder, my kids get more psycho and my boss gets crazy and the people that work for me are absolutely insane and I just get to where finally I can't stand it anymore and I've got to have some relief and the only relief that I've ever received is about 45 minutes into drinking and all of a sudden you know it's like there's nothing like it. I mean, even on a really, really good day, you still get that. You know, and people are saying, you need to quit. And it's like, what are you talking about? Come on, you know. I have never had a miserable day and decided, you knows, I'm going to go to the store and I'm gonna buy myself six apples. And I'm gotta put three in the trunk. I'm not gonna eat them all. I'm just gonna put one in the glove compartment. and I'm going to eat one on the way home and when I get home, I'm gonna eat that other one right in front of her too, by God. You know, I've never had that experience. I don't have that peculiar mental twist that we all seem to have with that stuff. I find that I think that this time based on who I am and how long I've been sober and how much I know and how many times and how how much work I've done in Alcoholics Anonymous, All these sayings add up to I've overcorrected. And the truth of the matter is, I probably wasn't that bad when I got here in the first place. Now that is a peculiar mental twist. If you have a mind like mine, you know exactly what I'm talking about. It's called insanity in the book. It says, what else could it be called? What else could there be called but plain insanity? With the inability to think straight. And I would say that's the inability to think straight. Alcoholics Anonymous, the book of Alcoholics Aanonymous doesn't tell us how to quit drinking. It doesn't say that anywhere in there. It tells us how do I live life successfully sober? And how do i find that peace and ease and comfort that i used to find in a few drinks staying sober? Now that's fantastic news because that's what i was always looking for. I wanted that ease and comfort, but I didn't know how to get that ease and comfort because, well, first off, I'm a really, really, really sensitive alcoholic. I mean, I have the ability to look at people and know what they're thinking. And it's usually not good. I used to have about 75 guys that worked for me and we had a shop and I'd walk into that shop and I would open that door and as soon as I pulled that door back they'd quit talking about me. Now, I don't want you to think I'm self-centered or anything, but they'd quick talking about me and I could be driving through part of the operation and they'd be over there and they laugh and they would be laughing about me. You know that they're working against you. I always had this group of people that was always working against me. I got to where I even had to pack a gun around because they were getting close. Every once in a while you'd look and there'd be people around just out of sight, and it'd make you nervous. You'd get nervous. Have a few drinks, and that'd kind of go away a little bit. I was nuts when I got to you, and little by little, I started listening to this Richard, and he just started telling me to do simple things, you know, like when you come to a meeting, clean up a little Bit. Act like your life depends upon this thing. He says treat it special. Treat Alcoholics Anonymous special, and It will become special. He would tell me to sit up front and take the cotton out of my ears and stick it in my mouth. And he'd say stupid things like, guy, you've got to love to hurt. I've never seen anybody hurt as bad as you did. You know, you just hurt, hurt. He says, it'd be really nice if you'd just shut up and listen to what these people are trying to tell you. There's a group of people that I got sober with, and I always like to talk about them a little bit because they really saved my life. and I bet you in anybody's group you've got the same type of people in there. One of the gals in the group was named Millie and Millie was a little old lady who was like a grandmother to all of us and she never said much but she sat in her chair and when she sat on her chair the world was right and she would say the dumbest things whenever I was new I'd walk in there and she'd say come sit next to me John and I'd go over there and sit next her just kind of pacify her a little bit and she'll say God John look at all the miracles I don't see any you know, I don' t see no miracles anywhere I don''t see nothing all I can see is my wife has screwed me over one more time my life is absolutely upside down and she's looking at stinking miracles and I don'T see any you know and then they'd call on this other gal her name was Margaret and Margaret would say my name is Margaret and then to go to meetings stay sober and then don't thank you very much and that's all Margaret would ever say she'd say it over you'd call her six months from now She'd say the same thing. My name is Margaret, and them that go to meetings stay sober, and them dat don't, don't. Thanks. It's like, my God, don'T call on Margaret no more, you know? There's a guy named Gerald, and I don't know why Gerald thought like this, but he thought I had a bad attitude, and he says, John, he says... I come up to you, and I ask you how you're doing, and you say, well, Gerald, I hate my wife, and I hate myself, and you hate yourself, and I love my kids, andI hate my job, and Ihate you,and I hate AA. He says, I'm tired of listening to that crap. He says, from now on, I'm going to walk up to you and I'm going to shake your hand. You're going to say, I'M GOING TO ASK YOU HOW YOU'RE DOING, JOHN. AND YOU'RE GOING To SAY, WHY, GERALD? I'M GETTING BETTER IN EVERY WAY, EVERY DAY. THANK YOU VERY MUCH. GOT ME LYING. THIS IS AN HONESTY PROGRAM. AND HE'S GOT ME DYING BECAUSE I'M NOT GETTIN' BETTER IN EVERYWAY, EVERYDAY. HAD THIS LITTLE GUY NAMED ROTTEN RALPH. ROTTENT RALPH WAS AN ATTORNEY. AND IF YOU GOT CALLED ON, I MEAN, IF YOU WAS A NEW GUY AND SAY YOU'D BEEN TALKIN' ABOUT HOW YOUR WIFE HAD been screwing you over real bad and this and that. You shut up, and they call on Ralph next. He just hammered you. And then when he got all done hammering you, he'd reach in his pocket. He always kept his money in his bucket and say, now, if I pissed you off bad enough that you think you've got to have a drink, let me buy you your first one. You know, I mean, that ain't no way to treat a newcomer, really. This little guy named Nick. Nick was the little guy about that tall and he could... They told me later that Nick had the ability that it didn't matter whether you had 20 years or 20 days, he had the ability to hit you right between the eyes and say those magic words that somehow there's a connection to a person like me that you couldn't hear from anybody else. But he had this really, really shrill little voice, you know, and he'd say, well, if you're new here and you've been here for less than six months, there's no reason for me to remember your name because you're just a visitor. You know, yeah, yeah. Now I have the same problem, but it isn't because I don't remember your name. I just can't remember nothing. I've got a really good memory, it's just short. And I thought one night, you know, I was just in my best newcomer voice. The meeting was over, there was eight or nine people sitting around talking, little groups here and little groups there. I thought, you Know, I'm going to teach that Nick my name tonight. and I went in my very finest newcomer voice and I says Nick do you have a second I'd like to visit with you a little bit I'm having some problems at home with her and started talking about my wife how she's been screwing me over he said shut up he says I want you to realize I want to know what you're going to start doing about your alcoholism so you're an alcoholic now what are you going to do and he said it loud enough that everybody in the room could hear it And it's like, God, I hate being embarrassed like that. And this is it. I'm done. I am absolutely done. I've had enough. By this time, my sponsor, Richard, who was a used car salesman, I ended up asking him to be my sponsor after he told me he was going to. I didn't ask him. He just said he was gonna be my sponjourer. Sold me this diesel car that I really didn't want. But he insisted that I did. He always knew what I wanted. And I ended up, you know, taking that home. And boy, you think things are hot at home. Wait until I drove that thing in there. It was not user-friendly. And of course, nothing made Cindy happy at that time anyway. And anyway, I'm talking to Nick about how Cindy's been screwing me over. And he tells me this little deal about me wasting, or he tells me this Little Deal about me being an alcoholic and what am I going to do about it? And I decided I'm quitting AA forever. This is it. So I got up. I started walking over to the door, and this little crippled guy beats me to the door and pushes me up against the wall and says, listen, you're wasting my time and you've been wasting their time and you're dang sure wasting your time. You're just trying to get drunk. So go get drunk, for crying out loud. Just go get drunken. And over his shoulder, out of nowhere, comes Rotten Ralph. Yeah, let me buy you a first drink. Let me buy your first drink! Love intolerance is your code. You've got to be out of your stinking mind. And I don't know what kind of AA this is, but I'm done. And I started to go out the door and I got out there and I was going to spend gravel all over that parking lot. And I got in this diesel car that my sponsor sold me that I didn't really want. And this is the old diesels. I mean, you could go 50 miles and you may be up to 25, 30 miles an hour, you know? And I'm screaming at the top of my lungs and I'm just absolutely insane crazy and I've been beaten on the dash and I'll holler and I... You know, just mad, just mad. Because I was a spoiled brat. That's what the problem was. I was absolutely a spoiled prat and didn't know it. And I've got about three The good thing was I lived in the country. I had a long ways to drive and I got about three quarters of the way home and just like somebody slapped me. It's like, so you're an alcoholic. Now what are you going to do about it? And I couldn't get it out of my head. and I kept thinking about it and then the next morning I was thinking about it and now it's night now I've got a real busy schedule nothing's going on I can go to a meeting tonight or I can stay home and think and that hasn't been working very good so I got in the car my brand new diesel used and drove that thing into town and I'm thinking god I hate this idea you know a million little miracles and you know and, oh, hi, Gerald, yeah. Getting better every day. Thank you very much, Gerald. You know, and give Nick his damn dollar back and have to reintroduce myself to Nick. It's like, but something had changed a little bit and I think what I began to realize is that I really did need some help. I was really sick, and I really thought that the people in Alcoholics Anonymous truly had a real answer for my problem. And I don't know how that came about other than just going to meetings and listening to people talk. And I began to really feel like there was a real solution to my life here. and uh you know the the book talks about roland hazard you know meeting with dr young and working with young for over a year and thought that he thought they was cured he he felt like he was okay you know it's back to that insane thinking that we have you know you got you've got time you got a little bit of time behind you and you've gotta a little bit of knowledge behind you and he's sober for a year and and he goes headed home he didn't even make it home you know sounds like he got maybe to Paris and ended up getting drunk and he goes back and asks you know we ask uh Dr. Young what's the deal you know and Young says you're gonna die so I thought she was crazy but you're not it's worse you're an alcoholic you know I don't see people like you sober up so I just don't say it every once in a while here and there Once in a while people have a vital spiritual experience, but I don't think you're going to make it. And I think what happened to him is the same thing that happened to me. At that point, I believe that that guy had a real sense of real desperation. And that, to me, is a gift. Desperation for an alcoholic is a guilt. To get to the place where we're teachable. I mean, it's hard to teach somebody who knows it all. It really is. It's hard for me to teach someone who knows the secret weapon. And for the first time in my life, I believe that I was willing to listen to somebody else and to really try to follow some direction and get to a place where I was looking for an answer. Now one of the things that my sponsor Richard used to tell me to do, he says, I want you to pray. And I want your to pray a real simple prayer. You need a simple prayer, John, because if you pray more than about five seconds, you're going to be trying to con God. You'll be laying on your back going, oh, Heavenly Father, how great Thou art. And you'll be talking about lottery tickets and driving Cadillacs. He says, we don't want you to do that. What I want you do, I want to get on your knees and I want you to say, God, please help. Thanks. Amen. And, you know, about four or five weeks after that, my life is upside down. Nothing's getting better. and I talked to him and he asked me how things were going and I said it sucks, absolutely sucks I thought that if I come into Alcoholics Anonymous and quit drinking everything should be wonderful I mean I've heard that forever all you need to do is quit drinking I quit drinking and it's just like it's like a pressure the little guy is really getting that thing tight and he says I ask you to get on your knees and pray. I've been praying. He says, I ask you to Get on Your Knees. Are you praying on your knees? I didn't know how he knew but I wasn't and I remember getting on my knees that night and I remembered for the first time I actually said the prayer on my knees and I says, God please help things. Amen. And it's like, I don't know. It wasn't like bells and whistles but it was like I knew something was changing in me. I knew that I was willing to do something a little, just a little bit different. You know, the second step says that I have to come believe in the power of God and myself that will restore me to sanity. I don't know if I ever had much sanity to begin with. But I know one thing, I need sanity. And I need to find something that can restore me to a place where I have a little piece of it. And I don't know whether it's God or whether it is the group or whether its the sponsor. It doesn't really matter as far as I am concerned. Whatever works, works. And you better grab hold of whatever it is that works. Because if you are sitting there faking it like I was for a long time Oh I believe in God. Oh yeah. You bet. I used to go to the holy rollers and we would get to speaking in tongues and rolling in the aisles and slaying the spirit. I mean I would be getting it. And I was just as far away from it as you could get. But I was acting like I was getting it, you know. And I got to Alcoholics Anonymous and you guys were talking about God and I was getting God. But it wasn't really working that way. It seemed like I Was lying. The truth of the matter is I wasn't getting much of anything. But I started to believe that my sponsor believed. And I started To realize that there's a lot of people in that group they believed. And they said, just borrow our faith. Just borrow from us. And I Started doing the things that they were doing. And little by little, things changed. I think this is not a quick fix. I think for most of us, if it was a quick fixed, we'd go right back out, you know? At least for me, it wasn't a quick fixing. I mean, I'm three, four years sober. You come over to my house, my wife and I are fighting every stinking day. I hate her still, and she hates me still. Them kids are terrified of me. I have by this time I am more broker at the end of four years than I was when I walked into AAA I was just broke when I got to AA by the time four years comes along I owe three million dollars with no visible means of support you know I had found this banker I found this banker me and him I tell this story you guys it's kind of hard to talk to this much because you guys have heard me so many times but I found This Banker who ended up being in the program. Me and him got in a fight over sheep one night and come to find out several years later neither one of us knew a damn thing about sheep, but we had this legendary fight. But anyway, we came up with a scheme that I could buy this farm, and I did, and just almost immediately it went broke. So here I am, three and a half, four years sober. Wife hates me. I hate her. Kids are crazy. I'm crazy. I'm broke. I'm going through bankruptcy. and uh you know i'm really getting the gift and and uh just just just cannot for the life of me figure out what the heck's going on well one of the things that's going around i'd kind of quit going to meetings you know I mean when you got important things like I got going on you can't go to meetings all the time you know a hold you back you know if you don't watch it and I and I I just kept I just keep kind of doing alcoholics and I would kind of do the steps and I'd kind of work without. I just kind of do the deal. It says half measures of bail mean nothing, but I'm so stinking slow, I don't know that I'm half bailing it. I think I'm at least holding my own, completely oblivious to the fact that I never forget one day, the bank wouldn't even let me into the bank. There's a place down the road. You go down there. That's where us guys in the cattle business called it the dyer pen. That's where you go to die. You go over there and we'll foreclose on you, but stay out of the main bank. We don't want you over here. So me and these other guys, these other ranchers that was in the same problem I was in, we'd go over to the dying pen. And I remember going out of that thing one day and you know, I'm gonna blow my brains out. I am worth more to my family dead than I am alive. Now this is me doing three and a half years of sobriety. You know what I mean? I'm working and And I, but the reason that I tell this story is because I'm trying to show you what kind of mind I got to work with. I'm suicidal, I'm coming down this elevator, I'm going to go home, I got the gun, I'm gonna blow my brains out because I am absolutely worthless to nobody. I can't even do Alcoholics Anonymous right for crying out loud. I am four years sober and I'm just as crazy as I was the day that I walked in here. and I got out and I drove around the block and the sun was setting over in the west and I am just absolutely full of despair and this girl in this white dress walks across between me and the son and she doesn't have a slip on all I can think of for about the next 3 or 4 hours is that girl and me You know, and I didn't even know her, you know, but I finally go, well, what was I thinking of before I started this thought? Oh, yeah, I was going to blow my brains out. Now that's what I got to work with, you Know, so I started to kind of look at that a little bit. That kind of gave me a pretty good insight about how stupid I am, how my mind works, you I have the mind of a chronic alcoholic. It's not a problem, but maybe I ought to really make it a problem. And if you get somebody from the outside that says, well, that's a problem now, it's really a problem You just take those little things It's like one lady used to say, we'd just love to pole vault over mouse turds You can't have a little problem You've got to have a big problem Sooner or later, I start doing my inventory I start writing down, you know, trying to get an idea of what's going on in my life. You know, try to put down on a piece of paper what's really affecting me and how the way I act and the way I think and the fears and all these different things how these things are working in my life and I get to sit down and I get to share this with somebody and by this time within a short period of time I had Jim for a sponsor and he says he says you gotta i've done a i've done an earlier fourth and fifth step i i did my first four step on a matchbook cover in code because i didn't want it to fall into the wrong hands and and uh my sponsor richard says i'll do it or else you can go to a preacher or priest whatever you prefer well i ain't gonna tell i'm not gonna tell him my life story so i go to this presbyterian preacher i'm sitting there we're going through this list. And within, you know, about 20 minutes, he says, how much longer do you got? Well, I still got a lot on this little matchbook cover here. He said, well, I got a golf game coming up here pretty quick. And if it had been today, I'd have gone with him, but I didn't play golf then. And so I, you Know, and I thought, well I hit the big spots. And for the next two years, I felt like I had done a fourth and fifth step. But I hadn't done a fourth. Like the book says, I only thought that I dealt with my...I only thought I had worked this stuff. I hadn' t gotten down to the causes and conditions. I hadn''t got to the fears. I mean, the fears that I have in mind. You know, I got to Alcoholics Anonymous and they said, God, you were scared of everything. And I was humiliated. These people would think that I was afraid. They said, well, how do you do an answer in your door? I didn't know how they knew about that. How are you doing about opening your mail, especially the stuff that comes from the banks? I didn'T know how THEY knew about THAT. But I COULDN'T open my mail. That's before caller ID. I couldn'T answer my phone. And I started writing that stuff down and all of a sudden it's like I had already made the decision to turn my life over to the care of God. And that was kind of a joke because when I turned my world and life over to the character of God, I expected bells and whistles, you know. And my sponsor Richard says, so what did you expect, like a burning bush or something? And I says, yeah, I'd like that something anyway, kind of confirmation that God's out there. He says, you knows, if you had a burning brush in front of you with your track record, you'd be peeing on it. No, he says, you've got to go ahead and finish your fourth and fifth step. And like I told you the story with the preacher, two years later I'm sitting in a hotel room in Salt Lake City with Jim and I'm doing this inventory. And I begin to really realize how afraid I truly am and all these fears that I have. And I begin to see that the third step is that turning point it talks about. It's the major step of the 12 steps. Everything points to the third stop. Once the third set is done, all the rest of the steps are trying to get me to where I can get that accomplished. It's like you're deciding to go to a meeting on Friday night, but it's Monday. You haven't done it yet. And that's what happened. and I had to do the inventory. I had asked God to remove these defects of character. I had started taking some of this stuff to the people that I'd harmed and started trying to make amends for them, not saying I'm sorry, but what can I do to make this thing right? And one of the toughest amends that I had to make was to my grandmother. My uncle had died, and my cousin and I had gotten really, really drunk. And at that funeral, we did everything but fall in the grave. And it wasn't the worst thing I did, but it's the worst thing that... It wasn't the worst thing that I ever did, but it was the thing that bothered me the most. Does that make sense? It just ate me. It just eat my lunch. You go two, three days and then there it is. Then you go two or three days, there it is. And my sponsor Richard says you will get... This happened earlier before I even did my inventory. He says you will get down there and you will do this right now. And it's a good thing I did because she died not too long after that. And I remember that and I was so scared, you know, because she was like a southern, southern Baptist. You didn't want to you don't even want to dance around her, you know, for crying out loud, let alone drink and cuss and I wasn't good at both of those and she says, look I just love you to death and she just the goofiest thing, she started telling me some things about her younger days and she wasn't no saint either, you know, and it's like, I was so glad I did that, you know. And I started trying to make amends to my children. I started trying to be kinder to them and trying to, trying to become kinder with my wife and treat her like she was important, you now. And things just started, little by little things started to change. And found myself, I found myself getting to the place where I really, really wanted to have some kind of connection with the power grid and myself. And you know, you the inventory you you do the 10th step inventory you kind of try to keep things cleaned up all the time and then you you uh 11 and 12 you're you're seeking that spirit and what happens in 11 it says now being new this is about this contact that we have with the power grid in ourselves says we're going to pay for this in all sorts of absurd ways boy i have i mean there's nothing hardly any more dangers than a guy who is coming from a spiritual hilltop. You know what I mean? It's like, yeah, but God's on my side. All of a sudden, everything that we learn just goes out the window because I'm no longer teachable. There's nothing any worse than a spiritual giant. Usually in here, we don't have many of them. It's just amazing. we don't have a lot of luck getting too spiritual around this outfit because if anybody gets too far out of line there's usually about 20 or 30 people just drag them down and that's really good I've always wanted to be around a bunch of people that we could poke fun at and have a good time and I always enjoyed that until it came to me you start picking on me and I find that little by little if I keep doing this I can take that stuff. I don't take it so, it's not so personal when you're not out there standing on top of a hill trying to defend an undefendable position. You know? Yeah, I was wrong. It's so hard for us to start saying that kind of stuff. You know, especially to your wife. That's really embarrassing but I just started doing that kind of stuff and my life has gotten really good. My life has gotten really good and then the 12 step set talks about carrying this message to others and that's where the gold is for me. That's where the gold ist for me, because I started working with other people, and I have never been able to see me as much as I do when I'm working with you. When I'm workin' with somebody else, I'll never forget this one time, I'm listenin' to this inventory, one of these guys that I sponsored, he's sittin' there, and he's talkin' about gettin' a divorce from his wife, and burnin' his house down. I mean, this guy's a derelict. I mean, burn your house down. I thought, my God, what a bum. And then it dawned on me on the way home. I had tried several times to burn my neighbor's place completely down. Just never could get the fire to go. You know, I always do some getting drunk. One night I got it going. I come home. I drive by his house on theway home. I come. I'm so drunk. I got the fire going and the fire starts going. Oh, this is going to be good, you know. So I'd drive home to get a little rest before we had to go fight fire at the neighbor's, and it rained. It rained. Just crazy stuff like that, you know? And then some days I think, I don't think I need Alcoholics Anonymous. You're dang right I need alcoholics anonymous. I need alcoholic anonymous bad. But I have never ever felt as close as I feel to God as I do when I'm working with you. I have Never Ever Felt, you know, you sit there and you're working with guys, and I've been talking to Dick all day about this one guy that I've got that's, he's missing. He has a bad slipper. Last night, he wasn't at the meeting. You know, we got meetings in our group, we've got two meetings that you better be at, or else you better be dead and i know he ain't dead you know and he may be dying but he ain'T dead and and he didn't call me he always calls me and i tried to call him i got other guys trying to call me but he's gone you know he's missing he's messing in action and uh you know i i hope pray the best for him but i can't i can' t give it to him i can carry the message to him god's got to deliver the message i am not a healer i'm a carrier i carry the message and that's what i love about book studies you you sit there and you carry the passage of alcoholics anonymous and as long as we stay close to that book and we read and we apply the principles the principles of alcoholic synonymous into our life things change i came here broken i mean my wife was leaving me my children was scared of me my job was gone but there was other things that my sponsor Richard talked about he talked about dignity I had lost my dignity I'd lost my self-worth I'd lost my respect you know when you lose those things it's it's worse than losing some other things. Richard used to say, well, you can get a new wife and kids, but those things you can't get unless you earn them. And he says, you've got to work hard to get some of that stuff back. When you lose your integrity, whether it's real or imagined, it's gone and it's hard to get it back. And I think it's such a precious gift to us today, you know, to be able to sit down across the table from another guy, look him right in the eye and say, what's happening to you is exactly what happened to me and you don't have to live in that hell no more. You don't Have to live in that insanity. You know, I know what it means to be insane and I know that you know and I Know that you won't be there no more so let's do something about it. Do you really want to live like this the rest of your life or do you want to really be happy, joyous and free like the book talks about? You know we are not a glum lot. We are not. Alcoholics Anonymous is the greatest thing that's ever it happen to me. I could not, not carry this message. I am absolutely thrilled and excited every time I get to do this because what happens, it reminds me of how goofy I am. You know, sometimes we just get well in here. I mean, God, you know, I mean it's old timers and I don't mean old old timERS but I mean like 26 or younger, okay? Because there's some old-timers here. But it seems like some of the guys, there's a lot of guys that I'm sponsoring that are starting to turn 20 and it's like you get to the place where you can't hear a guy with less time than you because you know him. And I think that's dangerous for a guy like me because I you know there's a lot of guys with less time than me that's doing a heck of a lot better than I am but I don't want you to know that you know and you come and talk to me but I only hear about it you know I got that old-timer shield and I want to keep that shield up because I don'T want anybody to know who's got less time in me about how goofy and crazy I really am you know. I DON'T want anyone with less TIME than me to come over to my house at 8 o'clock in the morning when I'm hollering at my stinking wife because she didn't do something that I thought she should have done. I just don't want that kind of stuff and I think for a guy like me it could be that if I allow that kind of thinking to go on there's a chance that the second half or the second step may not apply to me no more or the first step I mean maybe my life is not unmanageable see that's what I love about the book of Alcoholics Anonymous today, today I'm powerless over alcohol, and today my life is unmanageable. All myself and by myself. Today I need to find a power greater than myself that will restore me to sanity. Today. Today I need to turn my well life over to the care of God. Today I needs to make sure that my street is clean. Today I need make sure I'm continuing to seek a power great than myself. And today I need find a new guy and put my arm around him. You don't gotta do this no more, buddy. come on be a part of the deal this is something you surely will not want to miss by the grace of God we get to come here and we get to quit being so goofy I mean it's just fantastic stuff and some days you go I don't know if I really want to do this anymore go to that meeting again meet all my friends I just think I'll stay home and watch TV you know and god what a trap for people like me so i'm going to keep coming back because i really really like what i'm getting i really do and i gotta tell you i gotta tells you a couple things millie was right because now when i go to those meetings in that little group of mine i see all kinds of miracles everywhere i look and i got to tell you another thing margaret was right cause them that go to meetings stays sober and them that don't don't So I'm going to keep coming back because I like what I'm getting. Thanks.