Breathe In Acceptance, Breathe Out Judgment — The Whole Program in Six Words — Ira J.

About This Speaker Tape

Ira shares his slow-moving path into AA, describing himself as 'one long, slow bummer' of an alcoholic who took a very long time to give up. He recounts a jail cell scene early on — sitting there with his mind spinning, doing community service hours, meeting with an alcohol counselor for evaluation, wondering what he was doing there. He ran his own business for 40 years and carried himself as a capable, self-propelled man, which made surrender harder, not easier.

A through-line of the talk is denial. He keeps circling the phrase 'I'm Ira, but I'm not an alcoholic,' replaying how long he held onto that identity even after he got a sobriety date (March 25, 2013). He describes the alcoholic mind that wanted spotlight but hid in the background, the allergy of the body and obsession of the mind hitting him at the same time, and the trick of 'putting lipstick on the field' — dressing up his drinking so it wouldn't look like what it was.

He talks about his early struggle to find a home group and a job, working a sponsor, reading the 12 and 12, reading Bill W.'s story and being struck by the line about alcohol turning on him like a boomerang. The turning point he points to is admitting he doesn't have the energy or the answers on his own.

The tape closes on aloneness and connection: being in a room of 500 people and feeling alone, being 3,000 miles from home without the language and still finding two people and a half dozen folks who meant he wasn't alone. He describes a practice of breathing in acceptance and breathing out judgment, and thanks the SOS group that hosted him.

Topics

Timestamps

• 0:00 Introduction — chair welcomes Ira, thanks his SOS home group, mentions their morning text-and-meditation exchange
• 2:00 Opening line: 'My alcoholism was one long, slow bummer. It took me a very long time to really give up'
• 5:00 Court consequences — 100 hours community service, alcohol counselor evaluation, drunk-driving incident
• 8:00 Jail-cell scene — sitting in the cell asking 'what am I doing here?'
• 15:00 Walking up to a stranger to get his community-service sheet signed, and what that shame felt like
• 22:00 Reading the 12 and 12 for the first time — self-propulsion, self-will, the father/mother parable
• 30:00 Sobriety date March 25, 2013 — early months, home group search, the long denial of being an alcoholic
• 40:00 Allergy of the body, obsession of the mind — the red-light analogy for why he can't pick up
• 50:00 Reading Bill W.'s story — alcohol turned on him like a boomerang, whipped him to it
• 58:00 Closing — 3,000 miles from home, room of 500 and still alone, breathe in acceptance, breathe out judgment