Dave P. – Vision for You – Step 11 and the Road of Happy Destiny – 2004

My name is Dave. I'm an alcoholic, and this is the Vision for You workshop, and we're going to wait just a couple of minutes before we start. All of you for coming here and helping us fulfill one of the things that we like most to do, and that's be of whatever service we can to people in Alcoholics Anonymous or anywhere in the world, For that matter, we don't care whether you're an AA or not. We just found what for us has been the secret. Some time back, we were called and asked if we would do a workshop here at this conference, and we said sure. And Jerry said, well, what do you want to do? And I said, I don't know. We have two or three that we've done a lot in the past, And I'm, you know, I'm not tired of them, but I'd like to do something new. And he said, oh, okay, what is it? And I said, I don't know. But we'll do one. He said, okay. So a while back he called again and said, we have to put the program together so we need to know the name of your workshop. And I say, well, I still haven't started it yet, but it will be a vision for you. I thought, you Know, that's broad enough. I can do that. and uh he said okay what's it about and i said i don't know i haven't started it and um so um i sat down and polly and i talked about it a lot and i sat down and just began to put together you know what do i really think is alcoholic synonymous vision for you and for me and for her. And so it is the result of our talks and our reading and so forth that we've put together this workshop. And I want to start the workshop with a prayer that is one that I particularly like and it's very appropriate for this topic. Father, before we begin our AA event We pause to offer our thanks to you Our mighty God Once long ago you blessed us and gave us a destiny And when you brought us out of bondage Of alcoholism to freedom You gave us the promise that all alcoholics could be so blessed And that with your help we could be free at last It has come to pass in every generation For all who have thoroughly followed our path your path that you have given us a new freedom and a new spirit it happened to those who preceded us who came to this program seeking only a way to remain alive but found a place of promise and hope and sobriety it happens to us still in our time as you lead all of us into the vision of a life that is happy joyous and free and so with hearts full of gratitude and love we join our brothers and sisters all over the world today and every day of our life to gratefully thank you for Alcoholics Anonymous, for the Al-Anon family groups, for these friends, for our families, for our sobriety, and for your love. May we do your will always. Amen. I have a document here that is so rare as to be almost non-existent, and it is called an AA Speaker's Manual. And this is from the courtesy of the Friday Forum Luncheon Club, which met at 12 noon every Friday at the Mayflower Hotel in Akron, Ohio, back in the 40s. I'm going to open up with a brief reading from this. It says, This leaflet has been prepared by members of the Fridays Forum Lunchen, an Akron organization that warmly welcomes all AAs to meet with it for luncheon and fellowship every Friday, 12 noon at the Mayflower Hotel. The suggestions found in this leaflet are just that, suggestions. It is hoped that they may be of value to all speakers regardless of their AA age. The thoughts expressed are the thoughts of a score of AAs, AA's, mostly veterans of a year or more experience. Isn't that great? Isn't it just fantastic? Your talk deserves the very best effort you can put into it. Anything having to do with sobriety deserves nothing but the best. You can avoid the embarrassment of stumbling around, groping for words and ideas if you will use forethought and preparation. This does not mean sit down and write out a speech, but organize your subject matter beforehand. Prepare written notes. Follow them closely or you may get off on a tangent. Find yourself in a thicket of verbiage and have difficulty finding your way back into your notes. Remember you owe your audience some consideration To speak before a group with no preparation is an insult to their intelligence. So, hence I have notes. And so we're going to get started today. Polly's going to open up and this is our workshop on a vision for you. We've never done it before. We have no idea how long it's going last. It's not going to last past the allotted time. But, you know, if we get through early, we'll just let you guys come up and share. Hi, everybody. My name is Polly Pistol, and I'm an alcoholic. And I am a participant in this workshop as Dave's sidekick. And so I'm going to do a little bit of this. Dave prepared this entire workshop, and I'm just going to read the notes and kind of give some of the stuff that, you know, some of my opinions. I mean, I'm certainly an alcoholic with a lot of opinions. and so excited that all of you came. But one of the things that Dave and I both love is our 12th chapter, which is A Vision for You. And we love that, and both of us when we talk or when we share our stories are always talking about that paragraph about great events that have come to pass because Dave and i believe that our life is just that there's just no way you get from there to here And by God's grace and this beautiful program, we live a life beyond our wildest dreams. And so we want to share with you a vision for you and our vision that the things that have happened to us in Alcoholics Anonymous. And I'm going to read you some quotes and I'm gonna read you some parts of the book. The heartbeat of AlcoholicsAnonymous is in the big book. I don't know how it got the name. The true answer may be lost in the dust of antiquity. How do you say that word? Antiquity. But we revere the book. Many of us hold it in the same high regard as the Christians view the New Testament or the Jews view the Torah or the Muslims view the Koran or as the Hindus view the Bhagavad Gita. The big book is composed of a preference, a forward for each edition, a letter written by a doctor endorsing us, and then 164 pages of text defining the program of Alcoholics Anonymous. It discusses God and redemption, the ramifications and manifestations of the disease of alcoholism, a plan for living, a course of action, how to behave, how to be happy, and how to find and strike up a relationship with a power greater than yourself that will solve your problems. What a promise. In the final chapter, at the end of the chapter, in a vision for you, I'd like to read the last part. We have shown how we got out from under. You say, yes, I'm willing, but am I to be consigned to a life where I shall be stupid, boring, and glum like some righteous people I see? I know I must be getting along without liquor, but how can I? Have you a sufficient substitute? Yes, there is a substitute, and it is vastly more than that. It is a fellowship in Alcoholics Anonymous. There you will find release from care, boredom, and worry. Your imagination will be fired. Life will mean something at last. The most satisfactory years of your existence lie ahead. Thus we find the fellowship, and so will you. How is that to come about, you ask? Where am I to find these people? You are going to meet these friends in your own community. Near you, alcoholics are dying helplessly like people in a sinking ship. If you live in a large place, there are hundreds, high and low, rich and poor. These are future fellows of Alcoholics Anonymous. Among them you will make lifelong friends. You will be bound to them with the new and wonderful ties, for you will escape disaster together. Push it down. And you will commence shoulder to shoulder your common journey. Then you will know what it means to give of yourself that others may survive and rediscover life. You will learn the full meaning of love thy neighbor as thyself. The chapter concludes with these following three paragraphs. Still you may say, but I will not have the benefit of contact with you who wrote this book. We cannot be sure. God will determine that, so you must remember that your real reliance is always upon him. He will show you how to create the fellowship you crave. And if any of you have had to move away from your home group and do something different, believe me, you can create the Fellowship You Crave. Our book is meant to be suggestive only. We realize we know only a little. God will constantly disclose more to you and to us Ask him in your morning meditation what you can do each day for the man who is still sick I can't believe that Jack just made this terrible mistake about instead of changing his life He was going to change his wife And now I've just done meditation and medication I can'T believe I did that What can you do each day for the man who is still sick? The answers will come if your own house is in order. But obviously, you cannot transmit something you haven't got. See to it that your relationship with him is right and great events will come to pass for you and countless others. This is the great fact for us all. Abandon yourself to God as you understand God. Admit your faults to him and to your fellows. Clear away the wreckage of your past. Give freely of what you have found here and join us. We shall be with you in the fellowship of the Spirit, and you will surely meet some of us as you trudge the road of happy destiny. May God bless you and keep you until then. What is the vision of Alcoholics Anonymous? I think it makes it possible for you and me to grow from a state of hopeless, helpless desperation to a state of happy, joyous, and free. And Dave's going to talk to us about how to be happy. You know, when Bill wrote those words, he was getting pretty disillusioned for a time in writing the big book because he thought, you know, I'm just putting this stuff together and I'm having to send it off to Akron and here and there and all these people are editing it and you know and I've just some kind of editor for this thing which is a little bit of a common phenomena in Alcoholics Anonymous you don't see the miracle when you're right in the middle of it you have to get beyond it and look back to understand what's really going on and he wrote some words that I have no idea what was in his heart and I have no idea what was in the hearts of those who may have worked on these words before they made their final appearance in the big book. But it says that God, we realize we know only a little. God will constantly disclose more to you and to us. and uh there's a lot of people around because we're we're a collection of human beings and if you want to see uh a great spectrum of human reaction sometime propose that we rewrite the big book to be gender neutral or uh or suggest that we do away with some of our literature you know make make some suggestions on maybe some fundamental changes to Alcoholics Anonymous. But before you get nervous, see that kind of stuff makes me nervous because I admit to being human too. I don't want a gender neutral big book. We're not a cult because a cult always has some Bhagwan that runs it. And we all think that's a great idea if we're the Bhagwan. But if you're the Bhagwan, we're not interested. But he wrote these words, and at the time he wrote these words all we had was this book. We had no 12 and 12. We had a book called The Bible. We had to know World Service Organization. We did not have 12 traditions. We did NOT have 12 concepts. We did Not have any idea how to put together and conduct an AA meeting like we do now. We had no literature. We had No World Service Organization. We had NO General Service Office. We were only a small group of people in one only country, and we're now worldwide. I mean, it is astonishing what God has revealed to you and to us. You know, and he was so prescient when he wrote those words. We realize we know only a little. And so the first part that we believe is the AA vision for you and for us is that we be happy, joyous, and free. And the first point is happy. I have put some quotes in these notes along the way. And they're from everybody from a 13th century Christian mystic to a contemporary, relatively contemporary rock group. with a lot of quotes by Bill Wilson, Dr. Bob Clarence Snyder, and some other people in Alcoholics Anonymous. And the reason for putting such a wide collection of quotes in here is because we were not given something brand new in Alcoholic Anonymous We were shown how to apply spiritual truths that have been verities through the ages to our problem of alcoholism and living. And many, many people know about these and have found ways to apply them to their life. And we have, at their behest, capitalized on all of these. You know, the first quote that I want to start with is George Bernard Shaw, and this just happens to be one of my favorites because I think it's funny. He said, this is the true joy of life. The being used up for a purpose recognized by yourself as a mighty one. Being a force of nature instead of a feverish, selfish little clot of ailments and grievances complaining that the world will not devote itself to making you happy. So I came here, a feverished, selfish, little clot of ailments and grievances, and I hung around long enough to get pretty happy. And I said, what is happy? I'll tell you what my version of it is. Happy is just being able to comfortably be Dave Pistol, just comfortably live in my own skin, to comfortably enjoy having my stuff, not wanting your stuff, to just be grateful that I'm me and have what I have and do what I do. And happiness is not an event, it is a process. It's like sobriety. It's not an events, it's a process and so some of the thoughts that I have on happiness are these. First of all, we need to make, I think we needto make happiness a priority in our lives. I thinkwe need to think about it and make it a priority thing Bertrand Russell said, Drunkenness is a temporary suicide. The happiness that it brings is merely negative, a momentary cessation of unhappiness. So I feel that not only do I have the right to be happy, I have an obligation to be unhappy. I owe it to those around me to be happier. I owe my life and my children and my friends in Alcoholics Anonymous and the people I work with and everybody. I have an obligation to be happy. My happiness has an effect on everybody around me. We don't ever put happiness first in our lives. When you were growing up as a little kid, I don't know what you did, you know, but was being happy and loving ever said to be more significant than being neat or getting good grades or abiding by the countless unending rules of life? Nobody ever taught us that happiness should be a priority in our life. You know, when we make happiness dependent on achieving goals, it gets away from us. We think we're going to be happy if we have a lot of money or education or health or have some kind of successful marriage or having children or getting promoted or something. And they don't – you know, we don't — that's not true. You know, those things are nice. They have their own place. But happiness needs to be a priority. Another thing that we need if we're going to have happiness is we need to be authentic. You know William Shakespeare says this above all else, do thine own self be true. And it must follow as the night, the day thou canst not then be false to any man. You know happiness relies upon personal authenticity. You know and what does that mean? It says, when you look at me, do you get what you see? Am I one way around you and some other way around other people? Am I authentic? I think that we need to embrace all those funny little things that make us us, that make me me. You know, my idiosyncrasies, my quirks, my tics if I have any. You know? I need to embarrass all those things and revel in them. That's what makes me, me. You know, that's what makes you, you. That's people fall in love with you when you are not hiding those things. When you're accidentally displaying yourself. They fall in Love with that and when you find out they have begun to love you then you want to hide all that stuff from them. And that's why that's where all your charm comes from. You know just be in your goofy self. Be in my goofy self You know, I mean, it took a long time for me to feel that free. But it makes me very happy to know that I don't have to be afraid of you, that I do not have to hide me from you. The next aspect of happiness, I think, is to abandon judgment and criticism. Just give it up. There's an old man who has long been dead. He had a men's retreat in Palo Mesa, California in 1975. His name was Chuck Chamberlain. And many of you have seen his book called The New Pair of Glasses. I've read his tapes. It's now on CD. And he said this at that men's retreat in 1975. He said, there's no law of God or man that says I can't judge you. I am perfectly free to judge the hell out of you if I want to, and I'm very capable along those lines. For many years, I inventoried everybody that I ever knew and lots of people that were just walking by. Why don't I judge you? I can't afford it. The carpenter told me what would happen to me if I did, but he didn't tell me I couldn't. He said, Judge not that ye be not judged, for with whatsoever judgment ye judge, ye shall be judged. And with whatsoever measure you meet, it will be measured to you again, heaped up, pressed down, and running over. That's what happens to me if I judge. But he didn't say I can't. If I'm willing to pay the penalty, I can do it. When I start judging you in any way or criticizing you, I have a guy that lives up here. He's been up there as long as I can remember. I call him Igor, and whenever I start judging you, Ill Igor immediately begins to scan my database. And he finds examples of my behavior that are exactly what I'm judging you about. And he puts it right in my face. And he says, take a look at this, big shot. Tell us again about all your honesty. and so that's what's meant by heaped up pressed down and running over that's scary stuff anyway anytime i get into judging you about anything or criticizing you about anything what i'm doing in essence is saying i i know more than you do and I have judged that I am right and you are wrong because if I have to assume that you're wrong, I have be right. And my record for being right is not all at Sterling and so on what basis do I judge you? You know, whenever – I had something I wanted to say here. Where is it? Yes. Yes, trying to distinguish between right and wrong and good and bad, possible and impossible are not things that I can do well. Okay. I mean how do I know what's right and what's wrong? There's a philosopher named Immanuel Kant that held the premise that you cannot have a complete set of information on anything. So with that in mind, how do you know what's right and what's wrong? You don't have a incomplete set of confirmation. You know, there's a guy named Saxby that wrote a poem about six guys that went up, six blind men that were asked to feel an elephant. One felt his tail and one his trunk and one His leg and one side. And they asked what an elephant felt like, and none of them agreed. But nobody was wrong. You know, they just got a different perspective on the elephant. So the next idea is to be present in your life. You know? Be present in you life if you want to be happy. Albert Schweitzer said, truth has no special time of its own. Its hour is now, always. and it was a rock group called journey uh wrote had a song recorded could have been you and this is they had a line in there that says i can't wait all my life on a street of broken dreams so having spent a good part of my life either trying to relive the past or experience the future before it arrives i have come to believe that in the space between these two extremes The past and the present is a tiny little gap called now. And if I can stay in that gap, I am usually happy. I am visually okay. Igor usually leaves me alone if I can just stay in the gap called right now. Almost never, almost never in my life, and I suspect yours, do I need to be afraid of anything? Almost never in my life. But if I want to go back into yesterday or leap out into tomorrow, I can't go into the future without fear. I just can't. Almost never. Never in my Life. I have done the very best job I can to fulfill all the conditions of this program. So I am on good terms with everybody I know as far as I know. But if I go back into yesterday, I can find examples of my behavior that still cause me shame, still cause мне remorse, still cause میں regret. And it is hard to internalize and get into my heart and my head the idea that the person who did those things no longer exists. That because of the program of Alcoholics Anonymous, we have been transformed. And the person Who Did That no longer exist. So if I can just stay in the little gap, if I could just be present in my life, then I do well. the next one is be grateful for your life Carl Jung said Dr. Jung said one looks back with appreciation to the brilliant teachers but with gratitude to those who touched our human feelings the curriculum is so much necessary raw material but warmth is the vital element for the growing plant and for the soul of the child so be grateful for your love gratitude gives birth to happiness I don't know how you can be grateful and unhappy at the same time. You know, the gracious state of gratitude is one of delight and enjoyment and appreciation and just simply wanting to say thank you to the power greater than us who has made all this possible. Bill Wilson said, I try to hold fast to the truth that a full and thankful heart cannot entertain great conceits. When brimming with gratitude, one's heartbeat must surely result in outgoing love, the finest emotion we can ever know. The next one is to decide to be happy. George Santa Anna said happiness is the only sanction of life. Where happiness fails, existence remains a mad and lamentable experiment. and Abraham Lincoln said in a very famous quote most folks are about as happy as they make up their minds to be so decide to be happy you know this giant step of just I'm just going to be happy this evolutionary leap is an acknowledgement of our capacity to alter our beliefs and feelings as well as take an active role in guiding our lives. You know, decide to be happy. Decide to go at it with a clear and conscious intention. The next one is to be forgiving. This is a big one. No matter, John, Johann Christoph Arnold said, no matter the weight of our bitterness or despair, where forgiving is the surest way to get out from under it. And Bill Shakespeare said in A Winter's Tale, what's gone and what's past help should be past grief. So if we're ever going to be happy, I believe, we must learn at whatever cost to be forgiving. If somehow we can just believe that the universe is unfolding as it should than something that Chuck Chamberlain used to say all the time and that I devoutly believe is that each and every one of us, every person is doing the very best they can. I don't believe any of you are intentionally screwing up your life, and I'm not intentionally screwING up mine. He used to says everybody is doing their very best that they can, If they knew better, they'd do better. And I devoutly believe this. I mean, I have to look at me and I have to ask, what has been forgiven me? What did I bring to you when I walked into Alcoholics Anonymous? What did i have in the way of Boy Scout merit badges to hold up? Did I have any assets or accomplishments that I could point to with pride? Could I tell you about all my exemplary actions that I had taken all my life? Could I present examples of my generosity or my kindness or my love? Could I talk to you about my life experience? Could I say something to you? Could I share with you about ways I've been unselfish? No. You know, but yet I know in my own heart, it's important that I know. It's not necessarily important that you know. It's importantthat you know about you. It's important that I know, that I feel in my own heart, I know that I have been forgiven. I know that I had been forgiven by God and I know that I have been forgiven by my friends and I know that. My life cannot be at the point it's at if that were not true. I just devoutly believe that. So after all that has been forgiven me, how could I possibly withhold forgiveness from you? How could I possible say no to you that I can't forgive you? You know, how could any of us possibly withhold forgiveness after all that we have been forgiven by God and our friends? The last one is no, I'm sorry. The next to the last one is develop your faith. Benjamin Joyd says, My dear child, you must believe in God in spite of what the clergy tell you. Faith is something that has come to play a big part in my life. Faith simplifies things. If I have enough faith, There are a lot of unanswerable questions that I don't need to ask. One of the things I do as a sponsor often is I say, Don't ask that question. There is no answer. You are never going to be given forensic evidence that God exists. You are Never Going to Know Unless You Try It. And faith is not something that is on a sale rack at Walmart. You can't go down and buy it. You know, you have to patiently develop your faith. You have to let your faith develop in you. How does that happen? It happens by being bold enough to do what people whose lives are going the way you would like for your life to go by doing what they do and seeing if what happens to you is the same thing that's been happening to them. you know that is why I consider the big book sacred as sacred as any other religious body considers their book that's why I considered it sacred I did what that book says and my life is beyond anything I could have ever imagined of course I have faith how could I not have faith not as much as some people I know but more than many others it's my life and i know that's true for me you know in a vision for you it says abandon yourself to god that's a bold word abandoned i give up all interest in what happens to me i just turn everything over to god abandon myself to god uh i've been able to pretty much do that the last couple of years took me a long time to get to the point where I felt like I could really, really do that without some reservations. You know, how do I know I have reservations? If there's something I don't want to do, can't do, someplace I can't live, you know, there are any number of indicators that tell me that I have not abandoned myself to God. And it took me a long time. But I don' t care. I finally made it. What else would I be doing? To me, it just means that you give up all interest in trying to run your own life. Bill said, in my own case, the foundation stone of freedom from fear is that of faith, a faith that despite all worldly appearances to the contrary causes me to believe that I live in a universe that makes sense. To me this means a belief in a creator who is all power, justice, and love, A God who intends for me a purpose, a meaning, and a destiny to grow, however little and haltingly, toward his own likeness and image. Before the coming of faith I had lived as an alien in a cosmos that too often seemed both hostile and cruel. In it there could be no inner security for me. and uh there's another article that uh that he wrote uh in the grapevine that uh in 1961 the phrase god as we understand him is perhaps the most important expression to be found in our whole aa vocabulary within the compass of these five significant words there can be included every kind and degree of faith together with a positive assurance that each may choose his own. Scarcely less valuable to us are those supplemental expressions, a higher power and a power greater than ourselves. For all who seriously deny or doubt a deity, these frame an open door over whose threshold the unbeliever can take his first easy step into a reality hitherto unknown to him, the realm of faith. nominations will be accepted from the floor to find somebody that has three years of sobriety that can write a chapter like we agnostics for another big book i mean where did that come from yeah the last one is a point to be happy is don't submit surrender a guy uh some unknown guy said There are sudden moments or occasional periods when I am afflicted with acute emotional or psychological pain, and sometimes problems of reality shatter the fragile equilibrium of my life. Almost instinctively, I rally all my meager energies to overcome these moments, to ease the pain, to restore my sense of equilibrium. But for what? To return to an existence which I really don't value, which doesn't bring me any joy or even occasional satisfaction? Why not let the chips fall as they may? Why not letting God take charge? Why not just surrender to whatever he wants of me? What have I got to lose? And that was certainly the way I felt when I finally got over the last hump. And the hump for me was, before I could completely abandon myself to God, there was one last hill to climb, and that was the hill of fear. Wouldn't you just know it? And my fear was, my last fear in that process was that, you know, if I do this, just bigger than hell, I'm going to have to go to Africa and be a missionary or something like that. Oh, man, I don't want to do that. You know, being a good guy for God is not going to be fun. You know what? I'm gonna be on a bicycle with a short-sleeved white shirt and a tie and a helmet and a buddy and we're going to be going around town proselyting. You know, I don't want to do that. But the answer finally comes, what have I got to lose? What better choice do I have? What's my alternative plan? What's My Contingency? You know now and then alcoholics just get up and just walk out the door. Just walk out life's door. They're gone. and they're not gone from AA they're gone from life they were sober in the sense that they weren't drinking but they werenít at peace and they werenít happy and you know our disease doesnít need us to drink to kill us alcoholism is an implacable foe itís the only disease that I know of thatís entirely capable of fighting back of taking care of itself and of emerging in new places and new forms when it isn't properly treated. And that's because of spiritual malady. It's a spiritual malody. It has to do with spirit, the force that animates us and motivates us and makes us think and propels us. You know, as an alcoholic, my spirit is ill. That's the nature of our disease. And it's an instinct run rampant, a desperate need for acceptance and for a love that cannot be met. It fills me with fear and it fills me WITH RELENTLESS SELF-DOUBT. The selfishness and the self-centeredness of an alcoholic lies here and we are totally preoccupied with what is going on inside of us. to the exclusion of almost everything else. Somehow we've got to have some kind of relationship with reality. You know, we've gotta have some kinda positive attitude. Why bother to recover at all if all we've go to look forward to is doom and gloom and misery? You see that song, Oh Brother Where Art Thou? You know where he's always singing this song called Man of Constant Sorrow. So, you know, for a positive attitude to be born and to flourish, I have had to surrender to a power greater than myself. And it just sort of comes as part of the deal. You know? I mean, I get up every morning. Polly and I do. And we have a meditation and a reading. We read stuff. And then we pray out loud. You know, she says her prayer out loud, I say my prayer out loud and part of my prayer every morning is the third step prayer god i offer myself to you to build with me and to do with me as you will relieve me of the bondage of self uh that is to my way of thinking the same thing as admitting that i belong to god and that I am giving him a free hand to do whatever he wants to with me. I've grown very comfortable with that. It took me a long time, as I said, but I'm very comfortable with that, and it follows to me very clearly that as long as that's my position, I cannot whine and gripe about my life. If I said God, I'm yours, do whatever you want to with me, what am I going to whine about? What he's doing with me. I just told him to take it. Now, I want to whine about what he's doing? What the hell would I get up and do that again tomorrow for if I didn't like what I got today? So, Dr. Thiebaud, those of you who have read A Comes of Age, it is a great book. It's mostly about the traditions and how they got accepted in some of the early people in Alcoholics Anonymous who contributed enormously to our program. One of those was a guy named Dr. Thiebaud, his name was Harry Thiebault, and he wrote a paper that is in that book called The Act of Surrender in the Therapeutic Process. And I'm not going to quote any of that for you, but he said in that paper that in every alcoholic there can be found at least these two characteristics. And actually it was a guy named Salmon who said this, but Dr. Thibault repeats it in his paper. And he says those two characteristics are defiant individuality and grandiosity. And, you know, defiance is a quality that lets me extend my finger in the face of reality and live on, you now, undisturbed. And grandiosity springs from my persisting infantile ego. So, grandiosity fills me with feelings of omnipotence and demands for immediate gratification. I want it now in a tendency to interpret frustration as a sign of rejection. When I get frustrated, I feel like you are rejecting me. And all I am is just frustrated. So it's important to distinguish between submission and surrender. You know, if you submit, you say, okay, I'm not giving up. I'm just going to back off for a little while, and I'm going to figure out how this is really supposed to work. But I'm no surrendered yet. You know? I'm gonna figure it out. If you surrender, you see, I give up. I've taken my best shot, and my best shot got me a front row seat in Alcoholics Anonymous. I ain't got to hell with it. I'm giving up. Polly's going to talk about joy. Joyous, happy, joyous, and free. And we're going to take a look at that. We're going talk about Joyous. For most normal folks, drinking means release from care, boredom, and worry. It means joyous intimacy with friends and the feeling of the good life. Many alcoholics don't want to give that up. They think that's what it is. How can we replace that? What can we do with our lives that can replace that freedom and that joyous feeling of gathering up with people and sharing a drink? Bill knew the answer. In his letter to the grapevine entitled Emotional Sobriety, And those of you who have read The Language of the Heart, I highly suggest you read the whole letter that Bill sent to the grapevine because it's an absolutely fabulous, fabulous letter. In fact, Michael and I have been doing for about ten years a workshop on emotional sobriety because of that letter. It has had such an impact on my life. And when I came to the rooms of Alcoholics Anonymous, I could not find joy. I absolutely was so depressed and so despondent, and I just couldn't find joy, and even though I wasn't drinking, I still had the option of suicide because I just was so oppressed. How can I not be this depressed? I couldn't fine any joy. I couldn' t find it in the 12 steps. I couldn't find joy because I didn't understand what Bill had written and what he was trying to say. So I'm going to read you this part that he said in Emotional Sobriety. I kept asking myself, why can't the 12 steps work to release depression? The 12 steps, if they can keep me from drinking, which I had to drink no matter what, Why can't I be released from depression? Why do I still have this feeling of hopelessness, even though I'm sober? What's the problem? So every time I could get anything about Bill, because I knew he had depression also, I would read it. And this is what I found in that book. By the hour, I stared at the St. Francis prayer. It's better to comfort than to be comforted. Here was the formula all right, but why didn't it work? Why was I still so depressed? I still kept taking actions. I still kept acting as if. I'd still go help people. I'd sill go set up the meeting. I still did the things that I was told to do, but I couldn't get rid of that feeling of hopelessness, that depressed feeling. And if you've never had depression, you don't have a clue what it is. But if you're depressed, if you know what it feels like, and if you feel like you've had it, you know how it feels, and it's a desperate feeling. Suddenly, I realized what the matter was. My basic flaw had always been dependence, absolute dependence on people or circumstances to supply me with the prestige, security, and the like. I was totally and completely addicted to what you thought of me. I had to have your approval I never stopped to think what God's approval was I needed AA's approval am I doing enough in AA am I skinny enough what am I going all of this stuff just going through my head and I don't know if any of you have been tormented by that Just, I mean, I can do anything two times and I'm addicted to it. If it feels good, I'm addictive. And I can have complete dependency on that. My drug of choice right now is ice cream. I can't wait to get to the ice cream socials. I couldn't wait. You know, I had this long line last night waiting to thank me and tell me how much they loved me, and all I could think about was getting to the Ice Cream. With lots of chocolate syrup. So that dependency, do I have enough money? My whole life was money, men, and mansions. I just knew if you would give me enough, I would be okay. It had really nothing to do with me. And all I could end up doing was have that feeling of hopelessness and wanting to die. I just couldn't find joy. No joy. Failing to get these things according to my perfectionistic dreams and specifications, any of you ever told God how you want it, what you want, and in what shape it's going to be in? I had fought for them, and when defeat came, so did my depression. I can't be skinny enough. I don't have enough money. I can't be pretty enough. Nothing ever was enough, and the big book of Alcoholics Anonymous tells me that if I am suffering from a spiritual malady, nothing is enough. You can't give me enough, you can't love me enough and you can do enough. There is not enough for a person like me. I absolutely have to let go of everything. there wasn't a chance of making the outgoing love of san francis a workable and joyous way of life until these fatal and almost absolute dependencies were cut away and bill talks also in that article he talks about i had to give up my dependencies on everything even aa do you know that people come in here and they sit hoping to get sober by osmosis. When the deal is, what is the main object of this book? The big book is very clear about what the main object is. And the main object ist to find a power greater than myself. What I need is to find God, that power and we you know people want to call it anything but the deal is is it's god as i understand him it's God and if anybody's got a problem with that I guarantee you that whiskey will bring you back in if it's if talking about God sends you out whiskey will send you back in if you're lucky enough to get back in but I have got to abandon myself to God and to give up totally if I am to find any joy in my heart. Dr. Bob knew the answer. Love and service in his last message to Alcoholics Anonymous, he said, let's not louse it all up with Freudian complexes and things that are interesting to the scientific mind but have very little to do with our actual AA work. Our 12 steps, when simmered down to the last resolve themselves into the words love and service. I need to love you no matter what and I need serve you no matter what. Am I too tired? Do I not feel love? Then I better act like it until I feel it because one of the things that I have learned is If I'll just take the actions, the book tells me repetition strengthens and confirms. And faith then comes naturally. If I just do it over and over and over Clarence Snyder one of our earliest Cleveland members knew the answer he said what is a spiritual experience that is the change life we have been referring to. That is the change that comes to a person who has turned their will over to the care of God and continues to try and improve themselves mentally, morally, and spiritually. It states that we try to carry this message to alcoholics. We practice these principles of love and service in all our affairs, not just in AA meetings and associates and home and business, but everywhere. What a blessing this fellowship is. What a great opportunity to love and to be loved. Why cheat yourself? We have the prescription, the means of getting well and staying well, growing and best of all, serving. Come on in, the water's fine. Friends are wonderful, the fellowship is distinct, and God is great. and that was a transcription that Clarence Snyder wrote I loved hearing Beth this morning because she said she could identify with me and I could identify with her and I understand that because I'm an alcoholic mom and I've done things that I cannot today believe that I am the same person. I'm not the same person today. This is the same body, but it's a rebirth. It's a new soul. It's totally new soul because I cannot imagine that I could do the kind of harm to any child that I did when I was drinking. The transformation, the spiritual experience and the joy comes from that transformation and abandoning myself to God, as I understand God, knowing that I cannot, it's not possible for me today to stand in God's light and harm a child. It's not impossible. But it was possible while drinking alcohol because I was so selfish and so self-centered that I would abuse a child maybe your sponsor is talking to you about do it anyway you know you may come and say well my parents you know have mistreated me my mother still treats me this way my brother still treats me thisway and they'll stand there saying love them anyway forgive them anyway i just want to read you off a few anyways. Because what's important is for me to do it anyway. It's important even though my son, my oldest son did not want to speak to me for a couple of years because I married Dave and left our family. And he felt like, you know, here you have been drunk all these years and now you go and divorce our dad and marry Dave. And And my job was to love him anyway. People are often unreasonable, illogical and self-centered. Forgive them anyway. If you are kind they may accuse you of selfishness, ulterior motives. Be kind anyway. If you were successful you will win some false friends and true enemies. Succeed anyway. many of us have come into the rooms of Alcoholics Anonymous and we watch people succeed, and we gossip about their success and say bad things about them because they make money. If that's happened to you, go succeed anyway. If you're kind and people start saying nasty things about you just because you're a good person, don't stop being a good person. Just go be a good person anyway. If you're honest and frank, they may cheat you. Be honest anyway. I'm going to share a little story with you. Dave used to laugh at me about it but it's kind of funny in our house now. I am one of these people that I'll tell you anything. Just whatever it is, I'll tell you anything we had a broken car and i took it into the shop and i started telling you know the guy what was the matter with it and all that kind of stuff and he started telling me what he'd need to do to fix it and then he told me how much it would cost and i said oh my god i thought it was going to be a lot more than that and and dave's over there shut up shut up and And what happened was, is we went and picked up the car, and it was even less than what he had said. And Dave says, I really think your way works better. Just be honest anyway. You know, you may have a sponsee, and if you're like me, I love them. I'm a mother of sons, and so the women I have had the privilege to sponsor in the rooms of Alcoholics Anonymous some of them are like daughters to me and some of them have been a huge heartbreak you know what, you love them anyway and you don't ever stop giving just because they disappoint you and just because they don't do the things you want them to do just do it anyway what you spend years building they may they may destroy over a lot overnight dave and i lost at 16 and 17 years of sobriety we lost everything we lost everything but you know what we came up and we found out we were the richest people on earth because we had aa and we had each other so don't stop building. Build anyway. You know, and we just you know, we just dusted ourselves up got up, did stuff in AA and now how do you get from here to here? It's impossible. There's no way for us to get from hier to hier. But we do it. Just keep building anyway. If you find serenity and happiness, they may be jealous and scornful. Be joyous anyway. ever watch that if you're really happy then the next thing you know you get these little side things and people are saying you're a phony you don't really you're not really like that she's not really happy she's just manipulating other people don't stop being joyous do it anyway the good you do today they often will forget tomorrow do good anyway don't be waiting for somebody to give you an accolade for something you've done just do good anyway because see what we're really doing we do it if I'm pleasing God then I'm pleasing me and I've learned that the source is God he's my employer the book tells me that So I had to not worry about losing all the money. Just go do it anyway, because the real source is God. And who I'm really trying to please is God, so go do it anyway. Give the world the best you have, and it will never be enough. You ever tried to give a kid something, and they're standing there saying, but I want that? Ever watched a 50-year-old alcoholic act the same way? That's not enough I want that It'll never be enough So go give it anyway You can't please There's no way to please everybody So just go do it anyway You see in the final analysis It's between me and God It was never between Me and you Anyway the third component of the vision is freedom and in the big book probably one of the most often quoted lines is on page 83 we are going to know a new freedom and a new happiness bill said when we come into aa we find a greater personal freedom than any other society knows we cannot be compelled to do anything in that sense our society is a benign anarchy the word anarchy has a bad meaning to most of us but i think that the idealist who first advocated the concept felt that if only men were granted absolute liberty and were compelled to obey no one, they would then voluntarily associate themselves in the common interest. Alcoholics Anonymous is an association of the benign sort he envisioned. So what is freedom? And how does AA deliver that freedom to us? Freedom, first of all, is we regain the ability when we come into Alcoholics Anonymous and fulfill these conditions, we regain the ability to decide under what terms and conditions we'll coexist or will exist at all. We lose interest in what other people think of us. That's true freedom. Say you're free to think of me whatever you like. It's okay. You know I used to say I don't care what you think of Me. We talked about that when we were talking about Dr. Thiebaud. It's called defiance. You know, when disaster is inevitable, be defiant. We realize that our ego is not our amigo. We quit wasting time and energy trying to keep our precious ego fluffed up. uh freedom means we we present a consistent appearance to everyone okay we abandon subterfuge or deceit we resort we used to resort to honesty only when every means of deception had failed and uh and now we wear uh that like a badge of honor which it is to us that's what it becomes to us we become transparent if we're free you know uh the difference between what's inside and what what is seen on the outside is just melts away there is no there's no longer any difference uh it's it becomes safe to be ourselves and that is a joy when it becomes safe to Be Who You Are we learn to honor make and keep commitments you know commitments are are a real source of freedom. Many times I've said, you know, I'm not going to that group tonight that I've been going to every Monday night for the last 17 years because nobody down there gives a little pink rat's ass about me. They never have and they never will. Doesn't happen very often but happens. My commitment says you're going. You have a commitment to be there. You have a job there. You have to go. Commitments will set you free. We lose our passion for judging other people if we're free. If it's okay to be who I am, it's also okay for you to be who you are. And the idea of live and let live becomes comfortable. Not something you have to work at anymore. We claim freedom for ourselves and we unreservedly extend it to everybody else. We grow increasingly unconcerned about being right. And we begin to under, I wrote this. You know, I have to read this. I'm sorry. Igor made me do this. We have to understand that right is an artificial construct disguised as metaphysical certitude. Don't you love that? Oh, God, sometimes I just can't help it. We begin with the help of a higher power, with our higher power to slowly develop a sense of integrity and honesty and reliability. You know, the words, if it's not yours, don't take it. If it's true, don' t take it If it' s not true, don' nd say it. If it's not right, don't do it. These words take on a new significance to us. And the voice in our head, Oligor, who is so quick to disavow and criticize us, has his ammunition slowly withdrawn from him. Take away all his guns so he can't shoot at me anymore. We're just about out of time here And so we're going to have to skip over a lot of this So I'm going to let Polly take us quickly through One more time through that And then I've got about a one or two minute thing And if it doesn't make the tape, I don't care But I've Got About A One Or Two Minute Thing I'm Going To Read To Close It Up And We'll Be All Set so let us play it one more time still you may say but i will not have the benefit of contact with who wrote this book or showed me the way we cannot be sure god will determine that so you must remember that your real reliance is always upon him he will show you how to create the fellowship you crave the 12 traditions and steps 1 2 and 3 our book is meant to be suggestive only We realize we know only a little. People have feet of clay, and we are placing our sobriety at great risk if we balance it on a human being or a human creation. None of us is qualified to dictate to you what you must do with your life. We freely admit that we could not manage our own lives, so how could we hope to manage yours? God will constantly disclose more to you and to us We recognize God as we understand God To be the source of our sobriety And the foundation of our lives And all they mean and become We turn to him to do what he does best Guide his children We may never know God made us Nor why he is aware of each of us But to the extent that we are sober It is easy to believe that he made us that he enjoys us and that he loves us and that He wants us to enjoy Him to be in a community with Him. And that's in step 11. Also consider that when Bill wrote these words in 1939, we had nothing but the fellowship based on a few uncodified spiritual ideas that we whizzed from the Oxford group and a desire to have a relationship with a power greater than ourselves. Look at how rich we have become in the matters of spirituality. We have a world service organization which serves the entire earth, the 12 traditions which keep us together, intergroups, world service, the grapevine, and an internet presence conference approved literature. To this day God is disclosing more to us. Ask him in your morning meditation what you can do each day for the man who is still sick There was a time when an alcoholic took this suggestion seriously was spiritually encouraged to help you when you were the man who was still sick Payback doesn't have to be a bitch It can be sweet Check it out The answers will come to you if your own house is in order But obviously, you cannot transmit something you haven't got. See to it that your relationship with him is right and great events will come to pass for you and countless others. This is the great fact for us. Not great events for God, for you. And they will be your great events, tailored, made for you, your family, and your life. God does not have a set of great events that he passes out as though it were a service award. He sees to it that your life is enriched with highly personal and meaningful events, and they are so significant that you cannot escape knowing that they are a gift from your creator. Abandon yourself to God as you understand God. Admit your faults to him and to your fellows. Clear away the wreckage of your past. Give freely of what you find and join us. We shall be with you in the fellowship of the Spirit, and you will surely meet some of us as you trudge the road of happy destiny. May God bless you and keep you until then. Okay, I have one little story that we're going to close with, And this is a story of the donkey. One day, a farmer's donkey fell into the well. The animal cried piteously for hours as the farmer tried to figure out what to do. Finally, he decided, eh, the animal was old, you know, and the well needed to be covered up anyway. It just wasn't worth it to try to drag him out of the well, so he invited all his neighbors over to help him, and they all grabbed a shovel and began to shovel dirt into the Well. At first, the donkey realized what was happening and cried horribly. Then to everyone's amazement, he quieted down. A few shovel loads later, the farmer finally looked down on the well. He was astonished at what he saw. With each shovel of dirt to hit his back, the donkey was doing something amazing. He would shake the dirt off and step up. As the farmer's neighbors continued to shovel dirt on top of the animal, he would shake it off and take another step up. Pretty soon everyone was amazed as the donkey stepped out over the edge of the well and happily trotted off. Life is going to shovel dirt on you, all kinds of dirt. The trick to getting out of the wells is to shake it Off and take a step Up. Each of our troubles is a stepping stone and we can get out of The Deepest Wells just by not stopping, never giving it Up, shaking it Off, and taking a step up Remember the five simple rules to be happy. Free your heart from hatred, forgive. Free your mind from worries, most never happen. Live simply and appreciate what you have. Give more, expect less. Now, enough of that crap. The donkey later came back and bit the shit out of the farmer. who had tried to bury him. The gash from the bite got infected and the farmer eventually died in agony from septic shock. So, the moral of that story is when you do something wrong and try to cover your ass it always comes back to bite you. We love you. Why don't we just close with a serenity prayer?