David A. – Big Book – NA Only Promise Workshop – 2014

Followed by the wee version of the serenity prayer. God, grant us the serENITY to accept the things we cannot change, encourage to change the things that we can, and the wisdom to know the difference. Thank you. Welcome to ISNAC 9. uh please keep in mind that your conduct is a reflection on na as a whole if you are unable to conduct yourself in a reasonable manner you will be asked to leave appropriate attire must be worn in hallways and public areas at all times please keep your mind not everyone stays up all night please adhere to the hotel's quiet time hours from 11 p.m to 8 a.m please keep the noise level in rooms to a minimum the committee has provided a hospitality suite for the convenience of group gatherings please smoke only in areas designated to do so our public relations policy is based on attraction rather than a promotion we need always maintain personal anonymity at the level of press radio and film if you are approached by a member of the media direct them to the convention information table near the registration clarity statement we are presented with a dilemma when any members identify themselves of addicts and alcoholics I talk about living clean and sober the clarity of the in a message is blurred to speak in this manner suggests that there are two diseases that one drug is somehow separate from the rest requiring special recognition. Narcotics Anonymous makes no distinction between drugs. Our identification as addicts is all inclusive, allowing us to concentrate on our similarities, not our differences. Okay, this is Freedom from Active Addiction, the Only Promise Workshop, and at this time like to introduce the speakers and the first speaker we have is David a welcome day to day I'm David I'm an egg you take a moment of silence so the God of my understanding and work through me Thank you. I'm David. I'm an addict. I'd like to give thanks to God in this program and you people for helping me stay clean just for the day. I'd like to welcome anyone for the first time to the rooms of Knockhawks Anonymous or the first-time in their life that they've ever experienced in a workshop. First of all, I want to give thanks to God of my understanding for allowing me to be here. Also there's a lot of butterflies going on in my stomach right now. I'm just trying to let it hit me in the head because I can only share what was so faithfully given to me through God of my understanding. You know, freedom from active addiction is the only promise that this program has to offer. When I first came around years ago, the only thing I wanted was freedom from active addiction. I didn't know it was a promise, and I didn' t know it was a gift. As I continue in this process I've come to understand and come to learn to cherish that it is a gift to be free from active addiction. It's no joke to get out of the bondage of a disease. I tried. I fought tooth and fucking nail how not to get here, to be honest with you. I didn't want to surrender wholeheartedly to a new way of life. And I did everything in David's power how not to get here. Only through the grace of a lot of prayers from my family members and mothers. Only through the grâce of a loving and caring God. And only through a series of bottoms that I come to surrender and that was still through a gift from God I need you to feel me on that freedom from active addiction for me I'm talking about me came from God but it was up to me I'd still be out there real simple I'd be actively using because I want to do what I want to do even today you know I came in with a hidden agenda when I get my life back together I'm gonna get another job I'm again another car I'm going to get another wife I'ma get it all back and then I will be okay I got all that back only through this program now what you know the gift now to me is an ongoing going process you know I have to cherish the gift and a lot of times in the beginning I got to be honest with you I was actually in denial that it was a gift I couldn't conceive that it's a gift because of the disease but for the most part you know the denial and me wanted to do what I want to do kept me out there for a long time and even when I came in a few times and went back out there I gave the gift up I realized resumed using started all over again and each time I picked back up it got worse that's why it was a series of bottom for me to even understand the gift you couldn't tell me because my mind was closed and you can't grab the new idea on a closed mind is what the program has taught me so i had to get my ass thoroughly whipped i need you to feel me on that and come in the rooms like a peacock with a bunch of arrows in my ass i was a scout for you i want you to know that see some of us had to be scouts i couldn't come in the first time and stick and stay after getting a period of recovery getting a little bit of few tickets i wanted to be socially acceptable i wanted a job i got acquired a few things then after i acquired them i forgot about the gift from freedom of active addiction and said i'm all right now it's okay now and picked back up either i was around old people places and things um a reservation what i kept in uh secret i didn't want you to know that i wanted to resume using again i just wanted to get my life back together so i can use drugs successfully i need you to feel me on that and that kept me going in and out in and out not getting honest with you people not getting out with myself and not getting honest with the god of my understanding so i gave the gift back i gave it back and when I gave it back it was devastating because each time I gave me back I found myself in a degrading situation where I became a derelict where I become homeless where I becomes penniless where I becoming jobless spiritually bankrupt the disease of addiction actually took from me little by little and no matter how many times you told me don't pick up the first one don't use keep coming back I was still in denial and I'm gonna do what do you want to do I need you to feel me on that so it took a series of bottoms before I learned to cherish the gift of recovery that's how as promised, freedom from active addiction. I tell you, over the years, I've come to understand that if I don't maintain my recovery on a daily basis, I'm subject to relapse. I'm not relapsed proof. With 12 steps of sponsors, meetings, conventions, groups, the whole nine lives. Yes, I've built up some spiritual tools and some things to deal with in my life, but I still don't forget about the fact. I keep a good fear that I'm subject to relapse if I don't do what I was supposed to do when I first got here. And I will get the gift back. If I want to stay connected to your members, if I want To stay connected to someone that's in the program. But each time I disconnect, even the day when I think I got it going on, I find myself doing things not feeling well. My spirit is sort of... I go right back to my own ways of thinking overnight. I don't know... How do I put it? I don' t feel like that I've changed that much that I won't pick up another drug again if I don't stay connected I got this out about it just for the day said one promise many gifts my cox novice offers one promise and that is feeling from active addiction imagine how it might be we had arrived at the doors of my cocks anonymous desperate wanting to stop using drugs only to be met by a sales pitch. If you just work the steps and don't use drugs, you'll get married, live in the suburbs, have 2.6 children, and start wearing polyester. You'll become a responsible, productive member of society and be a fit company for kings and presidents. You will be rich and have a dynamic career. Most of us greeted with such a heavy-handed spell would have shook and voted and ran for the door instead of a high-pressure nonsense of a frightening prediction we are greeted with the promise of hope freedom from active addiction we feel blessed relief comes over us when we hear that we have never to use drugs again we are going to be forced to become anything of course after some time in recovery good things start happening in our lives we are Our given gifts, spiritual gifts, material gifts, gifts that we've always dreamed of but never dared to hope we'd get. These, however, are truly gifts. They are not promised to us just because we come through the rooms of Marquardt's Anonymous. Our only promise is freedom from active addiction, and this is more than just enough. Just for today, I've been promised freedom from passive addiction. The gifts I received are the benefits of recovery. And see, what I do with my gift is on me each and every day. I need you to feel me on this. If you look in the mirror, if you want to see a miracle, if you're going to see one, just look in your mirror. You're a miracle within yourself. It took me a while to learn To look into the mirror and tell myself I love myself That I am a miracle That I have had the opportunity And that I have been blessed With living two lives My program is real simple It's God first The program of Narcotics Now I'm in second Myself and everything after that I live my life in that order I'm not a spiritual general i do everything perfect but i do keep those priorities up front because it took me a long long time of uh over 25 years of active addiction to learn to put that concept and internalize that concept into my life so just for the day that's how i live my life not every day do i put god first to program in myself because some days i fall short some days I just can't hold on to freedom from active addiction and that's all I got I just go through the motions then the next day I feel like an innate guru I pick up my basic text I call my sponsor I do some step work I do what I'm supposed to do for my personal recovery just for the day some days i really feel good about myself and being a part of this program I've learned that The more I talk about certain things And the more I get vulnerable The freer I become Freedom comes to me When I can get vulnerable on this scale And talk about my most deepest Darkest secret That even sometimes a day after nine and a half years I still want to get high Sometimes the thought Enters and it comes and it goes I don't react on it I don' t give it any power I just surrender to the thought you know the steps have changed my life one day at a time I've learned to put steps in my life to help me be free of certain situations not that I'm free from active addiction that's the promise the program of non-coxonomics has delivered I want you to feel me on that if you clean the day it's delivered anything else you got coming you gotta roll your sleeves up you feel me you gotta run your sleeves up and get busy if you want anything else out of this program cause freedom from active addiction you got that zip now what you want what you wanna do with your life it's a process of staying clean first and then after we stay clean for a certain period we learn to develop and we learn to grow grow or go. You feel me? Grow or go That's what they told me Man, roll your sleeves up and get busy Now I'm going to be honest with you, what got me busy and got me working on myself was I got into a relationship in the early parts of my recovery Very real. I think one day I met her 30 days I dated her, I moved in with her 90 days we was married You feel Me? So I had to get busy. Really busy I had already rolled my sleeves up Because she wouldn't do what I wanted her to do She wouldn't cook dinner when I wanted to, she wouldn't wash dishes, she wouldn't come in. So my sponsor told me, you're powerless man. You got to surrender to people, places and things. You gotta change your old ways of thinking or you'll go back to using it. You feel me? Man, change your own ways of thinkin'. All I know is one way to think. How do I do that? Make 90 means in 90 days. Call me every day. Don't pick up the person. All this stuff was kind of, it was foreign. It sort of flew over my head but only through the grace of a loving and caring God. And all those bottoms and all that pain and all them arrows in my ass I surrendered wholeheartedly to this program. And then I began to roll my sleeves as I began doing some step work. I began the work on David and I began focus on David and no one else. I didn't focus outside of myself because anything outside of myself, I was on an emotional rollercoaster. I gave it fuel. It dictated my feelings. I would use the body. I never learned how to live without the use of drugs. I didn't know everything that I felt and done anything. I medicated. I stopped. I didn' t want you to know. I didn''t want to get humble. I didn ''t know anything about spiritual principles. So I went through this program That's part of the gift that the program offers That it offers spiritual tools Spiritual coping skills That's one of the gifts For me is to learn how to deal With situations that I can't change Unresolved problems Some things I just can't do nothing about So I've learned to surrender And in the process of surrendering I became real angry You feel me? I became real angry because I can't control the situation. My feelings were truly on my sleeve. I wanted to react, because right next to anger was rage. You know, fuck it! Now let's box! Let's fight! You know? Right next to it. It was like one emotion. I would go right into a reaction. So it took a while to learn how to memorize. We admit we have powers over our addiction and our lives and become unmanageable. I would continue to condition myself in that order until I finally started actually feeling it. In other words, I would do the right things for the right reasons and let my feelings catch up with my ass later. You feel me? That's what the program has taught me. I have to do the wrong things for their right reasons and let my feelings catch up with me. My feelings are on my sleeve even today. Still sensitive to verbal things. Still sensitive. Still sensitive to anything because I've learned how to not medicate them. You know, I've learn that I have to get vulnerable. I've learnt that I have to share my feelings no matter how sensitive they are and not worry about you judging me. They told me honesty is the antidote to my disease thinking so I better get honest. Once I began getting honest, I started getting better one day at a time. You know they told me the broader the base, the higher the point of freedom. So I started making more meetings, I starting branching out more, I start doing more step work, I'm started making conventions, I've started making marathon meetings, I started listening to tapes. I started watching the predecessors, watching their foot, let alone watching their mouth, just watching their feet, seeing if they share and share and share their ass or are they pulling a newcomer to the side? You know, trying to, what do they say, get a newcomers chance and keep your thing in your pants? You know so, I started watchin' those type of things. And that broadened my base. I would listen to guys' tapes and I was like, man, with my next lead or my next comment, I'm going to say just what Usman said in them. I'm gonna say just when I heard Charlie C. say it from Detroit or James D. or Melvin W. I'ma say that so I can sign for a founding. Maybe you'll like me. You feel me? But I've gotten away from that bit. But that was part of my process of learning that I had to continue to hit things over and over and over like a conditioning that they start sounding right, and they start meaning. Some of the cliches, you know, to keep coming back, more will be revealed just for today. I have faith in someone who believes in me or wants to help me in my recovery. Those things I started internalizing, and I actually started believing you wanted to helpme in my recover,y that you wanted help me get this promise and keep the gift of recovery just for today and it's true people start showing the unconditional love and i in turn dave starts showing other members unconditional love you know my mission became sponsorship because i had a good sponsor so i started helping guys work through some steps and he was like man well find what your niche is Why don't you like doing it? In other words, God gave you a gift. Now, feel me on this. The only promise is freedom from active addiction. But the only thing my conscious mind has asked me to do was give back what was so freely given to me, which is the gift, is to reach back and help another suffering addict like myself, like someone helped me. that's all it asked me to do and all it has asked me to commit to is to help another suffering addict in some form or another in terms of service and I made that commitment to reach back like someone had reached for me and that's what helped me grow with unconditional love, empathy self respect it helped me change for the most part I can't suggest that you don't hit your wife and I'm tagging mines You feel me? I can't suggest that you make meetings and I'm not making none. I can'T suggest that you work on your steps and I'M NOT WORKING ON THOSE STEPWORKS. I can'LL SUGGEST THAT YOU DO ANYTHING THAT I'M not doing. MY MOUTH MUST MATCH MY FEET. You feel ME? THAT'S WHAT SPONSORSHIP HELPED ME DO. IT HELP ME CHANGE WHEN I REALLY DIDN'T WANT TO CHANGE. BECAUSE MY RESISTANCE TO CHANGES IS STILL BUILT IN. I STILL DON'T WANNA CHANGE CERTAIN AREAS I DON'T Wanna LET GO OF. YOU KNOW, So those are gifts that the program, you know, the gifts I have to earn. I have work for the gifts. You know, I came in with a hidden agenda. And that hidden agenda was to return. I lived in the past for the most part because I just wanted to regain what I had lost. I thought recovery was to get what I lost in active addiction, the car, the house, the job. I want to get all that back so I can be socially acceptable. but it was a hit in the head for me because it was more than that more was revealed I had to buckle my seatbelt they told me because I'm in for the ride of my life and that ride in the new world is the spiritual truth the freedom for me comes from trusting in the God of my understanding when I'm on the road when I have feelings and emotions when I am in a whirlwind of certain situations I make a decision to turn my will and my life over to the care of God of my understanding, and I try to act like it. I continue to ride with some faith. You feel me? And it's hard when I'm riding with faith because things are not happening and they're not changing fast enough. It's not happening when I want it to happen. So I have to have some patience and some tolerance for whatever's going on in my life that I feel is keeping me upset. What am I doing to get into the solution and not remain in the problem? I need you to feel me on that. And some problems, I've got stuck in. I've got stuck with some problems. There's just nothing I can do with them, even though they keep arising. I remember saying earlier that if I only address some issue, they're going to address me. Some of them I put up on the shelf and just say, well, to hell with it. I ain't got time for it right now. I'll get back with it, and that's what I do with some of my issues. Honestly, I have to put them up on the shelf because there comes a certain point in my recovery that I'm not spiritually fit to deal with some of those issues right now well i don't have a willingness to go at them i know they're there i either get into denial or i get into procrastination or i give them the advocacy which is some of my defects and then i just let them be there and i just keep going through the motions i keep on with on this uphill journey i just kept on doing what i'm supposed to do don't use all my sponsor when i'm really in a real turmoil um go to work and try to be a productive member of society and a father and a husband to my family and be responsible that's all i can do sometimes and that's what i want to do sometimes to be honest with you sometimes i don't want to make a meeting sometimes i want to call my sponsor i just want to be myself and uh that's not good always because when i disconnect like that i found myself becoming really emotionally unbalanced. I find myself either too tired, hungry, lonely, or have the Hulk Syndrome. Because if I work too much, I sort of want to sleep. If I don't make enough meals, I find my self short-tempered. And if I don' t do what I'm supposed to in my personal recovery, then I'm not doing what I' m supposed to do with this gift. You know, I' M not taking it for granted, but it's just sometimes I feel I'm falling short within my personal recovery. And I can feel a difference in my attitude and my behavior when I don't do what I'm supposed to do. So another gift that this program gave me is a gift of no God. I need you to put me on that because, see, that's a gift that I have to work with. That's a gifted act to try to develop. That's the gift that I can truly share because a lot of times when you give me a new toy or a new gift of yours, I'll play with it for a while and I'm dazzled with it for a while, then after a while the gift is no longer sparkling. I'll put it to the side. I want a new gift. You feel me? I want anew toy. I want something new to get my interest. But see, this gift is ongoing. How do I keep this gift alive? How doI keep my recovery enthusiastic is what I'm trying to get at. Because, see, I think back. I thinkback of when the disease of addiction was like a steering wheel in my back. And it gave me a force and a drive that was like driving me straight to hell. And then when he got there, it burnt rubber. I had to kill him. It wasn't planned. It wasn' t planned. When I hit the bottom and I would get down there, all of a sudden, I would come out of nowhere to become the guy with some other film to get one more. So I had a drill and a drive To throw a brick through a window To do whatever it was necessary I was sponsored You feel me? To do anything At any minute Whether it took my spirit Whether it take my soul It didn't matter That drive Is the same drive That I try to have in my personal program I have to pray for the willingness For that drive You feel? I have pray for For the willingness To be ongoing in this process of recovery, and not to fall back and get complacent. You know that newcomer feeling when you come here? I got 90 days. Let me get a key tag. I got six months. Let me Get a Key Tag. When you get five, six years, you're over there. There I'm going. I don't know who I owe. You start digging in your pocket. You're coming up with less. I'm unmanageable. I can't pay this. I can' t pay that. I need to get on a budget. The reality sets in. Reality sets in that it ate. So what's your claim? You should have been responsible years ago. That's what they told me so what? Fine, you did yourself a favor and you saved your own goddamn life. Thank God that it was a gift from God. If I could save my own life, I would. I can't give myself credit because i didn't save my life god did you know that's the gift the gift that when he heard my monty hall last let's make a deal last prayer and i'm down in the mission i was singing for a bowl of soup they come back there were two dead flies in the soup and the soup is fucking cold it's a soup and i pray oh god just just get me out of this one He gets me out Put my feet back up And I resume using You feel me I gave the gift back so many times And each time I gave it back Man it stripped me It bankrupted me So The only thing that is promised from my God Is freedom from activity It's delivered and it continues to deliver Each and every day What I do with the gift Is on me each day If I'm so grateful, then I'll keep my sleeves rolled up. And I pray for the willingness to continue in my step work. I pray för de willingness to change my behavior. I need you to feel, I pray per the willingness to be a better individual. You know, I just look for myself to defeat the lies of understanding my God and working this stuff because see when I came in They said, Dave, you have one big-ass defect trying to find a character. And through working the steps, I found a character, the steps via character. So roll your sleeves up if you want to find yourself. That's what I had to do. That's why I'm continuing to do it. A lot of the defects will fall by the wayside when I learn to put some principles in there. You know, and I come back that I don't want to give back my gift each and every day. My promise is that I must be committed to Narcotics Anonymous and to God, and you people help me stay clean. And commitment is followed by action. I need you to feel me on that. Commitment is followed back. Don't just commit. If I'm committed, then I've got to put some action into it. Each and every day, I keep a daily maintenance. A daily maintenance, just like I got up every day not to sleep out my eyes and say, now I'm going to get one. Each and every day that I marched to the general, I heard somebody say years ago, Get up! I'm up. Get up. All right. Go right. I'm marching. Give me one. Give me three. How many of you want to give me four? I'm sick. I don't feel like giving. Get up with pneumonia. March. It didn't matter. I would get up and do whatever the disease of addiction taught me, had me to do. I was committed. Now that I'm committed to this program I have to do the necessary footwork Each and every day to stay clean If not, I'm subject to relapse And let's not get confused The battle of recovery And the battle of staying clean Is an ongoing process Each and everyday I can give my gift back If I don't do what I'm supposed to do And that's surrender Getting in touch with the God of my understanding Making a decision to turn my will and my life Over to the care of God of my understanding each and every day. I must live the steps. I must live them. Work the steps or die, as they told me. And it's still true today. Live the steps of death. And I don't want to die from a disease of addiction. And I want to give back my gift. With that, I keep coming back. Thank you. there Michael I'm at it and freedom from active addiction and that's a beautiful promise for an addict right next speaker like to introduce is David s hi family I'm an addict named David and I just got real nervous I expected this room to be about three-quarters empty about now y'all supposed to be getting ready for a banquet and it's it's pretty full I want to thank the committee that asked me to speak at this convention it's always an honor and privilege to speak at a narcotics anonymous convention I woke up clean today and it's only through grace one of my friends spoke in earlier workshop and she shared that like whoever got up the earliest today had the most clean time and that's what it's about before I get started I'd like to take a moment of silence to try to get me out of the way and let God of my understanding speak through me. Thank you. I was at the Chicago convention a few weeks ago selling jewelry with my sponsor and a friend asked me to speak at this workshop and didn't give me a choice topic just told me what I was speaking on. I told him I'd have to let him know because I was fulfilling a dream a few weeks later. I was going to Australia and I just got back a week ago and I had to figure out if I was gonna be home. And I wasn't. I emailed him back and told him that I'd be able to do it and I forgot what my topic was and I just needed to know what day, what time. I didn't really want to know what my topic was because I didn't want to be thinking about it for two months because I got a disease that won't be profound and everything and try to come up with this big heavy lead he run it back give me my time and my topic and I'm going like damn see I know something about the only promise I came to these rooms almost 14 years ago and they told me drugs weren't my problem i thought they were full of it was like drugs is why i was here i was in trouble at work i was about to lose my job and blah blah blah i remember when i got in trouble work they told me to go to rehab to save my job i told them i didn't have a problem i'd gotten rid of her that was before any step work you know before any kind of program Years later, with the sponsor and a few steps under my belt, I found out that was the fourth her that had gotten rid of me. She's definitely on my amends list. Last time I saw her was her butt going down the road. She didn't want no part of me, and it was like, damn. What I know about recovery, it's about change. It's about changing behaviors. I qualify for about 10 different fellowships and I can get it all in Narcotics Anonymous our first step doesn't say anything about drugs it says addictions you know, I've been clean a few 24 hours today and when I got problems in my life that's called unmanageability I'm at a first step and there's no drugs inside all I gotta do is look in a mirror and it's this David running amok in one or two different areas, a couple defects, whatever. I've had to own that. I also know it's about if I don't change certain behaviors or certain defects I'm acting on, it can become about the drugs real quick. Because the David that spoke before me talked about being a soldier for y'all. Well, I was one of them too. I was told not to get in a relationship for a year and everybody was telling me he had a wife or an old lady. I'm going like, you didn't kiss my ass. You know, it's like, I had to have me a woman. And I went out and found one that was like less than 30 days in shaking and I was a spiritual giant. I remember I caught a lot of flack for that alleged 13th step. You won't find it in our readings anywhere. But steps 6 and 7 sure add up to 13. And I remember one of those addicts that was giving me hell for that relationship replaced me. And I went to her house a week later to just talk to her, you know. That's what I was telling myself. I was probably wanting some more. But through the window, I saw him in her arms. And I caught the major attitude. And within a couple months, I was gone. That relapse happened long before I picked up. and I wasn't able to get rid of those feelings. A couple years clearing recovery my nickname was angry Dave you know I was wearing my feelings on my sleeves I was mad at every damn thing everybody and wasn't working much of a program I already had three steps under my belt probably about four or five service positions and working overtime out the butt. I did finally have a sponsee and I remember I came home one night and my roommate said here's Angry Dave now and it's like my sponse had got locked down with six months clean and I was pissed off at the system but the reality of it was he was doing time for the crime you know that caught up with including and he still had to go down and it's like one door got shut and another was open because on the other end of the phone was an addict reaching out for a sponsor. See, that was God working early in my life and I had some awareness then and I kind of realized that because I heard you all talking about one door shut, another opens and we're coming up on three years clean I had our rooms I was in a relationship, I had our rooms all rented to the Ohio Convention I was speaking on recovery and relapse because I had some history there. And like a week before the convention, I beat the crap out of my old lady clean. It cost me the relationship and didn't really want to use. I had a relapse history to help me stay clean, but I wanted to kill myself. You know, I had to deal with that pain and those feelings. I remember going to the convention and one addict took a look at my face and asked me how I was and I said, I'm fine. he said your eyes were saying i'm lying and uh made me talk and i got some of it out and he shared something with me that stuck with me for seven years now and um he said what do you got when you got a using horse thief they don't go to meetings they don't work steps they're just clean got a clean horse thief you know and it was like i had the foundation under my belt but i hadn't worked on that inventory and i hadnít got to the real heart of recovery which to me is step six and seven where you start to get rid of the stuff that makes us use now that woman came back into my life on a day that's significant to me because i'd gotten married on that day once and she showed up that day and we ended up back together ended up in a lip lock and from there you know where we went no she gave me an opportunity to work on those issues and she gave me a number of a group but I'm not endorsing it this is just part of my story but it was called the batterers group today I can tell you I'm recovering addict and I'm recovering batterer and I had to deal with those things you see I don't know if I would have got through steps four five six and seven if I would have had to go there but I was one of those lazy-ass addicts and I wanted recovery by osmosis and uh I remember the interview I had with this counselor he asked me if I had lost control or if I'd given myself permission I think when asked me the question i knew the answer but i'm a good addict and i said i lost control and when when the interview was over he corrected me on that he said we don't lose control over anything we give ourselves permission to do everything and it's like damn you know so all my relapses before i ever picked up i gave myself permission to go down that path now today i don't i ain't going to use over none of y'all no situation is going gonna make me use in the past couple years I've lost a couple loved ones and that was with a few years clean it was like recovery's given me the ability to travel this jackets from Paris the 95 World Convention and it was like that was my first trip out of the country and I fell in love with Europe and Europeans, especially the women. I'm a sucker for an accent too. See, there's one of my other addictions. That reminds me of almost 15 years ago when my fourth relationship was in jeopardy and I sought one of those counselors out that seems like every woman I was ever involved with had me going somewhere. This time it was my idea because i kind of knew a solution i went and saw this female psychologist my mate was supposed to go with me she backed out at the last minute and i went by myself because i was in pain and i wanted it to stop and this counselor listened to me for an hour she told me i needed to go to aa and i was addicted to that woman i told her she was full of shit as it turned out six months later when i was in my first rehab over that woman I kind of realized a little light went off for the first time what maybe she was right plus that's where I found you all thank God for H&I because I'm an H&i baby and I just blacked out for a minute whited out I don't have blackouts anymore I just white out but um I'm so great that first group of people that came in i mean the ones i was paying attention to were the women because they were all smiling and happy and some of them were kind of cute my favorite readings why are we here you know when i was in that rehab i was angry i didn't have a problem but it seems like the counselors knew i had a problem because i had to talk every female counselor it was there you know I've worked on those issues with women and David come home working on them now I'm at another first step with my sponsor I'm working out of the guide actually I'm working two of them I'm looking out of a guy I've got about a third of it done the funny thing is I started it a month ago in Australia he went with me thank He also gave me a book to read about keeping the love you find. And it's like the second chapter has about 100 and whatever questions. So this is a different inventory. It seems like in the last six months I've had, well, a little bit longer than that, about nine months maybe, and I've have these female problems. It seems like I've ended up in some strange places, because I was lonely. I was vulnerable. And what was happening was I was having an unmanageability in my life, and what was happening wasn't filling the void, the void in here. And it's like twice I ended up on the arms of two different married women, and it was like they were both separated, so they both assured me that it was okay. But for me, it wasn't okay. You know, for me it goes against all my upbringing because I can remember when I was using I wouldn't mess with married women because it was dangerous for one thing and that hasn't changed any. Like I say, it wasn't filling the void. Last July I went with my mother to the gambling boat down in Cincinnati and it was like between July and December, I went back about six times. And it was starting to become a problem. See, I'm retired working on a fixed income. And all of a sudden, this part-time job I got, which is designed so I can travel around the globe, the money I was getting there was going to the boat. It's like, well, damn. I'll just have to get money from over here. And was like no there's another solution you're powerless over your addiction why don't you just surrender you know that came from the only promise freedom from active addiction it's not just about drugs if I want to stop losing money quit gambling you know it's like I'm having a problem with the refrigerator well quit getting in it you know that goes with another addiction if I'm having problems with these women like quit doing it so that's kind of where I'm at you know it's like I just came back from Australia years ago I wanted to go there because Australian women love American men that's what my mind told me yeah that's true well so I kind of went there with that in mind but it was like I went there was this four step and this book and it was I was there for a month and didn't act out thought about it but I didn't act out you know it was like I also traveled a lot so I was moving too quick maybe that's what saved my little butt but uh I was in a lot of different places your travels become an addiction for me in the last few years and I've come to a an awareness another running around the country globe looking for that perfect woman to help fill this void and it's like maybe if i quit looking so hard i might find her in my backyard you know i don't know i've learned that it's not filling the void and it's also creating uh financial unmanageability damn i'm on the first step with no drugs inside you know them credit cards are so easy to use in my last sponsor i heard him share about it i heard my grand sponsor share about credit card abuse and damn if i didn't have to go experience it it's like i'm retiring now for almost three years so i don't have the means to pay off the card like i used to and i'm still trying to travel i heard some people in here earlier talking about going to italy that's like been there there's a convention in july and i want to be there but it's this trip just shot my wad probably for the next year other than atlanta I can't miss that bottom line is I choose not to miss that you know I'm going to be with family from all over the country and I know probably some from the world funny thing is I might even know most of them this fellowship has saved my life my first sponsor told me never to go anywhere without this book so it just went with me to Australia and Toronto there was a couple nights where i was in a crazy place and i just got my book out of my bag and started reading i mean i was an australian so i read the last chapter in our book that's by a crazy australia you know i was over there they don't do meetings right you know they don' t read our readings and uh they don''t hug i remember speaking at their regional convention like and one of the things i showed them i said if y'all see me standing around looking lost and lonely just give me a hug I said that's all I didn't have that meeting I had hugs out the yin yang and it was like most of them from women which made me happy but uh truthfully it made me happier when men were coming up to hugging me you know come from a sponsorship family that last summer we were not summer last December we were together 230 of us and looks like an addict showed up from New Mexico who wasn't part of the family be he'd been there before and he knew where to come and he was headed to Daytona we were in Florida and he had just lost his second child to overdose the day before they were going into treatment so here these men that we just had a workshop on intimacy which is a funny thing to think men were going to talk about but we sure did and then I remember we started going up one at a time to hug him and it just got too long of a process with 200 men we ended up circling around him and it was 10 deep and just just feeling the love and the warmth of that circle and the tears because we was all crying most of us imagine losing our own children to this disease because this these don't care who the who it gets i remember first camp out i went to i met a recovering priest who used to get high before he preached. And I was like, my disease is going like, yeah, that'd be my kind of priest. Not today. I've been taught in recovery to chase my recovery like I did my disease. Now for me to be a third of the way through this fourth step and being traveling at the same time, to me, it's showing me willingness. I'm not going to spend three years on it like I didn't on my first one because i was unwilling to get to the heart of the problem today i know i have more than the disease of addiction with drugs this fourth step i'm doing it's not about drugs this time now it's about feelings it's About defects it's about things that if I don't change them like I said earlier it can become about the drugs real quick I've got a history that proves it today I don't have to go back out there used to piss me off when i come back into these rooms from a run and some old-timers thanked me they thanked me for showing them what not to do that used to make me so damn mad but it's now when somebody's doing it that's what i share with them pisses them off but that's giving back what was given to me it's like there's a workshop going on over here that i really wanted to be at but i know how to be there i'll buy the tape you know it's work the steps or die used to be a couple words after that you know working steps are dying mofo and it's like um it seems like through the last few years that's changed to work the steps or live of course my mind still goes mofo that's just me today I am working the steps I am living my life for the most part is good there's a couple small things that I need to change like I need learn how to be a better maid my house looks like a tornado went through it I moved over a year ago they're still shitting boxes it's hard to clean or put anything up if you're not there and it's like I found out running for me wasn't working kind of running around like Don Quixote or something looking for whatever he was looking for, I forget what he was looking for but I think I was looking for a mate and today I know I don't have to do that you know maybe if I work on David the mate might appear might. Or maybe I've already used up all the cards in that arena and that's okay too. I'm cleaned today by grace. I'm also cleaned today by my efforts. God will do for me what I can't do for myself but what I can he's just going to sit back and watch he's going like you're still going to do it that way? Well go ahead. That's just the way my God is. I remember coming back to my last rehab, crying and reading why are we here in that NA meeting that I was avoiding. You see, the miracle for me was I wasn't coming back. Y'all was a bunch of phonies. I'd done senior acts and it was like what it was was I was the phony. I was one that wasn't able to get real. And the barmaid that God put in my life, that was my angel. Took me to what was supposed to be a mental unit, because I knew I was crazy. I had Narcotics Anonymous books at home, Narcotic Anonymous shirts that I couldn't wear and a book I wouldn't read. And I got off the elevator that morning and it said, First Step Recovery. I remember smiling a little, smile, like okay God, I surrender. and the first thing I saw in pajamas was Relapse Roy some addict been around long enough to sponsor our whole area and it's like we laughed an embarrassed little laugh it wasn't one of those funny ha ha laughs, it was an embarrassed laugh that night a friend was working the desk and then when those three men showed up for that H&I meeting I had taken two of them to state convention a year before and all three of them said the same thing to me welcome home now this addict's been home ever since i haven't used no matter what that relationship that i was talking about i spent between three and eight years clean in and out of that relationship five different times and i finally understood what y'all some of my friends were talking about like what don't you understand about a second step you know why do you keep trying to make something work that's not supposed to you know the last time she but the first time they split up was a dear John letter the last farm with the dear John later and I just thanked her because the first times he said that wasn't the way she operates and five years later it was the same thing I'm going like thank you for showing me who and what you really are and thank you for setting me free I said if you ever decided work at 10 step just mail it to me i had a healthy fear that if she came back we'd end up kissing and you know where i go from there and it was like uh i don't have to worry about it anymore she found somebody else and got married and the first i was hurt and angry then i got real grateful you might think we're talking about relationships here but we're not you know i'm talking about my disease that's just part of my disease and then you know I came back from Australia with several hundred dollars after being gone a month and a couple of places I stayed I walked in these little pubs the price was right the hotel was above and the bar was bottom they had machines they had the women the evening and they had suds and i'm going like man i got it all right here well this is insane are we testing ourselves no we're being frugal i also had narcotics anonymous regional schedule and i had a meeting everywhere i went and if i didn't i had this book and my four-step guide and i had the book he read to us out of called just for today and um i stayed clean i stayed busy getting blankets that's telling me it's time to shut up because I've said all I need to say and then for the newcomers out here you know please get a sponsor and please use them because you will find out that drugs aren't your problem and if you don't change what's going on drugs will be your problem I proved it David proved it and we don't have to today because we want to live in the Thanks for listening. Hello, Michael and I'm at it. I'd like to thank David A. and David S. for speaking about that spiritual gift of freedom from active addiction as our only promise. And with that, can we close with the wee version of a serenity prayer? Oh yeah, that hit nice. We have a moment of silence for the addict who suffers inside this room and the one who except for outside. All about a free bird and that's the end of the prayer. Thank you. God, grant us this to accept the things we cannot change, encourage us to change the things we can, and listen to our brothers. Let's go back. Thank you. Thank you.