Getting Humility from Step 7 After the Ego Collapsed – Mike F.

Hi, I'm Mike Bowser. I'm an alcoholic. Mike Bowser! Apologize for not wearing a shirt and a tie. J.D. asked me today to speak, and I said I would, but I said that I would definitively not wear a shirt and tie just to spite him for asking me so late. And about ten minutes before I got here, I felt bad. And that's what A.A.'s done to me. Some real simple stuff I've been told to do, just don't curse, wear a skirt and a thigh, and tell the truth, and I've already screwed up one of the three, so let's hope I get the other ones right. It's a privilege to be here. You know, I do have a simple job tonight. It is to share my experience, strength, and hope. I have to preface this that this is just my perception of my experience. It could be 100% wrong. You can ask all sorts of other people who have been in my life how accurate this is and I'm probably not that accurate and tomorrow I might see my experience completely different and that's a wonderful thing because I got to a point in my life where it was dark life sucked it was taking too long everyone was mean to me everyone was out to get me it wasn't fair and I just believed that was how it was going to be and for an alcoholic like me that's exactly where I had to be I did not come into AA on a winning streak. I did not come here by mistake. I came in here repeatedly and got beaten into a state of reasonableness, and that's what the big book says we need. I don't tell anybody else. I'm very careful because I'm around a lot of new people, a lot of people who are coming in and out, and I'm very careful never to say, go get done or maybe you haven't had enough pain because if you're an alcoholic like me, you've had enough pain. If you relapse, if you go back out and decide this isn't for you, you don't need any more pain. We don't get done. We get dead. The only thing that's offered in AA is a spiritual solution where God will take us off that rollercoaster. And if you're tired of living your life the way you've lived it, sober or not sober, there's a wonderful program here that can solve all your problems. And I'll tell you, my problems today do not look the same as when I came in here. but the truth is they really are at the core of the same exact problems. I only have one problem, and it's not believing that God's going to take care of me. And you can dress it up, or I can dress up in all sorts of things about making enough money, my girlfriend's not treating me right, my daughter's a pain in the butt, the job, the family, all these things where I thought were my problem are not my problem because I drank when I had a girlfriend, I drank what I didn't, I drank while I was broke, when I was rich, Job, no job. All those outside things have never been the cause of my alcoholic insanity. So I know my problems aren't my problem. What my problem is, is that I'm spiritually disconnected and I don't know it. We were talking about it before the meeting. My whole life, I wanted my life to be run by a higher power. It just so happened for the first 33 years it was drugs and alcohol. But I never wanted to run my own life. You know, I never felt capable. I always felt less than. And I wanted something, something to guide me along. You know, and alcohol is the only thing I really ever tried to do well was to drink, you know? And I failed utterly. You know? And that's depressing when you put so much into something your whole life and you can't do it right. You know. I watched these awesome like beer and vodka commercials and like, I want to drink like that, you now? And I have never, ever drank like that. You know, I have never drank socially. There was times when I didn't drink every day. But I was always thinking about drinking. And when I wasn't drinking, I was extremely uncomfortable. You know? It didn't matter what it was. Like I said, outside circumstances had nothing to do with it. I only felt okay with me when I had something in me. And, you know, the big book also talks about incomprehensible demoralization. And it's so sad that as human beings we have to get beaten into a state of reasonableness, be incomprehensibly demoralized before we'll look at our lives and say, yeah, maybe it's not working out. But it's great because we do have a program for us. And once again, I don't know about bottoms. I don'T know what will incomprehensively demoralize you. I know what it took for me. And it was pretty severe. And it wasn't the outside stuff. And like I said, the big book talks about getting beaten into a state of reasonableness. I kept thinking of men getting beaten to a state of sobriety. I kept thinking that if I get beat up enough, robbed enough arrested enough, broken up with enough, suicidal enough that that in and of itself would get me sober. And it wouldn't, you know? Sure, every time they put the handcuffs on me I did have a moment of clarity where I was like you know what? This isn't working. And it would either be followed with I really need to change or I can't wait to do it again, you know? And I don't think that's what makes me an alcoholic or doesn't. But what I do know is that I do not drink like a normal person. And I won't say that I'm an alcoholic. I don' t blame my alcoholism on genetics, but it just so happens that all four of my grandparents were alcoholics and so was my dad and so were my mom's two sisters and they all died way before their time. My mom, she can drink or not drink. So, you know, just a little bit about my growing up. And like everybody else, if you asked me, when I first got to AA, I had a horrible childhood, you now. I had two parents. And like I said, you known, my dad was an alcoholic. He was a very successful businessman. He actually did opiates and out of respect for AA, like I said, I'm not going to curse. I'm going to carry a message of hope. I really don't talk too much about drugs or alcohol because when it comes down to it, neither of them are my problem. But it says share in a general way what we used to be like, what happened to us and what we're like today. And general does not mean vague to me. So I like heroin. And you know if your spiritual disconnection comes in a different form, that's fine. And I do respect Alcoholics Anonymous and I do reflect the traditions. some people say, I always thought the alcoholic was the guy with the trench coat, the big red nose, and a brown paper bag. And my vision wasn't. It was my dad who was a wonderful guy who never hit me, never yelled at me, always came home and just happened to have a spiritual disconnection like me. And eventually I was born and raised in New York City and my parents got divorced as a result of my dad's alcoholism. And, you know, by fourth grade I already started feeling different. I already starting feeling separated from the people around me. And I went to a private school and we were all pretty much the same in a lot of ways, you know? Ethnic, socioeconomic. I was already comparing myself out. I'm not like these people. In fourth grade, that's painful. And, my mom got remarried. I moved from New York City, Manhattan, to Southern Maryland. And man, I felt different around the people I grew up with. When I moved to Southern Marilyn, boy did I feel different. You know, it's like a fish out of water. And I never felt, I think that time, that was in 7th grade. I think from that time until I drank three years later was the most uncomfortable time of my life. You know? I'm growing up. I don't look like anybody. I don' t talk like anybody . I don''t like the same things. I don't fit in and you know I have a couple of experiences of my alcoholism and my first drink was not one of them you know my first drink was after freshman year you know I had some friends and we decided to get a case of Milwaukee's Best and go to the senior party and you know how it is in high school you know three years difference a senior like you might as well be hanging out with like the king and queen it was a big deal you know and we're gonna go to this party and me and my buddy would get a case of Milwaukee's Beast. And, you know, I know I didn't drink 12 beers. I'm sure we shared them. And that was when we shared, you now, our stuff. And that would soon change. But, you kno, I probably had like six or seven. And I don't know, I can't remember the magic from the actual drinking, but I do know I felt a part of something. And if you had told me in that night, in that, you know, backyard party, when I'm 15, Mike, if you take that drink, within seven years you'll be homeless. Warren's out for your arrest. Everybody that loves you turned their back on you. Suicidal, hopeless. I either would have said you're crazy or I don't care because being me at that time was so painful. So painful. I'll take my chances. You hear those AA slogans one day at a time. Man, this alcoholic drinks one day to time. I could care less about tomorrow, you know. You say you got a drug test with probation tomorrow, that's tomorrow. My mom says you steal one more check, you got to leave, that is tomorrow, you know, I need to drink today. So I did, you now, I drank and there was no immediate consequences. I had it pretty easy for the first couple of years because, you know my curfew was 12, my parents went to bed at 11, so I come home at 4, nobody knew, you kno, it was just real innocent. And I think in high school and into college, I was able to kind of mask my alcoholism because everybody drinks and nobody has a tolerance. Everybody makes a fool of themselves, or so I thought. You know, there's people that didn't. There's people who actually studied and went to school and didn't drink and I just didn't know them. Either I avoided them or they avoided me, which was probably the case. And even when I'm drinking, life's not good. I'm not comfortable. And like I said, my parents got divorced and my dad had kind of sobered up And he was living in Connecticut. And I know, you know, typical alcoholic fashion, I know my dad had so much guilt about our family breaking up and everything that happened. And I just decided one night in the middle of my junior year, I was like, if I live with him, he'll give me a car. He'll give мне money. He'll let me do whatever I want. So I moved in with my dad, and I was right, you now. I just ran the show there. And I took advantage of that man up until the day he died. And so I moved up to Connecticut from Maryland, and I played lacrosse. And lacrosSE is pretty big in Maryland, and it wasn't so big in Connecticut. In Maryland, I would say I was mediocre. But as soon as I moved to Connecticut, first of all, I'm telling the coach that I'm an all-star. And he knows I'm from Maryland, so he's believing it. And I'm running with this, and the season starts, and I'm pretty good. I'm not great. And He's like, if you kind of just keep your nose clean, maybe you can get a partial scholarship, blah, blah, whatever. I was like, that's cool. And back in the early 90s, they didn't drug test kids. What they did was they gave them this thing that was called a blue book and it was your pledge not to drink or use drugs during the sports season which is kind of redundant because we're under 21 so we legally can't drink and drugs are illegal but they just want to have this one more thing with your signature on it saying you won't do this stuff. And I signed it and in my mind, Monday through Friday afternoon, I belong to the school and practice and I wouldn't drink and I wouldn't use drugs and I wouldn't smoke and I'd be a good student and I would be a good lacrosse player but the weekends belonged to me you know and I felt justified in doing whatever I wanted on the weekends and the junior prom comes up in the spring I've only been into school for three months and the night before the junior prime the coach pulls a couple of us aside and he says you know they're going to be looking for you guys at the prom. They knew who was kind of, not a troublemaker, but just maybe a little bit more out of control than the other kids. They're going to be watching for you. So just go easy. This is the coach saying, not saying don't drink, he's just saying don'T drink too much. And for the non-alcoholic, that is valuable information and they can say thank you very much, I will not drink too much. The problem with the true alcoholic that's laid out in this big book is that I've lost the power of choice, and I didn't even know it. And we find someone to buy us alcohol, and alcohol in high school is all about timing. You might have like an hour party before parents come home, so you have to consume as much as you can. So we had found this stuff. It was called Cisco, and I think it's been outlawed in like 48 states because basically it's like a sweet tasting. It tastes like a wine cooler, but it's 80 or 40 proof. It's powerful. And it came in these little bottles with a long neck, looked like genie bottles, you know. It got you tore up. And we each got two of them. And about ten of us, ten couples went out before the prom and we're in a parking lot, you now, real classy, drinking this stuff. And everybody drinks one. You know, A, they don't want to get too drunk. They don't wanna get caught. They wanna enjoy the dance. They wanna save one for later. These are four things that do not compute with me, you kno. I drink one, it feels good. That other one's going to make me feel better. And yet on top of that, I'm alcoholic and I've lost the power of choice. So I drink the other one. And as a result, I walk in there, I're destroyed. I'm the only one who gets caught. I'mthe only onewho gets kicked out. I'mthee onlyone who gets suspended. I'mthey onlyonewho getskicked off the lacrosse team. And here's the powerof this alcoholic brain. My dad had to come pick me up and he wasn't too pleased, But somewhere between getting picked up and getting back to my house, I decided, you know what? I don't even like lacrosse anyway. It was just too much. I'm not going to get a scholarship. It was a waste of time. And that's how my brain or maybe our brain protects us from the realities of life that we bring upon ourselves. How many times have I said I didn't even love her anyway or I didn' t like that job or I need school? I just kept giving up this stuff and it was just taken away from me. and I was just telling myself I didn't want it anyway. And that happened within a five minute car ride. And I got home and my dad said goodnight and I went in my room, climbed out the window and went to that after party. And I showed up there and people looked at me like, what the hell are you doing? Didn't you just get enough from this evening? What else are you looking for? And that didn't even make sense to me. What else am I going to do? Sit home and be drunk by myself? Which later on would be mostly what I did But, you know, at 17 I still wanted to be out and about. But that would, you know, that evening characterized my drinking. Once I begin stopping has very little to do with me. I either have to run out, and I mean really run out. And you have to ran out too. Or I have to be arrested or locked up or just locked away somewhere. But I rarely just quit on my own. I rarely put down something and say I've had enough, you know. Just don't, I don't have that experience. And it wasn't until I came here that I found a lot of other people who don't either. But, you now, I went on to college and college for me was just an excuse to get drunk before noon, you kno. It was close to home. I still have my old connections so I was kind of like the go-between for a lot o' people on campus. And that was fun because it, you kow, inflated my sense of self-worth. but this is when drinking became an everyday thing and once again looking back I realized I was the lower companionship but I kept finding people who were willing to do what I did all the time I had friends, I traveled a lot to different schools I had a friend who wanted me to come up on Thursday nights and I stayed till Sunday he did every single drink and drug I did from Thursday to Sunday and Sunday he would wake up and say I've got to go to the library and study What the hell are you talking about? You know, we've got so much more to do. And, you know, he had a purpose other than that. And so I'd have to get up and go and find somebody who wanted to party Sunday, Monday, Tuesday. You know? I always found somebody who was doing what I was doing. And believe it or not, at this early age, at 19, maybe people don't understand, alcohol in and of itself, ethyl alcohol, stopped working. It was tearing up my body, you Know? And it's funny when you try to tell someone who's not an AA, it's like, yeah, I stopped drinking. I started doing heroin because alcohol was the problem. But I needed something because my head was still racing. At 19, 20, I'm drinking as much as I possibly can and my head's still racing and I'm not comfortable with me. And I feel like that 14-year-old kid again scared to death of everybody. And I found something that would shut off my brain the way I wanted it to. I mean, I thought it was the best kept secret in the world when I found it. You know, I was like, where has this been all my life? You know this is what I wanted. I feel so comfortable anywhere doing anything with anybody and this is how I want to feel for the rest of my life and I'm willing to pay any price for it and it's really sad when you're willing to make that kind of proclamation you know about something that's killing you but that's how I felt. You know at 19 almost 20 I had found it. And, you know, at that time, I had the means to do that sort of stuff. But shortly after that, my dad died. And it wasn't one of those, you know, hallmark moment, you know, hospital bed, everybody gets to say goodbye. Dad says, you know, I came home and found him dead. And that was difficult for me and it gave me an excuse to continue to drink the way I wanted to because people, you And I had been using excuses for a long time. Oh, the parents got divorced. That's why Mike's doing that. We moved. Moved again. Different schools. Now it's his dad. And ultimately, obviously, I would have done these things anyway. But I love those excuses. And my dad, I was left a lot of money that any 21-year-old kid with a raging habit should not have. And it's just amazing that I didn't kill myself. But this is when the arrests start. You know, I start getting arresty. And I had a friend who got arrested for DWI in high school. And you know what he never did again? He never drank and drove again. You know, he does not belong in here. There's not one time I was arrested where I ever said it. Maybe I said it, I never thought, I've got to stop this. No, I have to do it differently. I've Got to hide it somewhere else. I've GOT TO drive this way. You know, I've got to wear a shirt and tie when I go into the ghetto to buy what I'm going to get. You know? Whatever it is, whatever insane plan I had, stopping was never on the list. Because when you take this away from me, I hate being me. There is nothing more painful than being me sober. And I kind of want to speed up, but this is when, like I said, the arrest starts. And the rehabs start coming to picture. And the rehabs early on were just a place for me to kind of clean up for a week or two. Because I wanted the pain to stop. And don't let anybody ever tell you that coming here because you want the pain to stop is a bad reason. That's why we all come here, you know. We want the paint to stop, so there's action to be taken. But ultimately, I'm not showing up in rehab, detox, or AA if I don't want the pain to start on some level. But, you now, whatever you want to call it, I wasn't ready. and I was introduced to AA. And I can honestly say now, I wouldn't say it then, but I can say now I didn't give it a shot because what I would do is I'd look at the steps. First of all, I'd looked at the people and if you're a good alcoholic like me within three minutes of me speaking I would have been like, this guy's bullshit. He's not like me. I don't care if you cloned me put me up here and told my story they'd be like, no he's not. This guy's got a different problem. So that's my first thing. When I was a real good alcoholic, I would judge him when he was sitting before he even got up. You know, you're like, what a loser. So the guy speaking is not like me, so his problems aren't like me. So his solution's not like mine. And I look at these steps on the wall. I see this word God a lot. And I think back then I would have told you, I don't think God's the solution. God can't be the solution, but in retrospect, and like I said, as my perception and my experience changes, I think what I really felt was I really hope it's not God because I've been such a horrible crummy, deceitful piece of crap my entire life if God's the only way out of this he wants nothing to do with me and that's why I wouldn't stick around because if I had to face this creator because I had a very basic religious upbringing nothing too severe nothing too involved no bad experiences but like most of the stuff in my life I pick and choose what I want to hear and formulate this idea of God and it was not pleasant. And I get here and it says all these things that I have to do and none of them sound like the solution to why I wantto do what I wanna do. I wanna get drunk so bad right now and you're telling me an inventory and amends and prayer and meditation is gonna fix that? I don't know what you guys have but it's not what I have. And that kept me out there for a while. And one other experience I just want to talk about is what happens to you when I'm sober. Because when I was about 23, I got carjacked and I had nowhere to live. And I call my mom, and of course mom takes me back one more time. And I'm 23, 24, and I'm scared to death. I know I cannot go back to that life because it's not going to work. But I don't know how to do anything else. so what I do is I sit on her couch and I watch TV and I stay up all night on the internet and I sleep till noon and this is what I did for four months I can't leave the house I'm a complete shut in I haven't talked to another person besides my mom for almost four months because I'm scared to death of the world and my head's going crazy and I'm so socially retarded that I can even flirt online I can'T even get people to talk to me in chat rooms that's how weird I am and my heads always racing and the noise is loud and it's just pathetic. And what happens is after four months my mom finally goes on a vacation biggest mistake she ever made and I have a car and money and the opportunity and I go and I do what I do and I overdosed and I woke up I woke up to the smoke alarm going off and what I'd done is I put a cigarette out on my leg and my shorts caught on fire and this is how I know there's a God anybody who knows me, the burn goes up one leg, stops, and then goes up the other leg. I have a daughter now, so obviously, you know, full functioning, and that's how I know there's a God, but, you know. I had to, I had third degree burns, and I had two skin graft surgeries, and I was in John Hopkins Bayview Burn Center for five weeks. The most painful experience of my life. I drank the day I got out, you know, and I don't know how many people would be surprised by that. I couldn't wait to drink. See, I don' t associate, I do' n't connect those two dots, you know? And there's you cannot scare an alcoholic. You know, we can be scared into getting sober, getting sober but not staying sober. I've had a gun put to my head, and they said, if you ever come back here, we'll kill you. And I went back, and it's not because I'm tough, you know. I was just hoping maybe they were kidding, but, you Know, I really, really wanted what they had, you Now. And I think back to some of the experience that I've Had, and it made, You know, from two, three years ago, four years ago to ten years ago. It makes my stomach turn, thinking about the situation I used to put myself in. But anyway, so I get out of the hospital. And like I said, I drank. It's just not working out. And I've been in and out of AA a little bit. And I'm in Maryland. And it's just nicht working there. And I had some friends who were in AA. But they were going to meetings in Baltimore. I live in Annapolis. It's about 40 minutes south of Baltimore. But they Were going to Meetings in Baltimore And I Had nowhere to go. My mom Just couldn't do it. She didn't want to come home and find her son dead. she loves me to death and to this day she still thinks she's responsible for my alcoholism which is so sad you know but she couldn't do it anymore so I start staying in this guy's couch, he's going to meetings in Baltimore he's like alright get in the car here I am completely unemployable I have no skills whatsoever I'm homeless I'm socially retarded I'm 30 pounds underweight I'm yellow and he says get in the car and he doesn't have a car but his sponsee picks this up he's like get inthe car we're going to a meeting I was like where like I need to know for my social calendar where we're goin he's liket doesn't matter I was liket well who's speaking he said you don't know him I was liek when will you be back he's liek it doesn't mater and I used to want to kill this guy I mean, there's, J.D. might remember him, you know, but there's just, he would just say those things, you know, like that would just drive me crazy. Like, I'd like trip over his foot and I'd be like, sorry. He's like, don't be sorry. You've been sorry your whole life. I'm like, are you a mother? What? You know, or I'd Be like, I'm going to get, you know, a pack of cigarettes. And another guy would be like to jazz your sponsor. I'd To be like what? I can get, I can do these things on my own, you You know, just everything was just so principled. It drove me crazy, you know. And we lived in Annapolis. We didn't have a car and went to a meeting in Baltimore the first night. And the next night we went to an meeting in New York, which is an hour and 20 minutes away. And the last night we were in New Jersey. The next night went to meeting in D.C. And the second night we had been living in Annapurna for about five years. And I knew there was plenty of meetings there. You know? I was fully aware of the meetings that were within five, ten minutes. And we didn't go to any of them. And what we'd do is we'd go meet at this Denny's up in Glen Burnie. And that's where our sponsorship family, so we just, all the cars, the caravan would meet and we'd decide where to go. And it was a wonderful experience. And that brought me up to York, Pennsylvania. And, you know, I'm a Northeast boy. I've been all over the country. I've never been to York. I've always been to Pennsylvania. I'm sure I passed it going out west or something. But, you Know, that's Where I Ended Up. and man, God is alive and well in York, Pennsylvania and in Lancaster too and a lot of other places but that was the first place that I ever showed up and saw people who described their problem and they sounded a lot like me told me their solution and how they were living now and it seemed attractive. I've been to that kind of thinking man's headquarters tent AA where it's all cerebral and you've got to figure it out and that's just painful and I don't last. What I got involved with was what we call the firing lines, where it's like you get a sponsor, you go through the steps rather quickly and you start helping other people. It doesn't mean sponsoring people. It means if you have a car, take them somewhere. If you have phone, answer their calls. Call them at a meeting. Talk to somebody. Get commitments. Go to detoxes. Get yourself out there because the only way this works is if you're actively trying to give it to somebody else. It doesn'T mean successfully give it to somebody else because that's up to other people I probably had 10 sponsors in my life And I'm pretty sure nine of them are sober, regardless of my willingness. We're not in the results business. And sometimes you get a little bit comfortable when you work because there's so many new people and so many people have been through the steps. It was always pointed out to me, the history of AA is very important. I go to graduating. I'm a historian, technically. I love the history. I love stuff. And the history is the two guys, our co-founders who had the message, went and sought out people who didn't. And that's what we're supposed to do. We don't wait for them to come to us. And that'S what I was introduced to. Man, it looked exciting and it looked fun. And these people were staying sober. They weren't full of crap. Because we can smell crap pretty well as alcoholics. We know who's full of it. And I'm not saying anybody's perfect that I ran into. All I'm saying is that the ones who are doing it, you could see it. not by what they were saying, but what they were doing. And that was really attractive. And I didn't stay sober from the moment I got to York, but it's funny because about four years ago, I ended up going back out because my dependence wasn't on God and I was just kind of doing, like I said, the legwork, but not this prayer and meditation they were talking about. And I wasn't truly dependent on God. And i had to leave York to get sober. Well, I didn' have to, but I chose to. And went back to the same halfway house I'd been in eight years earlier in Annapolis, Maryland But I had something. I had this message. And even though I was brand new sober, again, I kept the same sponsor up here in New York. And I started doing it because I wanted to be sober. And I decided to do it. I started going and I started doing these things. And it's funny, we got a... When I come into AA, people's expectations of me are really low. You know? And that's a good thing. We get to start off low. For the first year of my sobriety, my mom was just happy that when I left nothing was missing. You know, and after like two years, you know, just the fact that I call her twice a week or she calls me and we have conversations and I'm telling the truth and I am not telling her about some old charge that I need help with or some old bill. You know but I have had the ability to repair that relationship to a wonderful friendship now. But I went into this halfway house and I had this message and I was in this way of life even though I was newly sober and I had a car. And I'm living in a happy house in Annapolis. I'm going to meetings in Baltimore. And I go to meetings in D.C. And, you know, there's 15 other guys there and I think maybe one or two had a sponsor. And, you know they had to go to a meeting. So they're like, hey Mike, are you going to a meet and you're going to whatever down the street? I'm like, no I'm not. I'm just going to Harbor City. They're like where's that? Baltimore. But Mike, there's a meeting right down the stream. And I was like yeah that's where I'm gone. They're Like okay cool. And he never asked me again. you know, and hey where are you going tonight? Hope is here. Where's that? Northern Virginia. Northern what? You know like and for the first month nobody was getting in my car but I was going. I called Ben and I'd be like dude nobody's getting in my car. He's like huh? You're sober. You're happy. You keep going. And I'll tell you it was a slow transition. This is what I meant about expectations. You know I was living by these principles so well that the house manager didn't even check my chore because he knew I did it well because if I said I did it well, that's not something I put on a resume. Like I did my chore well at the halfway house. But at the time, when that's all you have, you do the best you can. I don't care what your job is. If you're a janitor or a president, whatever's in front of you, you do the best you kan with it. You make that the most important thing in your life and you get good results. At least I did. And I'll tell you, like I said, that first month nobody was getting in my car. Then guys started drinking and disappearing and leaving And one guy said, Mike, where are you going? And I said, well, I'm going to Harbor City. He said, can I come? Sure. And by the second month, I stayed there for four months, a little under four months. By the second week, I was there for about a year and a half. By the end of the second one, my car was full every night. And the newer guy would always ask where we were going. And I'd say, it doesn't matter. He'd say well, who's speaking? I was like, you don't know him. When will you be back? I was that we'll be back by curfew. And you know, it really didn't matter and people would just get in my car. And I don't know, I know of one guy that stayed sober from then. But, you know, I stayed sober and I had an opportunity with school and work to come back up to York and I did. And you know with four months sober, I was living so spiritually that I thought it was time to get a girlfriend. It involves somebody else in my spiritual life. And I got a girlfriend two weeks later she was pregnant And two weeks later, she wasn't my girlfriend anymore. And I'll tell you, when you're living foul, you're doing cruddy stuff. It's hard to – you know it. You know what you're dealing with is wrong. But when you think you'redoing well and stuff doesn't go your way, you're like, God, where did you go? And that was, I don't want to say the toughest time in my sobriety, But that was definitely where I had to practice the most principles. And people said, well, just give it time. Things will change. And that's been my problem my whole life. I cannot see past my eyes. I always view things in this moment, right here. It's going to be this way and I know it. And that is one of the greater gifts of AA. Not only do I have a sponsor who can see my life a little bit better than me, I've been accumulating these sober experiences where this thing is so broken I've Been Wrong so many times in my life and when I'm wrong now you know, when something happens now I'll be like, you know what, I'm probably wrong it'll probably be okay and then I'm right, you Know but when I get focused in on nope, I gotta fix this, I Gotta Change It this isn't gonna happen, they're wrong I'm Right, man being right is really overrated It really is, man. Wow. It used to be the most important thing to me when I was drinking, being right. Because my pride, my ego. I remember being in a rehab in Baltimore and I'm using the whole time there. I hate crack, but I'm smoking crack in the bathroom at a rehab. And they know. And they call me into the office and they say, Mike, we know you've been getting high. No, I haven't. Mike, we're going to drug test you right now. You know, right now, if you get honest with us, you can stay and we'll work with you. We'll help you. But if you come up positive, you've got to leave. I said, I'm not using it. That's insane. It was more important for me to be right as they're kicking me out. Not even right, but just keeping to my bullshit that's just so ingrained in me than just asking and saying, you know what? I'm wrong. I lied. And that's, you know, one of the best parts about being sober is I rather, I have an opportunity usually to be happy or be right. Which is it going to be? And being happy is so much more important, you know. It really is. Being right is just so overrated. So, you know, my daughter's born and she's amazing. And I'll tell you, the day she was born, they're holding her up in the nursery. And my first thought is, she is so beautiful. I would never do anything to ruin this. And you know, once again, for the non-alcoholic, that's a beautiful statement. You know, the non‑alcoholics can say, I have a beautiful daughter and I would not do anything. And I would never do nothing to jeopardize that. But the thought that came to me right after is That's my alcoholism speaking. Because as beautiful as she is, as wonderful as she ist, as great as everything is, if I'm not spiritually centered, if I're not seeking a relationship with God, if I'M NOT HELPING OTHERS, MAKING AMENDS, DOING ALL THIS STUFF, MY BEAUTIFUL DAUGHTER WILL BECOME A BURDEN. MY BEAUTIFUL GIRLFRIEND WILL BECOME A WHATEVER. THE JOB SUCKS. SCHOOL SUCKs. THE FAMILY SUCKSS. EVERYTHING. AND I'LL HAVE TO DRINK. AND WHEN I DRINK, IT'LL BE LIKE THROWING OFF A HEAVY COAT. FINALLY, I'LL BE OH SHOOT. and that's the painful time when you realize that there's nothing and that is a human power beautiful brand new baby girl is a human power that is not going to keep me sober and that ok because she doesn't have to and she doesn' t directly care that I am in AA she would probably rather me be home tonight but indirectly trust me she needs me here you know she needs my here I have a couple friends who there are a couple children of friends whose parents aren't here anymore, you know, they passed away as a direct result. And that's me. That's me, left to my own devices. And I'm not going to harp too much on the kid thing because before I had a kid, people talked about their kids from the podium and were like, dude, shut up. You know? Don't you break out the pictures. You know, it's like... But, my daughter is the epitome of self-centeredness. You know. She's two and a half and it's all about her. When she doesn't get her way she cries. And she's so cute when she does it. She cries It's okay for a two-and-a-half-year-old to do it. 33, I do the same thing when I don't get my way. That's not cool. So you'll hear stuff like she's just one of God's kids, and I have to remember that. I have TO remember she's one of G-d's kids whether she knows it or not because I've always been one of g-d'S kids whether I knew it or no. so you know the people who told me that you and your daughter's mother will get back together and I would have swore on a stack of Bibles they were wrong, they were right and we were able to work it out and it's been not easy but a beautiful experience um you know I went back to school before I got sober and I'm graduating in a month you know it's amazing I'm getting a 15-year bachelor's degree. I'm going on to graduate school. And like I said, you know, I can tell you my problems today are trying to find daycare or enough money or going to graduate School or finding a job. And if you're brand new in here, you're probably like, dude, your problems are not my problems. You know, my problems are I want to get high. I want it. I don't want to go home and get drunk. I'm growing a jail. I got nowhere to live. and I want to tell you that I've had those problems and those aren't my problems today, and those problems I just told you are not even my problems either you know, my problem is that I think I'm in control of my life that God doesn't care about me that I gotta fix this that's my only problem, because once I act on that I'm screwed you know I'm not gonna tell you if you hear people say yeah, I went to court, I was facing everybody in AA is always facing like triple digit you know it's facing 500 years and the judge said probation I love us man we're awesome we're all the biggest drug dealers back in our hometown and we're off basic thousands of years but you know it's chasing 30 years and they said probation that's God well that is God but if you had done 3 years too that would have been God too because I don't want anybody to ever think that if things don't go your way that God's abandoned you because it's not true God's never abandoned me I've always turned my back on God we were talking about it before the meeting I figured if I drank and did cruddy stuff for 15 years it's going to take that long for God to enter into my heart and when you start going through the steps a couple times we're asked to pray and pray to our vision of God And I'll tell you, the God of my understanding in the third step was not pleasant. Because what I was doing, before I did an inventory, before I started making amends, before i got really into this program, I looked at God as a reflection of me without even knowing it. God was jealous, resentful, angry, petty, mean, because that's all I knew. That's all i knew. But i got to the point where i was willing to say maybe i'm wrong, Maybe there's a loving God. Maybe he is forgiving. And then after I did an inventory and I'm asked to invite God into this, you know, this kind of confession with another person, he's starting to change a little bit more. And now he might even be loving. And in the seventh step, I've had a powerful seven-step experience. And there's some powerful spiritual experiences that just can't do him justice from the podium, you know. That's why I don't really go through the steps, because the steps are such a wonderful experience that you just have to have for yourself. But after I had this seven-step experience, where essentially it was a person whom I hated because he took something from me, who I had plans to kill. And I don' t mean like, I'm going to kill him. I mean, I'm gonna kill him and I woke up one morning and there was love in my heart for him. That's not me. I'm an angry, resentful, cynical, smartass You know, that's what I bring to the table. And to go from that to someone who would seek out this man and tell him, I don't dislike you, we're brothers of the Spirit, it's all good, is amazing. And that's kind of where I had my spiritual experience. And that'S when God didn't just exist out there, but He was inside of me and I was inside Of Him and all that flowery stuff that until you feel it, it just sounds kind of corny. I'll tell you what, I love being corny I do. I've been so cool for so long, you know, it got me to New York, Pennsylvania. And that's when this God became personal. And I talked to him like a friend, you know, and I was sharing this when I spoke a couple weeks ago. I was going through not difficult times, just busy. And I got off from praying. Stopped praying for a day or two. And a day or two turned into like two weeks. And after two weeks, I'm sleeping on the couch again. Because when I'm not right, I like to stay up and watch TV and watch SportsCenter until 5 in the morning, you know, and just my head's kind of getting loud again and I'm uncomfortable in my own skin. So I'm speaking on the coach, and nothing's going wrong, but that's the thing about alcoholism. Everything's okay until it's not, you now. The girlfriend's okay until she puts a dish in the wrong slot in the dishwasher, and I want to burn the house down, you know. And I remember like hair staying, I'm serious, that's not like an analogy. She put a dish in the wrong place and I was pissed. And I'm like, what's wrong with me? You haven't prayed, you haven't done a legitimate prayer in two weeks. Not while you're going to the bathroom, that kind of ten second prayer. You haven'T done a legit prayer. A legitimate prayer. Prayer meditation. And it's just so crazy, the one thing that gives us life, the one things that gives a chance, It's the one thing that removes the obsession to do all those things we do. We'll tell ourselves, that's not it. After years, after years of sobriety, and we get egos in AA. And when I have years sober, I don't want to call my sponsor and say, hey, I was thinking about drinking. I don'T want to say I'm really resentful because what I want to do is I'll convince myself, ah, I know what he's going to say. I know he's going to say, I know she's going to tell me to do. No sense even calling. And that means I'm running the show again. And like I said, I don't run the show for very long. God or heroin runs my show. That's it. And I'm grateful that I had some time sober because by having some time sober I get a little bit more of a grace period. You know, when I have a month sober and I stop praying, done. You have a little bit of time and I was able to get back on track and I started and I said I was about to start praying again and I say God I'm an idiot. You know? here I am again. And guess what? God is not like me. God is never like me He's not petty jealous resentful He took me right back. You know and I get these wonderful opportunities and what it does for me is I get a chance at life you know I get the chance at a life beyond our wildest dreams and if that sounds corny like I said cool you know I'll take it. I had very small aspirations throughout my life. Because I was full of fear, and I was like, I can't do it. And I was the kind of guy who if I didn't think I could do it, I wouldn't even try. And man, it's fun to try. I've tried some stuff recently and failed, and it's okay, you know? It's okay. And I get a chance to have something bigger in my life than just me. And that's the gift. And I'm like, when I get to lay down on my head and I do some very specific meditations and it basically involves a process where I'm getting ready to talk to God and I get excited. And it's funny because now that I have a child, she goes to daycare and the teacher tells me what she did today but I can't wait to hear it from my daughter. I cannot wait to see her I cannot waiting to hear that she made a macaroni turkey or whatever it is. I don't care that the teacher told me. I can wait to here it from her. What I'm trying to say is that I already know what she's going to tell me But I want to hear it from her. And that's how God is. God already knows what we did today, you know? God already know what's going to happen tomorrow. He wants to hear from us. He created us so that we can have a relationship with him. You know? This is all about relationships. You know, from the morning I wake up till I go to sleep at night, my life is relationships. Some are brief on the highway. You know some are more significant. Family, professors, employees, you know, fellow employees. but life is all about relationships and if I start my day off getting good with the one with God the rest of them just go by so much better you know and that's how I try to end my day and if i do that you know i probably haven't mentioned you know really drinking the problem is removed skip ahead to the 10th step if your sponsor says it's okay it talks about recovery over alcohol it's done with nothing on our part But I did not wake up one day and say, oh my God, today I'm not going to think about alcohol. No, it's like, wow, I haven't thought about drinking for two weeks, six months, whatever it is. It's removed. We are not asking anybody to just not drink. We're asking people to just take some simple suggestions, go through these steps, and the problem will be solved for you. That sounds like something you might be interested in. You're in the right place. This is a wonderful opportunity for all of us to get back, not even our old lives. I've never had an old life. A brand new life. More than I deserve. I want to thank J.D. for asking me to speak. That's all I got. Thank you.