He Told the Saudi Arabian Army He Was Jewish to Get Kicked Out – John D.

Hi, everybody. My name is John D., and I am an alcoholic. It is an honor to be here tonight, and thank you very much for this honor. And thank you to the committee and all the people who put this together. It's amazing. Thank you, Rob, for that introduction. That was really nice. And I hope you feel the same way after I'm done, you know, because the thing is that sometimes I say stuff that makes people a little bit upset because I sometimes say what I feel and what I think and that was what I was taught early in the rooms of Alcoholics Anonymous I was told to talk about what was going on inside of me and what was happening and really share that stuff and make sure that it was getting out there that I wasn't holding on to my secrets and my stuff My sobriety date is November 1st, 2001. Now, for those of you who are binary in your thinking, that's 11-01-01, which probably means something like, John, if you ever drink again, you're an idiot, because I'm going to tell you a little bit about what it was like, what happened, and what it's like now. And what it'S like now is beyond my wildest dreams. I owe absolutely everything that I could ever imagine to Alcoholics Anonymous. I owe the career that I have today. I'm up here at another conference that I've been attending up in Breckenridge for my career, which you didn't tell me I was going to get one of those when I got to Alcoholics Anonymous. I thought maybe a car, a driver's license, maybe a little toothless girlfriend. Maybe, you know, I get that. But, you Know, I was kind of hoping for something along those lines. But that, you Now, the career? Don't threaten me with a 401k. What the heck are you doing? I mean, oh my God. so I'm up at this conference up here and it's been fabulous being able to come to this conference and be invited here has been amazing because one of the things you also did for me in Alcoholics Anonymous is you taught me to say yes you told me not maybe, not I'm going to try you said you're going to say Yes you know we're going on this 12 step call nod your head John, Yes, Ok you're gonna go to this treatment center, Yes Okay, you're going to go over here and do this. Yes, you are going to do that. You are going take this service position. Uh-huh, uh-huh. And inside my head I am going, no, not that. And when they asked me to speak, that's what happened. I said yes. And then I went, no. Not that. Because, you know, I am actually terrified of public speaking. And it always makes me a little nervous. So I stand up here and I always ask God to kind of help me. And he is always there. Always has been, through my entire sobriety. I do reference the big book of Alcoholics Anonymous because I am an unabashed, absolutely unapologetic big book thumper. Absolutely. For those of you who are out there, thank you for carrying the message because this is where I found it. It's in these pages, and I believe in a sponsor, and I have a sponsor today. I've never gone without a sponsor in AlcoholicsAnonymous. I've always had one, one I can sit across the table from and talk to, and we sit there because the book tells me clearly that that's where recovery begins is when I'm sitting there with another alcoholic. That's what tells me where I need to go and what I need to do and that's important to me and I believe in a home group and my home group is in Loveland, Colorado and it's the Loveland AA group and if you ever get up there please come and visit us. It's a wonderful group and I love my home groups and I think and I know there are a lot of you here from around the world from I was sitting there having dinner with a guy from Ireland, you know, and I met a lady from Australia earlier and all these wonderful places. And I've traveled a lot. AndI remember going to a meeting in the Bahamas about a year ago and I was getting off the ship and I told the taxi driver, you know, the address. And he looked at me, said, no, man, you don't want to go there because I guess it was in a bad neighborhood. And sure enough, we showed up and it was on Dead Dog Alley. That was the name of the street. And it was a burned out church. But there were some dudes standing out front and they were smoking cigarettes and they would, you know drinking coffee and they had some tattoos and um and there was a little circle and triangle in the window and i was home i was at home i knew these were my people and that's what i needed to be like i say my sobriety dates november 1st 2001 but i spent 10 years in the rooms of alcoholics anonymous and i damn near died in these rooms i damn nearly died because i began thinking that you know i listened to a lot of stuff that i heard and i had these filters that would filter out things like get a sponsor, work the steps. I filtered that out. I heard, you know, I heard meeting makers make it. So I went to a lot of meetings and I didn't make it do my 90 meetings in 90 days. I did that and I drank the entire time. They didn't tell me to not drink between those meetings. But I mean, that was just one thing that, you know,I heard a lot stuff. It wasn't until I got my first sponsor who told me, you You know, he said what we're shooting for here is permanent, uninterrupted, long-term sobriety one day at a time. Permanent recovery. I am an unapologetic, recovered alcoholic. I do not know why that is controversial in Alcoholics Anonymous. The big book of AlcoholicsAnonymous on the title page tells me that we're talking about recovered alcoholism. That's what we'RE talking about. You know? Recovered from a hopeless state of mind and body. And that has happened through the miracle of this program. And thank God for this. and throughout the world I've seen it work over and over and over again. You know what? It's not about the people who slip through the cracks it's about me trying to figure out why these cracks are so wide you know, what's happening? I don't know but I know this, that if I do the work that's laid out right in this book with a sponsor something miraculous happens and it's happened with every guy I've ever worked with who's gone through those 12 steps with me you know and it happened to me I was born and raised in Pueblo, Colorado. Now that's not the reason I drank, okay? For those of you who know that area, okay? It could have been but it's not. There was some thorough step work done on that and that's not the region I drank. I was born and raised on a little farm out there and out on the mesa and it's a beautiful area. You got a view of Pike's Peak and a view of the smokestacks of the steel mill and pretty much, you know, the snow falls and the ash falls And that's kind of how it was. You know, everything was gray. And I grew up in a family that, you know, it was that Catholic-Irish-alcoholic-CIA connection thing going on. And that was, you knows, it was kind of normal. You do not have to kick my family tree very hard for about a dozen alcoholics just plop on the ground all over the place. It's just normal. That was what we did. We drank and died of alcoholism in my family. That was normal. That was considered, you now, the big book talks about that too. It talks about the alcoholic life seeming the only normal one, and that's true. In our family, that seemed the only normal one. And so, you know, we're living out there, and it's a nice little farm, and tractors, and dogs, and horses, and pigs, and cows, and all that stuff, and, you Know, it's okay. My dad's from that area, and my mom's from back east, and she's really not used to the farm, so they moved to San Francisco about 1968, to San Francisco. i had a little culture shock um for a while there um and you know the thing was is that i just wanted to fit in with the other kids you know i wanted to fit it in and i always felt different you know i felt like my ears were too big i was too skinny and i never fit in and I felt like things were all wrong with me and so they thought maybe they get me involved in a musical instrument so you know we looked around and um you know they started having me play the bagpipes which always makes you fit in with everyone else, you know, immediately. So, you know, the neighbor's dogs are howling. And if you've ever heard an eight-year-old play the bagpipes, I'm telling you, it's just, I love the bagpipe. So I brought them with me. I don't know about bringing them to the jam session tonight, but you may hear them over the weekend. But, you Know, it is kind of a solo instrument with a band though, you Now, and so I got involved in the bag pipe band. And I, and of course, you Know, you're wearing kilts and stuff, which always makes you fit in you know well in San Francisco it made me fit in but anyway the point is that it was this it really wasn't you know I didn't see it as that unusual to me this was just a normal life and I began to also notice some things about my family I didn'T really you know connect them all until I got sober my dad came home from work and we had this thing I called the five o'clock shadow which was you know he'd come home around five oClock and there was that shadow that began to happen in the household. And if you grew up in an alcoholic family or you're an alcoholic who maybe created this shadow, you'll understand what I'm talking about, which is the shadow began to descend on the family around 4, 430 and everything had to be perfect in the house. And if you could just make it right, dad would be okay, you know? Because you just wanted dad to love you because what you really were looking for was to be needed, wanted, and loved, you know? And that's what you were looking voor. And the thing was, is that you didn't know what it was going to turn out like you know but you knew something was going to happen he'd come home and you could hear those ice cubes drop in the bottom of that you know that glass about three you know cubes or so clink clink and then you'd hear that bourbon kind of you know bounce into that glass and that glug glug sound and and you can see my father change just as he was pouring the bourbon and then of course there was that little spritz of you knowing it's of the ginger ale and he put that on top sort of like a little film of oil like on top of water you know it was like this much you know it was tiny like a cherry on top or something I don't know and you could see after a couple of drinks the sense of ease and comfort that came over him at once by taking a few drinks and I understood that later in life you know and but you didn't know whether you're going to get the violent you know destructive father you're gonna get you know this loving kind joking little Irish father you know you never knew what you were gonna get and you know we got bounced around a little bit but that's not why I drank you know that's important to remember too is you know I used to blame things my alcoholism on on a lot of different factors and that's not true I'm an alcoholic you know and there's a lot of reasons why I drink but it doesn't matter I have a friend of mine who's a wonderful guy I grew up with and he's a professor in North Carolina and he he's a doctor and he teaches He's the neuroscience of addiction, and he's a professor, and he has a big grant from the NIH and all this stuff that, you know, fantastic work he does. And he and I were talking one time a few years ago about my recovery and about his work in figuring out the brain and why people drink and why they use drugs and all This Other Stuff and, you know, the methodology and et cetera, the ideology of addiction. And he was talking for a while, and I said, you know i'm so glad that you're doing that i really really am we need people like you on the front lines out there doing this work it's important it really is i said but for me it's sort of like if your house is on fire you know you're glad that the fireman you know has gone to school and he learned about fire science and he knows about you know temperatures and he understands you know what wood does and all this other cool stuff about backdrafts but what i'm concerned about when my house is on fire is, did you bring the hose? Because that was what I needed is I needed the hose because my life was on fire. Now with my family, that dynamic, you know, that the big book talks about that neurosis began to develop and things began to go kind of South. And I moved out when I was fairly young and, and, you Know, went off and began to explore the world, but I began drinking when I was around 13 or 14 years of age. I'm not exactly sure. Most of us can talk about that first drink and remember it, and I can too, you know, and remember that sense of ease and comfort, that thing that happened where I began to fit in, you Know, where I wasn't the geeky kid anymore, where i could talk to the girls, whereIi could be cool. You know, that began to take over and I wanted it all the time. So I didn't immediately go out to Skid Row and suddenly, you know, get a box or anything like that. But I mean the thing was is that well I knew where it was anyway. The thing was that it was kind of almost inevitable. The book talks about being driven and that I think is really important. I was being driven. I didn't have any choice about what was going to start to happen next. Once that stuff started to hit me it was on. So somewhere my drinking began to take on these larger and larger proportions, and I began traveling a little bit. And I'd get little girlfriends here and there. I remember one girl, she was very sweet. She was a bartender, of course, and she was my girlfriend. And she said, it's not normal for people to drink eight or nine gin and tonics at a time, like one right after the other. You may have a problem. And I thought, yeah, I've got a problem, I got to get rid of this witch. That's what I'm thinking, you know, seriously, I was done. Because anything that got between me and alcohol had to go. And I think that's important to talk about. I know people sometimes say, you know, well, I don't like to tell war stories. Well, how can I identify with you if I don' t understand where you're coming from? You know? I needed to hear a few war stories, I needed to hear that, especially in 12-step calls. I think it's absolutely essential. And so I'll tell a few because it's that identification that I'm a real alcoholic. I'm not the moderate drinker, I'm not, you know, anything else. I'm the real alcoholic and that had to be identified and I needed to see other people who were real alcoholics too. The thing is, is that, you know, this pattern began to show up where I began to drink a lot and, and I began to do some other outside issues but the thing was, isthat that was really never the issue. It was always alcohol. That was my first love and I loved it forever And the thing is, is that I may love alcohol sometimes more than people who still drink. You know, the funny thing about that, you know, that love was deep and it nearly killed me. But I didn't know what was happening at the time. Something had happened inside my head. The switch had been turned and the alcoholism was in full effect. Now, the effects of that, I could manage things occasionally fairly well. But around 21, 22, things began to get kind of out of control. I was one time working on a house and I, you know, decided, you know, we're peeling the paint off of this house. And it was in San Francisco, a very million dollar house. And we're pulling the paint often. If you've ever done that with a torch, it's very laborious. So I decided after about eight drinks that what I do is I put this paint thinner on the side of the house, then put the torch on it. That didn't go very well. The house exploded into flames, absolutely blew up. and i managed to grab a bunch of uh buckets of water out of the pool and put out the fire and in the meantime what i didn't realize is that she had all these macrame hanging planners you know those ones that you know are made out of macrime and then it's got a like a clay pot inside of it but they were filled with cactus and it had burned through those and one of them had landed on my head and had like embedded itself in my skull and i went downstairs and told my buddy what happened. And of course, my hair's on fire still and he's putting me out, you know? And I've got no eyebrows and I'm just, and I am a mess, you now. And I'm still smoking and it's just bad. And I got this cactus sticking out of my head with the pot partially stuck into my head and he is like, dude, you got a cactus sticking out of your head. I am like, I know man, I can't get it out of to my head. He is like... Dude, I don't know what we are going to do. And so we are pulling on it and cutting it and we're pouring alcohol on it and we pour an alcohol in me and that's not working and we go to the ER. And we walk up to the triage window at the ER and the lady says, so what brings you here today? I don't know. You know, so what I didn't realize though is at the time there was more than just that cactus on the outside of my head. There was a cactus on the inside of my hand and on my head there was something that was prickly that every time I touched it, it absolutely was going to stick to me. Because when I picked up the first drink, I could not not pick up the second drink. I had to. I had the allergy. That's the physical stuff that began to happen. And I think, you know, the book describes that masterfully, you know perfectly. It describes exactly how I drank. So, and I think most of you really understand that too. And those of you in the Al-Anon family groups, you know thank you so much. A little side note here. my entire family is in recovery my sister could not be here, she is a grateful member of the Louisville Al-Anon family group, she could not be here this night and she wanted to be but she couldn't be because she's in hospice work so she's doing that tonight my brother has been 16 years sober, he's in San Francisco my mother has been in Al-Alanon since about 1972 I don't know, you know, forever and it is Alcoholics Anonymous us and Al-Anon Family Groups has literally transformed our lives. And we thank you so much from the bottom of our hearts. So I'm learning, you know, that, that I've got a problem with alcohol that I pick it up. I can't stop. I know what I'll do. I'll join the army. Okay. That's brilliant. You know? So I go in the army and I go to Germany, which of course there might be a little drinking in Germany. I don't remember cause I was drunk the entire time. So, and I'm pretty serious about that I was really drunk the entire time except for a very short period where they sent me to Saudi Arabia I was there tdy for just a little short period but they extended it and they said oh you're going to be here six months and I said oh no I'm not you know and I freaked and I called a friend and he said this is what you do you go to the chaplain and you tell him this so the next day I went to the chapel and I told him you know there's been a mistake on my my records, I'm actually not Episcopalian. I'm Jewish. At that time in Saudi Arabia, they kicked you out of the country. They were like, we don't want you here. Goodbye. And they were like... Then they sent me back to Germany. That's the kind of lengths I was willing to go to to drink. I was unwilling to do that. You know, that's the kinds of stuff I did. Now, you know, my drinking progresses and I decided on a few couple of little things that might have helped, but it didn't. I went to, you know, I didn't know that I was an alcoholic. I really didn't, I ended up homeless in Northern California and I was dying. I was drinking two for dollar bottles of ripple, this Coca-Cola flavored wine. It's reinforced and it gets the job done 50 cents a piece. And I'm panhandling for that. And, um, and I'm dying and my family's not, you know, around anymore. They're kind of just gone. You know, my sister's in Colorado and my brother, he's off somewhere and my father doesn't speak to me and my mother, she's gone doing something else and I'm just alone and dying. I'm probably about 30 years of age at this time and the desperation with which I was drinking, I'm living in a little tent next to a polluted river there in Petaluma, California and I have rats for roommates that would scurry across my body while I was sleeping. And it was getting pretty bad. And I decided I'd end it all. And I decide that I couldn't go on this way, and I didn't know any way out. So I went out to the railroad tracks that were right there by the river, and I laid down on those railroad tracks, and I decided, I'm going to lay on these railroad tracks and when the train comes along, I'll know no more. What I didn' t realize is the train only ran about once a week, and it wasn't the right day. And anyway, so I'm laying there on these railroad tracks and I'm in there in the fog and the cold and I've got that sensation of that ripple inside of me that whatever the heck it was, mad dog or something and I am thinking okay, I am just waiting for that sound I am waiting for the end to come and all of a sudden this other drunk like trips over me in the dark, it's like 2 o'clock in the morning and she trips over to me she is walking down, she is stumbling down the railroad tracks and she like tripped over me. She's like swearing at me. She's all mad. She said, what are you doing down there? And I lied to her, you know, and I said, oh, I must've passed out, you know, and she says, you know what you should do? You should go across the street to that place over there at six o'clock tomorrow morning. They serve free coffee and donuts. And I said and I don't know why but that sounded like a good idea at that time. So I got up off those tracks and I waited till six in the morning and I walked into this little place and sure enough they were serving free coffee and donuts and that was the first meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous that I remember going to. And I looked up on the wall and I hadn't had a shower in about a month and I haven't brushed my teeth and I looked pretty bad and I didn't smell too good either, you know. But nobody seemed to mind. They seemed to just bring me a cup of coffee and they realized that I was hopeless and they talked to me which when you're homeless one of the things that happens is you become invisible. You really become invisible to people and as a homeless alcoholic that feeling of loneliness you know is really really deep and the book talks about that feeling Of Loneliness and so I understand that you know that loneliness that few will understand except you guys you guys understood that when I came to Alcoholics Anonymous and I remember looking up at the wall and there were these uh big banners and this thing and those must be the rules right you know because I looked at the rules and I read the rules and it said, we admitted we were powerless over alcohol and I thought, okay this is possible yeah, I think that I might be powerless over alcohol but I don't see how my life has become unmanageable I swear to God I went through, I'm like sitting there thinking, oh my god, really you know, my life is so I go to a little treatment center they get me into a little spin dry there in Santa Rosa at the Orinda Center and I get a little spin dry there and 28 days in this treatment center and, you know, I don't get a sponsor. I don' t work any steps. I do all the little things because I'm the star of the treatment center, you know. And I do go to a detox meeting and they do detox me from alcohol. One of the things that drives me a little crazy is every once in a while I hear things in the rooms that kind of make me nuts. And one of the thing that I hear sometimes is you never have to drink again if you don' T want to. I know the intention is good but what about me? What about me because I drank even when I didn't want to, desperately didn't want to. What do I do then and that was important when one of you guys somebody else came and they told me this is what you do. This is how you get out from under. This is what we do and that Was important to me. It wasn't about you know you don't you know slap me around and make me feel good and I put the little blindfolds on and I walked you know and I did all the stuff that they wanted me to do and 28 days and I leave there and I go back and I got everything set up so I've got a little apartment it looks like the Taj Mahal you know to me it's just a little one-bedroom flop house you know and I'm not even that like a little studio and but it's only a block from the Alano Club and I'm thinking okay you know so I go downstairs to go to the meeting you know that I knows at like five o'clock and instead or at noon I guess and I instead of turning right I turn left because I remember that my friend hasn't seen me in a while, and he must be worried about me. So I went to see my friend who was a bartender, and I went to see him. And I said, hey Mark, you know how you doing? He said, where you been? I said I've been in treatment. I'm an alcoholic. He said no you're not. I said yes I am. He says no you are not. Yes I am! He said no you aren't. And i said well maybe I'm not. Pour me a gin and tonic for four hours. I had absolutely nothing between me and the first drink. For four hours I managed to last. And that started another, I don't know how many years before I could draw a sober breath. And I kept going to the rooms of Alcoholics Anonymous. I just couldn't stay sober. I was in your rooms all the time and I was In those meetings and, you know, and people said, you know well we can't really 12-step him. He's a wet drunk. I'm really glad that Ebi didn't realize that when he went to see Bill. um the thing is is that you know that's what happened to me you know that's what happened to me and i and somebody you know began to help me out and they said you know what maybe you should go see your family out in colorado so i thought that's the ticket you know i'll go to colorado and i'll get sober i went to colorada when i came out here and i i'm out in denver and i'm i'm living in denvar i'm staying sober three months at a time sometimes and i'm going to to vitality down there on 72nd and lowell and um and i'm meeting some people and i'm starting to get some connections but i still have not got a sponsor i'm not working the steps i'm nicht reading this book by the way if you're new to the program of alcoholics anonymous i've been using that term a lot this is the big book of alcohol it's anonymous okay this is our basic text this is what it looks like open okay i swear to god i used it as a as a coaster for years so you know to me the big book of alcoholics anonymous is is so vital so important nothing drives you crazier than when a big you know when a newcomer can't get a big book of alcoholic synonymous anyway the thing is is that and yes i do a lot of writing around stuff like that so the thing isthat i'm in denver things are getting worse again it's getting even worse than when i was homeless i'm barely hanging on i've got a little apartment my mother is living in Louisville at the time and she says, hey Linda, I saw my sister Linda. She said, Linda, I saw on the TV that they found a John Doe face down in Sloan's Lake. Will you go see if it's your brother? Now Linda's a hospice nurse in Denver County and she knows all the corners and she said okay. So she went to the coroner's office and she unzipped that body bag and she looked to see if he was her brother. And for the next three months she looked at every single John Dole that they found who died of alcohol-related causes because I disappeared off the face of the earth and that was the kind of thing I was doing to my family. And if I don't think that selfishness and self-centeredness isn't the root of my problem, I better really think that over because that's the stuff I was going through and that's what I was feeling. Nothing, you know, I said was as bad as I'm not hurting anybody but myself. Selfish and self centered. They get me into the Salvation Army Rehab Center. At this point, my liver is kind of sticking out of my chest. I'm really actually, you know, you could actually palpate the outside edges of my liver. And if you know anything about the human anatomy, you should not be able to do that, okay? You should not being able to feel your own liver, all right? I'm yellow. My eyes are actually turning green because of the bilirubin that's in my body. And I'm reallly, realllly sick. I'm reallly shaky. I can't hang on very much. But I managed to get up to Estes Park and my sister medically detoxes me up there. she brings a body bag because she's not sure if her brother is going to live through this or not. Because that's the truth about alcoholism is that we die from this. And I can tell you from personal experience, I have seen it more than once. And the thing is, is that it's not a pretty death by any means. There's no sweet good night. It's usually pretty violent and it's pretty awful. And the things that I've seen thing is, is that my sister is having to do this because she loves me. And I have, what I've come to realize was a spiritual experience at that point. And something happens, a willingness happens in me to do absolutely anything, to do absolute anything for victory over alcohol. I absolutely am willing to go to any lengths. And so I'm willing to the Salvation Army Adult Rehabilitation Center. And if you have ever seen or been to the Salvation Army Rehabilitation Center for men, anywhere you're from, it is kind of the last house on the block. It's one of those places that really it's pretty tough. You know, I remember going in there and I'm sitting down in this little chair and I am waiting for the guy to, you know, kind of do the intake and he's up there being a little officious and he says, there's no room here. We don't have any room. You can't come in. and I'm devastated because I'm ready, you know? And I'm ready for anything. I'm willing to do anything because I am really dying from this and I just want it to be over. I don't know what's in front of me but I do know that what I've got is unacceptable. So he's saying there's no room here and my sister says you know, I talked to the intake counselor and he said he can get John in you know he said well he didn't tell me so you may have to come back and I looked at my sister I said I heard there was another place down in Colorado Springs how far is Colorado Springs she said 45 minutes said I'm willing to go if we need to go there I'll go there I'll be there I just want to do this and that's when the willingness was really there my sister said that she saw a change she saw something happen that had never happened before what's kind of funny about that story is that um about two years later um the head of the salvation army called me she says i've got a guy here who just can't stay sober i you know he's having such a hard time i think he needs somebody to really talk to somebody to sponsor him who might really understand him would you talk to him and i said sure of course i will and i showed up and it was that same guy who told me that there was no room at the end. Interesting how God works. But I get in the Salvation Army, and the only thing that I'm capable of doing is moving one box from it, from the pile of trash that's off the back of the truck, you know, which is basically stuff that people don't want anymore. And I'm taking it from there, and I'm putting it in another pile so it can be made useful again. What an interesting allegory that is for Alcoholics synonymous. What an interesting thing it is to something that, because I was unemployable, I was absolutely hopeless and through a period of rehabilitation, which means, rehabilitation means to be fit to live in again, to be rehabilitated. I can live in. Again. Wow. And that's what I began realizing I was doing was I was being of service. I was moving that stuff and I was, I was I felt as if I was making my own way in the world. It wasn't much. I was wearing the little cast off clothes from the Salvation Army and I'm going to chapel every Wednesday and I'd sit there in chapel on Wednesday and they'd say my name is Bill and I am here to get my life back and I think what part of my life do I want back and I realized at that moment that I needed a new life I needed an absolutely new life and I discovered that I could have that through this program through the 12 Steps of Alcoholics Anonymous, it promises me a new freedom and a new happiness. It tells me that I can have a new life. And I found out that I could do that. And I began to sit in those little meetings and I began really listen, really, really listen. And I begin to hear things like, I began hearing guys talk about the idea of doing your program like you did your drinking. Well, I don't know about anybody else, but I did some pretty hard drinking. So I put it all on the table. I really laid it out there. And then another guy said something along the lines of, maybe you don't want what we have, but the question you have to ask yourself is, do you want what you have? And I learned. The fact is that I didn't want what I had. I didn' t have a relationship with my family that was healthy. I didn''t have the ability to stand on my own two feet. I had absolutely nothing. I was empty. And I was willing to take anything that you were going to show me how to get. And what you promised me is that I could tap into a power greater than myself that could do for me what I could not do for myself because I was the guy who could not not drink and all of a sudden 30 days is going by now you know and I begin to realize that wow this is pretty cool and they let me out of there and they let me go to York Street so I go to Yorke Street now I love Yoroke Street and I went to a meeting there and I went upstairs and it was an open meeting and there were guys introducing themselves as alcoholic addicts and introducing themselves as addicts and then there was the dope fiend in the corner over there you know and there was some guy who I don't know what his 12 step program was and then the lady next to me introduced herself as a sex addict and for the rest of the meeting all I could think about was how to get her to relapse with me you know and I realized after the meeting was over now I'm living in the Salvation Army in a 5 bedroom room with a bunch of stinky guys. I've got so much to give this woman, you know? And the thing is that I'm sitting there and it hit me that she could not save my life. I needed you. I needed alcoholics who spoke my language, who knew a way out to save my life. So I began going to meetings that talked about alcoholism. I began going to closed meetings of Alcoholics Anonymous. I begun to go into meetings that talked about the big book. I begin to go to big book studies in 12x12s And I began, and then I got a sponsor. Now, I didn't get the sponsor on purpose. Most of what has happened to me in Alcoholics Anonymous is not on purpose when it says at some of these we balked. I have to tell you, I have sounded like a chicken almost all the way through AlcoholicsAnonymous. You know that beautiful prayer that, you know, you see sometimes the footsteps, you know, that beautiful pray? And I love that poem, I guess it is. And, you know, there's one set of footsteps and, you know there's two steps of footsteps and that's you know you and God walking side by side and then there's you know one set of footsteps where he's carrying me and then for me there's this third set where it's like one set of footsteps in the middle of the night and then these heel marks where I'm being drugged kicking and screaming all the way through because that's exactly what has happened sometimes you know there's a part of the book that says almost none of us almost none of us have light it says there is a solution almost none of have light the self-searching, the leveling of our pride which this process requires for the successful consummation. I'm kind of paraphrasing. And I always think about that part you see those commercials on TV where it says 8 out of 10 people suffer from diarrhea. I always thing do two people enjoy it? Because the thing is I don't know about anybody but when the process began I really didn't but my sponsor just kept saying nod your head say yes. So I got this sponsor, this guy, what happens is they trick me into getting a sponsor. You know, they say, you know, you should ask Greg to be your sponsor. And I say, well, I was thinking that Greg is standing behind me. He says, okay. And then I went, oh, call me on Wednesday. I'll pick you up on Thursday. Okay. So every Thursday we'd sit in his living room and he'd pull out that book and we'd read that book. And we went through the steps and we went Through the first step. AndI really understood powerlessness. Andwe read more about alcoholism very carefully because to understand the obsession, because that's what I suffer from too is the obsession of the mind. That thing that absolutely totally baffles me. That thing that keeps me pounding on the bar over and over and again. And one thing that I have learned in Alcoholics Anonymous in the 11 years that I've been sober is that I can never get so sober that I can't get drunk again. There is no place I'm going to ever reach at five years or 10 years or 20 years or 30 years where I can'T get drunk Again. Because the thing is it tells me very clearly in this book that my hope is the growth and maintenance of a spiritual way of life. It tells me that very clearly, talks about that, I'm paraphrasing a little bit but it talks about spiritual experience and I needed to keep having those spiritual experiences and I still need to today. Nothing has changed in that so he begins going through the steps and we really work that stuff right out of the book and it's the first time I've ever seen that happen. They'd always talked about big book thumpers, and I was kind of scared of those guys, you know, because they were always seem to be in the corner with a new guy going like this, you know, with their finger out, you know. And then their guys always seemed to be in service work and doing stuff, and they were busy. They were busy all the time. But I did notice something. They didn't seem to drink. They didn'T seem to get, you know, a 24-hour chip, and they weren't raising their hands. I did notice that. So I began to work those steps like my life depended on it, and it did. And I began to understand something about insanity. when I was in the homeless shelter there was a guy who used to take three steps and he'd take one, two, three and he turned all the way to the right and he muttered some incantation and then he'd take three steps and he would turn all the way to left and he would mutter some incanation and one day after I had enough ripple and I was also drinking mouthwash at that point because it was pretty easy to steal mouthwash it was harder to steal booze but you could steal that 99 cent mouthwash and it would keep the DTs off of you you know and I'm drinking that mouthwash And I looked at him and I said, so why do you do that? And he looked at me like I was crazy. And he said, I'm keeping the world from spinning off its axis. Okay, hit that bottle again. And years later, as I'm working the steps, I questioned that and thought about it. And I realized that every time he did that, the world never spun off its axes. His solution worked. and every time I took a drink, my world spun off its axis. So who was crazier, him or me? The truth is that I don't know. What I do know is that I recognize the insanity. You know, that's what I had to learn and I had find a power greater than myself that could relieve me of that. I had found a power. I just had to be willing to believe that there was one and I was. I had a little spiritual experience which had kind of done that for me. Now I'm still in the Salvation Army and I'm still, you know, doing the stuff that I'm doing there and I stand focused on the program that they've got but I'm working the program of Alcoholics Anonymous with this guy Greg and he is really, really working hard with me. He's picking me up every Thursday and we're doing the deal and we get to the third step and, you now, I'm not so sure about this. I'm just not so surer about it and we read it over and we begin to understand selfishness and self-centeredness. This, I think, is the root of the problem. This, i think, yes because when I really get down in there and I begin to look at it, I begin tell myself rest to grab violently i'm going to get happiness and satisfaction and i don't manage as much as i manipulate that's really the truth when i get right down to it and i had to get rid of that stuff and i have to start recognizing that that was going to be the case and i was going to turn my will and my life over to the power that i that i discovered was there and it'd been working in my life the whole time and i didn't know it i had no idea i get down on my knees with greg and we say the third step prayer and i turn my will in my life over to this power and something happened at that moment and i don't know what it was but something happened and something changed and there was something that the big book talks about very clearly and talks about the idea of a psychic change a change in mind a change in thinking and maybe it was only by five degrees but it was enough and I think most of my psychic changes have been in those five degree increments you know this little tiny things because it's about moving my feet with faith I have faith and I began moving my foot and that was what I was taught early on is move your feet do the work action this is a program of action and I begin doing the action so you know we begin you know writing that four step he you know gets me down with that pen and paper and I'm writing away you know it's right out of the book and I'm writing down and he was kind of nice about he said you know because I was a little afraid of the fourth step and he said it's pretty easy just write down all the people you hate oh I can do that you know so I'mwriting down to people institutions all kinds of things but I'm having to write down stuff that's that's hurting me I'm written down my sister because I have resentments against my sister this woman who saved my life and I love her so much. And I hate her. I hate her and I'm so angry with her. It's kind of funny because my sister a few years ago was talking to my brother and I and she said I don't know that our dad was an alcoholic. I think he was a rageaholic. And my brother-in-law just started laughing hysterically and she said, why? And I said, every alcoholic is a rageoholic. we are rageaholics period no separation there so I'm doing that work and and that stuff is starting to come out as I'm getting over to that fourth column my part is starting to come out in there and I'm not writing a tome I'm not writing an enormous book on this he has got me doing it just the way the book says it's a few lines here and there it's really very simple we're getting down to causes and conditions and that was important and we began talking about my fear we began writing that stuff out and that stuff was was powerful and you know i'd heard all the acrimons in the room these wonderful little things you know you know uh face everything and recover i think was one and and uh um something everything and run and i think my favorite today is frantically endeavoring to appear recovered you know I think that's my favorite fear one these days because there are times when that happens the thing is is that I'm writing that stuff down and it's becoming clear how this is running my life. This has been absolutely driving me. I hadn't understood being driven. The book talks about being driven by those things, being drivenby a hundred forms of fear, being driven my self-delusion, my self pity, that stuff. Being driven by that. I had no more choice about the way I was going to feel about that than the man in the moon. I began really understanding what that was all about and we began to explore that and that was powerful. And then of course you know, we did a sex inventory. You know, and I began to understand what my relationships were like and how I hurt people so badly and created jealousy and created these things in my life that were, I didn't, you know, I don't have relationships. I took hostages, you know, that was really what was going on, you know? And I think that's what, you know, what I had to understand was what was happening. And I began to understand that I could build a new ideal about that. And that was something that was really important. He made me write that stuff out exactly what that ideal was going to look like and what that was going to be for me and how that was going to work and how it was going to look. You know, and it wasn't going to be about me finding the woman of my dreams. It was going to be about me becoming the man of someone else's dreams. That's the key that I had to learn and I had to learn that I had to be the man of God's dreams. I had to do something more. So anyway, this process is beginning to go along and we get to the fifth step and I'm absolutely certain that when I read my fifth step to him he will never speak to me again as long as I I'm sure of it but I agreed at the beginning to do anything for victory over alcohol and I knew that I had to do that and I was terrified and I I said I'm gonna it doesn't matter if he doesn't talk to me again I'm going to do this because I don't want to drink again I don' t ever want to drink again so I went in sat in his living room and we did my fifth step and when it was all done he said okay this is what we do and we did the six you know we talked about the sixth step and he had me go home and had me think about that and recognize was I really entirely ready you know and I was and then we did a seventh step we got down on our knees again and we did The Seventh Step and something again changed there was a fundamental shift again those shifts happened and something happened and I don't know what but something began to change and all of a sudden you know I'm on the eighth step and I'm thinking that, you know, I'd heard people like burn in their fifth steps and doing this stuff and lighting a fire and my sponsor wouldn't let me do that. He said, no, no. That's where the list is coming from. Oh, so remember it says referring to our list again? Oh yeah, I read that. Darn it. I was hoping I'd get away with that one. You know, I could just write down a few people here and there, you know but no. It's all of them and I didn't have such a nice experience with the IRS. I have to tell you. I'm it's been 11 years I'm still I'm still you know and here's the thing that stuff that's happening my eighth and ninth step I began to learn something amazing is that as I began to do that work and put that stuff out there and doing those amends and I did it just the way it says in the book he really did not let me vary from that script he really really kept me on a tight leash and we we found all these people and I remember you know I'd I dropped a pizza hut when I was a young man you know and I dropped the pizza hut and I'd stolen many thousands of dollars out of this pizza hut. And um and I was very you know upset and I didn't know what to do about this and he said well contact Pizza Hut and find out how you pay that money back. I said can't I just declare bankruptcy? And he said no. He said you know he said uh call Pizza Hut and ask them what to do. And so I did and I called them and they said, that's like 20 years, 25, that place has been closed. I mean, they said can I send you the money? You know I mean it might be a little bit at a time but no, we don't know what to deal with it. I said well what do I do? I'm getting desperate. I'm thinking what do, I need this night step. I need some sort of closure. And she's like well just buy Pepsi products. In my room there's a case of Pepsi. And there's some Pizza Hut coming later, probably. The thing is, is that I did exactly that. I did what they asked me to do, you know? And I've done that and I've done that ever since. And every time, every month when that 150 bucks comes out and goes to the IRS, you know what? That's a spiritual moment for me. That is a spiritual moment for me. Every time that I pay a rent check, that is a spiritual moment for me, every time that I, you know, and I pay my rent on time. You know, not on the 6th. I pay it on the 1st. You know? I pay It on time, you Know? And that's a spiritual thing for me, you Know? and my utilities and things like that and my insurance. I didn't have a driver's license when I came to Alcoholics Anonymous. And you know I got a driver license. I was 40... You know I was 42 when I got a driver license. It didn't mean that I didn' drive, okay? Just means the cars weren't always fully registered and insured, possibly stolen. And getting pulled over was going to be the least of my problems if I didn't have a driver's license. So I didn' t have a drivers license so I got a driver license and I got insurance and I got a car with a plate that matched the front in the back. It was cool. And it was held together with rust and bumper stickers and it never missed a meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous And it never took me to a bar, and I loved that little car. And when I let it go, my little first sobriety car, and if you remember your first sobpriety car you remember what that was like, how powerful that was to be able to get to those meetings and do that stuff and get to that. And he began taking me to the jails and we were going to Denver Cares downtown and going to those meeting and watching guys have seizures on the floor and we're doing that stuff and that's what we're carrying that message and I didn't realize what he was doing with me and began to talk about the 10th and 11th step and 12-step, and he had me doing that work. And then one day I asked him, I said, have I had a spiritual awakening? And he just looked at me and he said, yes. And that was the end of it. And I went and got a sponsee. And that was kind of what happened, you know. And then, you know, a few years into sobriety now things are starting to get better. I've got a little job and things are getting, you know, better. And I've got some things going on and I begin to ask God, what do you want me to do? Where do you want me to go? What can I do to serve you? How can I be of maximum service? What a mistake that was. And I look back, no, not at all. I look Back and that was another moment where something changed. A psychic change began to occur. And next thing I know, I'm in college. Now, I had been to some colleges before, mostly for the beer. But I mean, I've been to the colleges and I'd never finished a class and I began to take some college classes and I um I began to pass them and I took some basic classes English and math and I'm taking you know one plus one equals two type of stuff I mean I'm literally taking the the entry-level classes and um I'm asking God what do you want me to do and the next thing I know he's got me enrolled into these classes for nursing school the last thing I wanted to do on a planet was be a nurse I'm like no no no not that not that my sister's a nurse i don't want to be a nurse by the way i'm a registered nurse for the trauma center of the rockies um i work in a level two trauma center the conference that i was uh attending is one of the top conferences in the country for trauma and emergency medicine and i was speaking at it i went to nursing school and they began to you know I had to move. You know, God sent me down to La Junta. Now, if you've ever been to La Junta, that's an experience because that's a dark district. That's a tough area. You have to travel a lot to get to meetings and then, you know, there weren't any big books and stuff and getting newcomers and talking to new guys, it was tough. And I began driving 60, 130 miles round trip to go to meetings of Alcoholics Anonymous and I was glad to do it and I didn't care because that is what it was required to do. And, I got through nursing school and I'm in Pueblo and I ask God what does he want me to do and he puts me in this emergency room you know at this knife and gun club that they've got down there and I mean it's tough drunks rolling in and out and I're getting, I mean they're just beating me up left and right and I am able to carry the message at various times one time I was in La Junta as a matter of fact and I was going through it wasn't even my day, I wasn't supposed to be there I picked up an extra shift and I was there and I was doing some PRN work and I I hear an IV pump beeping in the background and I see these guys standing in the hall and it's a social worker talking to the family members and I realize it's this guy that we brought in who has alcoholic encephalopathy which is a which is what we used to call wet brain and you never know exactly when it's going to hit That's the thing about that type of illness is that you never know if they're going to come out of it or not. Sometimes there's a lot of elasticity in the brain, but sometimes it just never does. And they can be 30 years old and 32 years old, and they disappear into those nursing homes or some other places, and they're mumbling the rest of their lives, and that's the truth. And he's in there, and he's strapped to a bed, and he hasn't said anything coherent for three days. and his family's in there they're in the hallway and they're talking to social services about committing him to the mental institution in Pueblo for the rest of his life and I hear that IV pump going off and I go in the room and I begin to adjust his arm because a lot of times people will bend their arms a little bit and it'll set off that little alarm and sure enough that's what had happened and all of a sudden he looks over at me and he says I don't want to die like this first coherent words he's ever said and I looked right back at him and I said you do not have to I've known thousands of men and women who are just as hopeless as you I've know them and they've recovered from a hopeless state of mind and body and you too can do that there's a way out there's away out you do not have live like this this can end there's way out and he kind of went back in his coma after a little while. And, and so I, after talking to him for a little bit and I did a little work there, you know, at bedside and, and I took a little time to spend some time with that man. And I left and I went off along my merry way. And about a year later, I was in Pueblo and I was coming out of the library doing something. I was, I was working with some, somebody new and came out ofthe library and this guy like, you knows, waves me down. He said hey buddy hey buddy you know can you stop a second i said sure he said do you remember me i said no i'm sorry i don't and um he said i was strapped to a bed in la junta a year ago i said oh how's it going and he said I'm celebrating a year tomorrow the thing about this program is that one thing i have absolutely learned in Alcoholics Anonymous is you never know when you're going to carry that message. You never know where it's going to show up. You never know how it's gonna turn out. I've seen absolute amazing things happen. I've absolutely been stunned in Alcoholics Anonymous by how the beauty of this program absolutely transforms lives. Every year at Christmas, you know, my mother gets a call. You know, she gets a calls. She used to get a call from us every year at Christmas too. You know, my brother used to call her from jail and I used to call from the ER and my sister used to call her from some place where people were dying and this year she got a call my brother he's a psychiatrist for the prison system in California and he was at San Quentin so she got a call from jail i was working the night shift in the er she got a call from her son from the er and my sister was working hospice that night and she got to call all of her kids are in recovery and all of our kids are of service and all over kids are on the front line of life all of them carrying that message somewhere but they're doing more than that you know that's the thing that's so cool that that amazes me is i got to go down to to uh to the international convention you know and with my sister and we drove all the way down there her and i in a car together and that was just an amazing experience to be able to to go down there with her um and i really really was in awe of the power that i began to feel you know with that and the power i feel when those of us who are in this fellowship you know this conference is called the fellowship of the spirit and i absolutely love the fact that you know that's what we have is we have a fellowship of the spirit we read how it works earlier and it talks about a couple of things in there that i think are so important and sometimes you know we blast by certain things when i was in that little detox there was a big indian guy and he was on the h and i committee and and he was he was like six foot eight he was you know and he uh he came into that little detox there at that little treatment center that was at up in Santa Rosa and he he came in with that little uh H&I format and he handed me how it works and he said read this it was like you're saying juicy fruit you know he handed it to me I was like ah and I waslike okay I began to read that and I began crying and I couldn't stop I absolutely was bawling and Iwas choking out one word at a time It must have took 10 minutes, maybe 15 minutes for me to read how it works. And he didn't stop me and he didn'T take it away from me. And he DIDN'T say, oh, it's okay, John, you know, we'll have some other guy read it. You're too distraught. He knew that I needed every single bit of the pain I was going to need. He knew I was gonna need all of that. He knew it. he knew I was going to need to feel that hopelessness right down in the bottom of my soul to be able to be recovered from this disease he knew that process and he was a faithful servant and he allowed me to do that in how it works it says that I'm up against something that is cunning, baffling and powerful and without help it is too much for me I need all the help I can get absolutely all of it I need God's help. I need AA's help I need everything I need outside help I need all kinds of help without help it is too much for me I cannot do it alone I must have this fellowship of the spirit it is absolutely vitally important for me and I've seen this message carried into the darkest places and it's the most beautiful places and I'm so grateful that it's out there and it says something else in there And if you're new to this program, if there's any one thing that, you know, that I can say, it was these words that absolutely kept me going. And it says, do not be discouraged. Do not be discouraged. This thing will work. We have to, you Know, I had to do this work in a way that maybe not everybody had to deal with. I had feel a lot of pain. You know that beaten into a state of reasonableness. Well, yeah, you know It says that god will you know, I believe that god Will move mountains, you Know and I know that you know I'm supposed to bring a shovel but my problem is is I want to bring A lawn chair You know, that's the truth about how I am i'm kind of lazy You know I want To do just enough and I have to get out of that I need to feel Uncomfortable when i'm really in recovery one of the things that's happening is that when i'M really spiritually fit. I'm a little uncomfortable. That's important. I need to be at various times. It's not always a comfortable thing. This is not always comfortable, but I'm grateful that it's there. I get such a wonderful feeling with this and I drank for those promises that are in the ninth step. I drank für those and I got them through working the steps of Alcoholics Anonymous. Every single one of those and more have come true beyond my wildest dreams. One last thing and I'll close. And I thank you again for this opportunity. It's extraordinary. I'm looking forward to the rest of the weekend. I don't often get to spend the whole weekend at conferences because I'm often having to work and do a lot of things. And the other day, I was working. I'll tell a quick story and then tell one fast one. But I wasworking. And if you don't think selfishness and self-centeredness isn't the root of our problem, I'm working. And this guy is out there in the parking lot. And he suddenly, you know, they hit the core button. And there's, you know if you've ever heard that go off and there's 10 nurses and two doctors running out there and this guy is dying in the car he has had a major heart attack or a pulmonary embolism of some sort he's not breathing he's got no pulse we drag him out of the car throw him onto a gurney i jump on top of the gurney I am kneeling on his chest doing chest compressions we are rolling 100 miles an hour down the hall if you have ever seen this it is a very violent and very frightening thing and I'm going a million miles an hour down The Hall and this this little drunk who's in the waiting room, she yells out, why does he get to go first? Selfish and self-centered. I'm just saying it's in there. So a few years ago, I was out in California and I was visiting my brother and I'm sitting there and we're just having a wonderful time visiting and talking. And all of sudden you know he uh you know he and I are talking one morning at breakfast and all of a sudden I had an absolutely overwhelming need to go to a meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous I don't know if you've ever felt that but I had a absolutely overwhelming need to be able to go to alcoholics anonymous any meeting anywhere I don' t care what I have to do I have to go a meeting my brother is alarmed and he says what's wrong and I said that's the problem nothing is wrong I have to go though so we called central service and picked up the phone, and they said, you know, there's a meeting at 10 o'clock at this place in Santa Rosa. You know, I said, okay, I got my car. I got a little rental car, and I jump in that car, and I've got a whole pot of coffee, and i got my big book, and drive up to Santa Rosa, and I find the address, and it's right there by that treatment center that I was at. You know? And I'm thinking about that as I'm looking at it, and I knock on the door, and its locked. Nobody shows up to open the doors of this meeting. I'm sitting there looking around, and I don't know why. It is a kind of a strange time. It's at 10 o'clock in the morning, and I'm thinking, okay, you know, maybe the schedule's not right, you know, whatever. I don'T know. But I'm looking around and there's a guy pacing in the parking lot, and he's walking around, and I know that pace. I know what that looks like. And I walk down to the parking lot and I start talking to him. I said, hey buddy, are you here for that meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous? He said, yeah. They told me there was a meeting here at 10 O'Clock. Doesn't look like the doors are open. I I said, no, it doesn't. And he said, I just got out of that treatment center four hours ago and I really want a drink. I said I got a big book and a pot of coffee in the car, a thermos of coffee. Why don't you and I sit down and talk? Four hours. Same amount of time that I'd had when I had nothing between me and the first drink. God sends us places. God sends this all over the place. A lot of stuff I've done in Alcoholics Anonymous is absolutely and utterly unintentional. Utterly unintentional I absolutely have no idea but I'm so grateful that I've gotten a chance to do it and it's about putting my feet forward one step at a time with faith and waiting you know those little psychic changes five degrees at a Time that utterly transform and do more than that there's a term called transmutation and I love that transmutation is the idea of taking something that is of little or no value, and turning it into something of great value. The alchemists used to do that. That's what their idea was. And Alcoholics Anonymous is doing that throughout the world tonight. There are people out there everywhere, not just in this conference, but in places all over the place, in little tiny meetings in Russia, and in Cortland, Nebraska, and all kinds of amazing places in Australia. Everywhere throughout the World, there are people who are carrying this message, one alcoholic to another, a message of hope. And for that, I'm going to be eternally grateful because I truly believe that this trauma conference that I was attending, I learned all kinds of amazing things about how to reattach limbs and, you know, the pharmacodynamics, I can never say that word, of arginistic T lymphocytes in necrotizing fasciitis. You know, I learned all that stuff. It's amazing. The thing is, is I know what that stuff means now, which is kind of scary that I know that. But the thing is is that in that whole trauma conference, that entire trauma conference alcoholism was never a topic, had never been talked about. This is a big deal. Alcoholism and addiction, but alcoholism in particular affects emergency room medicine like nothing. Nothing. I was sitting there in a meeting the other day and I couldn't understand why my ribs hurt. I looked underneath there and there was a size six boot print. That's right, that little 95-pound drunk kicked me across the room. I thought, man, 11 years sober and alcoholics are still kicking my ass and girls are still doing it too. And the thing is, is that I'm, I'm amazed that we, you know, that that message wasn't there because it's the elephant in the living room because we also are an emergency room. We are the front lines. That message that we carry saves lives just as much as stuff that's up there, just as Much. And that stuff is absolutely amazing and please keep carrying that message with clarity with strength you know I thank you so much for being there with me as we trudge, that means walk with a purpose, trudge this road of happy destiny and I thank You and God bless You