Honest but Not Accurate — I Sometimes Suffer from a Past That Never Actually Happened – Steve L.
About This Speaker Tape
Steve L. opens as a grateful guest speaker, telling the room his home group has cut him off so he'll travel anywhere to share. He frames gratitude as both a feeling and an action, saying he hopes nobody can tell whether he feels grateful by how he acts — because he wants to act grateful even on days when the feeling isn't there.
He sets aside the traditional what-I-was-like / what-happened / what-it's-like-now structure and tells the room he's honest but not always accurate. He admits he is often honestly mistaken and sometimes suffers from a past that never actually happened. What he shares is the experience of what his life felt like, through the prism of his perception.
He names the alcoholic's disease of perception directly — what he was seeing was often not what was happening — and describes a spiritual experience as being awake, beginning to see his life both as he's in it today and looking back. He says AA has given him all the information already; the real work is turning information into application that produces transformation by removing what blocks him from a Higher Power.
He closes the opening with a story about flying into Myrtle Beach for a conference, trying to meet a host he'd only spoken to on the phone, both of them insisting they were standing at baggage carousel six and neither able to find the other.
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Full Transcript
It's an absolute privilege to be here, and I so appreciate being invited to spend the weekend with you.
And as always, believe me, it's not just polite patter when I tell...
It's an absolute privilege to be here, and I so appreciate being invited to spend the weekend with you.
And as always, believe me, it's not just polite patter when I tell you that I will leave here enriched from the experience.
And I show up, by the way, not confused that you need to hear what I have to say, but I got an absolute need to say it.
So my home group has cut me off, so I'll go about anywhere.
And I say that jokingly, but I say it quite honestly.
I say it quite honestly that I'm full of gratitude, and that is an action, but it's a feeling as well.
And what I always tell people is, I said, I hope you can't tell whether I feel grateful by how I act,
because I hope that I take acts that look like a grateful man would take even when I'm not feeling it.
But when I feel grateful and act grateful at the same time, man, life is pretty good.
And tonight, I both feel grateful, and I will do my best.
I act grateful.
What a wonderful lineup and group of speakers all weekend.
That includes all of the panels and everyone that shared.
And I was thinking to myself, if you were hoping to hear something and you've not heard it yet, I wouldn't get your hopes up.
But I arrived here with no new information, okay?
We have got all of the information.
And we've had it for a long time.
And the challenge for a guy like me is how to turn the information into application that brings about the transformation.
Because that's what Alcoholics Anonymous is for me.
It's a spiritually transformative program that comes about by me taking these actions that remove those things that block me off from a power that work in my life in a way that I can't explain.
You know, you invited me here.
And our books suggest that, among other things, I'll tell you what I was like.
And I'll tell you what happened to kind of bump me into Alcoholics Anonymous.
And I'll tell you what it's been like since then.
But I've come to the conclusion that's really not what I do.
Because, see, I'm going to be honest with you.
I'm going to be as honest with you as I'm capable of being.
But I don't have the same commitment to accuracy.
I am often honestly mistaken.
And I sometimes suffer from a past that never actually happened.
And so what I'm going to share with you is, and really we've been saying it for years.
I think I've just been misinterpreting it when we say that we share our experience, strength, and hope.
And what I'm going to share is the experience of what my life felt like.
This is.
This is through the prism of my experience.
And I discovered that different people were having a different experience at the same time.
And, you know, I was with my mom and sister a few years ago when we were talking about a seminal family event that happened.
And as we talked about it, I was describing something completely different than they were describing.
And it's like listening to a piece of music or looking at a piece of art.
And we see it.
We see it differently.
And we experience it differently.
And we take different things away from it.
In part, when we say that a guy like me has a disease of perception that often what I was seeing is not what was happening.
And a spiritual experience is often described as being awake.
Being awake.
Seeing things as they really are.
Beginning to be able to see my life both as I'm in it today.
But I begin to look back at my life.
And I see it differently than I saw it going through it sometimes.
You know, I went to.
In fact, the second time that I ever saw my dear friend Butch and Kevin and my friend Eric who's speaking somewhere else up here tonight.
I went down to Myrtle Beach to a conference.
And they happened to be down there.
But my host and I had spoken on the phone a number of times before I was going down there.
And we'd never met.
So we were going to.
He was going to pick me up at the airport.
And when I got there, we couldn't connect.
We couldn't find each other.
And we're on our cell phones.
And he said, Steve, I'm right over.
We're here by, you know, baggage carousel number six.
And I said, well, you can't be, man.
I was just there.
And he said, no, I'm right there.
And I said, well, you can't be.
I'm right there.
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