Physical Allergy and Mental Obsession – Awakening Workshop – Part 3 of 18 – Local AA Speakers

Okay. All right. So welcome to our third week of the Big Book Awakening workshop. Our homework this week was all a Bill's story. Did everybody get it done? Who did not get it down? Wow. That's really good because we had two assignments. The writing wasn't that much as far as writing the questions, but yes. we were doing first and second part first and second part okay three points to bring up tonight first thing is how many of you are not getting the weekly email how many of you that are not getting the monthly email did not register on the website okay i am in a mood tonight so it's really important that you register online so if you go to bba works so all of you just write this down bbaworks.com and then if you click on audio no i'm sorry click on workshops i'm just trying to go by memory and then our workshop mine and Pat and Shakira's workshop is listed as the first workshop if you scroll down just a little bit you'll see a form where you can fill in your name your phone number and your email address once you do that it automatically puts you on a list through MailChimp and we send out a weekly email to everybody that's registered for this workshop and it's really important that you do because we don't have any other way to communicate with you guys throughout the week when sometimes you're here sometimes you are not but we have a way to communicate with everybody if everybody is registered it doesn't cost anything just do it so if you haven't registered please do also if you have registered and that goes for all those people on Zoom too and those of you that are out of the San Diego area just make sure that you go to the website and i think most of you have because otherwise you wouldn't be zooming in so i'm assuming that most everybody yeah it takes two seconds exactly just to register and it's really important like i said if we have something really important to tell you we want to let you know and last week it was important to let everybody know that we were doing um bill's story first part and second part so um the homework will be listed on there once a week and then we'll recap some stuff and um it's just our way of communicating with you so please make sure that you do that really easy you can actually do it from your phones right now if you wanted to so super easy as everyone doing that it's easy all right um the other thing i wanted to bring up is um our zoom and i am super excited about this i i can't even tell you how excited it is exciting it is to have people outside the san diego county zooming in and us doing this workshop with people not only from out of the state but also from out of the country so we have people that are like waking up at like 2 a.m. and some people staying up to midnight just to zoom in and do this workshop because people are really wanting to do this work what this what zoom is not for is for those of you that live here in San Diego and so we just Pat and my Pat coming from North County me coming from Lakeside and Shakira coming from San Diego, we don't, we are not going to come here to put on a show for everyone to watch from their living room online. If we did that, then you know, we would have no one here in the room. So we if you are here in San Diego County, and you can't make it one week, it's not a problem, we are going to upload the recordings. So you'll be able to listen to us online, not the video recording, but you'll Be able to Listen to our recordings like we normally do our workshops from so you'll be able to listen you know and get caught up but you won't be able to watch us live from san diego you don't get to sit in your living room and do it and and we're not what we're just not gonna do that does that make sense to everybody you're you're gonna have a much better experience by per by being here in person the people from out of the state and out of county and out of country don't have a choice they have to do it this way but you don'T So we hope that you can attend when you can't attend. I understand people get sick, that happens, but then listen to the recording, all right? And then you'll get the email that'll let you tell you about the homework too. Also, I wanna also reiterate your step partner, step buddy, your sponsor, your BBA sponsor, whoever it is that you're working with. Is there anybody here who is still not paired up? Someone called you today? Okay, someone called Wayne today? There they are. Okay, they just connected. That's so cute. Okay. All right. So she's who I paired you up with. Anybody else that does not have someone to go through the work with? There's still time if you're new. If tonight's your first night, you have to have, in addition to having your big book, your big awakening workbook and all the writing material, You have to have a step study buddy, a step-study partner, or a BBA sponsor, whatever it is. You have that in order to go through the work. And it's really, really important. Just coming to this workshop, I mean, Pat and myself and Shakira can't express enough how important it is that you, in addition to doing this workshop that you also meet with your step-study partner or step-steady buddy. Is everybody doing that? And I want you to also know, too, that that person's taking time out of their day and they're, you know, out of Their Life to work with you. And I hope that you respect the time that they are doing that for you and, you Know, to take time out Of Their Work Week or Their Personal Life to work With You. And so respect that time. You know, same thing with your sponsor, right? You would respect the Time With Your Sponsor. respect that time with your partner if they say that they're going to meet you here at six o'clock be here at 559 you know um you know what i'm saying so just just try it try to be respectful in that area you'll have a much better experience doing the work and working with somebody and meeting with them once a week in addition to just coming to the workshop because just coming to the worship you're not going to have the experience that we want you to have going through this work. Capisce? Everybody good? Okay, good. All right. So with that said, Pat and myself and Shakira, we are going to make it official that we will end this workshop at or before 830 every Tuesday night. We're not going to go over. You win! You guys win. And I get it, you know. And as much as we'd love to keep going on and on, but we are gonna end it at 830. And so what we're going to do tonight is we're going to be really, really diligent about making sure that at 8.05 we're gonna stop our speaking and we're gong to give all of you including our Zoom people on watching us online the opportunity to share. I have this really cool little speaker here that works with Bluetooth. I'm so excited. So super excited with all my little gadgets. So we'll be able to hear people from somewhere else share as well tonight. So we're going to give you that opportunity tonight. So I'm going to go over last week's doctor's opinion really quick, and I just want to reiterate how many of you understand or feel like you understand what the physical allergy is? Does that make sense? how many of you like can like really feel like you who here does not doesn't really maybe understand what the physical allergy is or what that feels like okay so we have all alcoholics and addicts in this room that's great how about anybody on zoom anybody all right so going over the physical allergy and what that looks like is that when i put alcohol into my body when i Put drugs into my body i break out into a craving for more when we look at the set aside prayer. The set-aside prayer, the first part says my physical craving after I start to drink. I don't have a physical craving before I start zu drink. I have a physical craving AFTER I start du drink. Now that physical craving, alcohol can last in your system for what 24 or 48 hours so when you wake up in the morning and you feel like you need a drink the alcohol is still in your body the physical craving is still is still acting out right? So I could still feel that physical craving. How many morning drinkers do we have here? All right. Yes. Morning drinkers. All right, right? That feeling of ease and comfort that I got in the morning when I'd wake up and I'd have a drink just so I can get through, just so i would stop shaking first of all, but that's the physical craving, so when I'm sitting in a meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous and I hear someone who says that they've got 30 days or 40 days and they say that they're craving a drink. It's just semantics, right? They're not physically craving a drink, they're obsessing over the drink and we'll talk about the physical obsession in a couple, about next week or the week after next, we'll start getting into the physical, I'm sorry, to the mental obsession but the physical craving is something different and the big book is very clear on stating that I must have this to be considered the real deal. Dr. Silcor says I musthavethisphysicalcraving, right if i have a three-part disease it's physical we've heard that mental and spiritual right i know what the mental obsession feels like i know i understand i have a spiritual malady we'll talk more about that later in step one but most importantly i have to have this physical addiction this physical inability to to digest alcohol like normal person this physical addition to alcohol and or drugs or whatever it is in order for me to be the real alcoholic or the real addict? Does that make sense, right? I have to have that. And it can look different in anybody. When I put alcohol into my body, do I get a sense of ease and comfort, right, immediately? Do I need that sense of peace and comfort in order for me to, you know, for me, ease and comfort is that first two or three drinks, and then I can't control the amount that I drink once I start we'll look at control in a little bit too but I can't I have no ability whatsoever when the physical addiction is on for me to control the amount that I drank once I started or for me to control what I do I lose all ability to to think and do responsible things like does being strangely possessed by alcohol makes sense like i i made it right i made i made a decision okay this time i'm only gonna have two drinks i'm gonna go to the bar and i'm just gonna have two drinks and i am not i'm not gonna black out i'm like i could like i can control that i'm not gonna block out and i're not gonna go home with strangers and it always turned out that way right pitiful and comprehensible demoralization all the time and I couldn't understand why I couldn't mentally control this I couldn'T understand why didn'T have the ability to like what like to keep myself from from having a blackout but I DIDN'T what I DIDNT understand was that I had a physical inability to to digest alcohol like say a normal person could like my husband. Why is it that he can drink? Why is it that some people can have one or two drinks every single night for their whole lives and never acquire the physical allergy? I think that's the million dollar question. I don't know. Some of us may be predispositioned to have this physical allergy some of us come from parents or you know or someone down the line that might genetically have been passed this down to me. I know for a fact that my dad's an alcoholic you know he's still practicing and he's almost 80 years old and and it's it's really really sad I think what happens after a certain age if you don't get help it's just kind of hopeless you know and I don't know I haven't seen it and in him and I know I don' want to believe it either but um it's not hopeless I know but anyway that's another personal opinion that I'll talk about another time for another venue, not this one. Anyway, but I have to be able to see does that physical allergy break out in me? Do I break out into a physical craving for more? Right. And everybody understands that. And I think it's really important to see where Dr. Silkworth was coming from, that no, I'm beyond human aid. No human power can relieve this physical addiction that I have on this, this inability to control what I do once I put alcohol into my body. See, I don't have the physical craving until the alcohol is in my body, so for all of you who are sitting here who have more than 48 or 72 hours of sobriety and you want to drink, you're not craving it, you'RE obsessing over it. Does that make sense? Right? You're craving the drink in the morning when you wake up because you still have alcohol in your system and you need more alcohol, right? Got to get it going on, right? In order for me to start feeling better, then you get that sense of ease and comfort. do you know normal people who drink don't feel that way do you know that even if they've tied one on and drink just as much as you the night before when they wake up in the morning if they do have a Bloody Mary they're not like doing it to overcome a physical addiction they're just doing it because I'm doing it at least that's what my husband said well you're having a Bloody Mary so did I he'd just stop at one but then I couldn't stop at once I couldn'T understand that I think it's really important to be able to see people who dream normally I really do I think it's like if you don't have an Al-Anon in your life you should get one because it's really cool to be able to see how they drink or like a normal drinker you know it's fascinating it really is fascinating it's been great for me it's been like a study for the last 13 years watching you know my whole family besides my son and I we're the lucky ones I watch my whole family alcohol just isn't important they have a beer and drink a half of one I don't see a physical addiction they dodged a bullet my husband's a normie and so are my daughters so far you know it looks that way right now but I'm not that way I have this physical addiction and this physical allergy that when I put alcohol into my body I break out into a physical craving for more and if that's where you feel that you are and that's what you feel you have then you're sitting in the right room and we're going to go through this work and you're the whole idea is to show that i am hopeless when alcohol is around but there's hope for me by doing this work going through this process and building a relationship with the power greater than myself that that um us us together will be able to have each one of us will beable to have our own experience in this work and um you're in the right place you too online so with that said we're gonna say the set aside prayer step one about and then we're going to read my physical craving and then we're gonna go into a five-minute meditation all right God please enable me to set aside everything I think I know for an open mind and a new experience help me see the truth about my physical craving after I start to drink. All right, can we get those lights? Can I have you hit those lights back there? Nathan, did you have your... Yep, got it right here. You got it? Okay. Here I come. Can you stay? Raise your hands. Oh. Shh. I don't know. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Satsang with Mooji Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. I love you. Satsang with Mooji Thank you. Okay, all right. Shakira, are you up? Oh, good evening family. How's everybody doing? I'm Shakira. Grateful to know that I'm a Dofaholic. You know, and it's wonderful to be here. You know as I was driving here this evening, I know when my higher power is in the car with me, this warm feeling came all over me and i thought you know what i love leanne i love pat i love my life i love what i'm doing you know i've been coming here a couple of years now and i started speaking with pat and leanne about a year ago hey i want to work with you guys and help facilitate this workshop and here i am man this feels good okay so you know I've been around the rooms of Alcoholics Anonymous a number of years and I've read the big book of Alcoholics Anonymous a number of times but it was all an exercise in a plethora of theories and concepts and none of it made sense to me. I certainly couldn't feel anything, I couldn't identify you know and Bill's story how could I identify with a guy who's living back in the 1930s who's a white straight guy who married he's an alcoholic and I'm an African-American revolutionary living now and I am a crack addict, you know, and I m a lesbian. So how can I relate to what this guy is talking about? So it was through the process of coming here to this workshop and listening to this woman Leanne and Pat, you know share about Bill's story taking the narrative the statements and converting them into questions and I would have to ask myself did I think like that? did I feel like that? And as we went through that process, I found that I had more in common with Bill W., okay, than I thought possible. Okay, as a matter of fact, the story is quite fascinating, don't you think? Here's a guy who's just, he manifests the spiritual malady from the very beginning, right? He had this feeling of inferiority, right, he was unsure of himself and like me he was addicted to fear I could identify with that from a small child I mean my first addiction was fear I couldn't imagine existence without fear I feared everything that you weren't going to like me that you might like me too much that you wouldn't even know that I existed on the planet that I wasn't adequate enough all of these fears beset my life and when I read this guy's story and I'm looking at him and he's in high school and he is this tall thin guy, and I was kind of like me. I was real skinny, right? I started identifying with what he's feeling now. This feeling of just deep, profound inadequacy. I don't fit wherever I go. I'm just out of kilter with what's going on. I haven't found my rhythm yet, okay? And he tried out for sports. He didn't fare well there. You know, he did well academically. That was also me, right but i felt isolated and not a part of and then when he went into the military and he excelled there he was a born leader right he became a lieutenant i'm not sure what military branch he was in wherever he was he did quite well there but then when the fear set in right i noticed that he got out of the military and took his first drink and it was at that time that he began to feel that sense of ease and comfort that we all want right okay so one felt good and then he went he goes to a party there's a social event and he's feeling self-conscious again I don't fit in man those cats are better than me you know just that inherent feeling of inferiority that I'm not enough that he not enoughness okay so he had one drink and then He started feeling like hmm yeah I'm coming up to size now. And then a second drink and then a third and on and on and on. And that was the beginning of this physical manifestation of the disease. Now it started with what? The physical malady and the spiritual malady, I'm sorry, that feeling of restlessness, that irritability, that discontent, never being satisfied with self, not ever being satisfied with anything that's going on in his life. Right. And that led to the mental obsession right and the mental obsessed session in turn led to um the physical the physical craving that sets in here um let's see okay so this guy actually was quite um successful as a stockbroker as an investor right he was able to make a lot of money but a part of our story, my story anyway, is that of being Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, right? I can do quite well. As a matter of fact, I took the bar exam and passed the first time around without taking a bar review course. And all of my friends are paying money and studying, and I'm popping pills and drinking black label beer. And then when I pass the exam, I go, man, wow, yeah, I really got it going on here. And I'm convinced that drugs and alcohol are quite positive and good, right? As a matter of fact, it expands the human mind. I believe that Bill had a similar kind of thinking going on here, right? Yeah, he would drink, get loaded, man, and come up with these bright ideas, and at first it would be successful, and then he'd do a nosedive right in the middle of success. He crashed into some type of depression or some typeof disappointment, and that scheme wouldn't go over. That's the story of my life, and I was able to see that finally i was able to identify with this guy right okay um he had a beautiful wife lois and lois i think was certainly a candidate for alanine right whatever she could do to support him through his insanity and madness she was there so when things were not working well for them in one location and i believe that was in vermont i'm not sure my my comrade pat is going to go into the details he's the expert here um they decided they were going to do a geographical change right so so they left in their little motorcycle sidecar and and lois is doing the driving right why do you think she's driving because bill is loaded on the sideline right what do they have packed man they got a tent a few clothes right and his business manual okay that was me guys i would go from state to state right i would move from georgia to florida from florida to new york okay and wherever i go things are going to change i'm going to be successful i'm gonna make the world great and ready for democracy, right? And I saw myself in all of these great and high places, right, and I had to continue to drink and use drugs to sustain that kind of fantastic fantasy thinking that was going on in my mind. And the more I drank, the more i became controlled by the drink and the drug. My addiction became progressively worse. That's a part of all of our stories, right it's certainly a part of bill's story right so he goes to this new location and he becomes an investigator there wherever he goes he's very he's a glib talker man they work on a farm they make about 75 for that month of work right okay and then they move on to another place because he has this idea that he needs to investigate general electric because they've got some stock in that particular company, and he easily makes friends, right? And he does the investigation, and he's successful there. But as soon as he's on the brink of success, again, his drinking causes him to plummet, okay, into destroying everything that he's earned at that time, right? So they make another move, and then another move. And wherever he goes, there he is. And he was a very sensitive, hypersensitive individual. He would write these love letters to his wife, Lois, who was right by his side saying, honey, I'm really going to give it up tomorrow. I'm going to stop next week. And that reminds me of what I would say to myself when my son was two years old. I'd say, well, I'M GOING INTO REHAB TOMORROW. AND THEN THE NEXT YEAR, REHABS TOMOR ROW, TOMOR-ROW, AND MY SON WAS FINALLY TEN YEARS OLD WHEN LAW ENFORCEMENT ACTUALLY RESCUED ME. AND I ENDED UP GOING TO JAIL, AND THERE WAS THE BEGINNING of some idea of what was going on with me okay do you see how are you guys relating to any of this by the way you're going to have an opportunity to come up and talk about how you can identify and relate to bill's story and i'm talking about a woman here now you see the differences right that i thought were there okay and it absolutely amazes me and and i know the reason for it and And that is that this is all divinely inspired. It had to have been that this man could write, think, talk about those feelings, those thoughts that an alcoholic like me would have some many, many years later, later on down the road. Right? Okay. This guy was so strange. Okay. He decided that there were some things going on in Cuba and that if he went to Cuba to invest in the sugar cane industry, he'd really come up. Okay, now this is going to blow you guys away. Guess what? Right out of law school for me, one of my goals was to go to Cuba and to meet Fidel Castro. I felt that if I learned something about communism and socialism, then I could come back and make democracy work in America. Is that insane thinking? Yeah. I have to laugh at myself okay I didn't know that part of Bill's story but Pat last year when I took the workshop told me about this book pass it on and I recommend it very highly and in reading this book I came across that what this fool goes to Cuba and he's loaded man the whole time that he's there and he starts making some in rows and he is on the precipice of making some success and he blows it again the story of my life can anybody relate to this oh my god okay um so these guys were kind of like gypsies um moving around in this little uh motorcycle with the sidecar with the 10 in it in this book going from place to place all right um let's see okay So we talked about Cuba. The progression of the disease looks like this. Bill genuinely wanted to stop, but he couldn't. He tried every imaginable remedy, but kitten okay so finally he ends up in town's hospital where dr william d silkworth is the director of that that particular program there he's a neurologist and dr silkworth gives him this this notion that hey man you know you gotta this is uh a serious deal here there is not very much hope for you um but if you can have a spiritual awakening okay then there there's perhaps a chance for you he talked about this physical allergy that once you start you can't stop so Bill says well oh man I'm smart I'm armed with self-knowledge now so I can lick this thing I know what to do now so he and Lois they start celebrating this windfall because he's armed with self- knowledge right well oh boy was able to stay clean and sober I think a month was it a month, maybe two months, something like that. And then when he succumbed to alcohol one more time, he felt totally and completely defeated. He felt like an abject failure. And he was just out of his wits. What can I do now? And I believe it was at that point that he met Ebi Thatcher, who had met this other guy, Roland Hazard, who Had been familiar with the Oxford group. And they shared information. He was clean and sober for a short period of time, relapsed one more time, which also is a story of my life. I used to call myself a chronic relapser, and this old-timer who's not alive now, she's written a couple of books. A black lady, Chaney Allen, she said to me, Shakira, go on up to LA. It's some women up there at a conference called Miracle of Women, And maybe you can hear something there, you know, that can help you because you don't have to keep coming in and out of the rooms of Alcoholics Anonymous. And I was able to go to that conference and surely enough, something miraculous happened for me. I just had a spiritual awakening. I just started crying uncontrollably and I just felt like the weight of the world just kind of like melt off of my back. And that was one of many spiritual experiences that I've had. with Bill W he went back to town's hospital one more time ready to die at that point he just felt like hey there's no hope for me I'm a loser here the failures had stacked up and accumulated to the point whereby he felt completely and totally hopeless and then all of a sudden he decided to fall on his knees and pray and he said if there is a God show yourself to me now and something very miraculous happened for Bill W. at that point he felt this warmth come all over him and this light just radiate the room and he felt all of a sudden okay and comfortable in his own skin for the first time in his life and it was at that part that he felt like hey man I'm gonna live after all, there is a God. And I found that God. That was the spiritual awakening that separated Bill W. from active addiction. And from that point forward, he lived for the purpose of being of service to others, of helping other alcoholics and addicts, just like Dr. Silkworth had helped him. Just like Ebby Thatcher had helped him. Thank you for letting me share. So I hope you guys enjoyed that. That was incredible. Wow. You know, I was debating on how much history to go into tonight. I mean, I always usually talk about the history And it was like God was pushing on me hard to back off a smidge on the history. I mean, we'll talk about the history, but if you really want to know the history... I'll show you guys. Can you see the title? You guys got it? Okay, good. Pass It On. It's one of the AA approved books, and this is the story that Shakira is relating to. and it is a great um jumping off place for the history of aa what happened in bill's life what happened in ebby's lifewhat happened in roland hazard's lifewhathappened in shep's life what happenedin um a lot of the sam schumacher how did he get connected up and where did harry tebow show up and all these other guys right tybo tebow always get it squared i wonder how pronounce it is it typo tebow that's what i thought so but the idea behind it the history is good but this isn't about knowledge it's not about knowledge and the thing that was impressed upon me like just you know in working through it a little bit was i want to identify with the progression of this disease and i think that's what bill was you know really getting at and saying you know he's telling a great story but the idea behind it was can you relate to what was going on shakira you did a great job i mean bill bill was from an early age you know i liked the guy but i could also see how everybody in the world hated the guy i mean he was one of those polarizing kind of people either you liked them or you hated them and that was the way it was in the rooms of aa all his life you know he'd get an idea in his head and he would drive that thing until people wanted to shoot him and he wouldn't ever back off and i don't know about you did you guys keep on working an idea way beyond its good measure till you just drove it into the ground and it still didn't work and you kept on resuscitating it and trying to make it work i think it's sort of an alcoholic tendency it's an addictive tendency to not give up on our brainstorm because this next time it is going to work right and when we do that it's the same thing with the drug or the alcohol we're not going to give up upon it next time i'm going to get back what i so loved about it a long time ago so in his story there are some key moments i mean do you remember times early on in your drinking or using where there's a little voice in the back of your head is going man i think this is not going the way i wanted to go i had to back the heck out of this i really oughtn't to be doing this and not because somebody told you not to not because you know it was wrong but because there's some little voice in your head that says, this is going to end up taking me to a place I don't want to go. Anybody ever have that? I remember that hitting me when I was 14. And occasionally it'd show up and I had lots of experiences where outside people would tell me, you're an alcoholic and you better go get some help. That started at 16, 17, and 18 and I didn't get sober until I was 43. So I tried a long time. Some of us that have harder stories in terms of using didn't have the luxury of trying to last till 43. And they come in their 20s or earlier. My wife, one of her best friends, got sober when she was 14 years old. Started using when she Was 12. She's still sober today. Black belt in the steps, knows this deal, recovered, wonderful. But she had two years of using about killed her. So it's not about time. It's not a matter of time. not about the quantity it's about whether or not you and i have this thing called the allergic reaction in the mental obsession now there's a lot of other things that you'll hear in the rooms that says well that's an alcoholic mind well a lot people have a lot crazy ideas it's not limited to addicts and alcoholics the fact that bill wilson develops a boomerang in vermont and he gets into the you know the atlas for you know the almanac for great things to have accomplished and because he was you know really a good investigator insecurities and stocks and bonds and people would listen to him and and he would have great success that doesn't make bill an alcoholic the fact that he wouldn't give up on an idea and would keep on pushing and pushing and pushing and that doesn't make bill an alcoholic none of that the fact that he was insecure as a kid and tried to overcome insecurity with way over-the-top performance to his detriment does not make bill and alcoholic now that's a lot of his story that he goes into from pages one through eight he talks about what it was like when he was in the military what it was like to be the leader among his troops sounds like he's like a you know leader of the entire army in in europe well he's ahead of six guys and he never saw action and he almost got killed because the little training exercises they're doing in the coast of france about blows him up you know and he's supposed to be his spotter and they're supposed to practice in this this artillery shell thing right and they're shooting off this cannon and bill's watching the thing coming in and it's getting too close and he throws down the goggles and he starts running for his life out of the way because the guys that he was supposed to train and how to shoot the thing blew it and they almost blew him up that's bill's wonderful leadership skill all right so What's the point? The point is he has a lot of flamboyant, crazy stories. Do you ever hear those in the rooms of AA? It's called a drunk-a-luck. And the confusing thing for somebody trying to figure out whether or not they're an alcoholic or not is that if they don't have the same flamboya story or they didn't have the same crazy DUI experience or the same jail experience or the same waking up in the wrong airport and the wrong town experience or the wrong wife or whatever else was going on. Gosh, maybe they're not an alcoholic and they're confused in the rooms. In the rooms where they're supposed to be seeking recovery. So what Bill weaved in his story is the progression. When it started out, alcohol was Bill's friend. he's insecure at the party just before he heads off to france and he's seeing white linen cloth and crystal chandeliers and crystal goblets and he seen silverware that he's never seen he's seen butlers with white gloves i relate to that because i grew up on the other side of the tracks and i never saw any of that shit i remember being at my first uh awards thing when i was in sales and I won this award and there are four forks on one side. There's a spoon on the top of the plate and there's three knives on the left or the right, whatever it's supposed to be. And I am panicked because I don't want to make a fool out of myself and I don' t know which damn fork or what to use and people are looking at me like, well you should know all this. And I was totally insecure. Thank God for alcohol. Right? So when we're insecure and we're in fear, what do we do? We use. Right? That's what we do. That's where Bill did. That's why he discovered alcohol. That's when he discovered alcohol and he found that it did for him what he couldn't do for himself. It filled a void deep down within that said I'm not enough. I'm spiritually sick, I don't know what's wrong with me and I need something to fix me. Alcohol fixed Bill for a lot of years. gave him the moral courage gave him the competitive edge gave him the inspiration to dream great dreams did that do it for us for a while in our drinking and using for a little while for a wild maybe some of us don't even have that part of the story some of them say no it took me to a dark place from day one it never got better so again the story behind the story doesn't matter what matters is for Bill it started out as this is great and it was on the fringe of bill's life it wasn't on the middle he didn't go to the party and say i gotta get a drink it was wow okay i'll try a drink that sounds whoo that was great i think i'll trying another one blacked out the first night then he goes over let's see good then then he going over to europe and he's at winchester cathedral real famous spot and he's scared to death you know he doesn't know if he's going to be assigned to the front lines the back lines sidelines what he doesn'T know and I've never been to war but people that I talk to it is it's not as glamorous as Hollywood makes it out to be and the realness of life and death hits and he'S scared to DEATH he goes out into the cemetery behind the church and he sees this tombstone with the guy's name, not quite the same spelling as his buddy back in Vermont, Ebi Thatcher but he sees this little tombstone with Thomas Thatcher's name on it and it's the Hampshire Grenadier everybody got that in the book? Remember that? The Hampshire Grenadiere that term is the Navy seal of the day Hampshire Grenadyer is the badass mother effing soldier that no one wants to mess with it's the when everything else is going to shit this is the group that you bring in the hampshire grenadiers these guys are legendary and the story of this particular hampshire grenadier is he died because of drinking not because of shooting not because a military action but he literally died from drinking Ominous warning that Bill failed to heed. So then it goes on and he gets back and he has some setbacks early on when he tries to go out and make his living. And his ego's offended and so he keeps on trying and trying and starting to get some success and drinking becomes more and more and more the mainstream of Bill's life. Yeah? Oh, does it? all right let's see actually in this up in the top you have to sort of push on the side of the behind the speaker sorry guys no no it's good and so bill is having a level of success he starts connecting up and now i'm going to pick up on the book what's if everybody's got their book on page i'm just going to be highlighting a couple places and we're going skip around a little bit but bill ends up on wall street on page three of his story and he starts having some success and i'll spare you all the detail but the bottom line is this bill makes it loses it bill makesit loses it they'll makes it and loses it but the bottom line behind that isn't the setbacks it's that his drinking which was not daily becomes daily his need for the drink that used to be it was helpful became a requirement and his ability to choose when and where he would drink became less and less In fact, what used to help him out ended up costing him. And he was highly successful. He wasn't like a little bit successful. He was highly stressful on Wall Street. But he kept blowing himself up. And the one common denominator among three huge opportunities was from his employer. And the employer said to Bill, You're on. We believe in you. Don't drink. we're going to give you an expense limit we're gonna give you all the options all the opportunities you need in the whole world just don't drink and three times Bill could not pull that off he drank he drank in the most inopportune time when it was everything against him to do so and he drank anyway any of you have the experience of you swear it off because of all sorts of opportunity. You swear it off because of the right relationship finally coming. You swear off because you finally got part of your health back or whatever else is going on and you picked up again. That's that mental obsession side. See, the mental obsession doesn't respect your goals. It doesn't expect our dreams. See, the idea behind alcoholism is that it is coming and it is out to do one thing and one thing only in our lives and that's to kill us. It will kill us emotionally. It will killed us with relationships. It will kills us financially. It will killing us with spirituality but ultimately it's gonna kill us physically. It's gonna take us to the grave. That is the goal of alcoholism. It is a progressive disease and Bill's ability to fight back. Bill, when the stock market crash happened, he was in a spot where he had absolute defiance and disgust for all the people that were showing signs of fear. Supposedly jumping out of the windows. They're gone. They're emotionally crippled. They are devastated. Their financial house in ruins and they have no way out. And Bill's answer was, he goes to the bar and drinks. Pound in the bar, and goes, that's not me. I'm broke now, I'll get it back. All of it. And damn if he didn't do it. The following spring, he's got more money than he did before. He goes up to Canada and pulls it off. Guess why he's let go when he's up in Canada? Only thing is, the guy says, I will back you, but you can't drink. Bill pulls it together for four months. and in four months time he gets back all the money he lost in the New York Sox crash and he drinks and his employer says you're gone Bill comes back and he has one more trip one more opportunity and this one was unbelievable and the only thing he had to do is again not drink and he couldn't pull it off and he had sworn off to Lois I won't do it anymore he goes out on a road trip and at the road trip they're at the hotel and these engineers and Bill are sitting around and the engineers are passing around a bottle of Jersey Lightning Apple Jack and Bill says God I've never had Apple Jack I gotta have some Apple Jack and this was late in the evening because earlier in the morning he was swearing it off the third time around the group he takes a swig and taking the swig he nullified the contract that he had with his employer which was a huge percentage of ownership in an unbelievable opportunity that would have set he and Lois up for life not for a few years not for many years, not for months for life and for the sake of his for life goal the drink nailed him again it has no prisoners if you're the real alcoholic the real addict there is no prisoner it will kill you it will do the same it will not kill me why do you think that we sit around here and do this work and take other people through the work and continue to do the work ourselves and continue to do 10, 11, and 12 continue to force up inventory continue to look at areas of agnosticism in our lives it's because I know to the innermost core of my being that this disease will kill me and any kind of spiritual health that i have today any kind of moral integrity that i had today any kinda relationship consistency that i have the day is one drink away from complete devastation because i and not like others i can't use or drink like a gentleman building and here's in here's the pit The second half of Bill's story, this guy is desperate. He finally meets up with Silkworth when he's absolutely devastated and Silkworth tells him the truth about what's going on. This is before Silkworth says you're going to die. Silkworth actually thinks that the first time Bill, Bill goes into the hospital four times from 1933 in April to finally getting sober in December of 1934. So a year and what? Six months, eight months. four trips the first trip he is completely devastated and he knows that he's he's trashed and his brother-in-law puts him in the richest wealthiest very very very fancy town's hospital town's is betty ford clinic on steroids it's casa palmera on steroids i mean it is freaking And it's the life. I mean, it's really the place. And he meets Silky. And Silky starts doing the treatment, castor oil to puke him out, belladonna treatment to sweat out all the other stuff in him, and starts talking to him. And Silty's trying all sorts of methodologies, and he hasn't figured it out. Remember last week we were talking? Silkworth, what was his success rate? Does anyone remember? 2%. And what period of time? 34 years. silky's at two percent or 34 years that's his success rate but he has hope for bill because bill desperately wants to get better with every fiber in bill's body silky runs him through the process takes him out bill goes out comes back in devastated and he's getting hit by this mental obsession and silky is telling him on this visit two and three listen mental obsession physical allergy, progressive, you're going to die unless you get a handle on this thing. And you got to adopt this moral psychology we're trying to give you. Try again, try again, try again. And it didn't work. And the fourth time in, Silky says to Bill, the fourth time, actually the third, excuse me, the third time, third time in Silky said to Bill and to Lois, your husband's going to Die. He's going be locked up. He is going to die from dt's or he's going to go wet brain insane that is bill's future bill doesn't walk out of the hospital this time with any hope at all he knows he's gonna die he's hopeless and then he meets ebby and bill's thinking through all this stuff and i'm sort of playing around sorry a little bit but he's he's thinking threw this mental obsession and sticking through that's physical allergy and he goes he gets a call from Ebby and Ebby says Bill you know me, five years ago you and I opened up an airport that wasn't supposed to be opened up we took an airport jag and we landed in Manchester airport and we had the townspeople come out with a band and then they realized that we were the wrong guys and they're all upset and we're upset but we sure had a heck of a time didn't we? Can I come over and see ya? Yeah come on over Bill on the table has got a jug of some vodka and some, what was it? I can't remember the juice. I want to say, I don't know, not lemonade, but something. I can only remember. What was it, Seminole? I've got it in my mind, but it doesn't matter. Anyway, he's sitting there, and Bill looks at Ebby's eyes, and a year and a half of Dr. Silkworth is in Bill's head. mental obsession, physical allergy, don't touch the drink. And Bill can't pick it up, he can't put it off, and he's dying. He literally knows he's going to die, he's hopeless. And he looks at Ebby and he goes, God, whatever you're doing, it worked. So now I'm going to fast-track what Ebby said to Bill and then we're going to open it up for Sharon. And here it was. Ebby says, Bill, I was just like you. I literally couldn't stop and they were going to lock me up and I ran into a buddy that had come up to see me while I was still painting and shooting up the side with pigeons. His name was Roland Hazard. Roland Hazerd got sober in 1931. 1931, so he shows up, and Roland says, Ebby, I was just like you, and I couldn't stay sober either. If you will do what I have done, I think it could work for you. So they convinced the judge to let Ebby go live with Roland. Roland takes him first to Vermont. Then he takes him on to New York City. Ebby ends up living with Sam Schumacher down at the Mission. And Ebby is desperate enough to try whatever they told him to do. You know what they told them to do? Get honest. Do some personal inventory. Tell the truth to yourself. Now tell it to somebody else. Admit complete defeat that on your own you couldn't do this thing. And then if you've harmed anybody when you're doing the reading to somebody else, you got to go make it right. You got to do some restitution. And then you've got to be of absolute service to somebody else without expecting or even wanting anything in return. You got go be of service to someone else. That's what Ebi was doing with Bill. And then Sam Schumacher told him, Ebi, you got a try and experiment. you've got to get in touch with god because if you think the inventory and restitution and serving others is going to do it on its own it's not you're not going to be free you know anybody like that dry drunks the only step to freedom was his spiritual contact with a power greater than yourselves and sam was so cool sam schumacher was a very devout christian and he didn't tell well, Ebi, you've got to adopt Christ as the center of your life. He did say I think it would work because it works for me. But he said to Ebi. He said, you got to try this grand experiment. Give everything that you know about you to whatever you know about the God of your understanding. And begin a relationship. Begin the building of freedom. That was the deal. That was the story. Progression of the disease, no solution, and we sit here in 2019 with all the answers. Bill had none of those answers and was desperately looking for them. Abby had noneofthoseanswers, was desperatelylookingforthem. And thank God they laid out this program for us. Thanks. Awesome. okay we're going to open it up for sharing so um keep your share on the topic of bill's story how you think drink and feel like bill you want to come out first I'm going to call on someone where's Campbell where is she come on and then we're going to call on somebody call on online on zoom okay hi I'm Campbell I'm an outage alcoholic um I can definitely relate a lot with Bill's story um it was really interesting to go through and kind of analyze it a little bit more in depth um than I ever had in the past um yeah I think something that I can relate with the most was um sorry I'm nervous um yeah so I can definitely relate with that kind of roller coaster that Bill talks about like ever since I was a kid I've always been very one track minded about different plans and ideas like oh this is it this is what I'm gonna do and just going after it full force until I kind of don't anymore and I'll just kind of go up and down and up and down and think that I have it all figured out and then crash it all to the ground again. But yeah, hearing his solution through the second half of it was super interesting and I don't know, I'm really looking forward to working with other people and just kind of continuing on that growth through helping others and yeah that's what i got thank you okay karen do you have someone do you Have someone who wants to share on zoom i i asked if anybody if anybody want to share because i asked them in the chat and nobody Come on, you guys. We're going to come back to you then. We'll come back to you. We'll go We'll come back to the Zoom. Okay? All right. Rich! Come on Rich. There you go. I'm rich and I'm an alcoholic. Rich! Yeah, I, you know, when I was a kid I never felt a part of not even my own family and, you know school the whole thing And, you know, when I picked up that drink, man, it fixed me. I was right. The whole world was right, and it lasted a long time. I had a good, you now. And so, you known, and then I remember even as she's my first, I was probably drinking only a year. I remember being out on a boat with this giant cooler full of beer and being out there for a couple hours and, like, reaching into the cooler and had to find a beer, and I just panicked, came over me. Like, you know, we're all the way out here in the liquor stores. And that was a year into it, and I knew this is strange. And then I became perilous for years, you see. And I knew I was perilous, and I would wake up in the morning just like Bill, you know, and know that this is the worst thing that I could do. And I'd be all day in work. yeah i'm gonna go to aa i'm going to quit and then like three o'clock would come and i just irritable and discontent i i couldn't wait to get to the liquor store and um and off and running i went and who knows where it was going to end and and then you know i and i you know that that god took that drink away and i know it was god because i couldn'T do it i tried all kinds of methods and just like bill you know I knew I was paralyzed you know when in the worst time Like, why would I drink right now when I'm ruining my life? But yet I would do it. And I knew, you know, God took me out of that. But see, I was still that same as I was when I was a little kid, irritable and discontent and not fitting in. And that's where, you Know, that's Where God Comes In. And, You Know, God Can Take Away The Drink. But, You know, He Also Has To, You Knows, You Knew A Second Step Is, YouKnow, He Can Take That Drink Away. But the third step, he also has to fix that irritable and not fitting in. And, you know, I fit in in AA. I fit it in with people like you. And I can share my life. See, I was a piece of crap. So if I shared about who I was, it was all lies. And today I could be honest and share who I am. I'm not a legend in my own mind anymore. And I'm okay just being who I am sometimes. And sometimes it comes out where that irritable discontent comes back again and it'll attack me when I'm alone, you know, and I don't allow that. The loneliness is very dangerous for me, but I know where I can get help. So thanks a lot. my name is cory i'm a crystal meth addict um you know i can relate a lot to um to bill's story um especially the parts where um just being uncomfortable being uncomfortable life but um i grew up you know in a very square family i mean i did everything right i i had good grades i finished my plate everything my Yes, ma'am. No, ma'm. It was totally like I was square. I was so boring it kills me today, but um All of a sudden, you know in college I turned to alcohol and it was just like wow magic was happening and For about five to seven years. This is like that magic kept happening and it's just nice it was good and I was able to to build a career and and um you know in this great you know the last big office job i had a corner office and um but i started using i started um shooting up crystal meth and um you know and my my boss was on to me all i had to do was take people to um out to eat and get them to use our company for our services that's all i have to do all i has to do is give them to buy in and i'm very good and very passionate about getting people to buy it because i'm a salesperson but um crystal meth just somehow took over i don't know how but um you know in in um you're not going to really relate to when bill would drink uh in those times when he had like something uh important coming up so i lost a lot of jobs because of that and a lotof times when i would um i would get um job interviews job interviews used to be my biggest trigger because i would have the job interview and i would say oh my god i'm getting ready to start this job let me go get this out of my system so i'm saying to myself that i have control let me go get the side of my sister because i don't want to take this into the suit job but as soon as i go relapse and put this in my system i can't stop and here i am starting this job and the same shit is happening over and over again and i can stop and uh you know and then my parents got onto me and so they're pleading with me please stop we'll pay all of your bills we'll cover everything if you will just please stop but i can't and there's no amount of my mom you know pleading with me or saying we love you everybody loves you it's just not enough so until i had to hit my absolute rock bottom and and come to you know but anyway i appreciate the work. Thanks. Are we doing online? Okay. Hi, my name's Nicole. I'm an alcoholic and hi. Um, and so, um, you know, how do I relate to Bill's stories is on page eight. Um the first paragraph it says no words can tell of the loneliness and despair I found in that bitter morales of self-pity quicksand stretched around me in all direction i hadn't met my match i had been overwhelmed alcohol was my master that was me i i didn't know how to not drink alcohol and i would show up to all these job interviews really drunk or i couldn't even get there because i got so loaded the night before you know and i with with all my heart i wanted to stop but i couldn t and I didn't know what was wrong with me. I didn'T know why, like normal people, they just, I'm just having one and then it's okay for me. I'M just like, who has one? Like, let's go all out, you know? Um, so when I wanted to stop, I really couldn't, and I didn' t know what WAS wrong with me. And so going on, Bill says, um, stumbling, I stepped out from the hospital, a broken man, fear soaked me, sobered me up for a bit. I have that experience, you KNOW, fear that, uh, you Know, if I don't get this job, then i'm not gonna have any money i'm gonna have a place to live so i gotta cut the crap for a little bit right now so it worked a little bit at the beginning but towards the end no i feared didn't do anything if anything i drank even more because of the amount of fear that i had and then so it goes on to say that um bill says um then came the insidious insanity of the first drink and so on Veterans Day, he was off again. He was drunk again. And that's me, right? So everyone became resigned to the certainty that I would have to be shut up somewhere. So like locked up in the ward or the asylum or whatever, you know, throw away the key. And let's see. He said that he would have be locked up somewhere, shut up or stumble along to the miserable end. And that's how i felt i was like i don't know what's going on with me but i just this is must be life you know that i just have to stumble along to the bitter end how dark it was before the dawn in real in reality that was the beginning of my last drunken spiel so that was for me for my last drunken spill i have met my match and i was just so miserable right and then he says that he was soon to be catapulted into what he'd like to call the fourth dimension of existence. And for me, that fourth dimension came along going through these steps and coming to these workshops and just experience that freedom. And here's a promise of the book about doing the steps. And Bill had this experience and so many others. And this was my experience. I came to the meetings because I just wanted to learn how to smile again. I just want it to have a normal conversation. i was the type of person i sit in here on me like oh my god don't look at me like nobody talked to me like this is so awkward i just wanted to be comfortable in my own skin you know that's that's all i wanted out of sobriety just you know and and if i'm gonna get sober might as well just do and make it worth it you know um so bill goes on to say i i was uh i was to know happiness peace and usefulness in a way of life that is incredibly more wonderful as time passes so that's my experience thank you applause anyone on zoom yes I can't hear you Kim I have three okay awesome can I turn the camera around so we can see you yes I'm going to unmute Jeff first okay Okay. This is so cool. Okay. Can you put the speaker next to the mic? Jeff, you're up. Hello everybody, it's great to be here. So anyway, yeah, what the part I related to in Bill's story the most was that self-knowledge wasn't enough for me. I was a chronic relapser. I was in four different rehabs. I tried to quit on my own and detox on my own. Oh, I forgot to say I'm an addict and an alcoholic. So I went to a lot of AA meetings. Not a lot, maybe 10 or so, over a 10-year period. So I learned a lot about, you know, the steps. I knew the steps one through three and four. And I had actually worked those. But I never tried to find a God of my own understanding, you know? So I had this knowledge that I had the mental obsession and the craving. I don't remember hearing about the spiritual malady that much back then. But it must have, you now, I must have. Actually, I don't think anybody even brought that up now that I think about it. When I finally went to my last rehab, I was like at the end of my rope. I just could not – I couldn't go back to doing what I was doing. I was in really bad shape. And I went to a rehab up in the mountains in the Redwood Forest. And it was six months before they'd allow me, you know, until I was able to leave. Until I felt comfortable enough to go to town and they felt comfortable enough for me to leave the property. So I took a class at a local city college and I was feeling good about myself. I was still feeling good About my program. I get in the car and halfway to the school, what do I do? I stop and I get a 16-ounce Budweiser. You know, further away from my last drink than I'd ever been, you know, stone cold sober, you know, and that's the insanity of alcoholism. And all I can attribute to that too is that the obsession was still there because I hadn't found a God that had relieved me of the obsession. So, all this stuff happened because I went back and told on myself at the rehab. And they wanted me to go through the whole thing all over again. And so I said no, and I left. And I went on this crack run down in L.A. And then finally decided I had to go back and try one more time. So I went up there, and... And I was going to leave again. it's a really long story I don't want to go through the whole thing but I ended up going out into the woods and just surrendering myself to what I discovered as my higher power at that moment the obsession was relieved of the obsession to drink and use right away the feeling was like better than any high I'd ever had in my life so all of a sudden the whole package came complete you know it all kind of uh came together and then the following weekend i went to a retreat and on the sunday morning speaker she said um she was speaking and all of a sudden it was my mom talking to me through her you know and uh it was it was the craziest thing i ever felt in my life you know so at that point i guess god had let me know that there is a god and that he's there for me and can help me in my recovery and help me make a life for myself and um and from that point on self-knowledge working the program and informing forming a relationship with my newfound newfound higher power saved my life at that point the only problem is after 10 years of being in the program i got away from it and um and my ego started to rebuild itself again and about a year ago i was a basket case again and that's when i decided to get back into the program i heard about bba listening to uh tastes on youtube you know and uh so um i'm feeling better already and uh and that that's all i got got to share thanks one more from someone on on zoom karen go one more yeah okay and tell them to introduce themselves lisa and have them introduce themselves and tell us where they're from. Okay Felicia you're up. Here she is. Felicia we can't hear you. Gotta get closer. Is she muted? No, she's not. We're not getting any sound from you, Felicia. Bye, Felica. Bye. No, no, no. Hello, Felice. Now I don't have any faith. Found recovery. Hello, Flicia. Well, we can't hear you, hon. I'm sorry. We'll go to somebody else, Carrie. Sorry, Felicca. Sorry, Felicia. So I have one more. I have Claudia. Okay. Claudia, are you ready? I'm ready. Can you hear me? Go for it. She's got the headset going. Claudia, recovered alcoholic. I am grateful to be here tonight. And I can so relate to Bill. Especially, you know, I knew that Bill was a very depressed soul. And I was depressed. I knew I didn't fit in when I was eight years old. I thought my parents adopted me as special so they could be mean to me. And I knew when I took my first drink at 17, I had arrived. And I could really understand what Bill meant. And, you know, I blacked out right from the beginning. And I just felt so loved by everyone. You know, I thought, gee, I finally fit in and I'm happy. And so for me, I think that happiness lasted for a long time and it kept me drinking. I was a spree drinker and I took pills to augment that if I couldn't get my liquor because I had just become reclusive. And then at the end, I didn't really, I couldn't stop drinking. And I was insane. I just wanted to kill myself. I knew the jig was up, but I didn' t know how to help myself. And I think that Bill and I had a lot of things in common. I went through this again, and I've been through this book many times. But I do love the BBA, and I'm grateful we're having this for alcohol. And I look forward to being here for the rest of the time. But I'm going to pass. I know we're out of time. Thank you. Where are you from? Oh, Claudia, where are you form? Ohio. Ohio. Oh, Ohio in the house. Yay. Thanks, Claudia. Thank you. Thank you, everybody. Leanne, we have a question. Oh, we had a question? Yeah. We've got one minute. We have one minute? All right. Go ahead. Let me see if I can. Terry, can you talk? Okay. Hi, I'm Terry. Hi, Terry. I'm from Southern California. hi terry hi uh question is um i wonder if leanne and pat could comment on how to apply craving to process addiction yes i'm an alcoholic and have other things situations going on but i'm trying to work this with clutter and uh if you've worked it with an alanon it may be helpful to understand what is the craving in an Al-Anon situation? Adrenaline. I think it's a, thank you, thanks Nathan. It's adrenaline. It's endorphins and adrenaline. The endorphines and adrenaline, I, I. Adrenalin, yeah. Does that answer your question, adrenaline? Adrenalina. Chaos. Well, yes. I think, I think what. alcohol is not in the system, the adrenaline doesn't, I mean the craving doesn't happen how does that reflect it? So you know what I'd like to do can you send me an email and what I would like to pass you on to someone who can help answer that question a lot better especially because I think we only have like 30 seconds right now left so can you sent an email to layarbor at gmail.com and then I'll make sure that I can forward it over to Nathan, and Nathan can help answer that question for you a little bit more thoroughly than I can. I don't think I would answer that, that question properly like someone else who has more experience than that, than me. Thank you. You're welcome. Thank you, thank you, all of you. Alright, that was awesome. Yay! Okay, so cool, you guys. Okay,so our assignment for next week is assignment five which is the first half of there's there is a solution pages 17 through 22 we're only doing one assignment all right so we're not doing that one right yeah and so please make sure that you meet with your step buddy the basket's going around for food please try to consider at least a two dollar donation so we can have this great spread um each week so we really appreciate it thank you and also helps pay for this room um any other announcements we'll see you guys tomorrow night let's close out in prayer yay 8 30 baby