Russell S. – Step Six – The Division Between Men and Boys – 2025

Good evening, gentlemen. I use the term loosely, of course. Charlie came up to me before the meeting started. He said, I didn't think you still do live meetings. And I said, well, look at this group. I don't think I'm breaking a streak. Man, I know some of you guys You've gotten old You make me feel so young I can't believe Tom Quigley, I haven't seen him for a while I don't know You must have 7,000 years of sobriety or something by now I don' t know what's going on with you So in any event, it's good to be here I'm an alcoholic and I haven' t found drinks Would you do me a favor Okay, thank you. You'll know. I'll tap you on the shoulder and haven't found a necessary to have a drink or have I since January 25th, 1981. I really think my real spiritual sprite day is December 25th 1980 but that's another story and maybe we'll go into probably not and I'm always left with this decision when I do a meeting like this, especially like this. do I tell you the truth or just take a nap and I'll tell you I could go either way at my age but anyway I think I'll say the truth I don't have to thank God one of the burdens that has been lifted from me for a while is the desire to or the need to have you like me which I think is it a more difficult burden than drinking? I think there are a lot of things that are more difficult than drinking. I think if you drink enough, you'll eventually come in here or you'll die. That's my theory. But there may be things worse than death and one of the things maybe worse than life is not ever living or being free or knowing heaven or knowing peace. it may be even worse as crazy as it sounds I just throw the crap out there just to piss you off wouldn't want you leaving here and not thinking about me it may be even worst to stay sober for 25, 30 years and not ever actually get it in other words just sort of like they say in the six step we never settle separate yourself from the boys That's where the great separation is. The sixth step says, you can tell the people that are separated because they're growing, they're doing anything to grow in the image and likeness of their creator, and they have an image and they have a likeness. It's not the God of their imagination. The God of my imagination always leads me to an imaginary sobriety. so um i'm in my 45th year and i don't uh like the old farmer's commercial he says uh we know a lot because we've seen a lot and i Don't really know a Lot I'll tell you what I've I've forgotten a Lot and uh you know it says we've got to get rid of old ideas I've gotten rid of a Lot you know this is the great thing about getting rid of Old Ideas when you clear out all the old ideas you can it's clear you can connect the dots and see things at 45 years i see things i never saw at uh 10 years or 5 years or 15 years or 25 years as a matter of fact at 40 i i see that i see things now that I didn't see last week. That happens, you know? You guys know about epiphanies when you first come in, everything's magical and everything, oh man, I'm not drinking, it's all so wonderful, but sometimes as you go up there, you know, in age, the wonder of it all, you're so trapped into the ballyhoo, you know what I mean? You know, the group, the cult, the family, the not drinking the going to the internationals with the 50,000, 60,000. I mean, you know, the whole wonder, the wonderful fellowship we have. But, you know, I think there comes a time, and I've seen it not only myself, I'm only talking about my experience. I've seen it not only in myself but other people that there comes a time and I think for most people the time comes at different times. You know, they used to have an old saying here, you know, that pop you hear in five years is your head coming out of your ass and everything like that. By the way, there's no strong profanity here, right? Strong. No strong profane. That's right. You know, if this was a front line in football telling me there's no strong sobriety, it's like a gaping hole that I can run through for a goal, but I'm going to be good because Sheldon gets upset. You know? And I used to have a wonderful sponsor for 20 years, John Glenn, who he sort of got upset when I used profanities. But the Apostle Paul used profanity. Some people, I guess it's the way he used it, some people use profanety to emphasize stuff with alcoholics. The Apostle of Paul says, I become all things for all men by using anything to bring them to Christ. And you know, the truth is, one of the problems with alcohols I think sometimes we make is we sort of hear the same thing over and over again, and we just like fall asleep. And we need, you know what do we need? We need like a cattle prod. we need somebody to say something that's why sponsors are so good they can translate a dry sort of deal in the big book into something that like slaps you in the back some of you guys are old enough all you guys remember that commercial with the guy slaps sometimes thanks i needed that sometimes you just need a slap you know what i mean something that just wake us up you know that kind of deal and so i'm probably gonna what i'm gonna do is i'm going to do something probably maybe a little bit different. I'm going to tell you about 45 years of sobriety and I'm not going to talk a lot about alcohol. I probably won't talk much, maybe three minutes about alcohol and the rest about the real disease. You know, I'm really an attorney and I've read a lot of books. As a matter of fact, I get paid by the word. But sometimes, like Billy Joel, you've got to leave a tender moment alone. And you know, if you ask me, I read the big book. I said it a million times, 12 and 12 a gazillion times. Dr. Bob, the good old guy, I'd read all these books. I had no problem reading the books. I tell you, I read them all and reading the paragraphs. But you know where I have a problem? I have an issue with I have problem with sentences. Sometimes you can read a book and say, oh yeah, I understand I've read the book a thousand times, but not quite understand a single sentence. We have a workshop every Saturday. I do a four-hour or four-and-a-half-hour workshop. And we'll read a lot of the big book. I'll throw in some scripture. We'll do different stuff. It's not really an AA thing. It's a recovery thing. And even though we read a Lotta stuff, I'll stop and I'll just say a sentence. Just a sentence. You know, Dr. Bob, and Dr. Bob is a good old time. It's a great book, and I encourage everybody to read it if you really want to know what AA is. I mean, not whatever they're doing these days, but the real AA, if you realmente want to know about that. You know the thing in the book where it says, rarely have we seen a person fail who has thoroughly followed our path? That was written in 1939. Their path was something that happened between 1935 and 1939. They weren't reading the big book, by the way. They were reading the Bible. Books they found absolutely essential were 1 Corinthians 13, Sermon on the Mount, and the Book of James. And if you asked Dr. Bob what his first things first mean, he'd say seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness. All things will be added unto you. Hey, don't blame me. You're entitled to your own opinion, not your own facts. Just tell New York to rip that out of one of those books, because I got that out-of-conference-approved material. That's what they were doing. Rarely have I seen a person fail who is thoroughly... Well, that's a sentence. rarely have we seen a person fail there is one who has all power all power, that one is God may you find him that's the sentence what the hell do you think they meant by that half measures of L is nothing what the heck did you think, that's a sentence let's just talk about that sentence half measuresofL is nothing unless you get rid of your old ideas the result is nil What does that mean? That's a sentence. Burn the idea into any alcoholic's life, you get well no matter anything, you know? As long as you trust God, clean house. What does dat mean? How about the last page? What does it say? It says, but we won't know you in the fellowship. You, Dr. Bobby, says, we can't be sure. God will determine that. But your real reliance has to be on him. He will even show you how to create the fellowship you crave. What do they mean by that? See what your relationship with him is writing. great events that's a sentence now you got to read a paragraph that's a sentence you'll meet some of us in the fellowship of the spirit what is the fellowship i know the fellowship may is all you need is a desire to stay sober it doesn't have to be an honest one what's the fellowship of the Spirit God is everything or he's nothing what the hell they mean by that you know what do they mean by these things it's like these all these sense so dr bob and dr bob the good old times when he went to 12-step clarence brewmaster clarenced snyder out of cleveland who started the first allegedly the first a group at least clarenc said that i think he was saying that after bill wilson died he said that but in any event so and clarency talked about his how dr bob 12-set people and dr bob what he says he came in and he's he's like 35 years old he's in a hospital bed and this is what dr bob says first line first line so what do you think about all this he says do you believe in god first line right out right out the gate so clarence says what you or i would have said well what does that have to do with it Bob says, everything. That's a sentence, everything, what the hell do you mean by that? You see we know paragraphs, we just don't know sentences. Well I guess I do, Dr. Bob says yes, nothing. You either believe or you don't believe. he says well i believe he says now we're getting somewhere that's the you know the big book it says no one has sunk so low not to be fortunately welcomed in aa as long as he means business what does he mean by that what do you have to be the main business and then and then when clarence said that he said okay now we get someone get out of the hospital bed and get on your knees, we're going to pray to God to have him come into your life. That's what they were doing before. That's where they were dealing. Really haven't seen the person who was thoroughly following my path. We're going pray to god. And then Clarence says this great line. I love this line. He said, I did what I was ordered to do. There were no suggestions. i mean generalizations are or are dangerous especially this one but pretty much what i've seen is the people that stay sober you know alcoholics our chief characteristic is defiant the peoplethat i know are going to stay sober i have a good feeling they're going to say sober are people that follow directions and don't argue i mean you can argue a little bit like we all do but i don't argue with you know i just tell them this is what you do this is what we do you know how about i sit here trying to convince you you know I mean the people that follow directions tend to stay sober and the people that say things well you don't understand or I'm different they carry on that bullshit you know this is like a self cleaning up every two years or so the alcohol comes through and just wipes out all the horseshit right they go to jail and they die or something like that until they're So that being the case, what am I supposed to say to a... And you know, what were they doing? Well, I'll tell you what they were doing. According to the doctor, they weren't handing out white chips. You just couldn't go to an AA meeting unless in front of everybody who was already in AA, you got down on your knees and you gave your life to God before the meeting. That's just a fact. I mean, if you really want to know what they're doing. I'll bet the meetings were a little bit... I'll think you didn't have a whole lot of people saying, well, if they had asked me to do that, I wouldn't have been here. They started off not on the first step. They started it off on the third step. But I suppose if you're an alcoholic and you'll get down on your knees in front of 10 or 20 people and give your life to God, I'd say that's a pretty good chance you've done the first steps. You probably could call the program drastic. I'm just starting off by just telling you a few things that I've learned in life and doing this thing, not to gain popularity. Dr. Bob was the guy who said to Bill Wilson, he said, let's not screw this thing up, let's keep it simple, because they both had sort of different programs. Bill had a program from Manhattan. and he was worried about people walking away and laughing at him and stuff like that, which we all do. You know, I'm pretty much a people whore. You know? I want to do. I want it planned. I want a compromise. I don't want people to think I'm weird or strange or anything like that. And Dr. Bob was unapologetic. The first AA meeting was Dr. Bob putting his foot on the dining room chair and reading Sermon on the Mount, Matthew 5, 6, and 7. Bill Wilson, meanwhile, was talking to Harriet, you know and he walked up to harriet he said i don't think we should talk too much about god or religion or anything like that harriet said the only reason you're sober is because of god if you won't talk about god you might as well be the rotary club now listen this isn't crap i'm just telling you stuff this is in the material you know if you want to read it you know it's in the материall i'mjust letting you know in case you're 20 years sober 30 years sober and you can't understand why you're still worried about money property and prestige and you're still worried about what people think. In other words, one of the things we do on Zoom is we have a lot of meetings. I call them beginner's meetings for old-timers. You know, when you first get, you know, you see things differently. My perspective changed between one year and five years. And it changed between five years and ten years. if I took a guy who had 10 years sobriety and I said has your perspective about yourself and life changed from when you first from when he had 5 years he'd say yeah, I said would you like to go back to 5 years oh no, that was terrible if I asked him at 5 years he said it was great now at 10 years, no 20 years, you want to go back to 10, no you grow up and you see things differently you know and and so that's that's the deal i just see i just see things different see when i first came in i went to all the internationals first five internationals all this stuff and i was i was the intergroup backroom chairman for two years in a row with clancy down and johnny harris and doing all this up and sponsoring everybody and talking and when i First came in i thought everybody stayed sober i mean you almost knocked my socks off when i saw a guy with 30 years pick up a A white chip. I thought once you're sober, you're sober. I mean sure you get these guys that have 30 days or something. I never could possibly imagine because everybody was sober. 50,000 people in stadiums this is unbelievable. Everybody's staying sober. You know 5 years everybody's staying sober. 10 years everybody's staying sober 20 years everybody stays sober you know. 40 years 45 years nobody's sober. I look around the rooms where all the guys have been 30-40 years you know and the guys with 30 40 years that i speak to now they call me up and they're miserable bill wilson in uh in the in the essay the next frontier emotional sobriety said i've known and he had 20 like 23 years at the time because he hit a second bottle bill wilston after the lsd and everything like that and i'm not putting them down this is stuff he wrote about himself that's kind of what he he wrote this he wanted to write this down he hit his depression he wrote down and what he said what he said was he says I've noticed that not only am I depressed and unhappy and I wrote the book but I've notice a lot of ulcers who passed the drunk sobriety test some of my physicals wife are not happy with their sobriete it's funny at three and a half years in the big book you said now and then a drinker says who's not drinking now says feel better look better have a better time we laugh at that We laugh at that stuff, that Sally. We know he's going to try the whole game again because he's not happy with his sobriety. Sooner or later, loneliness is what you do. But wish for the jumping off place. And he said that. What's really strange is he said dat three and a half, four years. And at 20 years, he was there. He was there, so you guys love the stuff he wrote at three and half years. You don't look at stuff he write at 23 years or 20 years or what was going on. You know, Dr. Bob saw it. So I, you know, sometimes, you start hitting that six-step division point, the one that divides the men from the boys, the men being the ones who are doing anything their whole life and spent praying and asking God to move any obstacle between them so they can walk in the image and likeness of their creator. and the guys who are just picking up medallions and staying sober and trying to manage their lives and keep their jobs get laid and all that sort of stuff take some more Viagra and stuff like that in the world and looking at the world there's a division that goes on somewhere along the line between Alcoholics Anonymous and the Fellowship of the Spirit which is quite frankly not only confined to AA it's in AA but it's also outside of AA so I digress so let me just tell you I'm going to tell you a couple I'm gonna spit you know along the line I got to speak around you know conventions and stuff like that and uh so I kept on one of the problems I had is when you got years of surprise you got all these stories and I think the secret is in the stories you know I mean I gave a little history and stuff like that. But what I always think is if you're going to do an AMI, you've got to tell on yourself. You've gotto tell stories because the answer is in your story, your own personal. See, you may not believe anything I say, but you can check everything I said in the book and just read the books. But the real answer, they can't say, well, they can'T deny your experience. And so one day, you know, what I was doing is I would have problems. I never really planned what I'm going to say, which you probably figured out by this time. And so what I did was, just for the heck of it, I made a list. You know, people come to me and say, oh, tell the Camaro story or tell the chicken on the roof story. So I made an list of these stories. It was like when I had 10 years prior, I had like 289 stories. So all I had to do, I'd look at them and say one story, and I'd pick out three stories, you know, and everything would truly take. And then somebody would come up and say why didn't you tell that story? I said, like, it's a 10-minute story. I didn't have time to tell this. You know, you're only given an hour to tell basically this is what happened in your life for 30 years. You know what I mean? And so I got a couple of stories I want to tell you because it has something to do with all the stories have the seeds of the steps in them, have the seats of the principles in them. You know? And I know if I'm talking to, I have a heart for guys with time that are suffering. I just have, I know every group I'm looking at i'm talking to look i love newcomers i'll help a drunk but i know every time i'm talked to a group of people whether it's five ten fifteen one hundred three thousand doesn't matter i know there's one guy there with 11 and a half years that's going to be drunk in a year and he doesn't know it you know why because i know that because i've seen it all over the place this guy with 20 years who is dying what's even worse is he can't talk about because he doesn'T have any idea what'S going on and one of the things that has to do with us is that alcoholics have this profound ability to live miserable lives and tell themselves they're doing okay i know because i live that way drinking miserable life and say i'm not so doing so bad look at this gal i got look at this car i got this job i got it's only when you rip all that crap away you know what i mean that all of a sudden you're just there and you look in the mirror and say, who am I kidding? We had just a way of looking at things because we're delusional. We can't separate the true from the false. Our alcohol life seems normal. The way we think seems normal, you know? I mean, crap has to really happen to hit us over the head in order to see clearly. It's usually bad crap, which is probably why they have that repeated humiliation and the final crushing of our self-sufficiency. So I got a story. I have a couple stories. Yeah, I drank because no woman, no job, no amount of money ever worked quite as well and quite as fast as just a few drinks. And I guess if alcohol did for me what it did for мне when I was 18 years old, I'd still be drinking it, but it stopped working for me, so I don't drink it. The sad part about my life is it stopped work for me about 10 years before I realized it stopped worked for me and I hurt a lot of people. But the truth of it is, even though that statement is kind of true, it's not true. It's true for an alcoholic who has one year. It's truth for an alcohol that has five years. It's tru for an alcohock who has ten years. The truth is, no woman, no car, no amount of money, no job works quite as well and quite as fast as just a few drinks. Well, man, that sounds pretty good. And then you get sober and you realize getting laid works just as well having a girl works just as well getting $100,000 works just as well. Getting a new Rolls Royce a Rolex watch you know getting fit having women like you having men like you having people like you works just as well as alcohol and you realize that they said in the sermon and the mountain, the book of John, that I'm addicted to the world. And once you realize about being addicted to the world and the things of this world, Bill Wilson talked all about this just in emotional sobriety, says my problem was dependency. I was dependency on the circumstances and the thinks of my life. The Apostle Paul talked about this. Do not love the world or the things in this world. How do you not do that? you know I went to the bathroom I closed the door I got on my knees with the big book locked the door because I don't you don't want people walking in on you when you're doing the third step prayer got on our knees I said the third step prayer you know what the big word says we are now finished with the third step that's what it says we are not completed the third step then I got up and I called the bank and I checked my bank balance I checked my bank balance so it had been ever since I wanted God and he came I wanted God and He came but soon His presence was blotted out by worldly clamors, mostly within myself, how blind I had been and the drinking then you learn isn't even a problem because there's another sentence there, drinking is only a symptom of the problem you got thousands of meetings telling people don't drink go to meetings, which is important. Don't drink even if your ass falls off. There is no problem so great that a drink can't make it worse, which is important. It kept me sober for five or 10 or 15 years. All that stuff, don't drink, don'T drink, DON'T drink. Rush, you can screw up anything and be a total whack jock. If you haven't had a drink, you're a success. And I needed that and it helped and it's important. I don't want you to think it's not important. But what happens when you get to that Bill Wilson deal when you get to the thing where the world of the climate is blotted, where you got the steps down, you got everything down, and you give a good talk, but God is not a part of your life. When you have a book that says, what does it say? Each alcoholic in his own language and from his own point of view talks about how he developed his relationship with God. What do you do when you have a book like that? That's a sentence. What does that mean? What do I say to a guy who comes up to me at a meeting and says, you shouldn't talk so much about God, you're killing newcomers when they wouldn't let you go to a meeting unless you got on your knees and talked about God. What do I say about that? Is that the big book? Is that Bill Wilson's right? Is it the big one to compromise? Or is that man telling me, is he really saying, I know it sounds, it says you examine our motives. It says some of our motives are virtuous and some of our motives are selfish but usually it's a mixture when that guy tells me not to talk about god in any meeting is he saying i'm killing newcomers or is he really saying it's disturbing me it's making me uncomfortable because if you're right then i would have to change and i've settled fine for the way i am right now i don't know what is he telling me if the book says and in chapter of the agnostics if it says if a mere code of morals or better philosophy of life or even the steps you know would have if all this stuff would help us to be sober a long time ago but they didn't help us we had to find a power greater such that would solve our problems then of course we had a talk about god of course we had talked about god here's where agnosticks have a problem what do i say when i go to a meetings and I go for a full hour meeting and everybody talks about their problems and everything, not one person talks about God. What do I say in a... I can do a drunk log, how can I do a faithful log in a group like that? How can I talk about what the real deal is when I'm in a Group of Agnostics? It says this sort of thinking has to be abandoned. Atheism... What do i say in group of people that really don't want to talk about it because they think they have elevated the steps to a godlike thing, into Bill Wilson to a God-like thing. The Fellowship of Alcoholics doesn't have all power. Bill Wilson didn't have all power I don't have All Power. Only God has power. What do they mean by that? So, I'm sitting in my so I'm I'm, uh, sitting in my college class. I'm like 21 years old, however old I was, 20 years old. College logic class and I was I was going to go for my PhD in algebraic topology. I did all the courses and everything like that, got A's in it and all that stuff. And this gal walks into my class and she's got legs up to there. She's a cheerleader. She is gorgeous. And I say to myself, if I only had that gal, I'd be okay. As a matter of fact, it is 100% clear that the only thing missing in my life is that woman. As a matter of fact, I had the same thing. I had the same feeling about that woman as I had about a bottle of scotch. You know what I mean? That woman, as one of my sponsors, when I said to him in an A-mean, look at that blonde over there, he says, what'd you used to drink? I said, I used to drink, you know, top shelf scotch, he said, you see that gal? He says, yeah, that's a bottle of scotch with legs to you. You're not I mean, and he was right. You don't know what I mean. I crave that. And I knew that the answer to all my problems was that gal. And so I did what all alcoholics do, I insinuated my way into that woman's life. I met her father who was a doctor, I met her mother who's a lawyer, I said man this is a group of professionals you know what I mean? And ultimately I insulated into their lives and I was drinking at that time but i it wasn't like obvious i wasn't getting drunk all the time but i was drinking at the time and and all that sort of stuff and i was doing and and and i woke up one morning remember i have the mind of an alcoholic although i really don't think so i wake up one more day and all of a sudden it occurred to me i ought to be a lawyer i mean what am i doing with this professor of mathematics thing and they don't make any money nobody looks up to them I want to be a lawyer And actually they said I want you to be A doctor or a lawyer And I went And I applied I had the greatest grades I applied to Medical school They said You have no He said You have physics You have chemistry You have math You have multivariable calculus You have all this But you don't have any biology You got to go back To school And take biology Now you know I'm a You know I'm an alcoholic I ain't going back anywhere I'm not delaying anything Because I need this So I So I went to law school They said Well you got $300? They said, yeah, I give them $300. I became a lawyer. Okay. And so I, so you asked me, well, why'd you become a lawyer, Russell? Why'd you give up all that stuff that you were going to make? And I say to you, and I believe this stuff because, you know, this is why I say, well, because I've always liked Perry Mason. I like to talk and everything. I, I like logic. I like being a lawyer and, and now let me tell you what the truth is. I began, I changed my entire career and i became a lawyer so i could get in the gal's pants do you understand because that's the kind of integrity a guy like me has you understand what i'm saying that's yeah you're laughing you guys don't know what it's like you guys you guys would never whore around or give up any integrity you have just to get in a gal's parents i'm i'm looking at man i'm you guys are spiritual not religious a bunch of spiritual guys you know what i mean and so and so i to get in that house and i married that gal we had a baby we had to ask my beach and i became the division chief in the state's attorney's office prosecuting murders and all sorts of stuff like that and and i really loved that gown it was a great life and i love my in-laws and they were great and they love me and i don't know what happened i started drinking over at the alibi lounge and I'd get there at 4.30 in the afternoon I'd start feeling better as I was pulling up to a bar and I'd walk up and have a couple of scotches and everything, and oh no, the next thing I know I'd be looking at the gals after about six months, I'd been looking at the redheads and the blondes because this is what I did What I did, my whole life was about scoring, about going to bars and getting laid and getting some gal and everything like that Now don't get me wrong, I don't want you to think that I was like successful or anything I had as much success with scoring As I did when I got into fights It was a two hit fight They'd hit me and I'd hit the ground But the bottom line is That was my whole life If I could get a girl Now, I would have never said this Because all the guys I hung around Like, you know, look at that gal Look at this gal Guys in the bar Well, it's just like in here they think just like i think you guys think i've always i love alcoholics that's why i love you guys because you're as crazy as i am you think this is so i'm sitting there and i'm trying to score this my whole life and so uh and you know and so i get married and my wife has a baby she got a little baby at home and i'M at the bar and and iM the next thing you know i get home at four o'clock in the morning that's after six months of marriage and all i'M doing now you'd be proud of me. I was proud of me I never once physically cheated on my wife I would just stay up till 2, 3 o'clock in the morning drinking while my wife is at home with the baby, you know what I mean and thinking about how I could get that blonde or that redhead if I just wasn't married If I just wasn't married, if I only had that one, I'd be okay If I could only do this one, i'd be okay and leave my wife at home without a husband nobody ever came up to me in the bar and said what are you doing here russell you know i mean you got a wife you got a baby at home what the hell you're doing why don't you call your wife people would leave the bride say why where are they going i mean the booze is here you know what i mean what are they doing and i did that for five years for this woman then something really amazing happened something really amazing happened you know um my wife one morning came up to me and she said to me she said i just want you to know if you come home drunk one more time i'm leaving you you know what that is that's a sentence if you become home drunk one more time i am leaving you that's 12 word sentence I'm an attorney I'm trying murder cases I'm in my blue suit My white shirt My red tie Going into court To try a complicated case And she didn't say it like she wanted to start a fight It was like she was just dropping off the mail You know what I mean Come home drunk one more time I'm leaving you And I heard it And I was as sober Oh man, I wish I could say The booze made me do it Oh, if it wasn't for the booze, I'd be a nice guy. The booze... I hurt more people more ways sober than I ever hurt... As a matter of fact, I've hurt many people sober in AA the same way as I used to hurt them. You know, the only thing booze did for me is allowed me to live with my sorry-ass self while I was doing it and told me I was okay. So she said that to me. You come home drunk one more time, I'm leaving you. I get in my car, I'll never forget this. I drive about three or four blocks, and I come to a light. And I think about what she said. You come home drunk one time, I'm leaving you, and I say this to myself. What the hell did she mean by that? You see, we're good with paragraphs. Really not so good with sentences. You see? See, that's the alcoholic brain. Everything that was important to me or should be important was bread on the line. All I had to do was make it home. So that night, I went to the bar. the alibi lounge which i helped name i'm proud of that went to the alabi lounge and i sat at bar and i ordered my drink a double scotch neat so i could whack it down you know so i could get that place where i really didn't care about what people thought about me and doug hartman came up to me a drinking buddy one of many drinking buddies i had there you know we love our drinking buddies and dugg hartman became up to be And I looked at him, and this is what I said to him. I said, Doug, I cannot stay. Ronnie told me if I come home drunk one more time, she's leaving me. And Doug goes like this. He says, he puts his arm around me. He says Russell, I love you buddy. Everybody loves you. You're the greatest guy in the world. everybody loves you your wife is crazy about you she will never leave you and I'm thinking shit that's exactly what I was thinking laughter laughter laughter you know that thing with Doug Hartman putting his arm, I said that's what I'm thinkin that's the God as I understand that's my God that's my imaginary God no matter what I do and who I am I never have to worry about it because he says you're the greatest guy in the world I love you I like that God I want all my gods to be like Doug Carpenter I don't want my God to get me broke or get me in jail or cause me to do things where I hurt myself or have bad breaks and misunderstandings I want that God who puts his arm around me and tells me no matter what I do and who I do it to, I'm okay. That's the God of my understanding. And so I have another drink, and the next thing I know it's 4 o'clock in the morning, and the last thing I do is I'm going to be like, and the night after the next morning my wife kicks me out of the house and that's the end of a five-year marriage. Lost my wife, lost Sam, my son, lost everything. And I wasn't even sorry. You know what I mean? I was too chicken shit to ask for a divorce, but you want to know something? the bottom line is I could say well she threw me out and if you ask me why I'm getting divorced I'd say well we were different people, we were growing in directions, she was trying to change me, we got married too young I had every excuse in the world and I believed it and all I knew is I left my wife of five years of my baby I left her because I wanted to screw other women because that's who I really am and I did it cold stone so you know what i mean now it gets better so my wife who actually believed in things like taking a vow to death to his partner and everything like that who invented that crap you know what i probably some religious guy thank god i'm spiritual not religious she wanted to try to go to a marriage counselor to try to patch things up i mean you know because she believed in that stuff and i went to the marriage counselor and sat there and the marriage counselor i'll never forget he asked my wife these questions what are the three things you want to change about russell i guess it's like a marriage counselor thing they teach him that and she was talking she was saying something but i wasn't listening i don't even know what she mentioned alcohol i think she might have said to come home for dinner or something i don'T KNOW WHAT SHE SAID but i remember thinking to myself i have a date with this redhead tonight and this is screwing up the whole thing i felt like the movie the godfather you ever see the god father too where he says i got out and they dragged me back i felt like i was being dragged back into the cage and i had a date that night you know what is it going to do i mean i'm not and then he asked me russ what's the three things you want to change about your wife and i said i just want to date other women by the way i tell this story all the time because it's an important story to me because I want you to know that I'm not only an alcoholic, I'm an asshole. Does that qualify? What is that? Is that a rough or what is that kind of profanity that I am not supposed to use? I'm and asshole. As a matter of fact, I had to graduate into a different fellowship in AA. But I'll tell you about that in a second. I'll try to get through. So that's what I said. And it wasn't until I was five years sober where it sort of dawned upon me what saying that in front of my wife who was the mother of my child did to her heart how I ripped her heart about and I said it without even thinking it was like just came right out you know why because I wanted to do what I wanted her to do and that's what I wanted her do and what I learned later on down the road is love you know it didn't matter whether I quote didn't love her anymore love's not a not a feeling it's a decision you decide you're going to love somebody no matter what you become a man and you use integrity and you decide this is my wife and i'm gonna love her and protect her and not be a jack-off you know what i mean but that's what i said okay and i was cold stone sober when i said it so the bottom line is a few years then uh so i did you know i became my goal was to become the uhafner of miami It didn't work out so well because you've got to be able to stand up when you're Hugh Hefner. You can't be wobbling around, and I kept on drinking, and it got worse and worse like the booze always gets with us. And then what happened is finally on December 25th, 1980, having been kicked out of a party with no woman in sight all alone on Christmas Eve, And of course, you know, I love feeling sorry for myself. And I knew I was the only one on the planet that was alone. And I became ashamed of what... It wasn't self-pity. I became ashamed of what I had become. And some preach came on the air and that's when I got down on my knees and I asked the Lord to come into my life, which I think is what they were doing in the beginning of AA. I didn't even think about that because I didn' t know anything about AA. And 30 days later, I stopped drinking and two weeks after that, I came to the Alcoholics Anonymous. Now, I'm running through... Now, I'll go through the next 45 years in about five minutes, okay? So here's the deal. So I came to AA and I did all the things you're supposed to do when I stayed sober for 10 years. And I got a whole bunch of stories. I got 289 stories, actually, to tell you the truth about what happened in AA. I remember telling my sponsor once when I was broke. I was about six months sober and I was broken. And it's not that I don't give a crap. I used to tell myself all the time, You ever tell yourself you don't give a crap what other people think about you? I'd say that out loud. I don't gave a crap when they think about me. I'm constantly telling myself. I usually tell myself stuff like that when I'm really worried about what people are thinking about me, you know. I've always told themselves all sorts of bullshit. So I used to tell myself that. But the bottom line is my whole life is about worrying about what you think about it, you know. What do you think About Me? What do people think About me? What are they going to think Aboutme? What is going to happen to me? One time my house went into foreclosure because the mortgage crisis and everything. I wasn't worried about losing my wife. I was like, my house, I was worried about what would people think about me if I lost my job or my house. That is the most... You know what that does? That stops you from even talking in AA because you filter yourself. Whatever you say, you filter yourself because I can't say that. What will they think of... Now, I'm not going to tell my group that I'm broke, that the Big Shot Lawyer doesn't have $50 in the bank, you know? Yeah, I mean, not that I care about what they think about it, but I told my sponsor, Bob Sullivan. I said, look, because I couldn't sleep a night. I said to my sponsor, I said I don't have any money. I'm broke. I haven't paid the rent in two months. I don' t know what to tell my wife because I got married again. I didn't know what I could tell my wife and everything like that. He says, I can solve that problem. I can solve that problem, Russell. I said really? He said absolutely. I said, man, I love AA. I love it. You know what I mean? I'm getting ready with my catcher's mitt, a couple thousand dollars coming in, you You know, and the meeting was over and he came up and he says, follow me. He says, I'm going to take care of that problem. He said, sure. He says he starts showing me how to make coffee for the group and how to set up the chairs. And I'm saying, I're not sure I explain myself well. I mean, I don't know. I'm not sure. I mean I'm talking about money here. That's not one just right up there with oxygen, you know. And the next day Monday didn't come in and I didn't want to go to the meeting. I didn't want to go to the meeting because the money didn't come in but I had to go to the flipping meeting because what are they going to say about me if I don't go to a meeting and make the coffee so the one thing that used to kill me worry about people actually saved my life three months later the money came in I was fine some guy comes up to me and says I'll make the copy I said I'm the coffee maker you know so I know we're coming to the end of this thing so the bottom line is the last thing I'll leave you with, somewhere around 10 or 12 years and this happened to me in 10 or 12 years. It's happened to people in 20 years. I've seen it happen to people at 35 years. I got to a point in my life where I was doing all the work in AA. I know they tell you that the reason people drink is because they stop going to meetings. There's a lot of people that drink who are going to meets. There are a lot OF people that commit suicide that are going on meetings. There are A LOT of people that are depressed that are going to meetings. Bill Wilson talked about it. There are lots of people have a lot of problems going to be used you know what i mean that emotional sobriety and i got to that point then i hit a second bottom in aa and i had and i hit his second bottom and somebody told me guy come up to me he says you need to do this and i immediately explained to him you don't understand i'm different i'm spiritual not religious you know i mean they said fine do whatever you want to do and all i know is that a week later i found myself in bible study go figure i guess i never read that part where we we see where religious people are right we encourage church membership i never heard what they were actually doing back there and i find that's what i've been doing i never stopped going to a i doubled my a and i doubled my uh and my third sponsor i found in a bible study had 55 years sobriety and so that's what i'm doing the one thing that added it ended the secret ingredient and the secret ingredient was god was no longer a thing or an it or something out there it became something that i could have a personal relationship with and i found the more i thought about god instead of turning things over to god and live the turnover life and so i talk about him at a means i talk about him in conventions i think about him all the time and you know what i found out about this god thing so i don't know it has the drinking is besides but what i find out is i stopped thinking about being a whore i stopped thinking about the money i stopped thinking about the women i stopped thinking about cheating on my wife i stopped thinking about getting the new car or having to have something to put on my body so or or something to do something so i look better than other people you know i don't know how it works and why it works but apparently it does and so that's all i have to say