Self – Centeredness, Inventory, Step 4 – Chris R.

He's so rich. There's a requirement before you do the third step prayer, we talk about it. Are you convinced that life run on self-will can hardly be a success? It's a yes or no answer. It's pretty simple. Third step prayer. I'm not even going to read the whole thing. Understand what it says. God, I offer myself to thee to deal with me and do with me as I will. Relieve me of the bondage itself That I may better do thy will Again, did it say Relieve Me of the Bondage of the Alcohol or Cocaine? No, because that's not the problem It's our selfishness That's the problem Take away my difficulties Why? So I can get rich? Take away My difficulties so victory over these Are going to bear witness to those I would help Of Thy power, Thy love and Thy way of life May I do Thy will always I mean, how cool is that prayer? See, if this is what we're supposed to be going back into meetings talking about, folks, I'm going to bear witness to you how my life has changed as a result of working this sense. Make sense? I hear people all the time talking about Christian Savior of the Poet, and you make it sound like all these meetings should be pep rallies. Yes. They should. They should because my life is not the same as it was 17 years ago. It's not the same as it was, I mean, two weeks into this, my life had started to change. And that's the stuff I'm supposed to be going back in the meeting and sharing with a newcomer. Because all that newcomer wants is some hope. Can I share some hope? Or do I just want to share a few war stories with him and give him an identification book? Big deal. You know? We're all bozos on this bus. Have we got that figured out yet? Yes. Okay. Now, can you share some help? How can I get off this hand-run away bus? See, that's what we're supposed to try to do. It's the coolest. Myers is talking about a 32 page four step book I've got an 81 page four step guide sitting on my desk at work 81 pages we have just a few minutes here and I want to kind of show you what this is about talking about this four step again we were talking about it earlier we share the podium with lots of different speakers and lots of speakers that want to really make this step business is quite complicated. It's just not that complicated. In fact, I'm going to say this from the podium. I really don't care how you work these steps as long as you work them. Everybody wants to, you know, they want to complicate it so much that most of us just lose interest after a while. It gets to be more weight than it's worth. It's as simple as four-step stuff. You sit in a meeting now, anyone in the States, you sit in the meeting and say, I'm working on a four-step. And everybody goes, they groan. You know, they go, oh. And it's like, oh, I know what you're going through. It was like, buddy, you've missed the boat. A four-stepper is the most free step I've ever done in my life. It was the coolest and it took me a couple of days to knock out. Once I got some instructions on how to do it, if it takes you longer than two hours to do a four step, you are so full of yourself it's not even funny. one of the things that the problem is in this uh in this work this ego that i grew up there The whole purpose of all the steps is to deflate our ego. I don't want to be less than you. I've spent my life looking down at the floor. I don'T want to BE LESS THAN YOU, but I DON'T have any right to be better than you either. And if I'm sitting up here looking down on you, I DONT LIKE IT SO MUCH. I'D RATHER BE ON THE FLOOR WITH YOU GUYS. But if I think by some way that I'M BETTER THAN You because I'M 17 YEARS SOBER or better looking than some of you... I am so wrong at that. You see, I just want to be on the same level with the rest of you knuckleheads. That's all I want. A man among men is what we talk about. I spent my life walking into groups of people and either feeling less than or better than. You know what I'm saying? I started out drinking in these big cool bars in Houston, Texas. These nice big, you know, dress up and nice women and really nice. And I ended up drinking at a bar called Jolly Rogers. in Lake Dallas, Texas. Can you all imagine a bar named the Jolly Ruggers and I'm walking in there with how many ass whippings do you think I took in that bar? You know, pirate jokes abounded. Why am I in that Bar? It's a seedy bar. It's terrible bar. It's the kind of bar where you lean over and peep on the floor and the guy throws you a towel to clean it up. You know what I mean? It's like... But I felt superior in that ball. Do you follow? My ego is she. This ego can go from everybody thinks somebody that's egotistical is, well he's just so full of himself you with me? but look, follow the thread down at the other end of the spectrum and now you've got this I'm just a worthless piece of shit I have I have many I don't know I'll feel better in a minute. These goddamn victims, these victims, the victim, and the AA is full of victims. It is not okay to be a victim. It is on the same spectrum with the egotistical son of a gun that thinks he doesn't need to do anything because he's better than everybody. I can take those egomaniacs and bust them in a heartbeat. I can deal with them all day long, but I'm going to tell you something, folks. Having been a victim all my life, I know how to work that system. Y'all with us? And they are the toughest people to deal with. Remember me? About the time you wanted to start doing some work? Well, I started working on the course tip and all of my childhood memories started coming back. And so what do we do? Okay, sorry. We'll work on that next month. You go take care of yourself. Take a little bubble bath now and everything's going to be okay. You see, we've got to understand Some of you are looking at me like I've just slapped you Do you think I'm making fun of that? No I'm saying a fourth step is completely different than that A fourth step Is not about looking at your history And all the bad things that ever happened to you A fourth set is a fact-finding mission It's an inventory So that we can get rid of the stuff that's not working You with us? You guys take the light out of context out of the book And think this is some kind of a life story It is not. Let me say this from the podium here in beautiful Denmark. I don't give a rat's ass about your history. It is boring. You're enamored with it. You can't wait to talk about it. But that's what we've done all our life. Remember the line, selfish and self-centered are the four? You know, let's talk about me for a while. You know? No! We're going to go in here and we're going to look at this four step and this fact finder. I was in, over in Seattle, near Seattle a couple weeks ago and there was this old guy who was about 40 years, 46 years sobriety was amazing this old coot and he got up this old geezer and he was just sharing about his story when he first got sober the first week he got sober his sponsor met him at the job site and said buddy it's time that we get started on the fourth step with us and everybody in the room it was like 200 people and everybody laughed they thought That was the most funniest thing I'd ever heard. You know, that was like a punchline of the night. And the only people that weren't laughing were all the little Bigfoot thumpers that were sitting on the back row with me. And we're looking at each other like, what's the joke there? Because he's exactly on time. First week of sobriety, great time to work on course set. Let's finish this work. Inventory of this. A little four column in the book shows three. You could explode it to four. A little five column resentment inventory. Let me make a list of the people I'm pissed at. There's a little simple fear inventory. I'm sorry, two columns. I'm afraid of this because of this. That's it. You with me? Simple. You want to do an eight-column fear inventory? Go ahead. See, it was just looking at the fear. Sex inventory. Got nothing to do with sex. It has to do mit how am I treating the opposite sex. You with m? Beth could do, my friend from England she could do a sex inventory and I could sit down and hear her sex inventory and neither one of us would ever blatch because we're not there to talk about the act of sex I don't care if you're poking sheep you've got nothing to do The book doesn't say, list all the terrible things you've done when you were loaded and acting out sexually. It says, where did you treat people with disrespect? Where did you unjustifiably arouse jealousy, suspicion, and bitterness? Make sense? We're going to drop this stuff down and we're going to look at it. Why is it that I treat all the women the same? I think everybody's the same and it's not. They're all the same. I treat them the same way. I need to stop treating them that way. I need to start treating them with respect. And I can see that from that text in the door. It's so quite simple. We can sit down later this afternoon and I can show you exactly what I'm talking about. Resentment inventory is the one you guys get stuck on because you're so busy trying to make this life story. Make a list. Let me ask you a question. We go in the store next door and we say, We say, we want to do an inventory of your store. What are we going to do? Look at the garbage and the crap they threw away? Or are we gonna look at the stuff on the shelves? Inventory is current shit. Current stuff. I make this list and I'm spending weeks. What are you doing? I'm working on my four steps. What are You doing? I'm working on my fourth step. Six months later, I'm looking at my fourth... No, you're not. You're spinning your wheels because the truth of the matter is you don't really think you're one of us. If you've had a first step experience and you understand that the necessity to have a spiritual experience is you're going to get this stuff cleaned out and you're gonna get it cleaned out in a hurry. I need to go look at current resentments. I heard a guy from the coding one time, if you haven't got at least 200 resentments on your inventory you're doing a thorough job. That is rubbish. Most of us in this room don't even know 200 people, much less resent them. Come on guys, what's a resentment? A resentment is an anger you're holding on to. You know, your second grade teacher embarrassed you in class. You think about that second grade teach and say, boy she was a loser. And you go on to the next one. Why are you going to put her down and do a four column inventory on that teacher? Does she really piss you off? It was 40 years ago. Why are we wasting our time? You think this is an exercise in writing? It's not. I'd rather see you cats sit down with a piece of paper and write down your ten biggies right now. My employer, my significant other, my kids. The people that are driving you crazy right now, driving down the road, you're thinking, grinding their teeth on them. Those are the ones we're supposed to write down. If you've got to sit there and think And meditate Oh God please Show me the people I'm resentful You don't have to have God's help To show you the people you're resentful at Guys It's the fourth one in your head Write that stuff down You've got ten resentments Write it down People, institutions and principles That you're pissed at Stop making a big deal out of this If you think of somebody Six months from now Do another little inventory on them It's just no big deal I put the guy's name in the first column second column I list why I'm pissed right? I'm pissing at her why? she said no again third column I look at the areas of my life that are affected my ambitions my security you know, my self esteem how did this hurt me? you with me? first column victim second column victim. Third column, victim. Can we stop now? We finally get to the fourth column where we look at our part. Our heart. Where was I selfish to the core? Where have I been fearful? Where have i been dishonest? You with us? See if i can see that i've got a little part of this i can get free. If i continue to blame them for why i can't be happy first column her. Second column, she said no. Third column, you with me? Affected all seven areas of my life because I'm totally affected by sex. Dig? Unlike my spiritual brother. Okay. Fourth column, what's my part? What's the truth? Why did she say no? Well, it could have been the way you acted, right? How did you ask? How did you treat her with us? Remember that thing you said that wasn't quite appropriate? Mm-hmm. Mm-huh. Are you taking her needs into consideration, you selfish bastard? You know? Are you? No. No. No. No. I get to see my part in the fourth column and I get immediately free from the resentment. She's not hurting me. She's somehow to get me. It's all in my head. Remember what the book said? These things people have done to us fancy to real. Most of us in here are running from stuff that didn't even happen. It happened in here. Isn't that right? And we just look at this stuff and we can get free. Everything in my life I can look at in that four column inventory and I can get freed from it. And I don't care if it's a simple resentment about a boss that fired me or molestation. You can look your part and get freeed. We can stop being a victim. it's the most unbelievable exercise I've ever done in my life I'm going to say this again we'll move on victims don't get sober and I'm going to talk about this in the morning but I want to tell you right now I'm so honored to know everyone again here and I am so clear that so many of us have been hurt And I'm not making light of any of that. I'm just saying, that hurt is not who you are. You're a beautiful child of God. You're all powerful individuals. Who some bad things happen to. And who's going to get past that? Some of you cats are waiting for people to come up out of the grave and apologize to you for shit they did to you. Let me read the verse that mentions this to you again. it ain't going to happen. What do we do? We've got this inventory maybe it's got 20 names on it maybe it'S got 50 names who knows. We've Got a little fear inventory we've got the sex inventory we're getting with our sponsor we dump the stuff. And the sponsor is going to do one thing he's going to help you see your truth. He's going sleep through the first three columns while you go on and on. I need to explain this one. You know what I mean? That's why you talk about it, you know? And then he's going to wait patiently for hopefully you to get to the fourth column so you can own your part. See? How did you place yourself in that position to be hurt? See? This guy can do this. When I sit down and do a fifth step, I've got a piece of paper in front of me and I'm making two lists. One, I'm taking an eighth step list for you. People that I think you possibly need to make amends to. And I'm also making a character defect list in six and seven. You'll follow us? So if I hear something that keeps repeating itself, the fear, the dishonesty, you're lazy then, sloth, I'm going to make this little list over here. So right after this fifth step, we're going to do six and seven. Isn't that right? The book says right after. Third step first says we launched out of the course of vigorous action to do the fourth step. We finish it, double fifth step. Six and seven, an hour later. I'm working on six and Seven. It's two freaking paragraphs in the book, guys. How much is there to work on? You're not the one that's going to remove these character defects. I don't care what anybody says. It's God that removes those character defects, and you just got to be clear on what they are so you can be conscious of it when it takes place. I've got my list in six and seven. You with us? I've gotten my eight-step list. I took it from my fifth step. I've ready to go. I sit with my sponsor, and we're ready to make amends. Boom, boom, boom. quickly. It's so difficult for people to understand. Bill Wilson worked the steps in nine days. Dr. Bob took two weeks. Who in the hell do you think you are? No, really. you just think you're extra bad I mean you know what Damien that's ridiculous that's really ridiculous six and seven we do that we got the eight step list we go make amends we're kicking butt we're praying and meditating already because my sponsor had me doing that from day one talking about prayer and meditation we're going to touch on that after lunch and we're going to spend most of the little time we have this afternoon We're going to talk about working with others because we believe quite clearly, like a lot of y'all, it's the most important step. It's overlooked. And then we're going do a little Q&A. Does that sound good? So right now we're gonna go to lunch. Mother's placement. Welcome, my name is Chris Thurman. I'm an alcoholic. One of those recovered alcoholics. Great break. Interesting. Thanks so much. It was good. Don't have a clue what I ate. It was excellent. Interesting talking to some of y'all this time. For some of you that weren't here this morning, I want to cover a little bit of what we talked about and kind of make sure we get all back on the same page and then we want to kind of spend most of this hour talking about working with others. But it's interesting when you sit and visit with you guys after we talk on the podium and y'all laugh at the right times and nod your head at the correct times and think, they're getting it. And you walk off the podium and it's like, let me ask you a question. It's like what are you hearing me say? You know, it's just like... Do I want you to go back into your AA groups and the first time somebody said something that's not in the big group and you go eat their ass and pick a fight and, you know, you can't do... Buddy, that's not what we're doing here. That's not What we're saying. We're saying each in our own individual ways are going to carry this message in our on ways. What we are trying to ask you to possibly look at is some absolute truth here. One, recovery rate 70 years ago was damn good. recovery rate today is damn poor you know with us that's a fact that's true most people that come to Alcoholics Anonymous don't stay in Alcoholics Anonymous and any of you guys that have been around longer than six months have watched this door go both ways in and out and in and out why aren't they staying it's like is it etched in stone how long it's supposed to take to work these steps Absolutely not. You've got some guy that's all detoxed out and he's loaded on pills and it's just, maybe you can't work him through quite as fast as somebody that's maybe not as physically damaged. But this idea that anything goes and you can work this through, I mean, we were laughing about it at lunch. This line that we just read in reading hot words is like, we beg of you to be fearless and thorough from the very start. You with us? that's always translated, take your time to work the steps. It freaks me... You know, we're sitting there talking to Myers. My wife wants me to be thorough washing the dishes. She doesn't like food left on the dishes I mean, it's kind of small of her, I know but you know, she wants me to be thoroughly but she doesn't want me to take all night doing it. I think it's a great analogy. It's a spiritual experience. We just read it in the ABC. ABC. That no human power can fix what's wrong with me. Not a sponsor can fix What's Wrong With Me. Therapy, treatment, nothing's going to fix What'S Wrong With ME. That God could and would if He were sought. Our only job is to get you guys connected to this power as fast as we can. If you've got six months to sit out there and work these steps and just get comfortable, welcome. Have a nice life. I mean, I don't want to split hair with this. I don' t want to beat this to death. But I'm sorry guys. Thank God Bill Wilson didn't have that information. Thank God. Bill Wilson worked those steps in nine days. He did detox working on his ninth step from the hospital when he has his barn burning spiritual experience. Dr. Bob. Remember the story of Dr. Rob? Finishes his last brief on June 10th. Drives around town and makes his amends. The one step he wouldn't do. He makes the amends and never drank again. Two weeks. but you can sit here and tell me about the way you do it in your country where we take six months to finish it well I think that's a bit presumptuous of all of us and then when the porch cat relapses we want to drop it back in their lap well they just didn't want it they just weren't ready sure they were maybe they didn't have the tools to get well Maybe that's pretty rigid. And I apologize if I'm offending somebody. But, I mean, you know, you can justify why your way is okay and you have every right to do it your way. But what we had to start looking at when I got into the treatment center 10 years ago, we started looking at our very poor success rates. And one of the reasons was people were dragging their feet to finish this work. It's working with others that keeps us sober. That's what the book says. but we won't let you work with others until you've worked the steps. But you can't work the steps until you're been sobering you. Guys, do you see something wrong here? It's like holding a carrot out. One day you'll be well. One day that day needs to be today. That's why we're simplifying this. That's what we're doing. That's how the steps were intended. They're so simple. Ask a question, do the work. Ask a questions, do the word. Boom, you're finished. I'd run the work to sets the rest of my life I'm 17 years sober I do a couple of four sets every year you with us? every time I sponsor somebody I take them through the work I do the work myself it's the coolest thank God I had sponsorship early on though that didn't let me sit on my butt and just gradually get sick again and I'd go out and drink that's all I got right now you want to do this? yeah just take a nice drink Howdy, Buckaroos. My name is Myers Raymer and I'm an alcoholic. I guess by now you know that. I've had some stuff that I've made some copies of and I think I'm going to leave it with some of these cats that you guys can make copies of them. But my hope is that you'll make copies of this stuff and then you can sit down some cold night which is every night, and look through this sack of stuff and you can go, that's shit, that's it. Just throw it away and maybe there'll be something in there that you'll like and you'll keep and it'll be important to you on down the road. These are just things that I've collected over the long haul about various things. But one of these things in here that I find of interest every time I look at it, you can look at this little piece when I'm done, is a list of desire chips. Do they do that in Denmark where they give you a desire chip when you come in for the first time? Yeah. Well, in the States they always do this stuff you sober up and you go in and you say okay I'm ready to start this deal and they give you a little silver medallion on the desire chip and then theoretically you're supposed to pick up one desire chip and say that's going to be the deal but for years what they've been doing in the states is tracking the success rate of Alcoholics Anonymous based on desire chips one year chips two year chips three year chips blah blah blah and down the road you see that's the only way that we can really get some grip it's not scientific and it's not foolproof, but it gives us some basis of seeing how successful we are. It's funny, this man comes into AA and his buddies stay sober right around him and so you've got five or six people and they're staying sober for the next several years and he's going, I don't see anything wrong. We're all sober here. But while he's sober, there's thousands of you out there falling off by the wayside not staying sober, you see? And so our perceptions of AA get skewed and we begin to get very defensive when guys like us from the United States come in and say there's a problem in our midst. There's a fox in the hen house, so to speak. I mean, and so all I want you to do, what this is, is a graphic illustration of how far we have strayed from the message and the direct manifestation, the direct results, is that we've got people not getting sober. Somebody at a meeting that we were in the other night, when we got here said something about somebody told him 90 meetings in 90 days. That's the mantra in the United States. Every newcomer is hold back. I want you to go to 90 meetings in 90 days. I said it for years to people. According to these stats, and these are 2,000 stats that I have right here, there were 21,000, round it off, 21, 000 desire chips given in 2000. This is in Dallas, Texas. Okay? Just in Dallas. Three months later, 90 days later, there's only 3,600 people picking up three-month chips. That's only 17% of us stayed 90 days. You skip on down to nine months, 10%, one year, 6.8%. Six percent! Now, you do the math on that thing, that's a thousand, that's almost 20,000 people that picked up desire chips that went bye-bye. Now you can't stand there and say that all those 20,000 people didn't want this program. They didn't wanna recover. They did wanna recover, guys. Many of those people did want this thing, but they simply could not get it because the message had been so convoluted and watered down and we didn't hold anybody accountable and we did not help them do what they needed to do. In groups like I am from in Dallas, Texas, where we have refocused our efforts on studying the big book and then 12-step work, we've seen a huge resurgence. Our figures aren't anywhere like this. Most everybody that comes stays. Most everybody comes and does the work recovers. I mean, it's very rare to see somebody in our group go back out again because we're so diligent to get them through this stuff. We were doing what we were supposed to be doing all along, carrying the clean, concise message of recovery that the book gave us. Now, let me mention something. This is just a little aside on this thing about accountability and about... You've got to know what accountability means. It's like everybody likes the concept of accountability until they're the ones being held accountable. And then everybody gets real grindy about it. You know, it's like I've been asked a thousand times, would you be my sponsor? Sure, I'd be delighted to. It'd be my honor. Let's do this and this and this. And by the way, I'm going to hold you accountable to do this. And then there's dead silence. And then they're gone. You see, the truth is that people don't want to submit to the work and don't wanna do what we're doing. And that's the grindy part. And some of you guys are sponsoring cats right now that are doing the same thing. You know, they say they want you to help them. You get involved and then all of a sudden they start disappearing. They start putting the distance between you and the work. Anyway, let's drag them up close and let's see what we can do. I find it interesting that the last part of this work, steps 10, 11, and 12, we trivialize this stuff a huge amount. And we get so focused in with our new guys that we're working with on steps 3 and 4 and 5 and we're going to do all this kind of stuff and the amends thing is a huge deal. oh, we're going to get in there and we're going to go do these amends and whatnot. But when we get around this thing of 10, 11, and 12 because they're not demanding immediate action, nobody's sitting there saying, do this now kind of thing. We tend to hold them at some distance, you see? It's funny, over the years, if I'm sponsoring a guy and he gets goofy, he calls me on the phone and he's sounding crazy, I don't ask him how many meetings he's going to. I ask him the same question over and over and over again. I want to know today how much time did you spend with God and how much times did you spend working with another alcoholic? Because those two things guarantee your sobriety and guarantee your happiness. It guarantees the quality of everything that you have in your life, you see? And we have to get focused on that. And it's a funny thing. Sometimes we get so busy doing things like go into meetings and stuff, that we lose sight of the fact that there is a God at the pinnacle of this that's controlling the whole picture. When the gentleman a minute ago read chapter 5, no it wasn't, it was on page 164, there's a line in there that said God will constantly disclose more to you than to us. Constantly disclose. Isn't it an interesting concept that if God is constantly disclosing information to us, why are we always so baffled about what we're supposed to be doing. We've got millions of us out there doing this number, scratching our head going, I don't know what to do. I don' t know where to go. I don''t know what actions to take. All of that head scratching is directly back to this inability to stay plugged in to God and Step 11 work every day. It's funny, you've got a guy with a blowtorch on his rear. His wife's giving him the fit. His employer's giving he fits. His kids are all... You know, his world is in chaos and we get these guys that are spiritual giants. They don't ever stop praying because they know they get all connected up. Fast forward a couple of months. The wifey poos back in the bedroom again. The job thing has kind of smoothed out a little bit and now all of a sudden we can't find time to pray. We can't fine time to meditate. Dr. Bob wrote a great essay one time about the importance of 11-step work of prayer and meditation And he said in this thing, and I'm paraphrasing it, I don't have it here in front of me. We could do without the meeting. We could go without most of this stuff. But we could not do without prayer and meditation. And yet as a fellowship, we trivialize it as it's just something that's there if you want to do it. If you're questioning God's will for you in your life, pray, meditate, spend time not running your yacht to God. Sit there still and be quiet. If you're having trouble with meditation, come see me. Or walk right down that street if you live here two blocks down there. There's a yoga meditation place that can help you with everything you need to know about meditation. They're great guys. I just met them. You see? Well, anyway. One more little aside and then I'll get back on track. I wanted to read this little piece to you. It was some guys that I was talking to at break that were talking about their group was real adamant about the discussion stuff, about needing to air our problems in the confines of the meeting. And I know we hit that pretty hard and were pretty straightforward about it. I wanted make sure that you guys understood from what I was saying last night. I encourage you to share your problems in your day and this kind of stuff, but I encourage to share it with your sponsor, not with a group because it takes up valuable recovery time. The new guy doesn't need to hear that you are a year sober and still having trouble in this deal. They don't need the help They don' t need to here that. Your sponsor needs to hear it so he can get you back into work. That's where it's supposed to be. But of interest, I want some of these men that I was talking to specifically, I want to read this little piece right here. Bill Wilson wrote this thing in a letter in 1966 and it said, Hmm... An AA group as such cannot take on all the personal problems of its members, let alone those of non-alcoholics in the world around us. The AA group is not, for example, a mediator of domestic relations, nor does it furnish personal financial aid to anyone. Though a member may sometimes be helped in such matters by his friends in AA, the primary responsibility for the solutions of all his problems of living and growing rests squarely upon the individual himself. Should an AA group attempt this sort of help, its effectiveness and energy would be hopelessly dissipated. Dig? We clear on this? Let's get back to the main deal. Let's Get Back to Making Newcomers Feel Excited About Being in Recovery. You see, remember the story in a vision for you where there was this cat that was talking about am I to be boring and glum like some people I know? Is there any man and woman in this room that didn't ask that question when they sobered up? The big question, the common thread that ran through every one of you, you and me both. Is there a solution that is sufficient enough to keep me clear of the booze? We ask that. Is there an efficient substitute? And the answer is yes, there is. And we need to make sure that the new guy that comes in knows that the substitute is there. That recovery is cool and exciting. I talked at a place down south Texas one time, and I remember walking into this room, and these people were like, I didn't know whether I was in a funeral or in an AA meeting. They were the most glum lot I have ever met in my life. They were totally miserable. Nobody was smiling, nobody was laughing, nobody Was happy. It was just a veil of tears. And I talked for an hour and got down and this lady walked up to me and she said, I had no idea recovery could be like that. And I wanted to weep. I just wanted to cry. They're missing everything. Guys, let me tell you something. If you are baffled today by this stuff, if you're still glum and depressed and getting the crap kicked out of you by this spiritual stuff on its own, please come see me and let's get you back on track. And the handshake, The secret handshake that's going to connect every dot of all of this stuff is this 12-step work. And I'll talk briefly on that, and Chris will finish that stuff up, and then we can do some Q&A kind of stuff and this sort of thing. We talked about this stuff briefly last night, but guys, I'm telling you, we want to hold all ofthis work at a distance. There are two types of people in Alcoholics Anonymous and in NA and CA and every other fellowship I've ever been involved with. You have those people that will embrace the newcomer and understand what our primary purpose is, which is to carry the message. And you have those that feel like they have reached nirvana because they got sober and they're going to just stay there on their own little island. And we've become introverted. We've become so self-absorbed that we can't reach out to the new man that walked in the room. I did a talk in a room one night and was doing the steps and as I'm doing this, this man walks in, stands in the middle of the room and just stands there. It's not my home group, this is somebody else's group, okay? There's 40 people in the room and this man is just standing there. Hugely uncomfortable. He's sweating profusely. He's nervous. He doesn't know really what he's even doing there. I mean, it's just one of those classic, well, I finally got up enough nerve to walk in. He didn't know it was a step study that night. He didn'T know I was going to be talking. And he's just standing here. And I'm thinking every molecule in my body is saying, please, somebody go grab that man. Don't let him just stand there and sweat. You know what? There wasn't one person to do any of that. They stood there and they let that man stand in the middle of that room until he was so uncomfortable and he started to turn away. And you know what, I could not stand it. I stopped what I was doing, sat down off that podium, went over there and hugged him and sat him down. And we did it. Everybody was too afraid to do something, to make a stand, to feel uncomfortable. Everybody's in their own little comfort deal and nobody wants to reach out, you see? Well, I already paid my dues. I walk in, I remember feeling that comfortable. Where's the empathy? Where's it? Where's all of it? Where is the, oh, geez, I want to weep thinking about it. It wasn't 30 minutes later towards the end of this talk, a girl that had been sitting in that room with a t-shirt on and a pair of shorts got up and walked out. Less than 20 seconds later, no longer than that, maybe a minute later, this same girl walked back in with no shorts on and nothing on except that t- shirt. I don't know. I mean, she's obviously stoned. And she had walked back out and I don' t know what was going on out there, but she walked back in with very little on. And I'm still trying to carry on this conversation from the podium, you see? And once again, I'm going, God, will anybody help this woman? Sixteen women in that room sat there and watched her bend over and show everything that she had and fumble around and she finally sat down on this couch and passed out. And there wasn't a woman in there who helped her. Nobody. After the meeting, she got up and walked to the door. I'm going, ladies, don't you do this. She walked outside. Guess what happened? A guy follows her outside. Ha! Classic. Classic. So here we have a woman practically naked in the room walking out and there's nobody from that home group that's going to help her. But some guy's goingto help her, you betcha. Well, you can imagine what happened. It was not pretty and I got right in the middle of it And we carried her treatment that night. Why do I relate these stories? Because, guys, in your own little world, your AA may be perfect. In your own world, things may be groovy. But out there in the whole world, guys there is some sex-cool AA with people floundering not having any clue what their primary purpose is. The book is clear. Tradition 5 told us our primary purpose is to carry this message in this book to somebody that needs help, whether it's a drug addict or an alcoholic. Those traditions state that. So let's go out there and do it. And if we have questions of how to do it, we need to get into this book and understand how to doing it. And that's what this whole thing is about. And as you begin to do that, I'm so frustrated. I get 100 emails a month from men and women who email me telling me how frustrated they are that they have no fellowship around them that wants to do what we do. And my answer is always the same. Why wait? Why wait for an entire group to change when you can change it? Listen, where we're going to change 12-step work is one man at a time. One woman at a times. That's how it is. This man right here is going to stand in a meeting and he's going to share something. And this man is going go, I like that. And he's gonna walk over after the meeting and say something to this guy. And this guy is going say, here's what we're gonna do. and they get a game plan together. They're going to work through this work and they're going do it. Now you've got two of them. Pretty soon you've got three of them pretty soon you got four of them now you got four men walking rock step through the work all plugged in all excited about what's getting ready to happen you got a bunch of other guys out there taking cheap shots at them but it's no big deal I can stand the arrows I can sand it all I have three friends right here that believe just like I do and the next time group conscience rolls around guess what we're going to do instead of having 20 discussion meetings a week, we're going to vote one of those discussion meetings out and put a good old big book study in there. There's a start. We are not going to affect change from the podium. We're goingto affect change one man at a time. As we sponsor, I'm a strong sponsor and I'm going to sponsor my men and they're going to be strong sponsors and their men are going to be strong sponsors and they're going to all know what their responsibilities are to their AA group, to AA as a whole and more importantly at times to their families and friends. They're goingto understand what it is it means to be a sober member of Alcoholics Anonymous and it does not mean just not drinking. It means we're goingo change and we're gonna be the men that we were supposed to be. That's what it means. Chris, you can have the rest of this. Thanks, ladies. I mean, how can you add to that? In the morning when y'all hear me tell my story, I come from a place of nearly dying in this fellowship. I'm not hearing that message. and it was pretty emotional for me to have finally gotten it and realize it goes another way. Twelfth step is not an option. See, twelfth steps is what it's all about. How can I put this? When Eddie's first 12-step, Bill Wilson, over in the front in Bill's story, talks about on page 14 in our text. He said, My friend had emphasized the absolute necessity of demonstrating these principles in all my affairs. Particularly was it imperative to work with others as he had worked with me. Faith without work was dead, he said, and how appallingly true for the alcoholic. For if the alcoholic failed to perfect and enlarge his spiritual life, through prayer is that what it said no damn sure it didn't it said spiritual life through work and self sacrifice for others he couldn't stay sober means that I don't have a choice if I'm going to keep this spiritual experience that God gave me I'm gonna have to continue to give it away that's what it says it also says over here on page 129 in the family after some of you nice folks that are visiting us from out on probably more familiar with these pages than some of us end up in the regular fellowship it says quite simple even if he displays a certain amount of neglect and irresponsibility towards the family it's well to let him go as far as he likes in helping other alcoholics during those first days of convalescence this will do more to ensure his sobriety than anything else did y'all get it? during his first days of convalescence that means while he's still drying out folks that means Whileie's still working with steps working with others is going to do more to help him stay sober than anything else this is what the book said folks written 70 years ago and then we've got the audacity to come in here and tell you after six months you can work with somebody else excuse me you don't work with somebody else you may not make six months that was my experience because that's the one thing that changed when I got back into this fellowship in 1987 I'm looking forward to telling you my story no I'm dreading it like some of us that's true because I'm going to stall some of you and I don't want to do that all we've been talking about here is sharing our viewpoints from where this is at You don't have to do it this way. Like Myers, I get lots of emails and phone calls from all over the country. Those tapes travel everywhere, you know? So you get calls from, I mean, everywhere. And it's like, how do you handle boredom in AA? Big question I get asked. Excuse me? I don't have time to go pee much less get bored you know in AA there's so much work to be done how can you get bored sitting in a room watching some guy you're doing the work with and watching the lights come on and watching him carry the message to somebody else how can we see a fellowship sitting the other night right after we got off the plane we were just dead and sitting in this men's meeting it was so cool to listen to these guys share. And they were all excited and they were laughing. Everybody's laughing. And they would, you know, how y'all do it here in this practically like chat when you read, you Know, and it was just gorgeous. It was just, how can you get bored watching people passionate about their new lives? You wake up in the morning and you get this intuitive thought to call somebody and you call them and all of a sudden there's a new job in line and miracles start to take place and you're going to tell me you're bored. You know why you're boring? Because you're not doing the work. because you're not in the trench. You're missing it because you think this is all about just staying sober one day at a time. And you guys, I can travel around and I share this on the podium and every time I talk about this you guys laugh. So why are we perpetuating this nonsense? Why do we keep talking about it? Well, just one day at a conference Do you realize that we're the bust of a million jokes out there. Alcoholics Anonymous is the butt of a million jokes. We've got organizations on the internet right now that are determined to destroy AA. And everything they're using in there is based on the falsehoods of AA. One of the lead lines on the Internet I was looking at the other day, because Alcoholics Anonymous professes that we'll be sick forever, we have this other organization over here that you can actually get well in. Y'all with me? AA you can get well in. But because we've got people sitting in meetings sharing misinformation about always being sick, y'all down with this? You can recover from alcoholism, folks. That's what the book promises. I asked a guy out here a minute ago, we were talking, and he was talking about being sober for a period of time but he was still thinking about cocaine, he was Still Thinking About Alcohol. And I said, buddy, let me ask you a question. How many times in my 17 years of sobriety do you think I've fought hard about taking a drink? And he says, oh me, not one. Not one, not One. Because the miracle of the spiritual experience took place in my life. And I stayed active, I stayed involved. That's what happens when you stay involved. The obsession with you stays away. Because you know when the accession to youth returns, I'm going to go to youth. See, that's the miracle of this. This is for peace. But the whole thing is set in motion by finishing the work. And then you work with others and give it away, and the miracle takes place. We could beat this to death, folks, but there's no sense in that. I mean, it's just that simple. If you've been in this fellowship longer than a few months, and you're not sponsoring somebody, you need to really start asking yourself why. Are you making yourself available to that cat Are you going to those jitter joints? We were in a treatment center yesterday, day before. A bunch of people in there looking for sponsors. Where are you? Make sense? I like that guy. I think so. There was a nice lady in the treatment center. She was so good. She said, how can I help anybody else if I can't even help myself? I hear it all the time. You're finally getting it now, guys. you can't help yourself it's by helping the newcomer that I get helped see how that works you're not going to believe it until you try you're rolling your eyes contempt prior to investigation I hope you get on this path with us we sure need you out there in the trenches we're going to take a smoke and come back and answer some questions does that sound good Thank you. Thank you.