Self-Centeredness Isn’t a Character Flaw — It’s an Addiction and You Can’t Choose Your Way Out of It – Russell S.

About This Speaker Tape

Russell, a member of the Coral Gables Group with nearly 30 years of sobriety since January 17, 1981, shares at the Twelve Step House on what he frames as a Step Two talk. At 61 years old, he reflects on how his understanding of the steps has evolved from intellectual struggle to simply living them. He describes the progression from hearing the steps, to figuring them out, to struggling with them, to applying them, and finally to becoming them — a transformation where you stop getting into trouble not through effort but because the old reactions just stop happening.

Russell tells the story of his early sobriety when his sponsor Bob told him to stop talking badly about people behind their backs, humiliating him in front of others. Though his feelings were deeply hurt, he came back because he recognized that his sobriety was somehow connected to his relationship with Bob. He stopped the gossip — first as an act of compliance, then genuinely — and as he stopped talking badly about others, he stopped thinking badly about them, and started feeling better. He frames this entire transformation as something that happened through another person's will, not his own.

He speaks passionately about the disease of self-centeredness, describing how alcoholics are addicted to self-will and cannot simply choose to stop being selfish any more than they can choose to stop drinking. He connects this to the Second Step by showing how his sponsor functioned as a higher power before he understood Higher Power — someone whose will he followed because he wanted what that person had. He emphasizes that the journey from self-will to something greater begins with small acts like picking up the phone and calling a sponsor, and that the miracle is already happening before you recognize it.

Russell also expresses deep compassion for old-timers struggling in sobriety, noting that physical sobriety and emotional sobriety are different things. He recounts a humorous story about a sponsee who feared he was "just crazy" and not alcoholic, and would have to leave AA — to which Russell assured him he could be both. Throughout the talk, his humor is constant and self-deprecating, from his weight gain in sobriety to his admission that he no longer has "fun" but feels great about his life.

Topics

Timestamps

• 0:00 Russell introduces himself, notes the Twelve Step House group is 61 years old — same age as him
• 3:30 Story about telling his sponsor he needed to lose weight at one week sober; sponsor replies 'they can't arrest you for driving while fat'
• 7:00 Reads 'The Man in the Glass' poem, connects it to Step Two and the illusion of material achievement
• 10:00 Describes the progression from hearing the steps to becoming the steps over 30 years
• 15:00 Everything gets ripped away — car, spouse, job — and you discover none of it was permanent and only Higher Power matters
• 20:00 Explores how alcoholics use the same words — happiness, serenity, fun — but mean completely different things
• 25:00 The disease of self-centeredness: addicted to self-will, unable to choose differently no matter the consequences
• 32:00 Free will paradox: you need free will to choose Higher Power's will but you're addicted to self-will — the sponsor becomes a bridge
• 37:00 Sponsee Tommy's panicked call: 'I think I'm just crazy, not alcoholic' — Russell assures him he can be both
• 42:00 Sponsor Bob humiliates him for gossiping; Russell comes back, stops talking badly about others, and his thinking changes — this is Step Two in action