Step 12 – Spiritual Growth Is by Subtraction – Part 3 of 4 – 2021 – Local AA Speakers

today. It's okay. All right. Everybody makes mistakes, he says. You got problems. All of them are not going to be solved by bedtime tonight. But the unsolved ones will not keep you awake. He's humming, singing, shaving, not cutting himself, talking to himself, liking himself. Takes a shower, he's dressed, he still humming, you know, he is having a good time. Dresses, goes to the door. His wife comes up. He says, I love you, baby. See you tonight. Got to go, you know? He goes out to the bus of life, which is pulled up to the curb and heads for the passenger section. You know people like that? Yeah? What kind of day do you think he had? I mean, he set himself up pretty good for that day, didn't he? Probably came home, had a good day. Probably sleeps good at night. I never did. How about you. Unhealthy guy. Scenario. Alarm clock goes off. He prays. Oh, shit. That's his prayer. Puts on a snooze alarm. Says I'll sleep until it goes off, it goes off and he hits it and prays again, right? I can sleep 15 more minutes, he said, don't really want to get up and he oversleeps. Wakes up realizing he's 30 minutes late already and he's not even out of bed and he prays again. You got that prayer? Runs to the bathroom, sees himself in the mirror and almost gags. You ugly. I don't think you can handle it out there today. You got to go to the office and you got to do that job and old Sam doesn't want you to do your job and he'll stand in your way every chance you get and he will probably defeat you and you're going to lose your job. the problems, he says. You've got these problems. He starts thinking about the problems. He's dialoguing with himself, you know, and he cuts himself and he prays again. And the problems kind of feed on one another, don't they? Once you let one of them have its run, the other one comes behind it. Before you know it, a man hasn't even peed yet and he's got 473 problems gone, All of them unsolvable. And he said, they're going to run wild today. You can't sleep tonight. You're not going to solve all these problems unless you can find the right solution to every single one of them. It's got to be exactly right. And don't you let anybody know you make mistakes because you're not supposed to and they'll get you if you do it. He's bleeding. Right? And every time he cuts himself, he prays again. He's already prayed 40 or 50 times too. See, he's not even out of the bathroom. Jerks on his clothes. They don't match. Runs to the door. His wife comes up. He says, get out of my way. I've got to go. runs out the door to the bus of life, which is pulled up to his curb, and goes dead for the driver's seat. What kind of day do you think he had? God, that first part of the morning is so important. Maybe that's the reason the big book Alcoholics Anonymous says when it's talking about prayer and meditation, upon awakening, not ten minutes after, upon awakening it says. We think about the day ahead. Okay? I don't know about you, but I can wait 15-20 minutes in the morning and I'll end up not praying and meditating. I got too many problems and I don' t have time. I'm a busy fellow, y'all. Too busy to keep an appointment with God. Way too busy. And by noontime, it is flying apart. Isn't it all that way? I know you're not, but, you know. Now, where do we get this point of view? Where does it come from? Because we need to understand that. You all have seen me draw this old picture of the mind so many times that you're probably sick of seeing it, and it's really not your mind, but it's a pretty good model, and let's draw it here for a minute. And in the middle of the man is that window that we look out of and we form opinions about what we see and we put labels on people and places and things and that's called perception. And my perception of things is the way I see things to be, roughly. All right? Now, when I came into this world I don't believe I had any opinions. Did you? I don' t think little babies have any opinions I don''t think they put labels on anything I think a little baby lives in a magic world, y'all. It's the world called we. The window that he looks out of, the perceptive window, it's clear. As a matter of fact, if he moves, something else moves. If he makes a sound, something responds. It's like everything's him and he is everything. He's real close. You know? He begins to get out of bed at an early age. Oh, and I've got to say this. Ever notice a baby in his crib or her crib? They're always seeking to relate to something or somebody. Don't care what it is. A kid can sit in the crib and play with a leaf for hours. I believe they totally absorb that leaf. They know everything there is to know about that leaf, not intellectually, but in the deeper knowing sense. They don't even know it's a leaf. They just love it, feel it, play around with it, absorb it. But eventually they get out of that crib, you know, and they go crawling across the floor. And maybe this thing here is sitting on the floor, And he crawls into that thing and he hits his head and he gets this strange sensation going down right here, right? Up until now, everything has moved when he moved. That didn't move. And furthermore, he's got this strange sensation down the back of his head over here. Watch a baby. Generally, the baby will back off and hit it again. You ever watch kids? Kids are a trip, man. They will back up and they'll hit that thing again. and they are determined it's going to move. Everything's moved up to now, that's going away, and it doesn't move. Now if you want to know if that baby's going to be an addict of some kind, that's the baby that backs off and hits it seven times trying to move it. And it won't move, and he hears a voice, and the voice says, honey, don't hit your head on the table. It will hurt. Table. This sensation is called hurt. I don't like that. scenario now, go with me and he looks at himself and he says, God you're small you're so limited you're not that table you're not that big thing over there that made that noise said something about hurt either and I believe fear sets in real early he has recognized his separateness and he begins to say a new word that he's never said before I me my if you want to test this out go up to a baby you know young one who's sucking on a bottle man they slobber all over everything you know that babies slobbber I expect somebody to come up one day with something called sloebber therapy We've tried every other way, you know. But walk up toward the baby and the baby sometimes will push that bottle out to you slobbering off. You know that? Because you're not you. You're part of him. I mean, he's like he's feeding himself. Really. Think. But he's three years old and he's got him a sucker and he licking on it, right? And you walk up to him and you say, that's a good looking sucker. Could I please have some of that sucker? He says, it's mine. There's a radical change here, y'all. What was related is separated. What was total and complete is now fragmented. Now, this kid begins to form a system of things that are very important to him. A system of what we call values, huh? I'll write it out here. And his values begin to impact on his outlook, on his perceptive window. His first value may be, it's important for me not to hit my head on the table because it hurts, right? Let's stay simple. He begins to form a whole system of opinions now about this world outside himself called beliefs. And they begin to color his perceptive window. He begins to develop certain definite feeling patterns so that we can look at kids when they're three, four years old and say, this one's outgoing, this is shy, you know, this was angry, this ones afraid. Feelings. begin to impact on his outlook on life. All these experiences that he stores up from the word go begin to affect on his point of view, his perception. And now, he is looking out of a window which is like stained glass. It's colored. He has a definite outlook. He begins to hang around with people who share that outlook. He begins to argue with those who don't. He behaves in terms of his own values and his own beliefs. He sees the world now through colored glasses. You understand what I'm saying? Is this clear to you? I hope it is. Now, suppose he looks at reality now and it is horrible suppose life is a plunger and it's going nowhere and I'm lost and I am alone and I pray and I feel afraid and I empty and I hurt and there is an ennui in my life I need filling he will go looking for something he'll go looking for something that will change his view of reality hopefully it'll change it instantly you know we like instant stuff go in your grocery store and look go to your bookstore and look at the instant books on psychotherapy and on how to get good and how to do it and how not to get well no, you know in ten minutes and get a degree for it We like instant stuff. Our society, I think, doesn't know how to delay gratification. I'll just say that about the whole society. Delay gratification, that's a wonderful big language, isn't it? This society doesn't knows a damn thing about eating Oreos. This society goes right for the creamy center. Never mind the wafers, baby, let's get with it. Listen to the street language, let'S GET IT ON! so we find something that's instant maybe it's alcohol maybe it was food but whatever it is the effect of it is to change reality or to seem to change reality or your point of view of reality the world which was a plunger changes radically dramatically instantly, instantaneously feeling good. That's wonderful, isn't it? That's what they call the elixir of the gods, I guess. Did I share with you last time I was down here about A.E. Houseman, the English poet? Any of you read his poetry? Nice stuff. It's really good stuff. And Houseman was an alcoholic, I know, because I read this poem of his one time and he couldn't have written it if he wasn't. And he was talking about this change. Now, let me share this with you. He said, Many appear of England brews livelier liquor than the muse, and malt does more than Milton can to justify God's ways to man. Ale, man, ales the stuff to drink for fellows whom it hurts to think. Look into the pewter pot and see the world as the world is not. Bingo! It changed, didn't it? The major reason that I drank and used drugs and did a lot of other addictive things was that those things seemed to change reality. Seemed is an important word. They never did. Reality was always worse when I returned. Houseman said that too. Look into the pewter pot and see the world as the world is not, he said, And faith is pleasant till tis past The mischief is it will not last For I've been to Ludlow Fair And left my necktie God knows where And carried to my home or near Pints and quarts of Ludlow beer And in the world seemed none so bad And I myself a sterling lad And down in lovely muck I've lain happy Till I woke again And then I saw the morning sky I hope the tale was all a lie The world, it was the old world yet Now was I and my clothes were wet And nothing now remained to do But begin the game anew Tell me he wasn't drunk I hate to tell you this I hated to discover this Reality does not change instantly. Oh God, how I wanted to. Now you wanted to you'd come off a bender and you'd make these world-shaking statements like I have learned my lesson this time. You hear that? We really meant that. I have learned my lesson this time we say I will never do this again. I am finished forever. And I've got to tell you what's true of me. Anytime I use the word forever, ever, or never, I'm on an ego trip. That was true then, it's true now. I have learned my lesson. I'm not going to look at it that way anymore. now you've been out there building that point of view of reality for how long now is it 20 years or 21 years or 25 years or 30 years and after one bad experience you're just going to change it all there's the instant grits again I'll just add a little water here it will all change instantaneously, painlessly hopefully sorry about that Your point of view of reality will never change until your values do. What are they? Abraham Maslow talked about a hierarchy of values. The system, that is arranged in order. First value, second value, you know, in order of their importance. In my mind, at some level, is that value system. All of it. If I asked you honestly now, hell, if I asked me, to write down on a piece of paper your top five values, could you do it? I could probably write down what I wish they were and what I thought they were But I doubt if I can do that. So if we're going to change our point of view and our perception of reality, we must change our values. If we don't know what our values are, we might discover what they are. How do you do that? at your behavior. That hurts. It's a dead giveaway. We behave in terms of what's valuable to us. Look at your behaviour. It might shake you up, but you discover what your values really are. And then when you discover it, Chuck used to say, you discard. You replace, you re-prioritize. But first you've got to know what's there. And then you start moving things around a little bit. And what happens is this. Okay? Now, you will never change your perception unless you change your beliefs. Your opinions about what's right and good and true and real and all these things. Your opinions about this reality thing. Right? What are your beliefs? What do you believe? Do you know? Then how do you know but it's your behavior. Discover. Discard. Reprioritize. Replace. What about those feelings? any of you ever look at the world through angry eyes I did for 30 years the world looks different doesn't it feelings boy they hit they impact so heavily on what reality is for me clean them up what's the 12 step program says clean them up learn how to express Get out these feelings. And the beauty of the 12-step program is it suggests we get them out through service to others. If you look at it very closely. Memories? Look at your experiences in life. Instead of damning yourself for having them, learn from them. There's a beautiful section in the big book, Alcoholics Anonymous. It begins by saying now about sex. God, we avoid that topic, don't we? And you know what that whole thing says? Look at your past behavior. See what your values were in your sexuality, huh? Because it's very closely related to spirituality. They are so intimately together that we confuse one from the other often. what your belief's been in your sexual life. You know, who have you hurt in your sexual life? The whole thing is, look at it, learn from it. Don't put yourself down. On this side of the paper, you know what you did and on this side of the page you've learned that you're going to do now to change. That's the way we learn. And so we examine those experiences and learn from them. If you will think, if you've been clean and sober or involved in a 12-step program for any time at all, you probably have realized by now that you learn more or have learned more from your mistakes than from your success. And it's the transformational process that takes place there, you know? This mistake becomes the foundation, if You will, of my future success. The big book says, Our past becomes our most valuable asset. That blew my mind until I understood that. Yeah, it is. This is a transformational process that's happening here. Now, when you have examined these things, when you've learned from these things and when you're cleaned up a little bit, guess what happens to your perceptive window here? It's clear. like a child unless you become as a little child okay moving on back clearing up the window and start all over again with what these principles which are guides to progress new priorities huh new priorities given to you in this program in these principles. It's a funny thing, y'all. The beginning phrase in the twelfth step. Anybody tell me what it is? Come on. Having had a spiritual awakening. What is that? If it's not a massive change in perception. Would you tell me? What is it? Carl Jung said it was that. Massive shift, he said, in values. Massive shift in attitudes and beliefs. Total change. Okay? So something dies. What? Old values, old beliefs, old feeling patterns. You see? And you really do start all over brand new. now you're ready to be if you will regenerated yeah made all over again oh that's far out anybody sitting in here that's an addict or addicted to anything or is addicted to an addict even it is strange what people get addicted to and, you know, your addiction hasn't killed you today. You're being regenerated. You're getting better. You're not being transformed. If you're a dilaudid addict, you haven't shot up today, something's happening to you. If you've been an alcoholic, you haven'T had a drink, something's happened to you, you see? But you see, in addition to being impatient Wanting instantaneous stuff? We want big stuff. Transform me, Lord, now. Get me on up there with Augustine. It's almost like God comes back and says, okay, if you're ready to work and wait. It is work. that almost kills them, huh? We've got to work at the program in order for it to be a success. And we balk. I'll go this far and no further. What do you mean 90 meetings in 90 days? Oh, I can go. well, my job won't let me do that. What do you mean get a sponsor? I don't want to bother anybody. What an ego trip. Well, you worked pretty hard to become a drunk and you worked pretty hard to become addicted and you think you're going to get over it on the slide Do you think God is some large foley bear riding across the clouds on a tricycle? I don't think so. So you got to work. Any of you familiar with a German philosopher by the name of Friedrich Nietzsche? Nietzsche fell into great disrepute you know because Hitler liked him Nietzsch died in the nuthouse when he was 40 you know what could he know do you ever realize some people are too tender for this world people like Van Gogh and Nietzche and we've known some others too tender for this World and NietZsche really took a beating because all the preachers a few years ago and they're yelling about God is dead and God is death and all this stuff. You saw the bumper stickers be dead, he died since this morning because I just talked to him and all that kind of, you know how we get carried away with stuff. Nietzsche was the man who said God is there. So he's taking a beating. But they never gave Nietzschi his full due. Nietzsche did say, God is Dead. His love for us has killed him. Know what else he said? He who has a why to work for can put up with any how in order to get there. If your goal is sobriety and it's strong enough and important enough to you, you'll put up with what it takes. You'll do what it needs to get to where it takes to get there. And if it's not, you won't. okay change doesn't just happen not real change only illusion okay now I think we're going to break for just a little bit it's about what it's about two o'clock Jerry do you want to say something first okay and let's take I don't know where y'all want to take about ten fifteen come on back, and we'll go from there. I want to talk to you a little bit next about maintaining things in terms of watching. If you don't know what that means, maybe I can tell you. All right? ...ringing it down to size, cutting it down to size. The first three steps obviously do this. And if you'll look at step 4, 5, 6, seven, eight, nine. Those steps are paired in a certain way. It's almost like six is get ready and seven is go, and eight is get ready, and nine is go. And four is get ready and five is go each is a preparation for the next. And the fifth step and the seventh step and ninth step very much are a process of ego deflation. If you're gonna have to do some reading to see that, okay? And every single one of those steps takes us along that horizontal plane spiritually towards others. Every one of them, okay. In the fifth step where we confess to another human being, okay, the exact nature of our wrongs, we're moving along. And the seventh step when we ask God to remove our shortcomings, we are asking Him really if you use the prayer in the big book to remove the things that are standing between you and him and your fellows. And in the ninth step, you're going directly to people. And the beautiful thing about the ninth up really of the restitution process altogether is, is that if you're familiar with the karma, the wheel of karma, are you familiar with that concept? Okay. Let me give it to you briefly. Okay. Karma says this. It's like you see a wheel up here and he's going around and around And karma says what you put on the wheel over here, exactly what you put on a wheel is coming back to you. In Christian tradition it is stated in a different way. It's called the law of retribution. It says what you sow you will reap. Now over the years of our addiction we have sowed many seeds on that wheel of karma. And the beauty of the process of steps four through nine is that we get a chance to identify what it is we put on a wheel, okay? Who we need to go to in order, if you will, to clean off the wheel. Yeah. We don't have to reap that which we sowed if we dig it out, okay, if we make amends, in other words, take it off the wheels. Another beautiful thing about the wheel of karma is that it works positively too. Whatever you put on the wheel that is good will come back to you. No ifs, ands, and buts. It's a spiritual axiom a spiritual law, that it's going to happen this way. So these steps are a process of ego deflation. They're a process when they deflate the ego, they move you closer to the other. They deflate it, they move your closer to the other because remember the ego the I is a conscious sense of separation from and we want to decrease that separation from and move back into that world that the child lives in which is called the we-world. okay and that's what the steps are doing for us in a very large way now if it said all the way throughout the big book uh we're doing this to deflate your ego tom i probably never would have done that because i didn't understand what ego deflation was don't think i even knew i had one when i got there you know and it was so screwy and so reversed anyway then it would have frightened me. Any of you ever read the original manuscript of the big book? I would have never joined this outfit. You know what it said? You must do this. You must do that. You most do this." It was all you, there was no we in it. And at one point after the twelve steps it says, if you've read this far and are not willing to go on with this then read it again and if you're not then throw the book away that's pretty aggressive isn't it and all the suggestion of a psychiatrist Paris the fall who said this is a little harsh little pushy they changed the words to we okay there's magic in that word there really is now after we've completed the first nine steps of our program I don't know what it says in a book but in a book it says we have now entered the world of the Spirit change in it we have now entered in the world and the spirit okay what's that think we've been dealing in the first nine steps with what ourselves but what aspect of ourselves our past right first nine Steps bring us up to the world of the spirit n-o-w now present where it's all at now is an interesting thing even before I quit saying the word now it's not now one of my favorite philosophers is a Jewish guy Martin Buber and he says now is the only point at which I shall touch eternity it is always now you ever thought about that it's a beautiful thing now higher power when he spoke to Moses and I always envied Moses you know higher power said I am didn't he that means like God's present tense I am present tense Now is the world of the Spirit. Now is a world of relations. And it goes on to say that our next step is to grow in understanding and effectiveness. Our next step is to growth in understanding an effectiveness and we get into those maintenance steps in the program. I want to take a particular point of view today. About the last two, or the 10th and 11th steps, I'm just going to try to touch those a little bit. Just touch and get you thinking a little better about them, okay? They're very important steps, these maintenance steps. Those of you who heard me talk last night, I said that when I got to this fellowship, okay, and into the 12-step way of life, I hated me. How many of you hated you? I mean really and truly now. in a very strong, strong way. Felt like you were an utter failure. I did. A real loser. I was the guy who when my psychiatrist asked me to describe myself answered instantly I am the sorriest son of a bitch in the world. Instantly. And didn't hear myself, Patty. and I wondered why my life was going consistently downhill. I wondered. It couldn't go any other way. I believe I'm rotten, I'm rotting. I'm going to behave rotten. Matter of fact, every time everything got good in my life, I'd louse it up. If I'm not careful, I do the same thing these days. These God-awful beliefs that I had about myself, When you get into your belief system, look at some of those. I'm no good. I'm sorry. I'm worthless. I'm unlovable. Look for them. When you see them, admit them. Accept them. Change them. Identify what's really there. But you can't do that unless you watch. Now the tenth step, viewed non-religiously but from the point of view of a spiritual teacher. Do you remember when a spiritual teacher came down? He'd been up on the mountain, been doing some praying. He left his guys down there waiting for him and he came back and they were asleep. Okay? He said two things. Watch and pray. Remember that? Watch and prayer. The Greek word for watch is a beautiful thing. It's a command. Gregorite. you know what it means wake up be aware realize look watch then pray look at 10 and 11 you almost see an identical pattern there watch and pray 10th step we continue to take personal inventory when we're wrong promptly admitted it It's a recapitulation of several of the preceding steps, obviously. But note the terminology. In the book Alcoholics Anonymous anyway, it says we continue to watch. That's what it says. We continue to look and continue to search for selfishness, dishonesty, resentment, and fear. And when these crop up, not if, when, we do the following. so we've got to move I believe from self-hate to self-love through watching through self-acceptance that's really far out isn't it self-acceptable to me except me I don't even like me I've got to fight and I've got to change and yet our program says in the preamble and how it works in the AA book. Those that don't recover are those who cannot or will not completely give themselves to this simple program, not fight anything. So we watch. Let's talk about three aspects of watching, waking up, realizing, being aware. And you know, I think it's a strange thing. A friend of mine says most of us walk around this earth for most of our lives in a state of spiritual sleep. We don't know who we are. We don' t know who others are. We don''t know what the world is all about and life is all about, you know, but we tell ourselves we do, which deepens the sleep. Watching is an interesting thing. If you believe that this world is a terrible place, watch for one day, all day, for the good things that happen to you and for you that you don't have anything to do with. Wake up. Realize. Be aware. Some of you are already thinking back through today, aren't you? Because some things have already happened. You know, I was so arrogant that when the good things happened I just didn't even notice them. I just took them for granted. They were supposed to. Really. Oh boy, but when the bad ones happened I was very aware of those. Why? Because of my attitude. Because of me. Because of myself. Because of perception of reality. I was looking at it from the left-hand side, always. And I was unaware of the good in life. I'm not saying this is a grand and glorious and wonderful world, but I'm also saying that I'm just not saying it's not. We have people who want to understand and don't understand what grace is. If you will watch for one day for the good things that happen to you and for you that you don't have anything to do with, you will begin to understand with that knowing beyond knowing what grace is. You will experience it. You will begin to look for it. You will begin to expect it. You will begin to count on it. And it will happen more often because you're awake. You're watching. How many of you have ever done that? How many of you ever taken an hour or two hours and watch for the good things that happen to you and for you. You don't have anything to do with it. We'll go to a meeting and we'll say, the most marvelous thing happened tonight. I was thinking about so-and-so and he called me. The most marvelous thing happened today. I was down and I got this letter. And after we talk about it at the meeting, it's gone. And probably that day when you spotted that one thing, you spotted 500 things that were bad and missed 500 that were also good. Which side do you want to live on? I'm not talking about being a fool. I'm talking about being more positive. There's an old song. I was talking to a lady about it the other night. I think Johnny Mercer wrote the old song says you got to accentuate the positive eliminate the negative latch on to the affirmative and don't mess with Mr. Inbetween. That's what I'm talking about and it goes beyond positive thinking. It includes that but it goes beyond. it's embracing the truth really that there's a God and that he or she really does care about me and that they consciously work for me 24 hours a day me else why is it that when I've got a particular song on my mind and I really want to hear it and I go get in the car and cut on the radio it's playing But you've got to watch The program is a program of spiritual awakening Because when spirits will sleep I believe they go together And spiritually, you see I take naps all the time Don't y'all? I take nap I take all the times There have been very few people throughout history that have been continually awake. And they have been so transformed that even those who loved them and lived with them did not know them. It's powerful. It's God. You've got to watch some other things, too. Watch for the vultures. You know what the vulture's are? Sid Simon wrote a book on values clarification. He's probably the world's foremost authority on values verification. He's also a very gentle and kind and beautiful guy. He wrote a little old book called Vultures, and vulturers are the put-downs that I do on myself. so why are you taking a day to watch for the good things that happen to you take another day I know this is taking a lot of your time to do this but take another day and watch for the number of times you put yourself down that's really incredible you want to find out if you hate yourself or not take a day and do this how you really feel about yourself We've got a terrible opinion of ourselves. We are God's kids. We are expressions of God. If what I said is true, you know, I don't know. I think it is. And we treat ourselves like dirt and beggars. Prodigal son, I am not fit to be my father's kid. We really do a number on ourselves. Watch for it. you make a mistake and you hear yourself say profanely so and so you've never done anything right. Do any of y'all do that? Boy, that's a never word again so you know the ego is involved in there somewhere, don't you? And all you've done is make a small mistake and you're damning yourself for it. People in transactional analysis talk about tapes that we have in us and certain things happen and the tape starts playing. It's an old reaction pattern, an old thought pattern or some kind of behavior pattern or some kindness. And I often thought, man, it would be wonderful if we could get a new tape library, right? Called The Regenerated Person, right ? The one who's grown down finally once and for all. Take out the old tapes and put in the new ones. Wouldn't it be wonderful? It's almost like going for the center of the Oreo, isn't it? I've got to tell you something about me. If somebody made me able to get that set of tapes and play them, I would find fault with them and be bored with them in a very short time. I used to think I wanted to live on a mountaintop. I don't. I long for the valley. I need the ups and I need to die.