Step 4 and the Self Appraisal of a Shattered Mind — Chris

Welcome to Sober Sunrise, a podcast bringing you AA speaker meetings with stories of experience, strength, and hope from around the world. We bring you several new speakers weekly, so be sure to subscribe. Whether you join us in the morning or at night, there's nothing better than a sober sunrise. We hope that you enjoy today's speaker. Hello everybody, my name is Chris, I'm an alcoholic. It's really good to be here. This specific event, I've got so many friends here, and all the speakers are phenomenal, and I'm just really, really glad to be here. You know, my topic tonight is a vision for you. So, reading a little bit about the history of the writing of the big book, I think it was one of the first chapters that was written. It was put in the end of the book, but it was one of the first chapters written. A vision for you. So what I want to do is, I want to give you a vision of what it was like for me as an alcoholic. Because the difference between the vision of me today, and the vision of me as an alcoholic is drastic. I'm not even the kind of person I would have liked, you know, when I was drinking today. You know what I mean? It's like just a quantum shift. But I grew up, like a lot of us, I grew up just not really feeling comfortable with this thing called life. I had a lot of internal turbulence about, you know, people and situations and responsibilities and, you know, what was going on. I never was okay with like what was going on. I felt off. And I would look around at the other kids or the other young adults, and they just seemed like everything was fine. And so I learned to act as if everything was fine. But it wasn't. You know, the best way for me to describe it is I was uncomfortable with myself, and I was uncomfortable with my environment. And if you, you know, this is like the 50s and 60s, right? So they didn't throw kids in front of the psychologists or the psychiatrists back then. You know, they sent you to camp or something. But if you would have put me in front of a psychologist or a psychiatrist back then, they probably would have died. I'm not sure what you're talking about. I think your problem is that you're not comfortable with yourself. You're not comfortable with yourself. I have to say, you know, when I was a kid, I didn't want to be a child. I didn't want to be a child. I was a little high strung. And, you know, nothing, you know, nothing. I just always wanted to just be by myself. I felt the most comfortable in my room where, you know, nobody could mess with me. I didn't get a go for team sports or, you know, boy scouts or anything that's like dancing class. You know, all that stuff. I just couldn't wait to get out of it. And I found that I was able to do that. I was able to do that. And I was able to do that. Now, you know, I knew that something was different about me. I had no clue what it was. But I did notice that the first time I drank alcohol, what alcohol did for me, it was a lot of alcohol. It was a lot of alcohol. It was a lot of alcohol. And what I liked about it was it made me feel okay with all that stuff. Like, like I started, I started drinking Four Roses whiskey with a couple of my buddies. And, and just moving into the second drink, this is great. This is great. I'm with my two best new friends. You know, this is so cool. This is so cool. We're going to do this every day, you know. And, and 10 minutes before, you know, I was like, I'm going to drink this. You know, I was worried about what I was going to say. Am I going to say something stupid? You know, so, so what alcohol did was it broke open the gates of freedom for me. And now I had a connection to you. I could connect. And the problem was I was alcoholic, right? So I would become over-served and, you know, become a violent lunatic or something, you know, and it would ruin the whole thing. But there was a problem. There was a window, you know, with alcohol where, where it did for me what I couldn't do for myself. And it gave me this artificial sense of connection with you. And, you know, from the first time I drank it, I became preoccupied with it. And the first time I drank it, I went to, went into a terrible blackout, came to in a field, you know, with lost time. You know, you ever have lost time? You know, it's disconcerting. You know, you'll, you'll come to in the back of a cop car handcuffed and you'll be like, what? Excuse me, officer. You tell me what's going on. You know, it's, it's disconcerting. So that's what happened to me the first time I drank. So, so I, you know, I, so from that day forward, I tried to manage my alcohol consumption and it never went well. You know, I was, I was an abject failure at, you know, managing it. Now I tried really hard. You know, I went from, I went from Four Roses whiskey to what the stuff that kids drink, you know, the Boone's Farm and the MD 2020. There was some identification there. Blackberry, brandy, Southern Comfort, all the stuff that you would never touch once you become a full blown alcoholic. It's like, ah, it's like, ah, it's like, ah, it's like, ah, it's like, ah, it's like, ah, ah, ah. So much sugar in that stuff. You know, just give me, give me vodka. So, but, so, but, but that's the kid stuff, right? You know, and then I, I went to beer and I started drinking a lot of beer, drank a lot of beer and, and, and I could somewhat manage, you know, you know, my, my blackout experience, you know, when I, when I, when I drank beer, it didn't always work, but, but for a couple of years there, it went all right. And, and, and, you know, I'm, I'm looking back on it and I am captured by this stuff. Like, like I come from, I come from a smart family. I got a brother and a sister who are both, you know, Phi Beta Kappa PhDs from like Cal Tech and Holyoke and all this stuff. It's just, you know, so I come from a family, we're all burdened with minds. And, and, and, you know, my mother and father were, you know, Phi, Phi Beta Kappa, whatever. And, and I come along and I start drinking. Right. And, and so, so I, I didn't, you know, there's so many things that happened, you know, beyond my perception. One of them was, is I became so preoccupied, preoccupied with alcohol that really that started to become the most important thing, you know, stay after class to get some extra help for the quiz tomorrow. Uh-uh. That's it. You know, I'm, I'm going to smoke a couple of joints with my buddy John, you know, on the way home. I just, I always, you know, so, so like, so, so looking back on it, you know, the day I started drinking is the day I, I turned a corner and, and, and, you know, I, I was, I was not able to accomplish really anything. I mean, I did go to college. I'll tell, I'll tell you this. I went to, uh, uh, I went to a college down in Florida. The University of South Florida. And, uh, I, you know, I'm pretty damn pr- I went there for three and a half years and I'm pretty damn proud of the six credits I got. You know? I, I, I still got the paperwork for those. Um, so, so, you know, like, you know, alcohol and partying. I party. You know, do you party? What are you, lame? You know? I party. You know? What's wrong with me? I, I wanna have fun. I party. And that's really what I thought it was for say the first ten years. And, uh, you know, look, looking back on it, I mean, it, you know, in Alcoholics, in Alcoholics Anonymous, one of the things that is, is absolutely necessary is, is, is for us to do, uh, self appraisals. You, you do it in, in step four. You know, you do it in step ten. We're really supposed to, you know, uh, adequately assess what's really going on with us. And through many decades of doing that, that's given me such a perception of just how screwed up I was and how much trouble I was in. But if you would have come up to me, you know, in 1978 and said, you know, you know, Chris, you're, uh, you're alcoholic. Alcohol consumption is, you know, getting a little bit out of control. You know, you know, you're, you're not doing well in college and you're probably not going to amount to a whole lot. And, uh, you know, you really should take a look at that. I'd be like, what are you talking about? Who are you? Who let you in the party? You know, it just was beyond me. So, so about ten years into my drinking, I, you know, I became chronic, a chronic alcoholic. And what that looks like is that looks like it, that looks like blackout drinking every night. That is a painful place to be. So, so this, this would be a typical day for me, a tip of the vision for Chris, you know, in the eighties, I'd come to wearing the clothes that I passed out in the night before that didn't fit me. Right. You know, and I'd be stinking of vodka or bourbon. It'd be coming out of my pores. Yes. I'd have drank a fifth of it the night before, you know, and it's just like I'm poisoned and I, you know, it's just, it's just trying to get out of my body, all this ethyl alcohol and I'd stagger into the bathroom and I'd throw some water on my face and you do so like I, I smoked non-filter palm oil. So I do some vomiting, you know, that was traditional and, and, and I'd stagger out to my hundred dollar car and go off to my terrible job. You know, I'm a terrible job. I'm a terrible job. I'm a terrible job. I'm a terrible job. Oh, no, no, no, just shattered, shattered, right? Just as ill as you can be. You know, the boss would say, oh I want you to do this. I want you to do this. I want to do this. I'm like, okay, by the time I get to the truck, but what the hell did you tell me to do? God dammit. You know? I always have to tell you three times. So, so like, you know, my mind isn't even working and the only reason I had a job was because I was working for an alcohol company. No, no, no, no. alcoholic. You know, he'd yell out the window and tell you what to do from the second floor. Go into so-and-so's house and try not to start a fire this time. I was an electrician. So, you know, this is going on. And I would be feeling so awful that I would be, I'd say, listen, you know, God damn it. Today is the day. Today's the day. You know, I'm not going to drink tonight. As a matter of fact, I'm going to quit drinking. You know, that's what I'm going to do because I don't want to feel this bad anymore. Folks, it's not even a hangover when you're like a chronic alcoholic. It's alcohol poisoning. You know, hangovers are for amateurs. We get poisoned. You know what I mean? So I'm poisoned. And I'm swearing to God, I'm not going to do this anymore. And here's the strange thing. If you take a lie detector and wrap it around my wrist and say, Chris, are you going to drink tonight? No. Are you even going to quit drinking forever? Yes. That needle on that lie detector would go to true because I meant it with every fiber of my being. That's a sane and sound decision to not poison yourself and have yellow eyes. And projectile vomiting and lack of cohesive thought. You know, that's a sane decision not to do that. And I would mean it. And, you know, I'd be doing bad electrical work on somebody's garage or something. And halfway through the day, I'd get a half a sandwich down. And I'd rehydrate because you always got to rehydrate when you drink like that. You got half a gallon, I'll just about do it, you know. And, you know, the whole thing is that you have to rehydrate. And I'd start to feel a little bit human. And I'd start to think about that decision I made. You know, I made a decision this morning to quit drinking. I got to look at that. You know, wait a minute with that. That might be an overreaction. You know, and so by the time I'm leaving to go home from work, I'm on the way to a liquor store. Now, that's what I'm up against. And the lie I keep telling myself is I changed my mind. Yeah, I know I quit drinking this morning. But it was kind of an overreaction. I've thought more deeply about it. And I've decided I'm going to go to a liquor store. But knowing what I know about putting alcohol in my body, And knowing the consequences of what happens when I put alcohol in my body, that decision can only come from a place of insanity. It can only come from a place of insanity. So that's why when I come into Alcoholics Anonymous, I must admit to powerlessness. Because if I think I can still do something about alcohol going in my body, I'm going to do that and not this. You know what I mean? So I've got to come to that conclusion. And I show up in Alcoholics Anonymous after 10 years of just ragged drinking. And I show up in the meetings. And it really was a bizarre experience for me. I started going to meetings in early 1989 in a town called Baskin-Ridge in Burleson, New Jersey. And they had what was discussion. They had discussion meetings. I didn't know any better. I had the meeting book. They gave me that in treatment. So I picked the closest meeting. I figured it's an AA meeting. What's the difference, right? All these meetings are probably pretty much the same. So there's one at the top of my street. I'll go up there. Well, it was packed with the craziest lunatics you've ever seen. They would just sit there and talk about themselves. You know, oh, here's what I did today. And, you know, I did some gardening. And I made some cookies for the grandchildren. And it was great. And then somebody would share, yeah, you know, the grass was a little high. I cut the grass today. You know, and there was a good game on TV. And, you know, it was really good. And I'm sitting there dying of alcoholism going, what the hell is going on? First of all, I don't care what you do. I don't care about your day. I don't care about your kids. You know, I don't want to hear about any of it. What does this have to do with my alcoholism? You know what it had to do with my alcoholism? Nothing. It was a closed-minded, wacky discussion meeting. But here's what happened in that meeting, okay? You got me. Every once in a while, every blue moon, an alcoholic would share. And this... It was a discussion, right? It wasn't often, but every once in a while, you know, I was living in a box, you know, with sugar blood. And I'd be like, that's my guy! And it slowly dawned on me that, damn it, I'm in the right place. You know? You know, yeah, I'm 50 times worse than these high-bottom, you know, lawyers and hedge funds. I'm not a high-bottom guy. But I'm still in the right room. You know? I'm still in the right room. And I kept coming. I kept coming. The one thing I didn't do was I did not stop going to meetings. Do you know how many people I watched blow through Alcoholics Anonymous in the last 30-some years? You know? Coming in all gangbusters. Oh, yeah, I'm going to get my life together. I'm sober. You know? Six months. Where, you know, where's bummed-out Bob? You know? Where? Where? You know, he was going to a meeting every night. You know, three months. You know, the inconsistency is the one thing that I got right. I stayed consistent. And what happened was I was exposed to some people who had a real working knowledge of the recovery program that's laid out in this wonderful book, Alcoholics Anonymous. And I got inspired. You know, Peter. You know? Beth, Scott, a lot of us have been inspired by these amazing communicators. They were able to communicate a spiritual recovery process with English language. It's not that easy. You know? And I became really, really, really, really inspired by these people. I started to listen to workshops. And spiritual talks. And the first thing I did is I started to sound good. You know? I started to give really good share. And, you know, spiritual share. And luckily, I hung around long enough to be inspired enough to actually start doing some of this stuff. You know what I mean? Because I think that's key. You know? And I was very inspired. I was very inspired. I was very inspired. I was very inspired. And, listen, these people, like Joe Hawk was one of the guys that I really got inspired by. And what he was really good at was explaining why you need to take a step, explaining exactly how you take the step, and then explaining what's going to happen after you take the step. Now, that's like, I wasn't hearing that in the discussion meetings. You know? That's the last thing somebody would talk about. Right. Right. Right. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That's what I was wondering. So I got in a discussion meeting. So I was getting all this stuff off the tapes. I was becoming inspired. And I made a run through the steps. Very imperfect. You know, doing it myself, you know, with the big book and some tapes. And, you know, and I did a bad job. But here's the good news. You know? We can do a bad job on this stuff. You know what I mean? You can do a crappy job with the steps. Because it's a way of life. And these are principles that we practice and we'll get better at this stuff if we stay at it. But what happened was I started to change as I went through these steps. I came in to Alcoholics Anonymous with an absolutely crushed spirit. And I think many of us can claim that same thing. I had behaved so abysmally that I had lost my family. They not only left me, they moved six states away so I couldn't travel in a blackout and show up. I lost like 11 jobs in like 10 years. And I was in a blackout. And I was in a blackout. And I had friendships that I had from high school. I had a ton of friends in high school. Every one of them is like, do not come over my house. Don't call. If you see me walking down the sidewalk, cross the street. So I'd blown up all these relationships. And the sad thing is, I believe deep within me, I long for connection. I long for connection to you. And I long for connection with the divine. I think it's been instinctually implanted in me by God. You know, we're tribal people. Listen, for 100,000 years before the modern era, we lived in little tribes, right? We were hunter-gatherers. And there'd be about 20 adults and about 40 children. And we'd just try not to get killed. And, you know, try to get stuff to eat. And move. Move around. We were tribal. So it's instinctual with us. So when we destroy the fabric of relationships, you know, it hurts our spirit. And I'm lonely like you cannot be. Only the alcoholic can understand this loneliness. You know, it's just like you're all by yourself. You know? And, you know, no one's ever, you know, gonna... You're never gonna be close. I mean, just that toxic loneliness. And how do I treat that toxic loneliness? With isolation. How else would you treat it, right? I'm drinking. You know? Don't call me. You know, I'm start drinking. Don't call me. Don't come over and ask me to help you move or something. You know? Are you kidding me? I'm drinking. So you do enough of that stuff. And you crush your spirit. Your spirit gets crushed. And you show up in alcoholics. You know? And you're in so much trouble, you don't even know how much. You're in 50 times more trouble than you think you are. You know, when you walk into the rooms of alcoholics. I know that by looking back, you know? And I start going through these 12. And what happens is, they talk about the spiritual awakening in the 12th step. You know? Our spirit will awaken. You know? What is that? You know, there's many ways that everybody can probably describe their own spiritual awakening experience differently. You know, what's a spiritual awakening? Experiencing all the promises. You know? What's a spiritual awakening? The conscious contact of the presence of God. You know? What's a spiritual awakening? You know? You know? You know? You know? You know? You know? You know? You know? It's very, very healing for me. You know? I can't put it in words. I can't put it in words. I can't put it in words. You know what? I can't put it in words. I can't put it in words. I can't put it in words. You know what? And I of course, I will never forget that. I can't put it in words. I think it's very onuble, very basic to me- that, that you, I'll tell you this. deep desire for connection with the divine, connection with God, connection with the Spirit, however you wish to describe it. I had experienced bits and pieces of it throughout my life. So probably the first time I could feel connection to the Spirit was when I was a child and Christmas was coming, right? You know, Christmas is coming. You know, it's about two weeks away. You know, Santa Claus is going to get under the tree, all these presents, you know. And I would start to really feel good inside, you know. Instead of cut off, I'd start to feel good inside. And that was maybe my first experience with connection to the divine. And then I became a vomiting alcoholic pig. And, you know, it was all over. But there was always been something in me that has wanted me to have that connection. Now, the book Outwardly, Alcoholics Anonymous talks about it like this. Selfishness and self-centeredness is the root of my trouble. Selfishness and self-centeredness. My problem is being toxically selfish and self-centered causes so much emotional disturbance within the continuum of Chris that I have to throw alcohol on it. Because I've got to have a vacation from that. You can't be that selfish and self-centered without some form of anesthesia. So that really is the root of my problem. Now, you look at the steps. It's funny, you look at the steps. Step three is a decision to seek the divine. To take these steps and seek the divine. And get connection to the divine. And then there's another line in there that says, various manifestations of self are what had defeated us. So there's manifestations of my selfishness and my self-centeredness that's defeated me and blocked me off from the semilatest spirit, caused my failure at life. And immediately that needs to be looked at. And the major manifestations of self are resentment and fear and the emotions that come from poor conduct. I need to look at that. I need to look at that. I need to share that with somebody. Then I need to become willing to embrace the divine and ask the divine to give me the power to overcome these manifestations of self. Because I can't just do it myself. And then I humbly ask God to remove the manifestations of self that have defeated me. And then I put a list together. And step eight are the people in the institutions that have been harmed through, through the expression of my manifestations of self. And then I go out and I make amends to the people in the institutions that my manifestations of self have harmed. And then in step ten, I've got to continue to inventory my manifestations of self. And when I'm wrong, promptly admit it. I have to talk to somebody and do inventory it. And in step eleven, I need to seek through prayer and meditation a deeper connection to the divine because that's the only way out of self. That's the only way out of self is that deep and abiding connection to the divine. And that takes work. Some people have spiritual experiences that blow their mind. I had the educational variety slowly over the course of time because slowly over the course of time I did the steps. There's no reason. Slowly over the course of time. Okay. So, so anyway, this deep and abiding connection with the divine is what's going to solve my problem. Now, now the tricky part of this whole thing is, is when you're a brand new alcoholic, that don't look good. You know, what, you know, what, what, what's the solution? God? You know, are you kidding me? So, we have to kind of approach, approach that slowly with some of the newcomers. But, but, but that's, that's the ultimate solution. The ultimate solution is God. Now, I got to start doing my job here, which is to talk a little bit about the vision for you. You know? Oh my God. Peter's here, so he'll fix everything I break. Come on. We'll be, we'll be all right. You know what I'm going to do? I'm just going to read some promises out of the vision for you. This book is packed with promises. So, so Bill Wilson used that, you know, as convincers, bait, you know, however you want to see it. But he knew we weren't, we were not going to want to do this stuff. You know, made direct amends to the people we've harmed. All of them. No. So, so, so he puts a ton of promises in there. And these are all, these are all promises. These are all promises that manifest. If we do the step work, we get the promise. I've never had anybody come up to me and say, I did this step and I didn't get any of those promises. Well, you know, how exactly did you do that step? You know, because, because it's my experience, my experience working with others that, that it's cause and effect. You know, you, you, you take the step, you, you receive the benefit of that step, which are these promises. So now we're wandering around out there. We're working on it. We're working on it. We're working on it. We're working on it. We're working with others. You know, we're home group members. We're alcoholics, anonymous members in good standing. And, and this is kind of where the vision for, for you kind of picks up. So is there a substitute for the camaraderie of the bar? You know, is there going to be a substitute? Because there were some good times in the bar, you know, before drink 11, when things kind of got, you know, so it's a, it's a, it's a substitute. And vastly more than that. It's a fellowship of alcoholics, anonymous. There you will find release from your care, boredom and worry. Your imagination will be fired. Life will mean something at last. These are significant promises. The most satisfactory years of your existence lie ahead of you. How about that? How about next year is going to be better than this year. And the year after that's going to be better than next year. I'm up for that. Sign You. I'm up for that. Umm among these crazy AA members, because we are crazy. Among these crazy members, you will make lifelong friends. I've done that. There's some of them in this meeting here right now. I know. I'm going to be friends with them for the rest of my life. You know, I know that you will hit, you will be bound to them with a new and wonderful ties for you. You will escape disaster together. You will commence shoulder to shoulder your common journey. Then you will know what it means to give of yourself that others may survive and rediscover life. You will learn the full meaning of love thy neighbor as thyself. The age of miracles is still with us. How about that? You know, listen, these early AAs, they were inspired in many ways. Certainly they were inspired by mainstream Christianity. They were inspired by the Oxford group, which was a break off of the Episcopals. But, you know, a lot of Bill Wilson and Dr. Bob's spiritual advisors were mainstream religion, right? And there's been a lot of study about the early origins of Alcoholics Anonymous and how Christianity kind of helped. Really play a part in that, right? But there's also another influencer that I truly believe. Bill Wilson was the main architect of all of this. So I like to look at, like, what was he influenced by? And Bill Wilson was influenced by the New Thought people. You know, what was New Thought? Who was New Thought? Well, Emmett Fox is a New Thought guy, right? So the New Thought movement kind of started with this guy. Phineas Parkhurst Quimby. Okay? He looks like a bad evil guy in a Charlie Chaplin movie or something, right? And in the 1850s, he was a clockmaker. And he made clocks. And people would go to him because he became a healer. He became a visionary healer. And people from all over the country. He healed like 20,000 people. And he started this thing called the Science of Christ or Christian Science. The Church of Science or whatever. It became New Thought. Well, one of the people he worked with was a woman named Mary Baker Eddy. You know, you look at Mary Baker Eddy and, you know, she credits Phineas with everything. Now, one of the people that was influenced by Mary Baker Eddy was a man named Bill Wilson. Bill Wilson was a man named Bill Wilson. Bill Wilson was a man named Bill Wilson. Bill Wilson was a man named Bill Wilson. Bill Wilson was Emmett Fox. So, in New York, Ruth Hock, the secretary of the Alcohol Foundation, when Bill Wilson was writing the big book and stuff, used to go see Emmett Fox in Madison Square Garden. And guess who she dragged with him? Bill Wilson. You know, so there's all these spiritual influences. All these influences that are impacting Bill Wilson. And he's having a real experience. And he understands at a very deep level that that's the solution to alcoholism. That spiritual experience. And what he did was he built Alcoholics Anonymous in a way that really is non-religious that throws the door wide open. He takes every spiritual principle from all of these disciplines and all of these religions and he makes them accessible to alcoholics. And that's... That's ultimately our solution. You know? Not making meetings. It's a deeper answer than that. Let's see if there's any more promises in here. It says here, Life among Alcoholics Anonymous is more than attending meetings, gatherings, and visiting hospitals. Cleaning up old scrapes. There's something deeper. There's something deeper in Alcoholics Anonymous. I believe it's the connection. I believe it's the connection we have with each other. And for people coming in, no one is too discredited or has sunk too low to be welcomed cordially if he means business. I'm personal friends with five bank robbers. Okay? Now, I wouldn't share that at the Rotary Club. But you get it, right? And so... And some of these bank robbers are the most spiritual people they're working with. They're the coolest dudes. You know what I mean? I'm proud to be a friend of theirs. And it says, Thus we grow. So we're going to grow. Remember when this book was written, there was maybe 60, 70 sober alcoholics. Some of them only for a couple of days at that time. You know, this is a prophetic book. This is writing about stuff that hadn't happened yet. But he knew it was gonna. So... You know, Bill Wilson was prophetic. So it says, Thus we grow and so can you. Though you be but one man with this book in your hand, we believe and hope it contains all you will need to begin. So it does. If you're a sober alcoholic and you move to some place where there's no meetings and no AA, you have this book and you look for alcoholics to help. And you can do it. You can begin that way. You can begin by taking people through the steps. It says here, God will constantly disclose to you and to us. Ask him in your morning meditation. That's assuming we have morning meditation. You know, a great thing. A great thing Dr. Bob wrote. Dr. Bob and the good old timers. He goes, attendance in meetings is good. But morning meditation is essential. You know, that's Dr. Bob. Ask yourself what you can do each day for the man who is still sick. The answers will come if your own house is in order. But obviously you cannot transmit something you haven't got. See to it that your relationship with him is right and great events will come to pass. How can you ensure your relationship with God is right? That's the steps. Steps are about clearing away. Everything that blocks me off from the sunlight of the spirit. You know, just to finish up. The change in me that is remarkable to me. You know, I used to be told things like a tiger doesn't change their stripes. You can't change. You can't change an asshole. You know, I used to hear all that stuff. And kind of even believe it. But I used to be told, you know, you can't change. You can't change an asshole. You know, I used to hear all that stuff. And kind of even believe it. You know, people are kind of the same. You know, maybe acting a little different. But, well, here's the good news. There is enormous change available in Alcoholics Anonymous. You know, I would rank up there with the most selfish and self-centered of anybody in this room when I was drinking. I mean, it was all about me. You know, if a family member died, I'd be like, some bitch died on me. You know, I'd be like, some bitch died on me. You know, I'd be like, some bitch died on me. You know, now I gotta get dressed up in a suit and go to a wake. You know, now I gotta get dressed up in a suit and go to a wake. I don't like wakes. I don't like wakes. You know, I'd make a funeral about me. You know, I'd make a funeral about me. And so there's been a shift. There's been a shift in my life. And if I inventory the hours I spend throughout the day, I see that most of those hours are engaged in activities that will be helpful for somebody else. You know? And I'm a million times happier. So when I was just doing what I wanted to do and doing things that were going to be good for me, I was miserable. Now I'm really trying to figure out ways to be helpful to other people, and I'm really happy. The math doesn't work on that. You know what I mean? But listen, God doesn't care about math. And that was good. And that was good news for me because I failed at it anyway. But really, you know, you gotta give it away to keep it. There's all these contradictory statements in Alcoholics Anonymous. How do you hang on? You let go. You know, there's all these crazy statements. But being of service to others is the most impactful thing in my life. And it's changed me. It's changed me to death. You know, I got a phone call about ten days ago. And it was, the phone call was from Meathead, my daughter's husband. And he goes, oh, you know, Danielle's in the hospital. They say she's had a stroke. And he's giving me this stuff. You know, the doctor said, I know, I'm getting on a plane. You know? So I get on a plane and I go out to Colorado. And they were on a vacation. They were on a trip. And she had a stroke. And she ends up in Grand Junction, Colorado. You know, that's on the far side of the Rocky Mountains. So I fly in. And I walk into the emergency room. It's the intensive care unit. And I walk in and there's more machines than I've ever seen in my life. You know, my daughter says, hoses. Everything's beeping. There's like nurses. And there's, you know, there's respiratory techs. And it was, I'm like, oh, my God. And I stayed there for four days. I stayed there until she was scheduled to get off the vet. Now, I want to share this with you because it's amazing to me. I was calm. I was not scared. And I didn't make this about me. I was focused. I was communicating with all the hospital staff. I was setting up group chats to be able to communicate with the extended family. You know, we were putting together ways for the family to be able to come and visit because none of them have any money. You know? And so I'm putting all this stuff together. And I'm actually useful. I'm actually useful in this situation. And that's amazing to me. And there was almost no emotional turmoil around this. I saw the situation for what it was. You know, what's a spiritual awakening? You know, what is an awakened spirit? It's somebody that sees things as they really are. You know? And I saw the situation as they really are. And I saw the situation as they really are. And I saw the situation as it really was. And for me to get whacked out emotionally over this whole thing would have taken away from my effectiveness. I was much more effective and focused. And she's doing much, much better now for anybody that's going to ask. But being the type of person that can be there in those situations is invaluable. You know? And we learn that. We learn that in Alcoholics Anonymous. We learn that from our sponsors. We learn that from saying yes. We learn that from our experience with service commitments, for God's sake. And I got to tell you, I am unbelievably grateful for Alcoholics Anonymous. You know, the best way to describe me in the 80s was pathetic. You know what I mean? And it's just the change has been extraordinary. And, you know, I'm not going to lie. You know, I'm really, really glad to be here in Wilmington. I'm glad to be able to hear some of my friends do some talks. This is going to be a really good weekend. And thank you all for coming. Thank you for listening to Sober Sunrise. If you enjoyed today's episode, please give it a thumbs up as it will help share the message. Until next time, have a great day. Bye.