Step 5 and the Professional Victim – Tom S.

Hello, I'm Tom Scholzheff and I'm an alcoholic. This is to beat people away if I don't do a good job, I suppose. Okay, now what? you know what comes up for me is i want to do a good job you know my mind has been just beating me to a frazzle for the past couple hours and it always gets nervous before i speak because it knows that for about 45 minutes to an hour it's going to going to be out of a job. It's really a privilege to be able to share with a group of the most wonderful people on the Earth. I really believe that. I think we are phenomenal people, alcoholics, recovered alcoholics. And it's quite an honor. It's almost paradoxical because that's quite an honour for a recovering alcoholic to share his experience, strength and hope with other recovering alcoholics not like I know anything because the thing I'm learning is that the longer I'm sober, the less I know, which it seems kind of backwards for somebody who's had about 12 years of formal college education. But it's progress for me. I'd like to thank the conference committee for asking me to speak. I don't know about you, but I get a lot out of this. But I have a commitment to getting a lot of sharing my experience, strength, and hope. The theme of the conference is Pass It On. I think that's AA's former retirement program. It's kind of sneaky the way we do that. I was talking to, I might mention, refer to this gentleman a couple of times in the course of my talk because for about the past 24 hours I've been working with a guy who's been sober about 3 and 1 half years with no steps. And that's a privilege. That's the highest form of Alcoholics Anonymous in motion is both of us together, for me. Because it's not uncommon. It's easy to get sober. I mean, I think so. Also, by the way, this is all my opinion. And if it's in the book, it doesn't really make much difference anyway. And if you get irritated or don't like something I say, look it up. It might drive you back into the big book and check it out. If it's not there, sorry. Never mind. Yeah, that's the ticket. Look at the book. But I also have a commitment to having fun in sobriety. I've done it both ways in AA, not had fun, been real serious. And I have a tendency to be a little heavy. Heavy does it. That sucks! I mean, and I had about four years of being heavy sober, you know. And it happens right around three and a half years when you know you know, you become over-sober. And you know those guys in the meetings, you'll see them. They're sitting back there, they don't say anything and they just not. Or when after you talk they come up to you and grab your arms and go like, like you're coming along kid. We have got just a bunch of great people in Alcoholics Anonymous. One thing and this is gonna I I've talked, shared at a lot of meetings, and I haven't for the past couple years because I've been obsessed basically. And not that I turn anything down in AA because I don't, but I think the energy was such that phone messages might have bounced off my telephone and never rung the bell, you know? But maybe I had nothing to say. I think that's probably more likely the answer. I don't even know where I was going with this. I don t really have a prepared talk. We call them canned talks, and I don?t. All we need is a tape recorder up here if that were the case. But I tell you what my intention is this afternoon. My intention is to tell the truth, one. Two, to make a contribution to you because I love you, because you saved my life, because you gave me the... I hope this is not going to be a cryy one. Because you made a contribution to me that I can never repay. Thank God. So I'd like to make a contribution to you, not just make you feel good, warm inside. I mean, have you ever gone to a meeting and they leave and say, how was the speaker? Oh, it was great. I cried the whole meeting. You know, oh, I laughed and I cried. What'd you learn? I don't know, but I laughed when I cried." We're junkies. We are emotional junkies, just bring me up, put me down, but don't let it just be, and God don't make me work the steps. So Jesus, but you know, the bad news is the short form of the story is if you do the steps the way it says to do them in and the big book. That's it, period. That is the end of Talk Sealer. That's that I mean so the rest is having fun I guess. But you know what matters is not just feeling good or going up or down but actually you know Wednesday morning is going to roll around. And I used to be a conference junkie. I used to love going to the conferences and stay up all night and drink a bunch of coffee, eat a bunch sugar. Oh, do you feel the love in the room? Oh God, I don't want to leave on Sunday. And Wednesday I was calling suicide prevention. It was like, what happened to the love in the room? You know, and then automatically, automatically the psychological assessment that I am says, must be me. What's wrong with me? I mean, why can't I be like that guy who talked? And the truth is this, is that for the past year, I have not felt like a good AA member. For the past year, there have been large periods of time when I looked for God and couldn't find them. For the past year, I feel like at times that I was in better shape spiritually as an Alcoholics Anonymous member when I was four years sober. Now my sponsors, people I love and people I respect and people that I trust say that that's normal. You know, don't have a real grip on normal. We could not find normal with a road map. If normal showed up, we'd call the police. So this is not about normal. By the way I deal with those normal people a lot and And they're crazy. They are stone crazy. We're, at times, pillars of mental health compared to them. So, you know, it's like there's this superstition in Alcoholics Anonymous. And I don't care how much we say we're not second-class citizens, that there's nothing too good for the recovered alcoholic. but there's this culture that's going on in AA, and I see it, and I'm a victim of that, that thinks that somehow we're not quite up to snuff for some reason. I mean, we talk about alcoholism not being a moral issue, that it's a disease, but we still feel like somehow I've got to be careful who I tell I'm an alcoholic. I tell you something. We are fortunate, blessed, we are better off than those normal folks. This is not a Chamber of Commerce talk, but a good example. I mean, how would you like to have cancer and not be able to arrest it? How would you want to be normal and just slightly neurotic and not know what it was. How'd you like to be able to afford fear and resentment? Oh, I can, it's in my budget, I'll take three resentments. We got off easy. Now, you know, I forgot to bring a tie with me and I have this, you're supposed to wear a coat and a tie, take a shower before you talk, you know the whole thing. I didn't have a tie, so I went to the gift store and I didn t realize, I don't worry about whether I wear my name badge or any of that stuff. I went in the gift story and I was talking to the lady a little bit and she said, you know, you are the nicest group of people we've ever had in this hotel. And I said, oh well thank you very much. And I said, well, I always do this. I said can I ask you something honestly for a second? She goes, yeah. And I say, what's the difference? Because I mean, I don't go for this hot air up your skirt. If something's good, I want to market it. You know what I mean? What is that that worked? And then let's do that. And she said, you want me to tell you the truth? No, I want you to lie to me. Yeah, tell me. She goes, you've all been very blessed by God and you know it and you're not afraid to let other people know it. This is a normal person. I think, I don't know, she's probably shooting heroin in the gift store right now. Oh, you guys are so great. I'm sorry. Forgot we're in Orlando. Anyway, so enough of this stuff that we're not okay the way I mean we I flew on the plane on the way out here and just because we did we quit drinking and using drugs and smoking pot and and I have one of those and I was It's like, oh, of course, you know, my mind. It hasn't been really working for a few minutes, and all of a sudden, see, I told you, you couldn't relax. Do not... You know that son of a bitch up there? What I love is after it's been sober a while, it starts talking to you in AA babble. You know, like, easy does it. That means I want to take a nap and I don't want to do what I'm supposed to do. It starts talking to you in AAEs, and periodically it'll say, where's God? And it'll run up to your left earlobe and go, this is God speaking. So anyway, I'm here to talk about what it was like, what happened, and what it's like now. There is no way for me to come from where I came from to be where I'm at now. You cannot draw a line between those two points, much less get there. It's a miracle. And I'm not here to tell you about what a great guy I am because I don't care about that. That doesn't help me. I liked that review last night. Bill Wilson was probably turning in his grave. I thought it was good. I enjoyed it. The only thing I had to... And you know what's nice? It's like not all areas in the country emphasize working the steps. They don't. They work the first half of the first step and the rest of the time they whine, you know? But you talk about the steps here and that impresses me. But the only thing I don't quite understand is this thing about the good points and the fourth step. I don' t know about you but my assets never got me into trouble. And it's okay, I mean you can add anything on you want, you know, it's not going to hurt anything. But and this relates back to taking credit. It doesn't matter, but my life has been phenomenal. Who gets the credit? You get the credit. I'd be glad to give you the credit, be glad to Give God the credit! I'm not sure I can afford it because when things start going down, I have a hard time with, well, if I took the credit when it was good, what about when it's bad? But I am responsible. And what I mean by responsibility, sometimes I and others have a heartache. I'm not sure if you've ever had a heart attack, but I have a lot of hard time understanding that. Responsibility for me, a way to describe it is that none of my life happened without me. Like I was always there, you know? Funny, God, I don't understand it. I went out with ten women. They all did the same thing. They all had the same problems. It all turned out the same way. What is with all these women? I sure can't pick them, can I? Interesting, the only thing in common with all ten of them was me. I could turn... It's like we have this relationship in our mind, this little box, and jam this person into it. And of course it's going to turn out that way. So I have this responsibility for my life. Not like credit, but like I was always there when it happened. and that's one of the first things i needed to learn in aa was that i was responsible you know uh now the problem i have at times is doing the footwork and letting go of the results if you're responsible i'll be responsible to the ground with it you know and of course god helps those who helps themselves you want to get goose by the Holy Spirit, you got to get off your duff. Pasteur said chance favors the prepared mind. Pasteur, he was a father of washing your hands before you do surgery. That's why we don't die of botulism when we drink milk, okay? It's going to be a pop quiz after this, right? But anyway, I mean, it's like I'm a lucky guy. Either I'm really lucky, Either I'm unbelievably, can't possibly statistically be this lucky, or this thing called AA is idiot-proof. So I suspect it's idiot-proof. I don't gamble getting up in the mornings at risk. being 12 years sober doing what I'm doing in life is a risk it's a risk enough for me not drinking today is a rest you know so I've been very lucky I started out you know it's like I don't like talking much about my story because it's like you know we ought to have slides and like here I am in Illinois you know It doesn't make any difference. That doesn't make any different. That I swam on a swim team my whole life, that I was a good swimmer and could have gone to the Olympics and started smoking dope and surfing, you know, that doesn't matter. What matters is since I was about 10 years old, I started making decisions that were to affect the rest of my life. Like, it doesn't mater what I do, nothing I do makes any difference 10 years old, my birthday, I get a pair of swim fins, a snorkel, a face mask. I was excited for a moment and I had one of those moments where I said, is this it? 10 years, hard work. Flippers. and then I started projecting. My mind was just in its adolescent stage at that point, just starting to get a few hormones going. It said, well, you know, the next thing you know you'll be 16, you'll get a car, but you won't be able to drive it very long because you're going to get drafted when you're 18. You'll probably go to Vietnam, get shot, and die at young age. I'm 10 years old, I have to take a nap. I can't look forward to that. That's not a bright future for a ten-year-old. My father was an alcoholic, periodic alcoholic. My mother was basically cranky. He died, she got crankier. He died when I was 15. He went to AA, stayed sober nine months. I love my father. He weighed 250, six-foot-six, vice president of Lockheed Aircraft. Nine months, being nine months sober and no third step, vice president of the Lockheede Aircraft, he died of a heart attack. Stress. That's another illusion. Stress does not exist. There's no such thing as stress. My mind, fear, I can relate to fear. I think stress is just a socially acceptable term in the 80s, a yuppie term for fear. And you know this has got to be an idiot-proof program because we do not learn from others' experience or from our own experience because we keep not trusting. Maybe I'm the only guy who goes through this, but I at times don't trust. I can't make these generalizations onto everybody else, but it doesn't matter how many times God's pulled off the big one, the miracle. I think, yeah, but this time I got to do something about it. He knows nothing about finances. Okay, I was wrong. He does know something about relationships. OK, I'll give him that. But what does this guy know about finances? Pretty much I woke up when I was about 15 when my dad died. That kind of woke me up a little. We were living in Southern California, Corona Del Mar. He died and I started smoking dope and going surfing. My whole life was to be a surfer. And I had the whole image. And I suspect that at times, it still plagues me and other alcoholics that I know too. I had a four-wheel drive Land Cruiser with three or four surfboards on the back, the white skier sunglasses, the Hobie t-shirt, the OP shorts, the zinc oxide on my nose, and the Beach Boys tape. I was dead and gone to heaven. Tell the teacher we're surfing. Yeah, yeah. The only problem is I was going to Alateen and I was depressed. I knew nothing I did was going make any difference, so it was just passing time, having a good time. I started using drugs. First I started drinking beer, and I didn't want to become an alcoholic like my parents, So I started using drugs. Of course, it's a logical decision. I wasn't going to become an alcoholic. So I start using benzadrine and methadrine pills. I wasn' going to be a junkie either. And that made me nervous so I, you know, I interv- I remember my mom had remarried to a psychiatrist. This is a whole other story. My mother, my family, when I married and the first time I brought my wife-to-be to meet my folks, my mom had remarried a psychiatrist in the program who had gone through Synanon before the rattlesnakes, back when Chuck Dietrich was sincere. He was an alcoholic, but he had this little non-social heroin problem. But he'd been sober at that time about 10 years and was one of these guys... Tough love was not the word for it. It was kind of like nuclear concern. He'd say things to me like, Tom, how come you don't have any friends? That'll twist your mind when you're 18. Tom, how can anybody be so malignantly self-centered? You know, gentle stuff like that. Anyway, I brought my wife to meet my stepfather and my mother. And it was so crazy. It was like bringing Jan to go see the Addams family. Where's Uncle Fester? Well, he's up in the, you know. She has these little silky terriers that are running around screaming and doing all this insanity. And my mom, you know. So talking about my family, it's a bad move. So anyway, the upshot of the story is I started using Benzedrine and didn't want to use Benzedrin. So I started drinking some Michelob. You can't be an alcoholic if you drink Michelob because alcoholics drink Brew 102. And I figured, well, I needed to quit. I needed a quit. And I knew AA worked for my folks, so I wanted to make sure I could quit. So I quit for about 60 days on my own without going to meetings. And what happens after you've been on kind of a run of drinking beer and smoking dope and taking bennies is all your bodily functions stop. And I didn't go to the bathroom for about three weeks. And that'll get your attention, particularly if you're new. And I remember I went to my doctor, who was a guy in the program. And he recommended I go to a young people's meeting. And so I did and also gave me some medication to relieve my problem. And had my first spiritual experience in the Program. And I say it when newcomers don't be concerned concerned when they say you're full of it. I was certainly. Anyway, I didn't have a heavy story. I mean I didn' go to prison. I didn''t have any 502s. I got sober when I was 20 and I had never been married so I couldn't have the divorces. You know I drank beer. I drank some Harvey Wallbangers. I did that for a few years. I took some benzedrine, smoked some pop. By the way, you know it's all the saying. It talks about that in the book. Dr. Bob and Bill W were the first dope fiends. I mean, they were taking morphine, you know. It doesn't matter. The problem is a spiritual illness, you know, so there's just not a... And I get a little concerned about all the conversation about, you now, pure alcoholic and all that, I suspect that God's going to take care of us too. And the only requirement for membership is a desire to stop drinking. And I had a desire to stop drink. So I went to that meeting. You know it's kind of funny, I'm talking a little bit about qualifying. There were some bad guys at that meeting I went to who had bad stories. Bob E., a friend of mine was in that group when I first got sober. He had a terrible story, just nasty story. I had visions of him shooting Sterno in prison or something. I never did that stuff and so I felt like maybe I didn't qualify. I was told once and I think it's kind of true, I had three beers, took a couple of Ben's dream broke my surfboard and came to AA, you know. So I don't do well in the can you bottom this game. I went to prison 17 times. That's nothing. I went 18. You know and the guy who's the worst wins you know so I can't compete in that very well but I you know I hit bottom Laguna Beach which means you're pretty much of a lightweight because it's tough to hit bottom in Laguna the beach. Something happened. I made a deal with God that night. I raised my hand as a newcomer. I said, I'm Tom and I'm an alcoholic. Two things happened. One, I knew I was at home. Two, I hoped I hadn't written a check that I couldn't cash because I was concerned. I thought that maybe this thing might not work for me, and that I had never done anything completely. I mean, I was close but no cigars and everything. Had a lot of potential if I only applied myself. That almost killed me. I was very bright if I just would apply myself, and I never applied myself, so who knows if I was bright or not? But if you have a lot potential, you don't have to do anything because you could. You could if you wanted to. I've since come to find out that potential does not exist. You can't prove that it exists. It's easier to prove that God exists. Look at the room. But you can't proof that potential exists because it doesn't, only here on your tongue when you say it exists, but it doesn' t exist. So I made a deal with God, and I said, God, look, this is it. The gig's up. I'm willing to do whatever it takes to be a good member of AA. I'm going to do what I can. Whatever it takes. Now, I just don't want to be dry. And I'm just telling you the truth. I'm not recommending this for anybody else. I'll tell you what happened to me. I said I don't just want to have one of those sobrieties fraught with whip-up, excitement, terror, and anxiety. I want to have a good life. I want to make a contribution. I wanna have purpose, commitment, integrity in my life and anything else that I might think up of later. And this is the deal. I'll do whatever it takes and it worked. And they told me a couple things and I did one of them. They said go to 90 meetings in 90 days and show up early for meetings and help clean up. Go to lots of meetings, get a big book, and do what it says. I went to meetings. I did all that stuff. I secretaried meetings, worked with people. I got a bigbook and put it on the shelf. At that time they said, I was going to be an alcoholic counselor until I got sobered. Then all of a sudden miraculously my desire to become an alcoholic counselor cleared up. Now, I think we need recovered members of AA doing that job if they're qualified. But that's not what I want to do. I had nothing else to do, and I figured the only thing I'm qualified is in not drinking for 30 days. But I didn't want to that. I just didn't know what else to. But when I was five years old, my mother asked me once, Tommy, what do you want to be when you grow up? I said, I don't know. She said, well, let's talk about it. Would you like to be a priest like Father Baran? I said yeah. He was a Jesuit priest. I loved the man. She said and he was in the Marine Corps. Do you want to be in the Marines? I said yes. She said how about the veterinarian who takes care of your dog Lady? Would you do that? And what happened was I saw a picture of myself holding my dog on a stainless steel exam table with a white coat. And I knew that was it. It went click. When I was five years old, I was going to be a veterinarian for a year. I was actually going to become a veterinarians priest in the Marine Corps. Hey, you know, when you're childlike and naive and open to possibility, I mean, you can be whatever you want to be. Now the world has not changed since then, but I have, and I think that the possibilities diminish, but they don't. I diminish. I implode. I restrict myself. I limit my own possibilities, and I want to talk about that. But anyway, I wanted to be a veterinarian. And I had just gotten sober, and they said, what do you want to do? Because part of being a recovered alcoholic is making contribution. And part of that is going to work. You've got to get a job. Otherwise, you're going to rot. You know, you've been sucking air off this ball of dirt long enough time to put something back to it. I had some They're real friendly people. So I said, well, I always wanted to be a veterinarian when I was a kid, but I can't do that now. I just got a degree in psychology and very mediocre grades. And you know nobody can get into veterinary school. It's 10 times harder than medical school. There's only 20 in the country. 4.0 students can't get in. I mean it's impossible. It's a myth. There are no veterinarians. just kind of have fronts. They're drug fronts, right? Have these dogs come in and out and they're just loaded with cocaine. That's really what's going on. There's no veterinarians. I said, so you can't get in. And they drilled me. They said, how dare you say there's no God and that you can't do anything that you truly love to do if it's God's will and you can make a contribution is to be of service to God and your fellows. You don't have the right. You do not have the right to not do what you'd love to do, because that's the only thing you're going to be good at. Because what you love to do, you're gonna be good. And what you're good at, you can make a contribution to people with. What you make a contribution to people with, you make it contribution to God with. And when you contribute to God, that's God's will. So unless you do what you love, you are not doing God's will, and you can't stay sober doing that very long or very comfortably. I went, oh, well, since she explained it to me that way. I always wanted to be a veterinarian. And I had a certain degree of spiritual naivety that said that, well maybe, you know, it was like that opening that, well maybe. I saw that there was a possibility that I could do that, and then it shut right down. But I explored it. And I called UC Davis, I'm from California, and I call UC Davis and they laughed and sent me a catalog. And, I was 21 years old, you know, I mean I'd already done a bachelor's degree. I got a C-minus average. I went to lots of meetings and I wanted AA worse than anything in my life. And I wanted to be a good AA. And i wanted to be a sober veterinarian more than anything else. And And I didn't know whether I had the commitment. I didn t know if I was sincere enough. I mean, I would look to see am I committed? And I'd look back at my history, no way. I never finished anything. I looked to see if I were sincere and there were times when I thought I was sincere and I wasn't. So how can I look down the freeway by looking at the rearview mirror? I got on my knees one night and I said, Dear God, please give me the commitment. Please motivate me because I can't motivate myself. It's like trying to bite your own teeth, see your own eyes, pick yourself up by the bootstraps. I cannot motivate myself, and nor could anybody else motivate anybody else, and I'm very clear about that. But God motivates. Love truly is the only motivating source. Love. and it's very powerful so I prayed for the motivation and I had a lot of fear and I have a lot to trust too I trusted you you said I didn't trust God so much you said trust God and I trusted God because I trusted you not because I trust that God is like okay God well these are Joe's a pretty good guy. And if Joe thinks you're okay, I think you're okay. The difference between trust and faith, I had a lot of faith, and a lot intellectual face with the difference between trust and Faith is if somebody walks across a tightrope with a wheelbarrow, I have faith they're going to get across, they know what they're doing. That's why I'm here. You know, trust is getting in the wheelbarow. Got to have something riding on it. You You know what I mean? I think life is not worthwhile unless I have a lot riding on it, unless I something at stake. A life that has nothing at stake in it is not worth living to me. I got to put all my chips. So I go back to, I start doing all these prerequisite requirements, and I can't. I don't know how to do all this stuff. Anyway, I'm going to try to make a long story short. The thing I get concerned about is any time I say that, a long story gets longer. You can't get into vet school. It's impossible. I was the kid with a lot of potential if he only applied himself. I went to Catholic boys' school for a couple years in high school and quit studying after that. So it didn't look good at all. I started doing my pre-vet requirements and I studied 12 hours a day for about seven days a week for about four years. I went up to UC Davis undergraduate, and there were classrooms this big. I would have to sit in the front row because if I sat in the back row I'd get sick and throw up because of the fear. My fear was that God would not allow me to do the thing I love to do. If I let anybody really know what I'd really love to do. Superstitiously, I believe that I wouldn't be able to do it. Later on, I found out that you have to say what you want to do for you to know it, for me to know, and to make it real. And so God knows what I'm doing because God works through people. Anyway, I wasn't supposed to get into Davis undergraduate and a miracle happened. I talked to the dean and I said, look, I want to be a veterinarian more than anything else in the world. In my mind I said a sober veterinarian. And this is where I came from, this is where I'm at now. He said well looking at your grades the past four years have been kind of mediocre but the past year I can't believe the change it's a different person what happened? I said well somebody got my attention he said well it's very unlikely I've less than a thousand to one chance but I'll think about it. Anyway this other Dean came back and called me a couple weeks later I was working with a veterinarian in Turlock, and he said, I don't know why, but something tells me that I should let you an undergraduate so you can maybe do some of your requirement courses here at Davis. He says, I dunno why, and this is unusual circumstances, but I just want to give you a call so you wouldn't worry. First miracle. Second miracle. So I'm up in Davis doing my pre-vet courses, three years sober. Out of all my pre-vet courses, three years, you know, pre-med courses, out of 60% of them I got in one of the top five grades in the course. And I don't know how I did that. You know, it was like I'd pray, go to a meeting. I had to deal with God. I did this study and he took the test. I just showed up. Okay, God. And there were many times it was, like, I'm clueless on this one. see, okay, see. Sometimes with a certain course, if I had a problem with it, friend of mine, a guy who lived across the street died last year, like 40 years on the program, 39 years on The Program. His name was Chuck and he would say you got to love what you're doing, give your full love and attention to the thing at hand. And if I have a problem with a course, I decided to fall in love with it. And when I fell in love with it, it became easy. Love, the true motivator. So there I was three years sober, great grades. I got all A's and A pluses for three years. I got one B plus just to keep me honest and humble. I applied to veterinary school I had met God's will at a young people's dance she I tell you it was the meshing of neurosis there she was across the room you know he's like we looked at each other's like I said hi my name is Tom what's your name she said hi I'm so and so she said you know in the course of the conversation I found out that she was a schizophrenic ex-cheerleader compulsive overeater alcoholic with 90 days and I said, I'm in love. I said can I take you home? She said yes. Where do you live? The recovery house. Okay great let's go. Anyway I imported her up to Davis. She left after about 60 days and it was tearing me up. I had applied to veterinary school and they said no, you can't get in. I ran out of money and one morning, the morning of my last exam in biochemistry, December 7th, I looked in the mirror and I had a really good tan and I hadn't been outdoors for for a month. And then my eyes started turning yellow. And then I started getting puffy. And I went down, and I stayed with my folks during that holiday. And my stepfather is the psychiatrist. He was a pathologist and an intern general practitioner too. He said, well, you've got hepatitis. You're dying while you're going to die. He was like that. Let me tell you about this guy. I love him dearly. He has made one of the major people make a contribution in my life. I remember one day when I was before I got sober, he said, I've got two letters in my hands. Which one do you want? He said, you want the good news or the bad news? I said, aren't the good new. He said you just been accepted to UC Irvine. This is way back. I said what's the bad thing? He said your drafted. He had a terrible sense of humor. Anyway, I had hepatitis. And I went to the hospital and they couldn't figure out what was going on with me. I had the mystery hepatic disease. They thought I had have hepatitis, they ran a test, they were negative. They thought it had a gallstone, couldn't find a gall stone. They thought that I might have some exotic amoebiasis and amoeba problem because I'd gone surfing in Mexico. They didn't know what's going on. All I know is that I was feeling like I was having heart attacks. I had blood sugar that was down below 50. I mean, I was getting ready to have seizures. I was on steroids for the itching. I puffed up. I lost weight. I mean I was in bad shape. It was so bad. Well, let me tell you what happened. So here I am, no vet school. She left. I'm broke and I'm dying. Nothing left to do, right? And there was a guy in San Rafael, a guy named Ed O'Dea. And he would mention to me, he would say, You might think about surrendering, Schultz said. I said, what? I said I'm a good AA member. He says you haven't ever done the steps the way it says to do it in the book. And I was at a meeting one night and my best friend at the time, his name was Mike, he and I were meeting somebody who talked about doing the third step with somebody else. And I said doing the 3rd step with someone else is not a good idea. I thought it was a head trip. I thought you just made a decision. And they said no. There's a prayer in the Book and it says you should do it with somebody else unless somebody might misunderstand, right? Like, oh, you are going to misunderstand what I mean when I say I'm turning my wool of my life over to God. What's he doing now? It's kind of weird, right. So that night, he and I did the third step, and I read that prayer in the book, and we talked about what it meant. And the book says a dramatic effect will sometimes occur if you do this step sincerely, and i did that step. Listen, it was getting my attention. A couple days before, I was in the bathroom. I was itching so badly that I was taking a wired dog brush to scratch my leg, and blood was running down my leg and it was orange. And I said, this is not joyous, happy, and free. And for the first time in three years, I mean, I must have looked at the book, but the first Time in Three Years, I picked up the big book with me in mind looking for the answer. and I opened up the book and it says God's will is to be joyous happy and free and I went right I'm depressed bagged out miserable suicidal and something happened I thought for a second logically kind of breath of fresh air I said if God's Will is to Be Joyous Happy and Free and I'm in this shape it's either God's Will or my Will I must be doing my Will and I read on further and it said we invariably have found that at times in the past we have stepped on the toes of others and they retaliate, seemingly without provocation. But we find that we make decisions based on self, which put us in a position to be hurt. And we're clueless about it. It doesn't say cluelESS about it, but we are. We just have no idea what's going on. And I said, oh, that means that I have done things based on self would put me in this position. And took responsibility for my illness and my life and not getting into school, and her leaving, and being broke. And I said, God, I have made decisions based on self that have put me in this position. Now I've gotten myself into trouble at a level which operating on that same level, I can't get out of the trouble. So I need a hand up, and I canít do it. And Iím your child, and Iím your inheritance. I demand that you give it to me now, please. Timeís running out. Because the doctors would say, I'm going to die. And I don't want to die, I want to be a sober veterinarian. And I did that third step that night with that friend. And a little bit after I did the third step, a funny thing happened to me. My mind got quiet. It had nothing to say. It was laid off for a while. and later on that night God talked to me and this might sound weird and I'm careful about it but I can trust you guys we're friends God talked to me he said Tom you're going to be a veterinarian and I started crying and I said when and he smiled he went uh uh And I cried for about, I don't know, it seemed like an hour. And for seven months, I had the most beautiful seven months of my whole life. Anybody who's done the third step, you can't be at the third step and not go on. If you're balking at a fourth step, you haven't done the fifth step. And I did a fourth step the way it said to do in the book. And I think there's a lot of stuff that confuses a lot of people. You can look in the best cartoons from The Grapevine to figure out how to do it, you know, Hazleton or, you know. Everybody's got a vote or an opinion about it. But what worked for the first hundred drunks worked for me. And I got out pencil and paper and I wrote those four columns under resentments. I listed my fears and asked why I had them because I was trusting my finite self instead of infinite God. And i wrote down my sex problems, my sexual incidents where I was selfish and what I should have done instead. And the bottom line to my whole inventory was that I was selfish because I was fearful that God was not going to take care of me. And I found out in the last column on the resentment list where I was at fault that I had created all my resentments, that they did not do it to me. And that's bad news to a professional victim. professional victims are very powerful people you know them they're the ones that lay back and have everybody do it to them you know oh god i mean they're just an accident waiting to happen they attract misery to them and that was me and i i was i couldn't pull the victim role anymore because i had set it up when i have a problem i ask myself where was the decision based on self which put me in this position to be hurt. And when I take responsibility for it and admit it, funny thing happens. It clears up. But I like my misery. I have a neurotic attachment to some of it. I kind of was like an old friend, you know? And some of us have a hard time letting go of some of our suffering. Jeez, what are we going to do on our time off? I remember talking to a guy in Sacramento. His name was Fred. I said, Fred, how's it going? He said, can't complain. And we were silent. I said Fred, isn't it interesting how we have nothing to say when we can't complain? He goes, yep. Something else happened to me when I did the steps the way it said to do it in the book is that I found God. And that's the purpose of the book. The purpose of this book is to find God. The purpose for the steps are to find that power greater in ourselves. because lack of power was our dilemma. And I found that power, and that power is God, and that great reality is within me and you. And I know that beyond a shadow of a doubt, and sometimes I look, I can't see. Sometimes I know that what I'm looking for, I'm working with. I know the power of God and I know it now beyond a shout of a death. And I've found God, and I quit looking for God out there, and I found him in here. And I quit looking for the answer, you know? The answer. Because I had found the answer. I got involved in a lot of service work and a young people's conference. And I loved you because you would love me back to life. And I just loved you. My whole life was about loving you. Making a contribution to you. And a funny thing happened. I applied to veterinary school again. I was working in the vet school for a recovered alcoholic on the program, again another miracle. And something happened. I knew that something was happening. I just had this feeling when the letters came out. Now when you're applying to professional school, there are two letters. There's a thin one that's bad, doesn't take long to say no. And then there's the thick one and that means they have insurance forms in it. And so the whole game with acceptance for professional school is thick or thin. And I'm scared, you know? But I put one foot in front of the other. And my sponsor Lynn says, you suit up and you show up, and you put one foot in from the other, and make a contribution. And it doesn't matter what you think, what you feel, or what you say, but what you do makes all the difference in the world. Because what you do, and what you're committed to, you do. And what you are committed to the whole universe aligns itself to facilitate that commitment. So just do what you're supposed to do, doesn't matter whether you want to or not. My automatic reaction to doing anything is, I don't want it. Hey Tom, you want? Nope, I dont want it, hey Tom, I do not want it alarm clock goes off, I don't wanna, you know, so I don´t want it and I know that now. It used to have me by the throat like Lyle Alzado, I I don't want to. I don' want to." Used to drag me around. I mean, I could not do anything I didn't want to do but with the help of these staffs and some very good people, I have found out that I can do what I don''t want to And it turns out that the most valuable things I've ever done in my life are things that I don ''t want. Like, I don'T want to make a commitment to Alcoholics Anonymous and do it. I DON''T want to Make a commitment to my profession at 3 in the morning when they call. I don't want to make a commitment to that woman that I'm married to forever. And what matters is doing what I said I was going to do, keeping my word. Very powerful stuff. So I came home that one day and I was looking at the mailbox 100 meters away and I could tell by the flex of the envelope through the slot that it was thick. and I tell you there is part of me today that's still alive that knows that I can never get into veterinary school and they said I could get in now that can't happen to a recovering alcoholic dope fiend like me surf rat they just don't let you hang around their pharmacy a whole lot makes them nervous hi I'm Tom I'm an alcoholic. I'm basically a liar, cheat, thief. I'm dishonest, untrustworthy. I usually don't show up. But I've been doing pretty good for a little while and if you would kind of go along with me I'd like to spend four years around your pharmacy. Huh? Oh sure, come on in. No problem. Lots of guys like you. And the thing is I had to apply like everybody else. I had be a regular member of AA. You know, and I applied. I mean, I had to be a regular citizen. I didn't do some alcoholic number where I say, I'm an alcoholic, will you let me in? I had the ability to do that. I had it compete on the same level with everybody else. And this is the thing about competition, and I have a problem with it. Competition is a myth. I know that. And sometimes I don't believe it, but I know it. Sure. Yeah. John Wells, call 645-0616. Speak to Hendrick. It's an emergency. He's probably a sponsee. He had a feeling. I'm sorry. Oh, God, I had a feelin'. It's all right. I'm sorr... I'm gonna get thrown out. God has a sense of humor. Where was I? Competition. It doesn't exist, but I don't always believe it. Anyway, I got into veterinary school. And I thought pre-vet was hard. Oh, geez. It was like, I remember one night calling my stepfather and saying, Lou, how could this be God's will for me? He said, what do you mean? I said, it's so hard. 25 units of medicine. I got a stack of notes over there I have to memorize by Tuesday. He said well did you think it'd be easy? And I said yeah. I thought if it was God's will it'd been easy. He said well you were wrong. Ha ha ha. So the hardest thing I ever did in my life was this veterinary school thing. And I graduated. So what am I talking about? I'm talking about commitment. Commitment's a very powerful thing, and I have three things that I've been committed to that I'm clear about. One is I'm committed to you and to Alcoholics Anonymous. Two, I'm committed to my profession. There's nothing more. Listen, I love what I'm doing. I just love what i'm doing, there hasn't been a day that I regretted what I do. And three, I'm committed to my wife. I was talking to Larry, the guy I was talking about before, and I get nervous about making commitments because I think instead of me having them, they'll have me. But they're the most empowering tool that I've found. I am so much more able to experience and enjoy life out of my commitments. I got through veterinary school. I needed to be, I had always put down student government when I was younger and I found out that what you used to put down before you got sober you wind up being in sobriety and I always wanted, I used to do that I used put down student government and they voted me class president freshman year. I remember the campaign speech they said, I said, I love to control and manipulate large masses of people and I'm good at it, and they liked me. They said he was the only guy who told the truth. I always used to put down ski instructors in ski patrol. I used to love to snow ski. And through a series of coincidences, I became a ski instructor and a ski patrolman, and I loved it. I love teaching those people. God, it's fun. I graduated from school and I had a dream about 12 years ago. I had the dream of having a veterinary practice by the beach where I could go surfing at lunch which is still a dream and I had this picture of what it could be like I want to tell you about my mind my mind tells me what's possible or not possible I have this box called what can happen, what can't happen what's impossible and what's not possible and it talks to me all the time and it's not necessarily my friend and the first person who ever talked about this was a friend of mine, Bob and then other people talked about it and I've done a lot of things even outside of AA and really looked at that a lot. And what I found is, A, that I'm an alcoholic, and it's the most important thing to me as long as I put the big book in the center of my life. Everything I do is and becomes AA. It's a 12-step call on all my affairs. But I found out about that, that voice in my head. Now, I didn't know what they were talking about at the beginning when I talked about my mind. you know that part of you that goes what are we waiting for what's he saying I want some coffee I have to go to the bathroom oh I don't like this oh I agree with him that's my mind but I realize that I was not my mind because if I was my mind who's listening to it now all the minds are going what do you mean I understand the committee, they all sit down and they all have an opinion about it. There's the chairman of finance, the chairman of relations, there's Dr. Joan up there, whatever her name is. There are all these committee people telling me what to do. It's like my sole function is to provide entertainment and transportation refreshments to my mind. Let's get a burger, okay. But there's something beyond that. That's the part that listens to it. It's like Chuck used to say, all that I am is God. And the part of me that listens to that is God, and it's a part of the God in me that's talking to the God new right now. I love you the key is like next Wednesday what's going to make a difference you know it's like I many times I have made a decision to do something and not done it now I got my son exercising Wednesday now we can make plans and designs and set it up against support for and do all that But what gets your tennis shoes on and on the street? And the only thing I've discovered is love being the motivator to do that. I love you very much. You saved my life. You gave me not only are these steps the solution to sobriety, but they're also the key to the good life. I had a dream of having a practice by the beach. And a year and a half ago, I heard about this practice in Newport Beach, and I drove up to it. And I stood in the front parking lot, and it was that practice I dreamt about 10 years ago. I saw that. I said, oh, shit, this is it. And I told the then owner of it, I said this is my practice. And he didn't know what the hell I was talking about. I said you just don't know it. He didn't even know he wanted to retire. And I had to come up with $50,000 in about 21 days. And that's not easy. And Jan and I, my wife, I met her. By the way, I meet her junior year in school. She had 30 days. And we started dating. AA coffee, you know. And there's a lot of superstition about getting involved in your first year of sobriety. It may be good advice. It's not very practical. There's nowhere in the book that it says you can't get involved in your first year. You're going to get involved with your coffee cup. I mean, I'm not sure that it's going to work out. I'm Not Sure We Even Packed the Gear to Have a Good Relationship for a Couple Years. But we had a good time, and I found out that it was good being with her and it was easy being with her. And that I loved her and she loved me and that was very important that she loved be. And we made a deal. We said, yeah, the most important, we made an agreement and we made the deal. We said what's important to you? And she said what's importan to me is that I stay sober and that I make a contribution and that i live the good life. I said me too. It's important for me to stay sober and make a contribution and live the good life. And we supported each other in those goals. And we got married. We dated for six months. We got married, and it's been very good. I tell you, she is a good AA member. Now, she doesn't sponsor lots of people and doesn't do a lot. She's not real visible in AA, but I see her get up and do what she doesn'T want to do because she knows she needs to do it because what she does matters. anyway she and I decided that we wanted to get this veterinary practice and about 20 days later that money was there and we bought this practice and in 18 months the practice has quadrupled every day there's three new clients a day because they want to know what's going on yeah, so-and-so says you guys are doing a pretty good job and it got so busy we needed to get another doctor there and I'm on a committee for addicted veterinarians, help keeping them from losing their licenses. What we do is we send them to AA. Save the state millions of dollars every year, send them into a free organization like Alcoholics Anonymous. That's pretty sneaky, isn't it? A guy named Blaine started that, and he's a beautiful guy, a professor at the veterinary school and a good member of Alcoholics Anonymous. It turned out there was this classmate of mine that was in school with me, a guy who graduated at the top of the class. The problem is he liked monkey drugs. And he used to drink a little bit too much and had a nasal problem. He used to tell the drug authorities that he worked with a lot of collies with sinus infections. Anyway, this guy came through and was getting sober. And Blaine said, well, you're getting fried doing that job. You're so busy. He said, I think you need another doctor. And I said, no, we don't need another. Anyway, this guy had to get out of where he was at and he came to work with me beginning of the year and it's been wonderful. So my wife's in the, by the way, Jan, My wife and I worked together, and she's the best manager of receptions I've ever seen. And it was not easy in the beginning working together. It was like, oh, honey, could you get that chart? What do you mean? I don't like the way you said that. So that warmed, that cooled off after a while. So anyway, we had, and then, you know, my technician, her father was my first AA sponsor. and we're just having a good time there. And so it's like, what am I saying? My purpose in life is to be of maximum service to God and my fellow. Now, I have a lot of goals. I had a goal to buy a practice, and I think it's very important for alcoholics to have goals because if I don't have goals, I get up every morning being closer to goals I don' t already have. I don''t know where I'm going. But I have an guiding purpose and direction. My purpose is to do the right thing. My purpose would be of maximus service to god and my follow. and when I get up in the morning and I don't want to go to work I go there and I take care of God's kids and God's creatures and I tell you something there's something I'm supposed to learn from those animals I love them every time I look in a dog's eyes I see God there's nothing more you know it's like he who shall be first why should you let him serve you know the other people it's not it's just like when I'm able to do something for a helpless animal. And they, you know, they just get better at our hospital. There's good vibes there. They don't get sick there. They get well. They don' t die there. Now I don' T take the credit for that. We' re doing something right. The practice has grown four times, three new clients a day. The animals get well and we have a good time. But let somebody have a resentment in that place. The whole place is down. But, you know I get worried about that competition thing. There's been five new practices that have moved in the area in the past year, and our practice has just been doing this, this, and it's like if I was a logical man, I'd see that we should have more practices move in because the more they come in, the better my business goes. But again, I think, okay God, you got me sober. You got me into school. I met a wonderful woman. I got a dollar more than I need. Everything's going great, but this time you don't know anything about supply and demand, God. You're a little iffy about the supply and demand thing. And I've learned that alcoholics do not respond well to supply and demand, but rather love and service. So I respond to love and service. And God's going to take care of me, continue to take care of me as long as I do his work. It's God's practice, not mine. I take care of his kids and his creatures and he takes care of me. And he's done a very good job with it. I found out that I wasn't my mind. I found out that God lived inside. I found out that my purpose is to be of maximum service to God and you and your creatures. I love my work. I'm in hog heaven. I want to thank you for the opportunity to have the God in me talk to the God in you. Ram Dass says, there was this guy named Ram Dass. There's a word called namaste, and namaste means I acknowledge the God in you, the light, the love that is in you that is you. And when we talk like this, I see the God, the light and the love in me. And when I forget who I am, I look at you and I see me. And when i serve you, I serve me. That's why pass it on is the big retirement plan. It's funny, it's a paradox. The more I give, the more I get. The more I love, the more I am loved. The more love I have, the more motivated I am. I'm a pig. I love it all. I want more. I want more. And thank you for the opportunity for me to have more. God, I love you. Applause