Step Three and the Decision to Turn – Herb K – Workshop – Part 2 of 25 – Herb

Good afternoon, good evening, good morning for some of you. Welcome to our Big Book 12-Step Workshop. My name is Herb. I'm an alcoholic. This call is being recorded. Please join me in the set-aside prayer, expressing our willingness to have our thoughts and our knowledge and our experience up to this point set aside for the potential of a new experience. God, please set aside everything that I think I know about myself, my brokenness, the 12 steps in you for an open mind and a new experience of myself, my brokeness, the 12 Steps, and especially you. Please join me in the serenity prayer. God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change. Courage to change the things that I can and wisdom to know the difference. We've worked very hard to come to this point which is the crossover from the first stage of the rocket launch to the second stage of rocket launch. We spent several weeks, maybe months even, looking at and understanding our own history in light of the information in the big book concerning addiction. Whatever identified addiction that we are looking at, and focused on for this journey through the steps. A substance addiction or a process addiction. and it might have been because you're brand new, or it might've been because you're a long time person and you've had a little flare up in a different area than was the original presenting problem. Whatever it is, you got to confront and challenge and understand and hopefully deal with the addiction du jour. and to have a deeper experience of no choice. That's really the point. Understanding it is probably a prelude to the experience for most of us. The experience of, I really don't have the capacity to deal effectively with my addiction. My life shows that to me, my history demonstrates that. Maybe creating a little sense of hopelessness and desperation enough to go on to the second half of the first step. for those of us who have long-term freedom from addiction and long-term exposure to a 12-step program but didn't really understand or apply the message in Steps 10, 11, and 12 that we're not cured, that we have a daily reprieve. that our life is unmanageable on our own power on a daily basis and if in fact we don't connect effectively with power our life will deteriorate subtly almost unnoticeably but at some point creating a suffering described in the doctor's opinion as restless irritable and discontent. And it has various colors, all captured in the bedevilments and we need to find power. We don't know where and we don't what and we don t know how but were led to a process of answering each of those questions. And again, we return to deep within ourself, we have free will, we really do have choice, not over our addiction and not over managing our life. But we have a choice of power or no power in the universe and deep inside ourself a power which we get to name and then decide that we want a relationship with we name it in step two it's an act of faith it has no concreteness to it it has no certitude to it it doesn't necessarily have any feeling attached to it it's very vague in one sense and yet it's very concrete in another sense it's vague in the sense that faith is a decision it's very concrete that the decision is meaningless unless you're taking action the evidence that you have faith is how your feet move and that first baby step is the step to turn a decision to turn and as i've been very clear the book is very clear step three is very clear it's a decision to turn. And underneath it is the powerlessness to do so. What a conundrum. Other than the experience so far is that we've been carried, it looked like a flimsy read and it happened to be the rope attached to a life preserver. And we make this decision and you've all made the decision by even showing up today knowing that in fact not only would we review step three but that as a community we would pray the step three prayer together that's what the big book suggests when we read that it said the wording is optional many of you have written out your own third step prayer not to improve the one in the book but to understand the one in the book to have a deeper relationship with what the book is inviting us to do to have an attitude of turning our will and our life over to the care of god what do we mean by that we're self-centered that's what we mean and our will is powerless to be other than self-centered except that we can choose god or no god we can choose a relationship for no relationship we can chose to turn and completely submit to the reality that we will be turned and we won't control that we'll influence it Somebody in a meeting I was at last night, read a little bit from the 12 and 12 in Chapter seven, working with others. And, and I'm familiar with it but not as familiar as the big book and he read a piece that I had not paid any attention to before and it said, Really it addressed the willingness and grace sort of question that I've raised before, which comes first, willingness or grace, grace or willingness. And it didn't create the question in that terminology but what it said is that this awakening that is promised in the 12th step is a gift. A gift freely given can't be earned, can't lost Can't be earned. It's a gift, grace. And yet the steps are the preparation to receive the gift. Brilliant. I think it's page 107 or 127 in the 12 and 12. I forget the exact page number. The work of the 12 steps which we do that's our responsibility. That's our willingness and that's action. And we can do that leaning gently into the dimmer switch. That predisposes us for the gift. In some fashion, at some time, not in our control. Actually, not even in our influence. That's where we're at. Made a decision to turn. Not a passive decision, not a passive attitude, not a passive action. there's nothing about step three that is a surrender step one is a surrender defeated and we give up we surrender step three is as i've mentioned before and i think i've used the terms kind of startles people it's not in the big book a ferocious act of my will a ferocious act of my will with all the determination that i can muster i attempt to establish a relationship with that power that is deep down inside of me and i make a commitment to turn see step three is not determining step three is the decision to turn the commitment to turn and the public witness to that commitment and decision public witness because bill suggests in the big book suggests that we pray this prayer with somebody else that makes it public and we're going to expand on that by doing it here in community normally if we were in a single room we would stand and we would form a very large circle the capacity of the room and maybe two or three circles depending on the number of people in the size of the room. And we would stand shoulder to shoulder and we would hold hands obviously we can't do that today but I'm painting the picture for you to imagine when we do that later on in a little bit. I think it might be a wonderful meditation and a preparation though for you to, if you haven't already and you have written out your third step prayer and you want to read it out loud to us. Dear God, I offer myself to you with all of my mind, heart, body and soul. I thank you for the gift of your grace. May I always be willing to do whatever it is you ask of me. and if i should resist allow me the grace of the pause to heal whatever it is no matter how painful and uncomfortable it might be so that i live each day as your beloved the one whose heart you know and love Thank you so much. Wonderful. What was your experience of writing out your own prayer and now reading it out loud? Well, what's been overwhelming me lately is what I've experienced in and how I've grown up until this moment. And the big deal of that is the pause, and in the Psalms, the pause is Selah, and so I was smiling when I wrote this because I resisted it for a week, And then finally I was ready to do it. And I sat down and paused in the Selah, and this is what came forth. You said a word I'm not familiar with, Selah. What does that mean? That's in the Psalms, in the Bible, when after the stanzas they have the word Selah s-e-l-a-h and it means pause that's where there's a pause oh or going on that might be latin then i don't know that i don'T KNOW THAT WORD yeah yeah and and um um so i i um i just really embrace yeah yeah yeah it's like it's transformative and that's the recommendation in the 10th and 11th step is that pause when disturbed pause or when you need to make a decision in the 11th step it says pause and uh the longer the pause probably the more effective is going to be the action afterwards yes yes and that's been such a gift such a gift wonderful thank you so much god spirit universe heal me so that i may live a life more reflective of your will and design for me guide me in my actions so i may echo your highest good in working with others use me as your instrument to model joy and connection yeah yeah and you notice i'm going to point it out that did not put an amen on the end of their prayer and i may have made the comment before the prayer in the big book doesn't have an amen and that's unusual for a prayer especially written in 1939 and so i i've never read anything about Bill's consciousness in writing the prayer but it seems to me after having done the work many times as I look back over my shoulder that it's very intentional that he didn't have an amen at the end of the third step because it's actually the beginning of a process of removing the obstacles in me so that the sunlight in me can shine to me we can name those obstacles in step four we confess them in step five we name how they impact my behavior in step six seeing that i'm powerless over even my behavior the source of the character defects and then i pray the prayer my creator which again i believe is brilliant to start that prayer when i'm so conscious that i need to be radically changed in the sixth step i'm so conscious of my powerlessness to do so. And I ask the originating source, my creator, to recreate me. Fix what is broken. My creator is the way the seven-step prayer begins and it ends with an amen. And I see step three, the beginning of a process of the healing of myself. The soul surgery that the author group talks about that concludes with amen at the end of the seventh step. The end of that process and then we begin a new process in that third stage of the rocket launch. Steps eight, nine, and ten if you wanted to be holistic about it in terms of ten as the spot check inventory when I'm disturbed because of my relationships with others. And eight, nine and 10 is the mechanism for healing my relationship with others." So that's my perspective on it. I just wanted to reinforce that and make that observation. Tell me what was your experience in writing it out? I felt very... I resisted it as I resist it for a long time and I really didn't wanna do it and then I had to call my step-guide. Good for you! Who was, who was, yeah. And once I started doing it and wrote it down, I felt very comfortable and I felt like this is one of the first or one of few times where I felt like I was having a real conversation. It's, you know, a connection in terms of not like, Like, like there's something very real for me right there in that moment versus something imaginary. Larry Appelbaum Yeah. Because prayer isn't about the words. It's about the intention that creates the words, and that's what you then investigate. What are the words in the big book? What's underneath it? What do they mean? What's their intention? And that helps you form your intention. Larry Appellum Right. dearest god i've made a mess of my life i'm turning to you and placing myself in your loving care i give up i am humbly willing to have you direct my life i pray that as you remove the blockages the wreckages and the difficulties of my life that i may give others hope and they may see your power your love and your way of life i pray i will learn to pause so that i made you your will always nice good yep and your experience in writing it out really it was turning back and looking at what my life had been and and and just seeing how much i need that relationship um i just felt like i was coming coming towards that relationship with that power it was um yeah it was just like a magnetic force pulling me yeah Yeah. I particularly have been entertaining that word in the last couple years, actually, in contrast also to radiate. And I'm bringing that to people's attention as part of their step two and step three, but certainly maybe part of Their Step 11 Quiet Time. The word magnetic drawing me to the center of where the source is in me but the radiation coming from that center source out through me to the world around me and it has a particularly for me uh intriguing dynamic right now yeah thank you for pressing my button anything else no well i love the invitation yeah i love that yeah it's uh it reframes the entire spiritual life doesn't it yeah yeah oh oh i can respond it's my decision and i also can determine how i can respond or even whether i'm going to respond yeah it's very empowering i think yeah thank you so much i just want to say that um i wrote my prayer before today but i changed what i called god today i had a total um experience um i'd been working through the names of god and i've always thought of god as my father it's just it's always been endearing but just today god brought me redeemer and so i just changed today and the experience i had with that today was incredible um but i'll read my prayer well before you before you've teased me anyway of curiosity tell me a little bit more about number one the dynamic of the choice of that term as well as your experience with it well um so i've i've been really doing a lot of meditation on those promises you showed us at the top of page 63 so this whole time we've been off i've been reading those meditating and really asking god just show me where those promises have come true and if they really had you know in my life and so that's been a very um very unique experience through that and then what i was coming about the redeemer today just took me to a place okay i think um i had told you a couple weeks ago about brokenness that i'm break things are breaking off of me instead of it being me broken before i got here it's me being in this kind of hardened cocoon of religious pride is a lot of it and of just my past experience and my willfulness so as that's breaking away what my redeemer is this morning it was like all of a sudden i'm opened up to what i've been redeemed from already what god has done to redeem me from the food addict that was killing myself to a person that for today you know time is not a tool i know that so i've been abstinent 558 days and today i woke up powerless so without this relationship that i'm developing on a level much deeper though i have had what i thought was a very deep walk in the spirit i hadn't even touched the surface i had no idea that i had no idea what i was walking in the Spirit was willfully walking as i thought God wanted me to okay that's all i knew right now i find this redeemer who has transformed all of that into a new experience and is because that grace and willingness got together yeah as my deeper willingness i'm getting deeper grace and as the redeemed my father who was my provider and loved me and accepted me suddenly becomes my redeemer who's restoring me he's restoring all the damage i've done so yeah it was i'm still just high from it right and you know i've just i've carried it around all day and i've shared it with several people and it's still um it still is an experience i can't really explain but no you've done a very nice job of sharing it with us it reminds me of a prayer from uh thomas merton many of you may not know that thomas merton it was a prolific writer died in 1968 uh a monk in the monastery at gethsemane in kentucky a trappist monk probably a prophet and a mystic certainly a deep deep spiritual thinker and writer and he has a prayer in thoughts in solitude is the name of the book and it i'll paraphrase that he said i really lord i really want to do you your will i don't know whether i'm doing your will i have not a clue that i'm doing your well but i do believe that the desire to do your will pleases you and that's what i'm hearing as part of your uh your journey yes yes just that that deep desire um this entire work is so transforming and and i get something and and I'll just go berserk about it and then before I turn around i give something so it's uh thank you so much you're welcome and you you were going to read your prayer yes i'll read my prayer real quick redeemer there's no you don't need to read it quick okay yeah okay let's take a breath redeemer i come in all i am to your throne of grace to be emptied of who i've been and willing to be made new in your will your way and become your channel of grace to help others following your guidance each new day your will not mine be done yeah yeah the the word that comes to me when i'm listening to you is the both your comments beforehand and now is the metamorphosis the transformation that a caterpillar receives going through the cocoon and dying and coming out as a monarch butterfly yeah that's interesting because i have actually been given a gift that said that um six years ago when my husband passed i was given a card that said you've been in a cocoon and you are going and it had a butterfly on it and this journey is your transformation and so i've carried that and um and i i do believe that that i'm experiencing just the tip of it i haven't arrived at anything oh no but you're you're preparing yourself for uh an additional gift Yes. And anybody who wants to incorporate something very special in their quiet time, I'm suggesting that you do a Google on the monarch butterfly and watch a four minute time lapse picture of the transition from the seed of that maze of the caterpillar, the crystallus that is made by the caterpiller and the butterfly that emerges. It takes four minutes, and it captures exactly what I'm talking about and what we are going to experience now that we're going into the chrysalis. Ah, I just got emotional. This work of steps four through nine is the death of the ego. It's the death of the false self. So, at least this is my poetic metaphor for what I've experienced and what I anticipate you will also thank you very much. Thank you so much. Yeah. Starts like this. Dear Sophia, I am making a decision to commit myself to you to work with me and do with me as you will i understand i am a slave to self please free me from this bondage i will then be capable and have willingness to be in alignment with your will please take away my difficulties so that your light and love can shine through me to others i will then be of use to you on this earth and follow your way of life yeah nice and as you noted i'm sure for me the key word for step three is alignment placing ourselves in alignment with the flow of life is really the image that yeah and that that is the um that is The Hope right you know and the prayer here the prayer the request not the demand but the request and the acknowledgement too on my part I think um um but yeah then in regards to uh like you asked a few people like what their experience was of it like the invitation uh to look at this prayer really has helped me a lot to understand it way better um i did try to say it you know on a regular basis and and wasn't doing it and I think this is going to really, really help me do that. I like the word wilt. I don't know where it comes from, but you don't see it very often in general language, but I didn't put it in, but I did have to call somebody in regards to, this is a few days ago, when I was looking at the word take away my difficulties, I was getting a little paranoid about that because i thought it was maybe it meant another part of my codependency you know if i'm powerful if god takes away my difficulties i can help my my loved ones better do you know what i mean and then i'll be able to fix them even better what's wrong with that if you reframe that from a codependent language yeah it sounds to me like a wonderful 12-step ambition okay thanks but then i got yeah you know my own spiritual director said when i got concerned about my own narcissism and doing this kind of work gives me a lot of visibility which might corrupt in fact my motives he said be concerned but never let your concern get in the way of helping people and then he said god writes straight with crooked lines yeah so yeah you've got some crooked lines of course you do yeah but that's the very grist for the mill that god will use to make you useful yeah and and that's you know and i'm on the enneagram i you know i'm a two which is helping always helping and be of use you know that it's almost like a it's bizarre how it's like a drive and so i had to put that in this one too so i can be of use to you not that i think god doesn't love me even if i'm not useful but you know what i mean I do. But anyway. Yeah. The important point is that you know what you mean. Yeah. Thank you. Well, see, you're not just mouthing words now. You're using words to reveal to us your experience and your intention. Yeah. Yeah. It actually came through, you know, I was trying to do that two-way prayer too. and I asked in the prayer at something about please help me you know I realized I said that I can only be of use and to you by having your light shine through me to others and I said please help that to happen and then in the answer that I found that I've found that God gave me what I wrote anyway it was summarizing it it said I think you're on the right track your purpose is to be humble and to do my will my will is loving kindness to all and once someone is loved they have a new beginning i know you want to help others and the only way is through love discerning what actual love is is important and as you get the addictions underfoot and they are not in such a predominant place in space in your life my light will be more visible and available to shine through you and the third step prayer will be being answered love god so it's that's where it came kind of came from that third that two-way prayer there because and it and that was a few days ago and then you know how it all kind of it starts out there and then it comes to here and yeah it's all great really great thank you so much when i when we first got the notice that we were going to skip a week you know i was a little bit sad about that because we were really rolling along but you know it gave it gave me an opportunity to go back and review steps one two and three again and uh i really needed to uh go back and take a look at powerlessness again because this whole thing about step three with having a relationship with god you know her i always said that i had a relationship with god and i truly meant it yep but having this new experience now in your workshop it really opened up my my heart and my soul to what a relationship is you know i struggled with the word powerless because i just couldn't grasp it i didn't know what it meant But your teaching about power in the third step, and especially I think about the line in that chapter where it says that we could not wish or try to be rid of our self-centeredness. We had to have God's help. And I really have come to this conclusion that all through my sobriety with good intentions and really meaning it i tried so hard to get it right herb and i just i couldn't do it yep get there yep you know and then this thing about having a relationship with god i mean i became a christian right after i got sober 29 years ago and i've always talked about this personal relationship with the lord but it's i always felt like there was some sort of a roadblock there, you know? I do. Yeah. And so I know that I knew it in my head. And I think that at times I probably had emotional feelings about it at church services and worship services and things like that, that felt really good at the time. But I see now that it really truly wasn't a relationship because I really just put the wall out. There was no relationship to be had. I love when you ask the question about what is it you yearn for in a relationship yeah I really had to pray about that one Herb because oh my gosh you know I really just desire that strong relationship with God and things have happened over the last few weeks in that that have shown me have given me proof that God has the power and that he's there and he wants to help me and he loves me and all I need to do is just get in line with him and it'll be okay yeah and it feels you know I don't want to say feel too much but it's just no it's okay in the context you're using it it's wonderful yeah it is such a confirmation I was telling my wife about it this morning because I had some things going on this week pretty stressful time with the board that I'm on and you know how it is when you wake up in the middle of night and you recognize that the first thing you think about is that thing that's on your mind and so that happened to me and i i laid back down in bed and and i look at god as my comforter and my advocate and my helper and i just said lord i know that you want to comfort me i know that you love me and I'm just going to trust you with this and within a matter of minutes i was right back to sleep and able to talk to my wife about this this morning it was really awesome Yeah, wonderful that you have a companion to be able to share your life with like that. Oh my gosh, it's a huge blessing Herb. You know, I know that's the grace of God too. So I wanted to read my thing for the third step prayer. I've always in my meditation time, I've reworded these prayers a lot because I, you know, that's kind of what I'm led to do sometimes, but I wrote this down because it's kind of where, you know, through your teaching and the workshop where I'm at right now. And it's God, I am saying yes to you. I'm comforted that you are the power in my life. Do whatever you want with me. I trust you because I know you care about me. Turn me away from my self-centeredness so that my family and friends will notice a real change in my attitudes and behavior. And they will know that this change is a result of me living in alignment with you. And I'm getting goosebumps just reading that. So thank you, Herb. I really appreciate it. Thanks for sharing it with us. Grandmothers, here I am in all my beauty and my scars, both healed and unhealed. Hold my hand as I step into the flow of your waters and allow me to channel your strength and love to all I meet today. Help me hear your voice through the day as I navigate difficult waters because I know every lesson I learn I can pass on. hold my hand as i face today's reality amen yeah the uh it's it's a wonderful poetic image holding my hand at the end of the fifth step it suggests uh the promises of the fifth step and it says as we walk hand in hand with the spirit of the universe and i was struck and i didn't make comment on but earlier i really encouraged the women to at least entertain a feminine energy in terms of the higher power as you just did and somebody previously had mentioned sophia and i wanted to make comment sophia is a greek word uh for wisdom and it's the feminine energy of the divine in the greek mythology i just wanted to reinforce the use of the word that that woman used sophia as an exploration for both men and women there's no i've i've explored it myself back in the day when i was looking for alternative relationships as well as experiences so what was your uh experience in writing that out now you obviously enjoyed uh it because of i could tell in the tone of your voice and the face expressions i just i you know living here um right next to the navajo nation i've um and you know we're all in our 12-step meetings together i um my mind has opened up to um just going ahead and saying it even if it's not the way everybody else is saying it but i feel very connected to the elder women that came before me and i've loved i've always loved the image and you've done this too of that slight shifting and getting in the flow and the water for me really works and it's or tapping into that electricity it's it's just allow me to tap into that whatever that like you said great mystery is let me tap into it let me try to get out of myself and then pass that on it's kind of like that well you know that's the image that bill uses in a in the appendix 2 in that crossover between 567 and 568 he says tapped an unsuspected inner resource it's exactly that image wow yeah it's beautiful it's another um sort of a imagery that helps us kind of unpack this mystery for the moment and explore it kind of munch on it until it doesn't have any more spiritual juice and then move on to the next yeah yeah and add twinkly lights and sparkles there you go some of us have more imagination than others and that's why i love the holidays i like the lights yeah yeah okay thank you herbert i've tried so hard to have this relationship with a higher power and i fought so much i went well act as if that's that doesn't do anything you just opened me up to it's aligning my will aligning my will is it's more than just opening up or finding someone so it gave it really gave me power and I can do this that's a really really powerful insight actually I don't believe we've explored that and that is we go into step three recognizing and sort of pushed by our experience of powerlessness in our desperate search for power but step three itself is the first acknowledgement that empowers us and then the steps four through nine is the real how would you say dismantling of the false self the delusion of control where we accept the mantle and responsibility of decisions and the consequences of those decisions but a hundred percent responsibility for them which is totally empowering and and giving us the freedom that really is optimal humanity so thank you for pressing my button on that one i i don't think i've explored it that way before with uh with this group thank you thank you herb i have raised monarch butterflies i actually had babies for them and um the caterpillar transitioning into the chrysalis is looks like a very laborious experience but the chrisola has those gold dots all around the top crown and then in a diagonal which i'm not sure what serves the nature purpose except maybe something shiny so that other things don't eat it you know because most of these things but it is a gorgeous chartreuse green decorated with these beautiful gold jewels it looks like i did not know that yeah and then it turns dark and then the butterfly comes out and the butterfly staggers around yeah drunk like and you just hope and then you know they fly thousands of miles even with a broken wing i want you to continue but also So I want to make this observation that the life of the butterfly is contingent on their ability to break the chrysalis, the shell, and that's how they strengthen their wings in order to survive. So they cannot have any outside help that breaks the shell. otherwise the butterfly will be crippled and will die which is really kind of interesting too so stay with the third step please okay the third steps uh yes well i really identified a lot powerlessness surrender those kinds of words have always been almost repulsive to me And I have not gone very happily towards them, although I recognize that they were critical to my recovery. But I just I didn't know how to do it. And there's something in the big book as well as I don't know, there's so many things that have transformed me. and um but the just the willingness to open the door a little bit a little it means that i have access i don't have to be all this list of things to get the love or the unconditional love that is there and i have always operated as a outside circle trying to get in somewhere and um so this that was so critical for me to know that i'm not sure why what all the the deep layers of that is about but anyway you know the big book you know all those bedevilments and i have every damn one of them and in space so it's uh and and you know i've been in this program a long time And anyway, I just powerlessness and surrender have a different resonance with me now. And they are almost softened. And it's okay that I need to surrender that I am powerless. I'm not a freak. And that it has love on the other side of it. And I really haven't understood love or known it or felt it or really been able to give it like I would like to. And even with my grandchildren, there's been some obstacles and that's a pitiful report, you know? and so this kind of jarring the door open has made an opportunity and the word invitation has been used a lot it's used in our sacred sisters and three of them have already talked to you and they I think they've all used it but I love that word it is an invitation to love and i i am just i mean it's like i almost want to cover my face so the third step prayer is kind of like for me somebody that is there somebody's they're listening somebody's there responding somebody's a witness somebody's going to be there for me or show me and and be consistent and be reliable and be there and so my my third prayer goes like loving mystery mother i submit my life application to join your force i trust the spirit to include me in the work capitalized work and guide me i trust that i will be given the spiritual energy mindset necessary tools to love yeah yeah i like that uh i've never capitalized w work and uh that really presses my button because this is sacred work yeah it is sacred word and what i mean by that is giving the self to others yeah yeah no i i got it 100 thank you that was wonderful yeah and what was your experience in writing it well my experience in writing it is that i've had a lot more compassion for myself and that compassion is like growing a flower in my brain i don't know why um but it is and i mean even when i have interactions with my husbands that hurt my feelings i just offer up a lot of compassion for myself yeah probably the next stage is to offer up some cat compassion with him for what i did before that made him react that way but we'll get there and yes no that's a really good insight because that that's reading what we're going to experience in step four is that your husband cannot hurt your feelings yes no do you know that i'm not there but i understand it see that was what i needed when i was four years five years sober going through this work for the very first time i needed the information first then i was able to understand it then i was able experience it so that's why i teach the way i do we need the information that's how we learn how to take actions that will in fact create the change that is the transformation okay yeah and then the other thing is um i just have experienced more lively fun you know i am a very fun seeking person and i mean it used to be to a fault just to take the low-hanging fruit to kind of um you know as much as the food but it's different you know it's just a sincere joy in spirit spirited relationships um recognizing the graces in my life that i did not recognize before so thank you no and that's uh that's the point of a gratitude sort of attitude in the morning and maybe even a list it opens the heart up to look at the blessings lord i offer myself to you please nourish and sustain me be my fullness and my ever presence that i will be filled by you not self not lesser things that i may better do your will yeah i think i just tacked that last line on but the other part is the real prayer well actually the real is thy will be done that's the essence of all of our prayers in the real authentic thing because knowing i can't do it but i'm willing to have it done to me for me as a channel so thy will be done that's the way the step 11 uh instructions in the big book ends on page 88. thy will be done so it's it's the heart of the matter i just wanted to reinforce that nice nice work and as you constructed it what was your experience well ever since you asked what we what i'm yearning for um i think you and i actually talked one night and i said fullness and little by little that started to make more sense in my life or more not even sense it's probably nonsense but um more something in my life that rang true and um i find that when i wake up in the morning i say the step three prayer before i even get out of bed because i was told by someone to do that but throughout the day i actually find myself saying something like this more when i get panicked or frantic or i stop and i say nourish and sustain me be my fullness be my ever present and i find that it calms me because there's something in me that isn't full that isn' still and calm but if i stop, and say those words i find it it's yeah right I think that that awareness was sort of the reason for the development of the term and my constant use of the word. The term yearn as each one of us has sought the fullness inappropriately with our addictions. And it never did fill us. Oh, momentarily it did, but not in the longterm. It doesn't fill us. And Carl Jung said that in his letter to Bill Wilson, that we have this deep capacity that we want to have filled or satiated and we turn to food or drugs or alcohol or relationships as a misperception of what in fact will satisfy this hunger this thirst and he has and i've mentioned it before i believe but he has this latin phrase spiritus contra spiritum the spirit with the capital s is the antidote to spirits with a small s this hunger this desire for fullness we misread all the time it's really as pascal said the whole in us is in the shape of god the hole in us in the shape anything else that we try to fill that hole with won't do it it's the wrong it's wrong whatever it is source yeah so thank you my experience with um writing this prayer was that i kept going back to it i kept finding myself reading the third step prayer over and over again yes back to work to see you know what it was really saying yeah um you know because i truly do want to be changed and want god to be able to use me and i know that the biggest obstacle is me and you know i just want to be rid of that self that selfishness so here's my prayer god i offer all of me to you to change mold and use me as i will i pray that my selfishness self-centeredness hurt and pain be removed for i know that these are the things that block me from being useful to others i praythat i may be a channel of your love and power and that i do that will always yeah yeah thank you so much for that i i again different words press my button and the word channel always presses my button it's the key word in the prayer of saint francis but it also for me is the keyword in my whole image of being in the flow the flow i'm i'm a container of the of the spirit and i'm a conduit of the Spirit and so I love the word channel I love the word Channel too and I read that Saint Francis prayer every day and channel just invokes um thoughts of uh water like passing through like it's passing through me yeah oh and it's just such a beautiful you know feeling yeah third step prayer it's like I love The Prayer the way that it is really but me too absolutely yeah and you know and i was like i just you know when i was listening to everybody else's prayer i waslike well my prayer really in that deep you know because some people's prayers sell prayers sounded like poetry it was just so beautiful and i'm like oh wow i'm just you have real simple about it but it's me you know. And that's one of the things that I have to get out of comparing myself to other people because I'm enough you know enough and that's one of the things that i have to tell myself all the time i am enough yeah so thank you for the exercise you're welcome a channel a channel of water and the fourth step is the roto-rooter it opens up the channel thank you her yeah it's good to have humor dear miraculous power of healing love i offer every part of myself to you to build with me and alchemize my fragmented selves towards your higher good releasing from the bondage of self-centered fear that i may feel connected to you take away my addictions fears resentments delusions dualistic thinking and self-seeking motives that victory over them may bear witness to god's creatures that i may help people animals the planet itself of your infinite power love and your way of life may i yearn for your will and power as you yearned for my attention today thank you nice nice nice and you used again a key word that is one of my trigger words and that is alchemy i i'm not going to comment on it but i really recommend everybody look that word up it's as powerful as the word metamorphosis for the work that we're about to do steps four through nine alchemy yeah what was your experience in writing the prayer well it's funny because i had this old fixed idea somebody who i respect a whole big lot who is one of my first people that introduced me to the big book said you know i've always like tried to do everything my way so when it came to this prayer he's just decided to leave it the way the way it is and so i've kind of had that attachment because this is somebody like you who i admire and respect on my journey but you know i i just opened it up so for years i've been saying it as is but the only thing i changed was where we'd say take away my um difficulties i would list i would kind of um elaborate on that but i decided just you know over the process of hearing other people do it i was like you know what the hell you know i mean you know just because i like this person and respect him doesn't mean you know we all what's right for one person at one time isn't right for somebody else you know i'm glad that you used the set aside attitude and you uh you approached it it sounds to me like you had a rich experience in doing it it's wonderful thank you for participating really close to god thank you thank you with god goddess ancestors i simply come to you as i am i am willingly turning to you to live a life of and co-creating love and light to be of service to others as a sober loving woman may i always stand at the water's edge and hear your gentle whispers in my ear allow me to partake in your mystery laughter and a divine love you know me i abandon myself to you my sacred friend may you keep me current open and willing to walk hand in hand filling your pulse within mine yeah you connected it at a deep level just get out loud was this the first time you read it out loud yes yeah i could tell because you you connected with the truth of it for yourself didn't you yes yeah yeah very powerful yeah thank you any comments that you want to make i had my resistance to do it was just based on that it really wrote a rooted out but like a god of my understanding i get to stand in the light the light not someone else's mind yeah and my resistance was coming from not writing these words down that i really needed to write down yeah yeah thanks very much i just want to say i i had a hard time because i wanted this prayer to be perfect i wanted this prayer to be you know something that people read in 200 years like the getty bird gettysburg address or like the st francis prayer yes you know something yeah and so there's a huge part of me that is so prideful and and this is just my prayer it's just for me yes it is so I wrote um and and I just want to say it has been so helpful to me to honestly what do I believe is God and it has opened up a whole new experience for me. And so I wrote, God, here I am your creation. Thank you for the gift of my life. Please help me to take, please help me be the best version of myself with the hope that I might be an example to others of what your love power and support can do for a troubled soul. help me to be ever mindful of your presence today so that i might do your will help me to fulfill your purpose for this for my creation aim or no amen well you're welcome to an amen it's your prayer wonderful and as you constructed it obviously it was very uh yours you owned it with your own phrases and words what was your experience in doing that well it was i i i must wrote 10 vision revisions of it you know you know there's so much information that you're giving us and i'm having a hard time putting it into a cohesive practice i guess but and and just something else that that meditation that you wrote in the third step that in your book you know uh 12 steps i can't tell you how moving that is to me um wonderful and um i sent it to my brother who donated a kidney today wow and um he just called me and he kept saying like a fish lives in water let me live in god it's just beautiful thank you that's a great image thank you very much for sharing that with us yep spirit here i am fully ready to align my will with yours relieve me of the suffering that my self-centeredness causes myself and others may i be willing to let go of my selfishness that keeps me separate from you and my fellows May this change in me be proof of your love for me and those that suffer. May your love be manifest in me. Thank you very much. And as you approached it with all your years, what was your experience with the process? Well, like I said, it was, I've been feeling very conflicted about the prayer because it has become so rote for me. This was, you know, it forced me to read it over and over. It forced me look at it and what it means to me. Yeah. And also to use my own frame of reference. Yeah, me. Yeah. And it just is so rich. And, you know, put it in my own words, I think makes it more immediate. And it personalizes at least the meaning so that when you say the actual prayer in the book, it has more juice. Right? Yeah, yeah. That's my prayer. Say it again. it's a juicy prayer oh my gosh and as we become conscious when we pray it some of the some new juices begin to flow different at different times also yeah i realized that i wanted even though i wrote a prayer a week or so ago that it really was more from my head than my heart and that i wanted to get more real about it i i am aware that i need to get out of my head more and down into my my gut in my heart um and so i wrote out the prayer from the book line by line and left space for me to translate it i found that um i rebelled very strongly against the old biblical language and i think that's the uh that the stuff that i uh was trained up in and and found not coming to my um not being not being relevant to my to my life unfortunately such as it was presented to me so anyway um my newest my latest prayer uh is just goes like this this. Dearest companion and guide, I come to you for direction, guidance, comfort and support as I travel these later years of my journey on earth. I know now how much I need you to talk with, to listen to, to learn from and just be with. Today and every day I will strive with your help to have your wisdom, your love, your peace flow within me and from me to all that I encounter. Take my hand and lead me on." In The Promises on page 75 has that image, and it's just a wonderful image of hand-in-hand, shoulder-to-shoulder companionship on this journey, which is what I heard from deep within you, which was wonderful. yeah and one of the songs that goes through my mind when i do my morning prayer and meditation and so contemplation is the the old hymn take blessed lord take my hand lead me on and um it was it was from that uh i'm used to writing informational. And it was very, very worthwhile to get beyond that. I like the idea of we thought well before taking this step. Yeah, I'm cautious. I feel like I got burned once. So not recently but way back when. So I wanted to make sure what I was saying and what I was signing up to um what you know just what i was committing to and and i and it was different um it was deeper it was more emotional than last time when i did it uh in the last workshop through so well worth well worth redoing absolutely well you're a different person at a different stage of your own personal spiritual evolution so of course you're going to have a different experience when you bring with it such intention as you have yeah thank you very much this process has been um awkward for me i guess you'd say i i realized as i was trying to write the prayer that i uh i really have a revulsion i can't say god i can pray to god i don't know what that means i don t like the idea um and so as thank you very much for giving me your little blessing the other day and and saying it was all right for me to um to associate my with with this wonderful man i knew who died but who is somehow still present or i don't know how but in my life and uh so i wrote a letter and this morning i read it to my sponsor who said that sounds just like a love letter i mean it's supposed to be a prayer oh wait i love a love letter wait a minute go man well here we go dear one i trust in our spiritual connection i trust your wisdom vision and judgment i trust the loving warmth with which you surround me so often i trust sense of humor which brings me back to the flow through laughter i trust in your ongoing love and desire to support me in this life i am in awe that our connection continues even some years after your death and even my new love relationship here on this earth i'm sure that you made that happen your fingerprints are all over it thank you now i'm asking if you will help me work through my addiction and the bedevilments as you once said you would in any way i can you and i experienced a shared love that spilled out all over everyone we knew i wanted to be that oh i want to be the open and in the world again i want to spill over with love in all directions i don't want the flow to be clogged by my manufactured stuck places i want talk to them i want to talk them over with you and learn how to keep the flow abundant and uninterrupted i want to share the wealth of vulnerability and openness brings me please help me for my part i will listen with great care your words have always been filled with tenderness and wisdom i miss him yes i am willing to trust that the deep connection we once shared on earth still connects our spirit i have known it in the past and trusted in the present and the future bless you my dear one today and every day thank you for our forever sharing i believe in it wow yeah of course the whole time right from the beginning that you were reading the only word that i had in my resonating with it was spirit yeah yeah we we connected he was dying when i met him and we connected wow level and it was profound and it connected it's been it's like it's real it's like i asked very real no it's very real and it's wonderful because the third step is a commitment to action and the key word that you used was trust over and over yeah yeah yeah and and trust is in fact the word for the behavior that follows the commitment yeah if in fact you make a decision and you don't take any action nothing's going to happen but if in effect you make it decision then you take some action you're trusting the process Spirit Guide Creator, I am committing to a one-on-one relationship with you. To be open and willing to follow your directions and will. Please remove my inherent selfishness, self-centeredness, turn my thinking and actions away from self so I can cooperate and align with you and be useful to others. away the resentment dishonesty and most of all fear that blocked my conscious relationship with you so your power love and way of life will shine through shine in and through me encouraging others to seek you god i will continue to seek You daily through prayer and meditation for guidance and power knowing that your ways are always higher than my ways yeah and as you were discerning and writing that out what was your experience with it well i think i think I'm still cut off from my feelings and emotions but But I think what I'm just really committed to this process and doing this work, like you said. And I'm distrusting what you said the miracle will happen. So I don't know when it'll happen. But, you know, I'm committed to do my prayer meditation in the morning and my little evening review. I do my 10 steps and. You know, and I reach out and I try to be helpful to others and be of service. um so i'm doing everything i know to do that's right that's right and stay as i my image for me and i offer it to others is to stay gently pressed up against it life the steps the spirit the tools the daily navigation of our lives and the speed bumps of it just stay gently pressed up against it all trusting the process and then here's where the key is be prepared to be surprised yeah because as you said you don't know when it's going to happen in fact maybe many of you don't even think it's going to happen for you it's okay it's okay be willing to be surprised yeah good thank you um thank you everybody for sharing as somebody mentioned you all will have quite a lot of courage to be so personal as also so vulnerable um i want to lead you through the third step prayer now. You don't need to know it, you don't need to read it, and you don t need to have it in front of you. I will lead you one word, one phrase at a time like we did in the monastery. It's called antiphonal prayer meaning anti back and forth, phonal sound like a tennis match. One group of monks on the left-hand side of the chapel began a prayer the the monks on the right hand side of the chapel responded and back and forth they prayed antiphonally i'm going to in a minute begin the prayer from the big book on page 63 you don't need to look at it it's better that actually you don t that you in fact maybe be here present open eyes or closed eyes and that you have in your imagination in your memory in your consciousness the concept that you made a decision about in step two what was the concept what are the words and the phrases of the concept of higher power god as we don't understand it what is the relationship that you made a decision about that you yearn for from the marrow of your soul the deepest part in your being and consciousness that you really want to have and maybe you haven't even got words for it which is just fine but you have this longing for something to bring fullness to each of us open with the set aside attitude and the set-aside prayer to have new concepts and new words and new feelings and new awarenesses about that but that in fact this effort that we're going to this exercise that we going to engage in is our commitment in public you've made it already by showing up and being here you've the commitment to turn the third step is done but now you're going to proclaim public witness in this community this cohort this band of brothers and sisters walking on this journey which we've begun together we've been several months together and we will be several months as we continue the journey and in our imagination picture us in a room it's pretty easy to do with everybody so wonderfully present to us in on our screens holding hands shoulder to shoulder praying this prayer God, I offer myself to you to build with me and to do with me as you will. relieve me of the bondage of self that I may better do your will take away my difficulties that victory over them may bear witness to those I would help of your power your love and your way of life may I do your will always now I invite you to still all muted I invite you to pray in unison the prayer from the big book if you need to look at the book or a sheet of paper for the prayer that's fine but I'm inviting you now is kind of a sense of conclusion together in community and have the flow of the prayer pray together God I offer myself to you to build with me and to do with me as you will. Relieve me of the bondage of self that I may better do your will. Take away my difficulties, let victory over them may bear witness to those I would help of your power, your love, and your way of life. May I do your well always. bill says at the end of the page 63 and the instructions on step three that you might have an experience with this it's only a beginning but if honestly and humbly made an effect sometimes a very great one was felt at once but he's very quick to point out that we have launched on a course of vigorous action and this is the first piece of work in that course the courses steps four through nine as i've reminded you all throughout our time today together but this step four is the first step of a personal house cleaning he says on page 64 this decision that you made is vital meaning life-giving coming from the latin word vitae and crucial meaning at the crossroads coming fromthe latin cruce cross at the Crossroads it could have little permanent effect meaning it will have a temporary effect but not a permanent one it might last a minute it might a month but it won't last long unless at once followed by a strenuous effort notice his jackhammer words an adjective maybe an adverb i'm not sure strenuous effort to face meaning to name step four and to be rid of steps five six and seven the things in ourselves which have been blocking us blocking us from oh that would be god that would be light that would power the clouds in us that are the obstacles to the sunlight our addiction is merely a symptom we have to get down to causes and conditions i recommend that you read and highlight the balance of that page and take a look at the instructions on resentment coming from the latin word sentire. Sentire means to feel. Resentment is a feeling of anger. Re in front of sentire, re sentire means you feel it again and again and again. And this is not about a memory of your anger. This is about anger that you experience today. It may have happened 40 years ago. it may have happened four minutes ago it's not about the time that it happened it's about the feeling that you have today and make a list of those resentments or begin making a list just some spontaneous list from your head from your heart from your gut from your awareness i'm not giving you any specific instructions yet i will next week but just begin allowing it to flow from your head and your heart and your gut through your arm to your pen to your fingers to a paper doesn't matter what paper it doesn't matter what form i'll explain all of that beginning next week and next week we'll start off with a debrief on your observations and questions and maybe your experience with what we did today and then we'll get into the first instructions in a deep dive on step four with resentments join me now in the serenity prayer god grant me the serendipity to accept the things i cannot change the courage to change the things I can and the wisdom to know the difference thank you everybody wonderful session and Now the real work begins.