Steps 10, 11 and 12 – 12 Steps Over 4 Weeks – Lisa R – Full Workshop – AA Speaker – Part 4 of 2 – 2022 – Sandy B.

me a little bit it really took to the second time going through that I got fully rid of it and I mean I really came in thinking he owes me and about three months ago he called me to make amends and I was like I don't need this call now I could care less I wanted that call 15 years ago where were you when I needed it you know and we had I just said to them, you know, I'll listen to whatever you have to say, but I have forgiven and forgotten everything at this point, and I wish you nothing but the best. You know, and I hang up and I tell my husband number two about it. He goes, did he offer you any money? And I said, apparently that's not part of his program. But I said it didn't even occur to me to ask him for money because that's where I'm coming from today. I don't care. That wasn't spent. You know, and I just share that because it just takes one relationship through the thing. At any rate, I can talk all night but I won't, you know, fear less. I will not talk all right. And my life has slowly been transformed because of the steps in this program. And the only reason it's been slowly is because I move slowly, not because the steps do and I want to be very clear about that. work, results happen. When I don't, I sit in misery. But the reality is if you don't pick up a drink, there's always hope to do the work. And again, thank you very much for listening. I'd like now to introduce our guest speaker of the month of January, and she'll be speaking on steps 10, 11, and 12, and that will be Lisa R. Good evening. My name is Lisa Ricci and I am an alcoholic. It's good to be here, it's good that it's the last week but I am very happy to be hearing this has been an honor and a privilege, and I've gotten a lot out of this experience. I was talking to some folks before I came here tonight and mentioned that actually before this month I had never spoken for an entire hour at a meeting in my life, and when I got up in front of the microphone the first night, I said my name and thank you. I had a momentary thought that it was going to be a long month, and it was gonna be me, Mike, and Kathy by week four, and then after that they'd probably never speak to me again. But I said a quick prayer and he took over and all was well, but I'd recommend this to anybody and it's all kidding aside it's been a really good experience for me to share my experience in this way and I always be grateful to this group for giving me that opportunity because I cannot pay back the Alcoholics Anonymous the gift that it has given to me and I'm grateful for that well we left off last week I feel like I don't know a weekly talk show host or something but we left off last week you know I just like this is a wild way we do things here I love it uh where I made peace with people in my life. Snapshot in time, though. And now I have to continue to live my life. And that's what 10, 11, and 12 are for me to continue the life. I don't believe they're maintenance steps. I don' t want to maintain anything. No thank you. I've seen that happen to people. It's not pretty. and I don't want it for me. And at times it has happened for me and it's a lot less pretty when I have to live it. I'm going to talk first about the 10th step. Continue to take personal inventory when we're wrong, promptly admit it. That was an interesting philosophy. Continue. continue continue daily the new philosophy for me because i'm my whole life i've been all right let's do what we got to do work hard for two weeks and then coast for about a year but this daily thing is kind of uh you know it's an encumbrance that's every day And I don't do every day well. I'm not by nature a consistent person, but I was brought up well in this program. My first sponsor required that I call her every day. She said, but do me a favor, could you call me after you've prayed and been to a meeting? a meeting you're a little easier to handle all right so I had this habit of when I got out of the meeting I would call her outside of the diner because I had to go to the diners every night you know I had two right yeah the only semblance of a social life available at the time so I was going but she had a life and had to put a bed attend so I have to call her from the you know out in cold at the phone booth outside the diner, you know. I didn't have a cell phone back then. I don't even know if there were cell phones back then. But if they did, they were like 400 pounds so that wouldn't have worked. And uh, and I would call her with my tales of woe for the day. It was very rarely the tales of hoopla, it was the tales of woes because I was miserable. And, uh, you You know, I would call her and I'd be like, you know, this is an ex-bomber to me. And I messed this up. And I would go in thinking, you Know, these people really made a victim out of me today. In this case, I don't know what I was doing. I was wrong there. Then after I got off the phone with her, I wasn't a victim. I was a volunteer. I had set the stage for that situation. And there were 14 places along the way I could have stepped off that trolley car. and the one or two things I actually thought I got wrong weren't quite as long as I thought and that those were the couple of things I was getting right but they were so not natural to me I thought they were wrong so that was my first introduction to this she didn't tell me we were doing any kind of inventory I was just telling her about my day and then as I started working on On my fourth step, before that, she had me starting with my daily inventory. And she gave me this assignment. She said, let's just keep it with the resentments at first. I want you to write down any resentments you have during the day, and we'll talk about them. And I didn't know what the hell she was talking about. She explained it, but I don't know who she was telling me about. going around, and I'd get agitated during the day, and they'd go, was that a resentment? I don't know. You know, it doesn't seem like strong enough to be a resentment. That's an annoyance. Does that go on the list? I don' t know. This is annoying me. Andy's going on the risk. That's who's on the left, Andy. The first day she gives me the assignment, I call her and tell her, you're on the list, because I don''t know what I'm doing in the shortfall. and she left and we walked and I said you know and I have these things that were annoyances and she was like oh easy, easy. Who did you interact with today? What did you say? What did you do? How did you feel? I'd rather tell you who I slept with this morning than all of that. You know really that's me you know so we go through this. And then I said, oh, okay. She said, you know, in these situations, she would point out where I had plenty of opportunity to leave the troubles behind me, but I was just kind of like once I was on a roll, off I went. You know, I was like, forget it. The train with no brakes and started introducing me to pray while it's happening. Don't pray afterwards it's not as helpful you know okay and she was like uh you know you're getting agitated a lot during the day um maybe you need to write things down as to happen and go get yourself a little memo pad and throw yourself in the ladies room when i have it a lot of it was around work at the time they really didn't value me enough and um they really had no idea what a gem they had and um oh man and uh you know and on a daily basis i had a resentment against my lunchtime meeting and uh three people at my home group and whatever and i didn't go through this and you know even i had to see it's getting quite boring the same people same crap every day and she's like, you can't change those situations. You can't change them. You can't change these things. I was like, I know! She was like you can change what you bring. That means I'm responsible for that. I saw where she was going with that. And I didn't like it. And she's like, until you start looking at your part, you're never going to be free. You're never gonna be free... I want to be freed. I'm gonna look at my part. And it really changed the whole way I looked at my life. and I haven't been a victim for years. I've been one stupid SOB many times over again. I have not been a victims and any situation I get myself into that forces me to write an inventory, there I am. It's not you, it's me. You could be, you could have done the worst thing in the world to me. How did I react? Did I react in kind? Oh, that's lovely. That's what God would have me do. You know, I had to learn to look at things a little differently. And there were some situations where I got really novel approaches to things. If I kept finding myself in a situation with certain people and no matter how I changed my behavior, they would still behave in a way that wasn't good for me, I could stop spending time with them. I mean this was like brain surgery. I just never knew, you know, I just never knew this stuff. This was simple stuff that was coming out of daily inventories. It was amazing and you know that was the beginning of a process and and I had to take it with somebody. I have to tell them. Me taking my inventory with me? Who's that going to get me? I'm right. They're wrong. They don't understand. I mean, you know, I shared why you need a person in the fifth step. I really believe if you woke me up in the middle of the night, I'd tell you I am thin and 27 years old. That's what I want to believe about me. So if I can't see something that like a stranger on the street can see about me, I think I need a little help with my inventory. I can take my own inventory, but if I'm the only one looking at it, it's not going to be too good because rationalization will come in. Oh, I don't need to write that down. I don'T need to look at that. You know, this writing business is overrated. I don' t need to ride every day. You know what? I' ve been practicing this for years. I have a gut instinct now. If I can't sleep at night, then I need to do an inventory. this is the kind of stuff I can tell myself left to me. You know, it's stuff that I have told myself at different times in my sobriety and had to pay for it. I, to date haven't had to paid for it with a drink but um, I have damaged relationships because of that thinking and that behavior. I have lost one friendship because of that behavior and I have done stuff that for a long time that could've been cut a lot sooner had I been taking a valid inventory. And that's what it's there for me. That's why it's there for you. It's not work. When I first came into AA, I thought the steps were like the punishment I had to pay for the life of Riley. I was a woman out there. I thought this was like, oh now I got to do this work because, you know, what I did. This stuff is here to free me. This is here give me my life back and even more than that because I certainly have a better life today than I ever had. And you know, there's a gentleman who helped me out a lot in the beginning and when I was telling him about writing my inventory at the end of the day, he was like, oh yeah, you're alone in your room on your knees praying and then you write. I said, yes. When's the last time you were alone in your room praying to God? You hurt somebody. Maybe you need to be doing that all day. Maybe you need me taking your inventory all day, not at the end of it. And the truth was, I needed to be taking it that a couple of times during the day because when I was new, I would read like daily meditation material and five minutes later forget what I read. So of course I'm going to forget who I got into an altercation with at 10.15 this morning. Please, you've got to be kidding me. I mean it wasn't like I was having one altercation per day at the time. It was like I was out there bouncing off of people in situations. If you only did one crazy thing it's easy to take your inventory, but I had a lot of stuff in there. There was a lot of people out in that world, you know, in my way. I am so nuts, and I belong. And that's been a process that to be quite honest for me is a litmus test for how my sobriety is doing. If I'm writing my inventory during the day or at the end of the day and sharing it with either my sponsor or another alcoholic, I'm generally doing okay. I'm doing okay! If I am not, just kind of getting by, bobbing and weaving, doing a little, just the stuff that's really eating at me I've got to tell you so I don't drink. But I mean, there's a big span in there and I've practiced every level of that span. And the one that works best for me is the one where I'm writing it down on a daily basis and sharing it with someone. And it's gotten to the point where I really don't care who I share it with as long as they have recovery principles in their lives. Because you know, I love my husband dearly but I mean I go to jail for the stuff he thinks the solutions to my problems. I love this guy, but he doesn't help me. He's very supportive and I know he's in my corner and he'll be coming every Sunday with a cake, but I need somebody who's going to find the solution for me, not land me in whatever the current version of jail is. It's a balancing act because we have different principles and I find that when I take my inventory with him, you know, I can get away with murder so I don't go there And there are certain things I should just never share with him anyway, but you know it is a process and I find that by sharing my inventory with people sometimes I'm reminding them what they need to be doing. And I'll maybe bring up something that's bothering them and maybe we help each other. Because the fellowship is very important to me. You know, I am very book-oriented. I believe in the steps. I believe that the power comes from God. But I don't think there is no value in the fellowship. You know it talks through the book, the fellowship that we crave. I crave fellowship. I've craved some interesting fellowship over my life. But I crave membership. And I get a lot more out of sharing what's going on with me on a daily basis this with other alcoholics who are trying to live in recovery than I do by not sharing my life. It's just, I get a lot more out of it and you know some of the best meetings happen in the car on the way to and from the meeting for me. That one-on-one, one alcoholic sharing with another, there's just something about that and taking my inventory with another alcoholic is a big part of that for me. And I can't stress enough how important that is to making positive forward motion in your life. And if that's what you want, that's what you kind of need to do. That's what I need to know. And, you know, I strongly believe that on a daily basis, we're either moving toward a drink or further away from one. There is no standing still. There's no maintaining the spot. It just doesn't work. I'm a malcontent by nature. I have the attention span of a net. I bore easily. I need to be moving forward at all times or I'm out there drinking. It's just a matter of time. Now, I'll do some other things first, I imagine. You know, there's a couple of other defects of character I'll pick up before the drink. I was at a meeting last week and it was a 7-step meeting. And the guy talked about defects of characters and he said, I don't really like that term. I'm thinking, yeah, who does? He goes, I prefer to think of it as mistakes I'm very likely to make. I identified with that guy. There are some mistakes I'M VERY LIKELY TO MAKE. They were all over my thoughts then. They continue to be in my head now, but at a lesser degree and thankfully at less frequency. So there is positive improvement. You know, if I had to say to you, it's so many years later and it's the same stuff, and this doesn't work. But if I don't keep fit, there are certain things that are just going to start popping up. And for me it's gossip. Imagining I'm being slighted in situations I'm not being appreciated enough to say no, what a gem they have. Whether that's my boss, my family, my husband or whoever, don't they know what I bring to the table? You know those kinds of things. And if practiced long enough not taking inventory can lead me to overspending, wandering eye. Hasn't led me to a wandering body since I'm in AA. Something is working but the eye is just as dangerous and you know that kind of stuff and you know we all have something. We all have something and it may be slightly different from one person to another but we all suffer from those five things whatever they are for you that come up when we're not doing what we need to be doing and I know mine I can't not know You know, it's like even I can't deny them at this point. You know they're mine and the reason they still exist is because there's some part of me that is still holding on to them. And I don't believe any way, shape or form that God is holding back his grace from me. I believe there's something I'm doing or not doing that's making them still be available to exist. And that's why I need this sermon for it. And hopefully, after a while even I'll get sick of this stuff enough that you know I'll actually honestly ask for his help. It's a process and you know it really is not natural for me to look at my part in things and uh... it is a little bit of work and you know it's a lot easier at the end of a long day catch you in the morning god thanks thanks for a good one it's not like i haven't done that you know that's why i have those words and i've done it you know And he is kind and he does give me his grace and I'm still here sober in spite of that. But my life has been transformed through the process of continuing to take my personal employment. And anyone who's sitting here tonight and is sober but is looking at their life, it's good but kind of missing something. I wish you could be a little better. This is the first part of getting closer to your higher power at this point in your recovery. I have to cleanse myself again to get into His grace. His grace is available, but I can't see it, touch it, taste it if I don't clean my slate and that's what this process is for me. And And I don't know about anybody else, but when I'm done doing my 10th step, there's no way to go but God. That's why 11 comes after it. You know, it's like, come on. You know that somebody with a clue put these steps together. Okay. And after I look at, it's January 30th, 2008. Look at my inventory. Let's open the book. Let go back. That's gone, that's still there. That's when I have to go to God because He's the one with the power. He's the only one with the power. I'll share it with another individual, but the answer is always to go to God. That's the ONLY answer I have. No other answer has worked. And so that's why we have an 11 step. It tells me this deceit for prayer and meditation to improve my contact with God. It assumes I've already had a contact. Well I have all throughout So the relationship started way back, but it's like any other relationship in my life. If I want a relationship with you, I have to spend time with you. I've got to be with you and that being communion with you if I met somebody person-wise who who, whenever I saw them, was always in a good mood, fun to be with, anything I needed they provided, always loved me, no matter what I did. You know, I'd be stepping on you to get to that person. That's what God does for me. If I would go following you around like a flea, that's what I need to do with my higher power. You know? And the first person I felt that way about was my first sponsor. When she stopped short, my nose hid her behind. I wanted to be with her. She was the first God I had in this program. You know? But she was good. She knew she wasn't God. She sent me to God. She's like, I'm going to fail you. You need God. You don't need me. You know, and that's where I've been instructed to go. You know. And this isn't just like prayer and meditation to feel better. Well, you know your life can be improved by prayer and meditation. No, it's telling me what to do. Only, only, one thing, only. Now it's for as long. And the power to carry that. I have to be honest, by the time I get to this step, God's will for me in most cases is very clear. There may be those handful of things, but in most cases, it's pretty clear what is lawless for me. I mean, who are we kidding? You know, a lot of the gross behavior is gone. Now it's down to those last few things, and it's usually pretty clear what I need to do, what each next right thing is. Where my difficulty comes as a human being is, oh, now I've got to do it. You know, somebody was sharing before, you know, that God gives them the strength to do the things she knows she has to do, that is right to do. But in the end, you're going to feel better about doing it. You know? That's the crazy part. The things that I believe are God's will for me may not immediately feel good, you know, which is what I want. I like the right now. I love living in the moment. like the right now. But it's about how am I going to feel a day from now? I have options many times during the day to pick one way or another in a situation. And my natural instinct is, well what's the easiest one for me to do right now? What's the one that doesn't require me getting off my fat beaver and what's the one that doesn't make me vulnerable? What's the one, that doesn t require me to put something I feel like doing right now on hold for a better good? That s the one I want first. But I know what I need to do. And what I NEED to do sometimes isn't easy to do immediately and that's when I need to ask for God's strength and power and guidance. In spite of my experience, there are times where it's right in front of me. This is what you need to do. And if you don't, this is the price. And in spite of all that, there comes a time where I go, it's not so bad in the price. I think I could pay that. Yeah, no, I'm going to do this. That wasn't that expensive. That's not so bad. Until the bill comes. You know, and that bill comes in many different phases. is strained relations with people. One of my favorites is, you know, I work in an organization where we're spread throughout the country and most of my communication is via email and I would love to send little email bombs back to these people because they send stuff and you're like, I know they wouldn't talk like this to me face-to-face. You look at the city and say, they would not say this to my face. But they are 3,000 miles away, and that's why they're saying it like that. And my first reaction is to respond in kind. And that has really gotten me into a lot of trouble because now there's written evidence of it. you know? And I've had to learn that when I receive an email that causes my blood pressure to go up and my desire to find the nastiest way to say something to as many people I can copy as possible, that my solution is to walk away from my desk. And if I'm too busy for that, that's a disease telling me I'm too busy. If I walk away, chances are I just may not behave appropriately. I sit at my desk and I say, you can't do this, you cannot respond, you cannot, God please help me, God, please help. And I say wow, I'm not that better. I'm going to draft the response and not send it. And that's how I do it. I have a big draft file. And I enjoy it. And every now and then I open it because that was good, I wish I knew. It would have been good if I sent that baby out. And uh, I learned about that draft file at a meeting. Somebody else shared about it. I was like, hey that could work! Because I'll get it out but they don't need to hear it. It's a beautiful thing. Technology is helping me, you know. And I've learned with the really nasty ones, what I find particularly enlightening is that I send back the sweetest message I can, try to be of as most service as I can. They have no idea that I'm like, oh so not true! And I don't feel this as I'm as I'm typing, that's how I get through. And you know, oddly enough, by behaving that way, calling in God's power just when I need it, I get the power. And people who, when I started there, I hated them. They had to die. I don't know anybody who I hate that can't...need to die. They can't just live elsewhere, they have to die, and that hasn't gone away. Someday, right? But some of those people, because I've not responded in that way and I've actually tried to find solutions after praying, are like on my list of people I actually work well with today. Imagine that, I could hate somebody one day and another day be working well with them. And uh, that's just amazing. God's power is more than I could ever explain in words. I've been in a lot of situations where I've had to call on that power. God God is great and God is good. Little kid's prayers are right on. God is great and god is good and uh, you know when I first came into AA I'd like to talk a little bit about um, I was like a twitch okay? I was just a twitch and uh I'm sure that had nothing to do with the 42 cups of coffee a day I was drinking and uh the Hagen-Bass Pints that was the post-meeting meal, you know, those kinds of things. And I was having a tough time sitting still or asleep at night, staying asleep when I got to sleep. So my first introduction to meditation was, Annie, I can't sleep. They say you sleep better when you come to AA. Well, let's sleep it. Did they give you a date by which you would sleep? No. Just hang in there. I can't sleep. Well, why don't you try meditating? Why don't I try flying a plane? I don't know how to meditate. You know, I don t know. I mean, I knew I was taught as a kid how to pray and everything I learned they kind of threw out early in this process of I had to develop my own prayers and my own conversation with God, and that chances are a standard prayer I've been using for years, well, that didn't work for you, so maybe you need to try different prayers and find a different kind of way of talking. That went like exactly opposite to what I was taught as a child, and it was Like, make up my own words to talk to them? Or me? Sure that's allowed. I've got a couple of nuns that would beg to differ. You know, I haven't been practicing that religion for a while, but they've been around for thousands of years. All right, so it's a little superstitious. All right. But I had started praying on my own. And I was given this lesson that a prayer sung is a prayer twice said. I like to sing. I have no talent, but I like the sing. But I kind of felt it was God's just rewards to get my prayers in the form of my singing them to him because my voice sucks. And I want a good voice and you're getting this one, that's how I'm praying. I was really sick alright but I actually still sing today and I think it's like God's joke But, you know, the first time I sang to my husband, he said to me, oh, did anybody ever tell you that you're a beautiful singer? I said, no. He goes, well, there's a reason. Should have known then I was going to end up marrying him, right? But he didn't tell me not to sing anymore, right. So it's a good thing. But, so I started with praying and then she's telling me that, you know, if I'm having trouble sleeping maybe I can try to meditate. I told her, I don't know. The only other entertainer I've ever seen was my brother and that seems, you now, it's some sort of transcendent. I don' t know what he's doing but it's very weird. And I don''t want to ask for his help is the bottom line. Yeah. So she said, you don'''t have to ask your brother for help. There's other people who meditate. I can help you. In fact, I have a tape that maybe you'll want to listen to try. It's a very beginner. And it's okay. So I get this tape and I'm like, okay, I can't sleep. I'm going to try meditating. So put the tape in and I had some really good instruction about the way to sit, it, the way to breathe, how to clear my mind. This guy had a very calm voice and was explaining everything. I fell asleep. So I called him the next day. She said, oh did you try that tape? I said yeah it don't work. She says oh really? I say nah I fell asleep. She goes you're sick. You called me because you needed help falling asleep. I give you a tape, you fall asleep and you tell me it doesn't work, what did you expect good to do. You know, and I was like, I don't know. She had her hands full, that's for sure. And, you know, well, I've had me back, so it's okay. But in God's infinite wisdom, I had me back in the form of sponsees. So Annie's like laughing her way. But this is the kind of sickness that I had. But eventually, you know, I was able to actually listen to that tape and not fall asleep. And I started to practice what that had. And I started to feel a little less twitchy. This stuff works. It was before, I was up to this but it didn't matter. She was like if it's in 10, 11 and 12 you can start with it now. You can keep improving at any time in your recovery. You'll get up there in its rightful term, but you can start now. And little by slowly I got introduced to other things to do and I haven't necessarily needed to listen to a tape or read a book at this point. I don't follow my own path in my own relationship and I like to talk to people about what they're doing because I get ideas. And sometimes somebody will say something very poignant at a meeting and I'll use that in my next meditation. There's a lot of opportunity for me to get meditation material. Sometimes it doesn't come from AA. Well we don't have the market cornered on God so I have to keep an open mind. There came a point about five years ago, six years or something like that, where I found that my spiritual needs were not being met in alcoholics or animals. Whether it was because of the rooms I was going to, the people I was sharing with, I just didn't feel as close as I wanted to, as I felt I could. Well, I found something that got me there. The book tells me that if I need other help, go to other places. I don't come here with a flat tire you know and I found a group of women in my church who support each other in prayer meditation I took a lifelong bow with them and I have something with them that I would not have here I don' t care where the door opens I'm going to go if God's behind it I want to be in there you know And I found out, you know, after a lot of searching that He's right within me. And it's just connecting to that. And sometimes I need other people's help with that. Sometimes I can do it on my own. But it doesn't matter. You know, sometimes I want to be alone with a friend. And sometimes, I want all my friends together. You know? And just in different times and different places. But I never want to stop talking to God. Even when I'm mad at Him, I've got to shake my fist at Him. But the important thing is to not close the line of communication. Because when I do that, I'm living in the darkness and I'm going to hurt myself and hurt other people. And I have a conscience today. When I hurt myself, it's not quite so bad as when I hurt other people. I can get over the hurt that I do to myself a lot quicker than I can getting over the heartache that I did to other people and that's the exact opposite of how I used to live my life before AA, you know? If I hurt you, who cares? But if I hurt me, oh, we've got to take care of this. You know, but it's very different today. And I don't think I'm done on my journey. I think there's a lot more out there. And I think that each and every one of us, if we took the time to talk to one another, could teach each other something about connecting to that power, something a little different, something that might get you there a little sooner. And I think, I know I've been guilty of this, but I think there's plenty of times in AA where we do a disservice to one another, where we're afraid to talk about how we practice our spiritual life. But I think we rob one another of opportunities. So I try at least with the people in my life to share what I'm doing. I don't share my belief in a higher power. I don' t think that's helpful to people. I think that we need to find our own path, and especially new people coming up in the program. It's my responsibility to definitely not share with them my belief in a higher power. I need to leave the door wide open for them. And if I share with him what I believe, they may think that's what they need to get AA, and I don't ever want to do that to somebody. So my higher power may not work for you. You need to learn your own. But I can tell you how I connect to mine. That's what I can share with you and what my connection has done for me. And I think that's, you know, incumbent upon me to do. And, you know, again, the step is about his will for us. The power to carry that out. As an alcoholic who's been blessed with recovery, and I am recovered from my alcoholism, what God wants me to be able to do is to pick up that message and carry it somewhere. Because it has no value if it stays with me. It's dead. It's a dead life. But if I share that with no human being and help them, then it has value. And that leads me once again very logically to the next step. And it says having kind of spiritual awakening as a result of these steps. Not as the result of watching TV, not as the results of a self-improvement class, not at the result don't drink and make meetings as a result of these steps. We tried to carry this message of the 12 steps to alcohol and the path of these principles in all our affairs. Well, we'd like to shluff that last part off, thank you. Because the lighting is just carrying the message, you know? Let me carry the message. But carrying the messages is very important. I carry the message in how I live my life. It's not in what I tell you, it's in what I do. I was taught very early on in AA, this is not my saying because you've heard it a hundred times, that I may be the only version of a big book that somebody ever meets. I represent alcoholics anonymous in every day life, every situation I'm in. Every time I show up to a function sober, I am representing alcoholics Every time I show up to a function and not behave like a moron, I'm representing Alcoholics Anonymous. Unfortunately when I show like a Moron, I'm also representing Alcoholic Anonymous and I need to think accordingly before I act. It's not just about me today. I could kill somebody with how I act if kids are digital, complaining about life. Oh yeah, life sucks. It only gets worse. life's a bitch then you marry her and they decide they want help with their alcoholism and they go oh I know somebody in AA, oh no she's miserable nah that can't work I mean I can't go living like that, I could kill somebody I have to carry this message everywhere I go you know when I first came into AA I didn't have much of a message to carry but I still had one to carry. I was counting days and I was in free spirit. There's a surprise, we eat three nights a week chances are I'm going to be there and I'm sitting at table with Big Vinny and some girl walks in and gives me the nod she goes who is that girl? I don't know. I said, I'm only here two weeks. You're here ten years. Don't you know who she is? I wouldn't say that. He goes, what do you think I've seen her here before? Do you know that girl? She said, no, I told you I don' t know her. What do you thinks she's doing here? I said what the hell do I know? Let's go over there and find out. What am I going to tell her? Do you know where the meeting was for? Yeah. Know where the bathroom is? Yeah. Know where coffee is? Do you now where the other ladies in the room are? Show her those things. Okay. Well, I didn't have much to give but I gave it, you know. And I introduced myself and I told her I was there two weeks. two weeks. I hadn't seen her here before. Have you ever been to this group before? She said, oh no, it's my first meeting. I said, I really don't know anything, but they told me to give you a meeting list and to get you coffee. And I'm supposed to introduce you to every lady now, and I think you've got to take their numbers. That's what they made me do. That was all I had. But I gave it freely, eventually. It was just easier to give it to her than to listen to him, you know, so. But it taught me something. He didn't tell me to give her anything I didn't have. So what do you have? Give it to her. And that's basically what I would suggest is that the best way to carry this message is to give the message that's your experience strength and hope, nothing more. My opinion is valueless. I have no children. I don't make suggestions to people on how to raise children, I have no clue. My dog runs the house, I'm not going to tell you how to run a kid. I mean, you know, we got no business going there. I try to be available to people and alcoholics and less. But if they have a day, two days, three months, twenty-two years. Sometimes a person with 22 years needs to end the day more than a person with one day. They're numb, they have no clue all this while they're not drinking. It's the guy who's been doing this for 22 years but doesn't have a message yet. He's just not drinking, going to meetings, holding on. He still white knuckling it. He has still got the mental obsession of a drink. That's the guy we need to help. The fact that somebody happens to have not drank for a certain amount of time doesn't mean they're out of the need of help. I was taught that when I go to my home group, that I hang around the people I know. Look to see who you don't know. Go talk to them. That's what I need to do. I need practice these principles wherever I I could talk up the sky in AA. If I go outside and yell at a cab driver, that's really not what this is about. I have to live the way I talk. Some of that happens kind of in spite of us. I was coming to AA for a couple of years, and somebody, a personal friend of the family who we never enrolled in each other's fan club shall we say, came into my home group one night. And my first thought was a little bit along the Bogart line, with all the rooms in AA why is she coming to mine? That was my first though. And then I said, she's at an EA meeting. Go put your hand up. She started talking to me. I don't know that we'd ever enroll in each other's fan club, but she said to me, yeah, well you know, I saw how much you changed since you came here. I wanted to give this a shot. I'm thinking, I still don't like her too much. See? So I said to her, what do you mean how much I treat you? Oh, you treat me so much better ever since you've come in here. I don't like you any more than when I first got here." This stuff really works. I learn things that go counter to my nature. I treat people differently, unconsciously. Unconsciously. From the practice of doing the right thing it becomes a second nature. It doesn't always have to be going against the grain. I hear people say things, well my you know I can't help it I'm an alcoholic. Well then go drink pal. You can help it. Through these steps you can help them. How we interact with other people can be helped and if it's not helped shame on you, shame on me. And you You know, I can talk till the cows come home about just the total change in the nature of my relationships with people since I've put these steps in my life. I'm open with the people in my lives. I don't have as many people in our lives but the people I have, I really have a relationship with, and they know how I feel about them. They don't wonder what did she mean by that. They know how i feel from what I say and more importantly from what i do. That's what this is about. Whether, you know it's very easy for me to treat another alcoholic in the rooms of AA kindly. It's a little harder with brothers and sisters I know for 30 some odd years. it's a little harder. I was taught a lesson, treat them with the same dignity and respect that you would a newcomer in AA. Well I took it all away didn't I? Boom, it's all gone. I've been given direct lessons for how to live this in my life. My life has been enriched You know, we talked about it, you know, some of working with others takes away from other parts of our life, supposedly. It takes time from, you Know, there's only so many hours in a day if I'm doing that, there's hours I can't be doing something else. I want to share something that happened to me recently. It was early December and it was the first snow. And I had a commitment to speak at a detox that night. And I hate going to this detox. It's in the same hospital where my brother died. I hate coming there. It just brings back bad memories. I always try to, you know, when I hear they're asking for speakers from that detox, I don't go running to the front of the room. You know what I mean? So they ask me directly. I never say no, but I don' t volunteer. All right? And now I got to go to this thing. I don''t want to go. But I'm going to go because you got to do it. And I called the chairperson to tell him, she goes, oh, it's nasty out. If you don't want to go, I understand. There is a God. And there is a guy. And I said, don't be ridiculous. I'll be there. So they closed my office at 1 o'clock because it's snowing out. But I stayed because I had stuff to do. And it was around 5 o' clock and the head of my company and stuff. so I he was uh yeah I figured you'd be in here so what do you mean because we closed hours ago what are you doing here yeah and he says well but it goes you know you've done a lot here you know we're looking for this position and at that night he told me about my promotion recent promotions my job I'm on top of the world I want to call my husband back here anywhere from the subway can't find them. I want to tell my friends, where am I going to detox? All right. I'm not going to tell them. What the hell would they care, you know? So, oh great. I'm excited about this crazy thing in my life. Let me go to a detox. That's how I fall. And I have never seen a more miserable looking girl in my whole life. You know, but 15 years two of them I might have wanted to date. Okay? I gotta be honest. You know, he was, you know, he's not that bad. You don't have to clean up a little. Nice blue eyes. I said, you sick puppy. It's still there. And I shared my experience, strength and hope. And, uh, and I'm looking at them. And I'm looking at me. I don't have no styrofoam slippers on. I may not be looking that great, but I have no Styrofoams clothes on. I'm going home tonight when I want to. I don't have to drink, I don t even want to, I m afraid but I m them if I pick up one drink and you know had I told that woman my first answer oh yeah it is miserable I ll take a brain check. I wouldn't have had that experience. I was not more grateful than when I walked out of that detox. I didn't even care about my promotion at that point. So I was grateful for the thing that mattered, that I have a life today. It was just a very poignant experience for me and it's very recent and I just wanted to share that and I'm sorry I just look at my life. I had a great life and I hope to God I never lose sight of that. Thank you. Thank you for listening.