Steps 10 and 11 Are the Engine That Makes Step 12 Sustainable – Greg H.

Hi everybody, my name is Greg Howard, I'm an alcoholic. Yeah, I haven't spoken in a while. So it takes a little bit sometimes to get my thoughts collected. My buddy's not helping me out here. He's been riding me since we got down here. I first walked into AA when I was 18 years old. I'm 41 now. And I've been here for all of my adult life. I've not been sober for all that time though. I've done some things really right in AA for stretches of time, and I've done some things really wrong in AA for stretches of time. And usually when I do things too wrong, I'm just going to get a little bit more of a break. So I'm going to get a little bit more rest. And then I'm going to be in AA for too long a stretch of time and AA, I end up drunk. And that's happened more than once. And there's a lot of differing opinions about relapse. I guess when I was sober 12 years, I could afford to be a little, what's the word I'm looking for, narrow-minded concerning it. But having spent a solid four or five years of my life being that guy, the one that was sober for a long period of time, got drunk, came back and seemed to pull it back together again, being on that end, looking through that lens, I've grown to be, I guess, a lot more relaxed about it and a lot faster to see the other side. The... The... When I first discovered alcohol, I've oftentimes called that my first spiritual experience because that's really what it was. Now, not everybody's experience with this is the same, but this is mine. And I can tell you that growing up, I had a lot of anxieties, a lot of social anxieties, a lot of things up here and in here were always very active. Stuff was always moving here. I was always moving here at Mach 9. No matter what was going on out there, even sitting still on the couch watching TV, I'm still moving in here, thinking, planning, wondering, constantly trying to guess at the motives, the thinking, the ideas, and the emotional states of everybody around me and trying to adjust myself accordingly for, I guess, to acquire whatever it was that I wanted, whether it was to be left alone or be the same. Whether it was to be left alone or be the center of attention or to manipulate something out of my parents that I wanted. But there was always a lot of unrest going on. I was never at peace. And I don't ever remember a time when I was. And the problem was acute. But I didn't see it as a problem. Matter of fact, I didn't even know that it was there because it had been there all along. But when I took my first drink, and I've often made this comparison, it's kind of like we've all sat in meetings before during the summertime. And as we walk in the door, there's a central AC unit running. And we don't realize it's running. We sit down, and the air is blowing. But we're straining to try to hear the speaker, to try to hear what's going on. And we don't even know that we're straining. We don't even know that we're annoyed by it. Until all of a sudden, it just shuts off. And then like that, there's a certain sense of ease and comfort that comes over not having to strain anymore. And it's only at that moment that you realize you were straining in the first place. And that's what my first experience with alcohol was like. First time I took a drink, suddenly the AC unit shut off. And I could relax. I could hear. I could be whoever it was I needed or wanted to be. I didn't have to worry about what was going on with you or how you were thinking or how you were feeling or how you were relating to me. I was fine with me for the first time in my life. And I can tell you that at that moment, and I was somewhere around 11 or 12 years of age, and at that moment, that feeling shifted and changed all my priorities. At that moment, it didn't matter anything. Nothing else, everything else in my life paled by comparison to that feeling. The sense of ease and comfort that I got from the first couple of drinks. The problem was that as I quickly demonstrated the first time that I drank was that I couldn't control my consumption. And every time I drank when I was an adolescent, there were always consequences. I always ended up disgustingly drunk for a 13-year-old. And there were prices I began paying. I stabbed myself in the leg with a kickstand on my own bicycle. I mean, who does that? You know what I mean? I gouged a chunk right out of my own leg. I stabbed myself in the hand with a carving tool. Working or just messing around in my buddy's basement. And every time I drank, it was like a scene from Abbott and Costello, you know, the Three Stooges. That was the kind of trouble I got myself into. And it was all innocent enough. But I was having a hard time accepting it. And I was a little bit of a drunk. I was explaining these things away. And my parents both grew up in alcoholic homes. However, they were not alcoholics themselves. So they were quite capable of functioning in this world. And didn't really have much understanding of the alcoholic or his drinking. In other words, they didn't understand their own parents very well. They were just pretty well disgusted with all the crap that they brought into the house. And they had absolutely no tolerance for it at all. None. There was no liquor in my house. My mother might have one glass of wine around the holidays. Get a little tipsy with her mother. They'd act really silly. And that was it. And my dad never touched the stuff, period. My dad was like a stone cold sober Irish Catholic. And he meant well. Very good man. Very high standards as far as how he conducted himself. Very high moral code. And so that immediately began creating problems for me in the house. But the thing was, was that what Booz was offering me was way more important to me than anything, than any expectation my parents or the law or school or anybody else might have had. I needed what Booz was giving me. What Booz was doing was making me comfortable in my own skin. I found a group of guys that drank the way that I did by my mid-adolescence. And I didn't have to be smart to hang out with them. I didn't have to be good at sports. I didn't have to be or do anything that I naturally was not capable of doing when I was sober. When I was sober, I was a nut. I was absolutely out of my mind. Loaded with fear. Loaded with anxiety. Loaded with depression. But when I was drinking, when I was messed up, I was hanging out with my buddies. We were having a good time and all was well. And I didn't have to worry about grades that I couldn't get and teams that I couldn't, you know, start out for and then make. I didn't have to worry about any of this crap. And I didn't have to worry about anything. I didn't have to worry about impressing or keeping my parents happy either. That was also the last of my concerns. The only thing I had to worry about was how much of that fifth can I get down before the guy next to me gets hold of it. And I can tell you I got real good. I got real good. But the problem was this. And this for me in a nutshell is really the nature of my alcoholism. It's that my capacity to cope with life's challenges and responsibilities is already very seriously compromised. That's without a drink, period. That's just the way it's been for me. I realize it's not the way it is for everyone, but that's how it was for me. And when I took a drink, when I began drinking, the things that I would do when I got drunk would increase the number or the amount of crap that I had to deal with when I was sober. Now, just handling basic human responsibilities as an adolescent was problematic. But as a result of the consequences of my drinking, the number of things that needed to be dealt with started to go through the roof. And the other thing I'm finding is that when I sober up, my capacity to cope is less than it is when I don't drink at all. Now I'm hungover and I'm tired. And I haven't eaten in a couple of days and I'm depressed and I'm frustrated. And I'm full of fear, a lot of fear, because there are consequences for not going home for two or three days. There are consequences for not studying for classes. There are consequences for, you know, driving, for getting pulled over. Driving at 75 miles an hour up the main drag in my town. There are consequences for these things. So my capacity to cope is going into the toilet and the number of things that I need coping with are going through the roof. And what happens, as the big book puts it, is my life shifts permanently out of balance. And on my own unended resources, I was unable to reset it. I couldn't do it. And so my life fell out of balance by the time I was 12. And it remained out of balance. For almost the next 20 years. I, um... When I came to AA, I came when I was 18 years old. And the reason I rolled in through the door was because I was in an excruciating amount of pain. Drinking does something to me spiritually that it absolutely does not do to other people. And I find that drinking isn't the only thing that does it. You hear people in the rooms, they talk about a hole in the soul, a void, an emptiness on the inside. Now I have that whether I'm drinking or not. And booze is not the only thing that fills it. There are a lot of other things that fill it. There's gambling. There's money. There's career. There's sex. That's the top of the list. That's the top of my list. I don't know about yours. Another one on mine. We'll call it, to make it a little fluffier, we'll call it sex and relationships. Relationship has got nothing to do with it. That's just a more socially acceptable term. We slap on it. You know what I mean? Yeah, we're in a relationship. No, you're not. You guys are just sacking up. That's it. All right? Consistently. That's all. That's all it is. But any time that I engage one of these other instinctual activities for the purpose of quieting the hole in the soul, quieting the void, it has exactly the same effect as the booze because I'm using it for exactly the same purpose. And the end result is that the emptiness, the void on the inside gets a lot bigger and it gets a lot harder to deal with. And then whatever it is that I initially picked up to try to quiet that, I then start blaming for not fixing it. So the relationship, so to speak, when you meet, you have the honeymoon period, which is about two weeks. And then after the honeymoon period, then the fight starts. Then the, you know, who was that that called? There's the checking of phone messages, the obsessing, the jealousy, the fighting, the you need to go take care of responsibilities, your partner doesn't want you there because you're pulling time and energy away from them. There's whatever it is, whatever form it takes, it doesn't matter. But the end result is that the fighting starts and that each partner is then trying to bludgeon the other one back into the position that originally made them feel the first way they did when they first met. And we do exactly the same thing. I know I did the same thing with booze. Booze had an effect on me. It was a bad effect for me the first time that I used it. And I spent the rest of my drinking career trying to reclaim that effect. With career, I've been lousy with that. Really lousy with that. I got a paper route when I was like 12. I went into debt. I used to steal my brother's paper. I did. I went into debt. How do you go into debt with a paper route? But I did. I went into debt with a paper route. I used my brother's paper money to pay off my debt. And I went into debt when I was 12 and I never climbed out. Never. I never got out. It just keeps getting bigger and bigger. It's up to 50 grand now. I'm $50,000 in debt right now as I stand in front of you. I don't know. The... When I came into AA when I was 18, I stopped drinking. I got sober. And the reason was I couldn't take the pain anymore. It was not outside circumstances or conditions and it never has been that have driven me in here. Never. I was never forced to come here by courts. My parents never gave me the, if you don't stop drinking and go to AA, you'll have to get out. I left. They tried that one once when I was like 16 and a half. I bolted. I was like, are you kidding? Of course I'm out of here. I can drink the way I want for the, you know, however long I can manage to stay out there for. I used to do that routinely. I... It was the inner stuff that drove me in here. Man, I just couldn't take being in my own skin anymore. The absolute terror. And that was the only way I could describe it is just terror. Why are you terrified? Because my eyes are open. That's why. My eyes are open. That's why I'm terrified. And that happens to me every time I drink. If I drink for any considerable length of time, I get what I call the terrors. The book uses the word the terrors. I don't know what they're describing in that book, but I know what goes on inside of me. What I drink. Which is that I open my eyes and my stomach is knotted up. My heart is racing at a million miles an hour. And I am just toast. I can't have a conversation with somebody. I can't walk into somewhere and order a cup of coffee. If I manage to get to work on time, I'm jumping out of my skin wondering whether or not they're going to fire me that day. And I feel like other people can read my mind. They know what I'm thinking. And that's very dangerous because I think a lot of really twisted crap. Like driving on the train, you know, like into work. You know, you see somebody who's hot and your mind starts moving. Your mind starts moving like, oh my God. It's just crazy. But this is what happens to me. And this was the stuff that drove me in here the first time when I was 18. I just needed to. And I was lonely. Lonely, lonely, lonely. I couldn't even tell you. I couldn't even describe to you the depth of the loneliness and the sense of isolation I had from everybody around me. I had no friends left. Nobody wanted to hang out with me. My parents, my relationship with them was destroyed. And something about the people in this place. When I came in, they were all about me. They were all about asking me how I was doing. And they really genuinely seemed interested in the answer. And everybody around here was talking openly about how messed up they were. And it would almost seem like they were all saying, yeah, you're as screwed up as I am. And that was a wonderful thing. And I was like, I'm screwed up. You know what I mean? I belong here, you know. I couldn't wait to tell everybody what a mess I was, you know. Because for the first time in my life, I felt like I found some place where I fit in. You know what I mean? Unfortunately, the bonding factor was being a total whack job. But I didn't care. It worked for me, you know. And so I got here and I was real all about the social aspect of the fellowship. That was really the strongest element that was missing in my life was fellowship. But there were a lot of things I didn't know. Which is fellowship doesn't exist for very long without principles, without recovery. Because otherwise you've got a bunch of selfish people together all working off of each other. And it just doesn't last. And I stayed here for 12 years and I did not recover. I did not get well. I did not drink. But I didn't get well. And I can't emphasize the difference between those two things enough. I dabble with the steps. Not dabble with them. I actually, for the first couple years, I dabble with them. And then when the pain got great enough that my life continued to run out of control, I got real busy with them. And I got really busy with them. And you know, I think that's the challenge with the fellowship. That when you get really busy, you get really busy with the people. You're not really going to get to the point where you need to be able to get called in and say, you know, I'm going to do this and do that. I'm not going to do it. I dabbled with the steps, not dabbled with them. I actually, for the first couple of years, I dabbled with them. And then when the pain got great enough that my life continued to run out of control, I got real busy with them. But I was reading all my steps out of the 12 and 12. And the 12 and 12 is a phenomenal book. But there are no directions in that. And there's a couple of suggestions here and there. But it is not a guide with which to walk me through the steps. And I didn't know this. And apparently nobody else around me knew it either, because nobody was forcing me into the big book. The big book was the book that all the psychopaths read. That was the one, you know, the guys that every time you'd say something out of your mouth, they'd be hammering you back a quote out of the big book. And I wasn't really very attracted to that. I wasn't into big book step study or all this other stuff. But I didn't understand the depth and the weight of what I was up against. If I had only known when I was 18 or 19 years old, obviously, I mean, we could all say that, what I know now, but this thing, this illness absolutely kicked the crap out of me. Absolutely destroyed me. Not once, several times. All because I thought I knew something that I didn't. All because I wasn't willing to listen to other people that were a little older than me and a little more experienced. I knew better. I was different. I would handle it my way. After I walked in and I sobered up, my ego refracted, came back together, and was... fully intact. I went to step meetings. I did about 100 fourth and fifth steps. I went out and tried to make my amends as best I understood. I had a sponsor. I would call him and I would talk to him about it. I made coffee. And I emptied ashtrays. We don't do that anymore because there's no more smoking meetings. And I mopped floors. And I went out on commitments and I did all the things that we do. And I can tell you that I did not recover. Not one iota. And the reason was this. One simple step that I missed. And that was to... I was 12. See, walking in here, everything that I collected, everything that I did, I did solely and exclusively for one purpose. To fix me. And I had no interest, zero, in trying to fix any of you. Not that I'm capable of doing that. But I wasn't interested in trying to help anybody is my point. I was all about me. I was all about trying to get me well. And what I had in my head was this idea. Was that once I got well, once I got done fixing me, then I would have something of value to offer. And that's what I did. And I didn't have anything to offer you. And what I didn't understand is that the thing that we have to value each other, the thing that we have to offer each other that's of value is love. That's it. Nothing else. That's the only thing I have to offer. And amazingly enough, it's the only thing that I found the newcomer really responds to. I could sit down and I know that big book like the back of my hand. I knew it by my 12th year. But I had no love in my heart. None. Not for anybody else. No compassion. No understanding. I was judgmental. I was arrogant and pig-headed. And so if there was anybody in AA around me at that time that was looking for help, I was the last person they were going to. I was still indulging all the things I liked the most. Still trying to become big shot. Trying to make the money, have the relationship, get the car and the home and all this other material stuff. And then in the end, even when I had it, didn't amount to anything. I mean, I'm as financially secure as I've ever been in my life. A couple of years back. And I want to go out to the barn on the six acre piece of property I'm living in. And I just want to throw a rope over the rafters. I just want to die. The material stuff for me, it just doesn't mean anything. If I got no love in my heart and I got no purpose in my life, I got nothing. Zero. Because my head will absolutely eat me alive. And that's what it does. For 12 years, I just kind of ran on this treadmill. And then finally, thank God, I relapsed. That sounds like a really strange thing to say, thank God I relapsed. I thank God every day of my life that I relapsed. And the reason was this. One day before that relapse, I knew everything there was to know about Alcoholics Anonymous. I was sober 12 years. I'd been here since I was 18. I had every old timer whacking me on the back going, geez, kid, I wish I could have got it when I was your age. Got what? I got nothing. I got nothing. Got what? I was like AA's poster child for young people in AA. And I thought I had it all sewn up. And I didn't. I had nothing. All I had was a bunch of time and a little badge of courage stating 12 years I would wear on my chest and proudly walk around. As if I was something now. You know what I mean? I was nothing. I was nothing. I was nothing. I was nothing. I was nothing. And so I relapsed and began drinking again. And then I went on a ride for the next four years that damn near killed me. And believe me when I tell you, I was on death's door when I got back here again. Liver disease. I'd had that for three years, drinking on top of it. When you get liver disease and you get hepatitis, the first thing the doctor tells you, whether you look like an alcoholic or not, is you cannot drink. That's not what I hear. What I hear is, Greg, drinking is really not a good idea, but it's okay to have a couple. That's what I hear. And my doctor wasn't messing around, but I just wasn't hearing him. And I drank on hepatitis, hepatitis B. And I got hammered. And then there were some other things that got thrown in there, too, some white powdery stuff. And between the two of those, they rocked my world. And when I got here, I was in a good mood. And when I got here, I had been, I was having sleep-deprived schizophrenia. I was nuts. I was just flat-out absolutely crazy. And I wasn't eating. I wasn't sleeping for weeks on end. My stomach was distended. And I had a nice little lump right here, which was my liver, sticking out of my side. I was about 16 different shades of gray. And my eyes were yellow. And I got off the plane to go meet up with my sponsor in Maryland. And I had a 30, what couldn't have been more than a 30-pound stomachache. I had more than a 30-pound double bag with me with a couple of things in it. And I could not, for the love of God, drive that thing across the floor to go meet up with him. I had to stop halfway and lean against the wall. And that's where he found me. And they didn't know whether they should bring me to the hospital or the spiritual retreat. And, of course, my sponsor was psychotic, spiritually psychotic. So we went to the retreat where I began to hallucinate and detox. And so I spent the weekend detoxing. I don't even know where we were. All I know is it was a very nice place. And I had plenty of people to talk to, even when the room was empty. And so it was an experience. And then from there we started with the steps, the steps that changed everything in my life. And he began, he sat me down with the big book and he started to run me through these things. And in step three, some really amazing things. I began to, and I remember when it happened too. I had, we were driving down 95. We were coming through Jersey. And we began to talk about the third step. And moving from the third step into the fourth. Excuse me. I had this thought. It was a memory of not that long back. And what my father said to me, he said, Greg, you thinking about you is the problem. He said, you thinking about you is no God. That's the problem. And in an instant I understood on a much deeper level what it was he was talking about. Now, we start talking about spiritual experiences from the podium. And they are never going to carry the same depth and weight. If I were to attempt to explain to you verbally what it was that happened at that moment, it will never carry the same weight that it did at that time. And I'm not saying that it's going to be the same. I'm just saying that it's going to be the same. It's going to be the same as what it did at that time. Because there's an emotional impact that happens with that realization that is beyond description. And I'd like to tell you that those spiritual awakenings are like permanent. You know, once you've had one, that's it. You're done. You're cured. And it's total horseshit. You're not. I wasn't. Maybe you are. I don't know. Maybe I'm unique that way. But I still had an awful lot to learn after that. And not the easy way. I'm a hard, hard, hard person to teach. I just do not learn the first time around. I've got to smash my head against the wall like a million times before I'm like, Oh, that's a wall. Yeah, I'm a dumbass. But when this happened, the memory that I got was me sitting on the back porch of my mother's house. And my brain is crunching again trying to fix my life. I'm trying to figure out, you know, how I'm going to get enough money to get an apartment, to move out of their place, and then buy a car. And then what about the insurance? And then this job that I'm interviewing for. And it's the second interview. And what am I going to say in the third one? And the mind is just going. It's just going crazy, going crazy. And I'm out there, and I'm twisting my hands. You know what I mean? I'm smoking 15 cigarettes, and I got half a cup of coffee down. And my mother walks out, and she says, Hey, hon, do you think maybe you could vacuum the dining room rug? You know, it's like you hear the record scratch. And you would have thought that she had just asked me to climb Mount frigging Everest. All she wanted was the carpet vacuumed. But you see, I was so locked up in trying to fix my life and trying to figure out a plan and design for how I was going to get out of the mess that I was in, that any time anybody ever asked me for anything, I was completely unavailable. Not only was I unavailable, but I was pissed off that you interrupted me. And I remember I wheeled around, and I said to Ahmad, Don't you understand? Don't you see the weight and the depth of the problems that I'm facing? The problems that I'm dealing with here? Don't you understand that I've got to come up with a solution for this stuff? I'm 33 years old, and my life is a disaster. It's an absolute mess. And you want me to come in and vacuum the carpet? And I wasn't nearly as nice as that. And at that moment, I understood what it was he was talking about. I couldn't fix my problems. The problem had never been that the plan and design... See, I always thought the plan and design that I constructed was the problem. But it was flawed. And what I didn't understand was that the flaw was the construction of any plan and design. And that what I should have done was abandoned whatever plan and design I was constructing in my mind, because the tool is broken. My head is busted. There's plenty of evidence racked up all throughout my life to prove concretely that I cannot construct a plan and design worth anything for me to fix my life. I can't fix it from now until the time I'm 83 years old. At 83, I will still not be able to construct a plan and design to fix anything in my life. I'm not qualified to do it. I can't. But God is. And if I've got God in charge of my life, which is what the third step is all about, if I'm about His business, then I don't have to worry about constructing plans and designs. And the third step in the Big Book, it's real clear that less and less we became interested in our little plans and designs, more and more we became interested in seeing what we could do. What we could pack into the stream of life. What we could contribute. Because the promise is this, is that if I'm about trying to make a contribution, that in turn, I will get the guidance and the things that I need in order to make more effective decisions for myself. I should have gone in and vacuumed the rug. Imagine that. The whole key to my miserable friggin' life was that I should have gone in and vacuumed the rug. It was just that simple. But I understood. And from there, started some pretty amazing stuff. The, um, but not right away. Um, in We Agnostics, it talks about, uh, logic and reason. My mind. What it tells me. You see, logically and reasonably, um, not constructing a plan and design to fix my life, that's absurd. That makes absolutely no, you can't live like that. That's what the mind says. The mind says, you absolutely cannot live like that. That's not gonna work. That's rubbish. It's crap. I'm not an unintelligent person. Um, and upon first glance at this way of life that my sponsor was outlining for me, even aside of the little spiritual experience, I could still clearly see that this was pretty, this was pretty some, some really weird stuff he was talking about. And, uh, in all my life, whenever I was given an instruction in Alcoholics Anonymous, my mind always told me that I did not get it. My mind always told me that I did not need to apply that, or that I really ought not to apply that. But it seemed like every time somebody in AA was telling me to do something, my mind was telling me that that's not the right thing to do. You need to go do this. That's gonna work. And every time I went and did this, it didn't work. And I would end up back here again. Sometimes drunk, sometimes not. And so what I realized was that my mind, my logic and reason, that is the enemy. That is what has to be abandoned. And, uh, and that's a very difficult thing to do. It requires an awful lot of humility to admit to yourself that, you know what, my mind's busted. And when it comes to me, fear rules every thought and every idea that rockets through my head. Now I realize, this is not the case for every person that walks into Alcoholics Anonymous. If you're sitting here tonight and you don't, you're not identifying with this at all, you still belong here. You still fit. But if you are sitting here and you do identify with this, you're screwed. No. I'm kidding. You're not. Um, and you do identify with this. It's probably, uh, if you're new, it's the first time anybody's ever laid it out for you this way. And you might be sitting in your seat breaking a sweat. Because for the first time somebody's explaining to you the nature of what's wrong with you. Because I don't know about any of you, but for years I went through my life trying to figure out what the problem was and nobody had any answers. No one could effectively explain it. No one could effectively explain to me why I kept making these same tragic mistakes and why I felt the same way, why I felt the way that I did. Not the psychiatrist, not the medications, not my parents, not anybody that loved me, not teachers, not no one. But my sponsor, he explained me pretty good. So we got going. And, uh, and I discovered some really amazing things and I set out about trying to help people. Is that clock right? Wow. Thought a lot more time had gone by. I, um, this was back in 2003 that I met him. And, uh, and then we started doing all this. And, um, starting to try to be there to work with other guys, this was a slow process for me. Because I wasn't really recognized. I was in really rough shape when I sobered up. And, um, and there weren't a whole lot of people that were willing to let me help them. Because I was a mess. And, uh, and you just see me coming a mile away. But, uh, I would show up at these meetings and, uh, with my sponsor. I mean, we were up at, uh, in York, Pennsylvania. And, um, we would go, we were at Fourth Dimension one night. And my sponsor would stand there with a bunch of his friends. And, you know, like when you're new and you're all jammed up inside of yourself and everybody's outside and they're socializing and they're talking. And you don't really have, like, a click. You know what I mean? It's like a group of five over here and they're laughing, having a good time. And a group of three. And then there's two, you know, kind of with a book open sitting off to the side or whatever. And, uh, and I was, I didn't know anybody. He was the only person I knew. And he's sitting there with his buddies and he's talking. You know, and I kind of walk up alongside of him. He's backs to me. And, uh, you know, I'm kind of pulling one of these, you know. I don't really know what I'm doing. And, you know, it's really feeling awkward and out of place. And, uh, and then the loser turns around and he says to me, Greg, he says, what the F are you doing here? And he had already got me up to step eight at that point. Steps eight and nine. We were on ten, eleven, and twelve at that point. He says, what the F are you doing standing here? And I'm telling you, because all his friends are now looking at me, embarrassed the crap out of me. And I want to punch him square in the mouth. But, uh, but I knew, but I had developed enough of a relationship with this guy that I knew that any time he nailed me hard it was because he loved me. And I knew that. But I was embarrassed as shit. And he says to me, he says, Greg, he says, I got nothing to do with this. I got nothing for you now. He says, the newcomer is over there. You've got to go talk to that guy. He says, I got nothing for you anymore. The rest of your recovery lies in trying to take what you find and pass it on to somebody else. Now I'm standing there at 110 pounds with a swollen liver and a distended stomach and long, scraggly gray hair. Um, and a different shade, you know, five, fifteen different shades of gray. There isn't anybody in that room that's willing to talk to me. Except for one. And, of course, my sponsor finds him. And, uh, and he's sitting over there in the corner. The guy's passed out. And he's, uh, he is. He's passed out. He's in the, he's in the chair. And the head's down and there's a line of drool going from here to his shirt. And, uh, so he's drooling on himself. And my sponsor walks up to me and he goes, see that guy? Go ask him if he wants a cup of coffee. And, uh, I'm like, oh, man. I don't want to talk to this guy. But, um, but I did. I walked up. I kicked him in the boot. And, uh, you know, the head goes, ah. You know. You want a cup of coffee? He's like, yeah. So I go get him a cup of coffee. A cup of black coffee. And I sit down with him. I give him a coffee. And, uh, and for that meeting, for that one hour, I wasn't thinking about my liver, my finances, my debt, living in New York, Pennsylvania, not knowing anybody, being unemployed, uh, my pain, my misery. I wasn't thinking about any of it. All I was thinking about was what I might try to say to this guy to strike up a conversation at the end of the meeting. I spent all meeting obsessing about it. And, uh, and the next time I went to a meeting, it was exactly the same thing. He'd point out a guy and he'd say, go talk to that guy and see, you know, just go say hello, you know. And, um, and Flynn was another one. Flynn was another one. He was always kicking me in the direction. Tommy. And, um, and then there were others that I knew that was, you know, and there was this whole network of people that were just all about trying to help other people. And so, um, navigating in and around these social circles and under this influence, not for that long. I was just trying to get people to understand that, you know, I was trying to get people to understand that I was trying to help other people. And so, uh, now I'm finally on the list. We had hours so much to get to where it was really tough because my whole life didn't fit as well as I wished or wanted it to fit. So, uh, here at the dinner,자 I was word about it as a weather. Who got mad? where you can punch Mother Teresa. You know what I mean? Really. Seriously. And I hope nobody's offended by that. I didn't mean to, but just to illustrate my point. But that's how I get. I get like that. You know what I mean? And I'm walking up the street and I see this kid walking down the street on the opposite side. And I've seen him in the meetings before and he's walking down the street and he sees me and he crosses. And I'm like, damn it. I don't want to talk to this kid. I don't want to talk to anybody. I'm looking for work. I can't find work. I'm starving. I've got like two cigarettes left and like a little bit of making for French toast back in the refrigerator. And you know what I mean? It's like two eggs and one and a half pieces of bread. And I'm going home to make French toast, have a cigarette, a cup of coffee, and sit in the air conditioning. And this kid's coming down and I know he's going to say, hey, how's it going? Oh, great. Taking it a day at a time. Loving life. Just doing that. And I am not in the mood. Really not in the mood for one of those conversations. But he approaches me and he says, yo, what's up? You know, nothing. What's up with you? You know, nothing. He says, I'm Tommy. He says, yeah, I'm Greg. He says, I've seen you in the meeting. I said, yeah, I've seen you around. He says, what are you doing right now? I'm like, oh, that's a loaded question. I don't want to tell him what I'm doing right now because he's either going to want to come with me or he's going to want me to go somewhere with him. I don't want to talk to him at all. I'm just pissed off that I've got to have this conversation. And so I said, I'm not doing anything. I'm on my way home. I'm tired and I'm sick. And he says, well, listen, he says, I was out last night shooting dope and I just got my paycheck. I don't want to shoot dope today. Do you think maybe I could hang out with you so I don't get high? And man, I got to tell you, I don't know what happened, but something happened at that moment. And I was like, and my heart swelled. And I don't know why. I don't know why it swelled. I don't know what happened. I don't know if it was the influence of being around with these guys or just for a moment or the desperation in the tone of this kid's voice and a pathetic look. But all I cared about at that moment was helping this kid just not get messed up for that one day. And suddenly, and then all of a sudden, all the concern that I had for me, for my life, for my miserable situation, for York, Pennsylvania, for the baking sun, for being unemployed, with two cigarettes. Suddenly, everything that I had, what little I had was this kid's. I gave him one of my cigarettes and we made French toast. We went back. And I had nothing. I gave him half of everything that I had. And it was my joy to do it. It was not like, man, how am I going to replace this? It wasn't anything like it was a joy to do it. If he had refused me, it would have hurt. But that's how badly I wanted to give to him. And we sat and we talked for three and a half hours. Now, I didn't have an awful lot of experience on what works in AA. And the honest to God truth is, I still don't. But I had an awful lot of experience with what doesn't. I had made every conceivable mistake you could think of. And that was of value to him. I was 35 years old, somewhere in that range. And Tommy was 18. 18 and 19 years old. And he was desperate. And he sat on the edge of that couch. And he listened to everything that came out of my mouth. Every mistake, every concept, theory, idea, question about what this thing was all about. Everything that I had observed, and everything that I had ever thought or ever felt about my life in Alcoholics Anonymous, and about staying sober and getting drunk. And he listened to all of it. And he absorbed it like a sponge. And he asked me to sponsor him. And I was out of my mind. Nobody had ever asked me for anything. And this kid was asking me to help him. And I felt frightened, but focused. And almost like I grew a couple inches taller. And capable, for the first time in my life, of really being able to contribute something to somebody else's life of value. And I did. And I did sponsor that kid. And I don't remember a damn thing about that kid. And I don't remember a damn thing I told him. And I doubt he does either. And he didn't stay sober. He went back out drinking. But I didn't. I remained sober. And from that time forward, my life was about trying to help other alcoholics. I understood what they were talking about in the big book. For the first time in my life, that giving is its own reward. That the ones getting the short end of the stick are the receivers in Alcoholics Anonymous. Only they don't think so. They think they're getting, that they know something. That they're on their way somewhere. They're not. It's the givers. Most Alcoholics Anonymous meetings are run, no matter how big they are, they're run by just a handful of people. Three to five people run every meeting and yet hundreds of them show up. For the number of, for every one person I know that's serious about sponsoring people, that one person sponsors dozens. The number of people that take an Alcoholics Anonymous versus the number that give is so far out of the box. It's out of balance. It's crazy. And so one would think, if it was that far out of balance, why do the givers keep giving? Because they know something you don't. That's why. There's a reason they keep doing it. And the reason is because it's not just another day of sobriety, but the heart fills. And for some reason, when my heart fills with that kind of love that enables me to want to give, it creates a buffer around me that insulates me against all the shit that life throws at me. I'm just better able to cope. I'm way better able to deal. Things that would normally have driven me completely out of my mind, you know those little annoying things, like the car not starting in the morning when you're on your way to work and you're already late. Or that boss that annoys the crap out of you. Or the secretary that wheezes when she talks. You know, that one. Those little, you know, the love interest you have that's not returning it in kind. Or the love interest you have that just won't get away from you and leave you alone. You know, any one of the multitude of different situations and scenarios that we run into every day that just whittle away, piece by piece, bit by bit, at our serenity and at our peace of mind. When I'm giving consistently to other people in this form, it insulates me. It buffers me against that. And so, how I feel about myself and how I feel about the world I live in becomes tainted. For the better. The same way as when I drank consistently and I spent all my time in bar rooms, my perception of the world became tainted for the worse. I saw the worst. I was suspicious of people and I saw the worst in their nature. Now, when and how to give becomes a whole other growing process in Alcoholics Anonymous. For me, the largest growing process was getting to the place where I could finally figure out that it's about giving. Recovery is about giving. And then once I got there, then I realized that there's this whole other sub-thing about how to give. And there's a lot of recovery in there. Because if you don't give correctly, you can screw yourself up and other people really bad. And I did that for five years. I gave and gave and gave and gave and gave. And now everybody else has got cars and gas and I'm broke. I've got nothing. You know what I mean? And I'm pissed off. And I had some... I had some... Over the course of five years, I had some just unbelievable things I got to witness. That spiritual experience I was telling you about in the car with my sponsor and what happened with Tommy on the side of the street. Those kinds of events. I've seen people have those events right in front of me. Just as powerful and just as altering to the content of their character, to the very person, to who and what they are. Their countenance changes. Their face actually literally changes. Once that takes place, it's an experience. You know, you hear people say, you know, the greatest joy is watching the light come on in somebody else's eyes. It's so cliché. I just could never use it again. But that essentially is what it is. But it's so much more than that. It's so much more than that. You see somebody wake up to a part of themselves that had been dead. To wake up to experiencing joy and love unconditional. And to having forgiveness for people they once wanted to kill. Those are amazing things to be a part of. And know that you didn't cause it, but I was instrumental in it. It happened because I took the time to show up. And so I discovered some really amazing things about giving, about how to give. And man, I made some horrible, horrible, horrible mistakes. Some real tragic blunders. I had... around four and a half years old, maybe around five, I had a six month stretch where five guys that I was working with, all under the age of 26 or 28, within six months, each one of them, one of them died right after the other. One of them hung himself in his mother's basement. The other four died of overdoses. And there was still a lot that I had to learn about God's world. And about how this thing, not how it operates, but just about God's world. And I didn't realize it at that time, but losing all of those guys in such a short period of time really fractured my faith, which was already becoming compromised because I was very, very interested in step 12 and not so interested in 10 and 11. And I got to tell you where I sit right now, 10 and 11 is the, that is the meat, that is the sum total of what this thing is about. Infinitely more with 10 and 11 in terms of time and energy than on 12. Because if I don't do 10 and 11 effectively, with any type of discipline or consistency, 12 becomes very, very, very difficult. I've talked with people that have been consistently working with others for a long period of time and every one of them reports exactly the same thing. I'm drained. I'm showing up and I'm doing it, but I'm not feeling it anymore. I'm empty. These people are pissing me off. They keep calling and I don't want to answer the phone anymore. Matter of fact, I don't even want to get out of bed anymore. And the reason that happens is because we stop running on God's juice and we start running on ours. And that happens because 10 and 11 aren't taken seriously. They just aren't. They're like those things that we'll get around to when we have time. And I can tell you that that was how I viewed it. 10 and 11 were not anything that I considered something that I consistently disciplined myself to incorporate despite all that time and energy that I spent working with others and despite all the wonderful and amazing things that happened. If I had just paid time and attention to those two steps, what happened wouldn't have had to, but it did. I got tired and I got burnt. I got burnt out. And I got sick of these meetings and I got sick of you people. And my attitudes and my ideas began to shift again and I began to grow suspicious of people. I didn't trust anybody anymore because we all like to gossip around here. And I wasn't able to rise above that anymore, especially when I was the target. And everyone takes their head. No one's immune. But I had no compassion and I had no tolerance and I had no understanding and I had no patience left for the shortcomings of people in AA. And my spiritual condition weaned terribly. And I found my way back to a drink again. And then the doctor called me and told me I was cured of liver disease. I couldn't figure that one out. Who gets cured of liver disease when they go out drinking? But that was what happened. And so I was like, Yes! I'm going to the bar! I'm going to the bar! But, uh, and so I spent the next three years slaughtering myself. Um, I could go into detail on all that, but I really don't want to. Um, because it's not, it's the same, it's exactly the same story as, you know, all the other portions of the drunk log I gave you. You know, it's no different. It's like, uh, watching the Three Stooges get drunk in a bar. That's what happens. Um, I got tased. Four times in one night. That was a rough one. I, um, I lost my job. I got taken out of my place in handcuffs. Um, it was a mess. It was a mess. But, um, coming back around, um, and wanting to get sober again, and wanting to be a part of this thing again, and wanting to feel the way that I used to, but really not wanting to make the same mistakes I did. Um, I kind of had to go back to the drawing board. And, uh, and I can tell you, it took, I had to exercise effort. A lot of effort. In trying to not be a know-it-all. In trying to be teachable. To be taught by people that I used to sponsor. That was hard. It was a hard hit. And the reason is, they want to tell you everything that you said. Every time you raise an objection for why you don't think you need to do a step, yeah, but you said, I know what I said, shut up. I said it for Christ's sake. I know what I said. It, um, it was hard. It was difficult for me. Um, I, um, I have a way overinflated sense of self. And I tend to think I know something. And that I'm somebody. And I'm not. I'm just a drunk. Um, that, uh, gets real drunk when he doesn't follow these directions. Period. And, uh, And so, uh, so I had to stop following directions again. So, but I was fortunate. I ran into, uh, I ran into a buddy of mine that, uh, probably is crazier than I am. And, uh, and I got sober under the threat of being thrown off the second story balcony if I didn't. Um, and, um, but he's, uh, but he's been my best friend. He's, uh, he saved my ass. Um, because he sat me down and he just told me point blank. He says, I don't give a shit who it is that you think you are. I know who you are. And I'm not impressed by all of your previous accomplishments or all the people you, you sponsored. You're gonna die. And this is how I see it. And he shot me right between the eyes. And he was dead right. And then, uh, and I got busy again. Uh, writing inventories and, uh, sending off, uh, one amends letter I've sent off. And it's been slow. It's been about four months now that I've been back with you. Um, started working with one guy. And, uh, he's messing up royally. Kidding. Joking. Um, but, um, but the love is back in my heart. The love for this thing. And the love for you people. And the love for this way of life. Um, but the only way it's gonna stay is if, uh, is if I remain consistent with 10 and 11. Um, the, uh, I'm, uh, I think the hardest thing that I've had to grow to accept is, uh, concerns responsibility. Um, I am, uh, 100% responsible for the life that I create for myself. 100%. I'm not a victim in any way, shape, or form. And if there are things happening around me that seem to be unfair, um, the probability is real good that I made the decision based on self at an earlier point in time, which later placed me in a position to be hurt. But I usually don't think so. Um, what I know is not what kills me. It's what I don't know. What I can see about myself is not what kills me. It's what I can't see. It's what I'm blind to. And, uh, there are a lot of aspects of my nature that are very dangerous to my sobriety that I am very blind to. A lot of things about me I don't see as a result of, uh, over-extended pride and fear. Um, so, um, and if I'm not doing 10 and 11 on a regular basis, then those things, they slip right by me. And they can get worse. Much worse. Uh, and if I'm going unsponsored, and what I mean by that is if I haven't given somebody my permission to confront me on whatever they want, whenever they want, when they see something out of whack, if I don't have somebody checking me, I'm screwed. Because that means I'm leaving that up to me. And I can't see myself very effectively. I can see you very effectively. I can be very critical of you and tell you everything that's wrong with you. But that vision doesn't work the same turning it back on myself. It just doesn't. So I gotta have somebody around that can help me out. Somebody that I've given permission to smack me upside the head when I need it. And, um, and then again, my relationship with God and trying to deepen my dependence on that power. Um, and to expand, uh, my understanding to grow spiritually. Because there's a lot of things that happen in my experience that I don't understand. And when I don't understand them, that just simply means that my understanding of God hasn't grown enough to encompass that event. So my understanding of God has to grow so that I can encompass the events that happen in my life and I can make sense of them. And some of them I'll never make sense of. But with a little bit of time and energy spent in that direction, um, I can make sense of quite a few things. And, uh, I'm about out of time. I guess that's all I got. I want to thank you for asking me to come down tonight. Thank you very much.