Subtracting the Ideas of Higher Power That Didn’t Work – Sarah I.

Thank you to the, thank you. I'm truly honored to be here. Hi, I'm Sarah. I'm an alcoholic and, uh, you know, I, I absolutely love Alcoholics Anonymous. I love this fellowship. I love the people that I get to interact with having, being able to, um, connect with my people all over the world, all over, you Know, in person and online, and it's such a gift and it'S such a pleasure to be able to share this experience with like-minded people and like-hearted people, my people. And, you know, cause for most of my life, I felt isolated and alone and frightened. I didn't feel like I connected with anybody, you Know, as even as a little girl, I couldn't connect with other people. I Didn't feel those bonds that, you know, I saw other people experiencing. I Didn't experience those beautiful print, uh, friendships that I witnessed other people experience. And I certainly did not experience it's a connection with God that I saw from a young age, other people experiencing. And I'm one of those people who come in Alcoholics Anonymous covered in contempt prior to investigation because I have an idea of God that had never worked for me, a conception of God that had just failed me utterly. And it wasn't that God had failed me utterly. It is that my mind had come up with this idea of what God was and what God wasn't. and this idea didn't work. It was this rewarding and punishing power that when I was a good girl, I got rewarded. And when I Was a bad girl, I got punished. And I rejected that idea. I thought I had thrown the God idea out entirely like it talks about in We Agnostics. And I don't come to believe in a power greater than myself until I'm crushed by a self-imposed post-crisis. I can no longer postpone or evade. Like when I'm crushed by the weight of my own choices, the weight of alcoholism, the weight and the pain and the suffering of this disease. When I become surrendered by the circumstances of alcoholism, both the outside circumstances and the internal ones, which were so much worse, the shame that I come in here covered with. And you know, I can't really talk about 11 without touching briefly on the fact that these other steps brought me here because I had to get cleared away of my old ideas and my core beliefs and all the things, the stuff, the ideas that were all in the way of my relationship with you and my relationship with God, all the stuff that was blocking me from this power. See for the longest time, I think this power is out somewhere outside of me, that it's far away from me. And that the only way I can access this power is to behave a certain way. You know, it talks in her book about, you know, if we had a better moral code, many of us, you Know, this idea, if it were just about morals, we would have recovered a long time ago. I'm raised with morals and values. I'M raised with an idea of God and I understand what it is to do good and what it is to love others. And I have these ideas deep within me, but I can't act on them because I don't have power. And that was the one thing that had to be so deeply smashed into me coming in here. I don'T not only don't HAVE THE POWER TO STOP DRINKING AND TO STAY SOBER, BUT I ALSO DON'T HAVE THE power to do the next right thing, right? I came into AA for years and everyone's like, oh, just do the next right thing. Well, I can'T because I'M DRIVEN BY A HUNDRED FORMS OF fear, self-delusion, self seeking, self pity. And in my mind, when I even though my motives are good, I'm stepping on the toes of my fellows. And that's how I show up here. That's what gets me here. And as I go through this work, and I start to have this educational variety alcoholic, you know, experience as I Go through the work. It's not that I'm learning or intellectualizing what this power is, I'M actually undoing all these ideas of what I thought God was that see, that's the amazing, brilliant thing about Alcoholics Anonymous, it wasn't about adding on to this idea of God, it was subtracting all the ideas of God that did not work so I could tap into what was left. And what was left was so much bigger and so much greater than anything that I could ever imagined. And I didn't experience it like Bill in some cathedral white light moment. I didn't have that experience. But what I did have is as I went through this work, as I cleared up the wreckage of my past, I start to get unblocked. I start To feel this power. And I can't deny it. You know, by the time I get to eight and nine, I can'T deny what this power is doing for me. That shame that I come in here cover with that is so oppressive and overwhelming is being lifted. And I'm able to look people in the eye and be of maximum service to God and the people around me in ways that I never dreamed possible. Then I'm be able to show up and stand in the face of terror, grief, and fear and not be shaken and feeling the love of my creator, right? Feeling loving and, you know, feeling a peace that passes all understanding in the depths of despair. Like that's what I experienced coming into Alcoholics Anonymous. And if you haven't arrived at this point, I totally understand because like, I don't stay here, right? I don'T always stay in this place of connectedness. I DON'T always stay in THIS place because I have a mind that'll, you know, get complacent and start to sink back into delusion. And I'll start to convince myself that I am the power yet again. And this has happened to me multiple different times in my sobriety. We talk about second surrender. I'd argue that I've had probably five and maybe more at this point, really deep surrenders in my sobriety where there's the surrender when I come in here while I'm screaming out to God, kill me or stop me because I can't stop drinking. And I get separated. But then there's a couple of years in and life starts to happen and I drifted away a little from the work and surrender again, surrender again. And then there's middle of COVID, which was probably the worst. And they talk about it all the time because during this period of time, I was doing this thing called two-stepping, which for me is like, I basically admit I'm powerless over alcohol. And then I start life coaching the women I'm sponsoring. And that's all I'm bringing to Alcoholics Anonymous because I have no connection with a power greater than myself. And her book is clear that I can't transmit something I haven't got right. What am I transmitting? If I'm picking up the phone for a woman in AlcoholicsAnonymous and giving her my opinion, right? That's just it. I'm handing off my unmanageability. So not only am I, is my life become unmanagable sober? I try, you know, I insert myself and my will into the lives of others. And my favorite description of what my problem really is lies between the pages, pages 60 and 63. And I realized I'm bouncing all over with the steps, but that is my problem. That describes me to a T on any given day, that delusion that I can rest satisfaction and happiness out of this world if I only manage it well. And i come in and you're telling me that, you know i have to, you stop believing that i'm the ultimate power. And I'm like, I don't believe I'm God. But if you look at the evidence, like I believe that I have the power to control and manipulate everything around me. And I have a mind that is constantly telling me I need this thing to be okay, or I need to avoid this thing, to be. Okay. That's all I've got. And the problem comes in when I start making my mind, the highest power, when my mind becomes God, the God of reason becomes my higher power. And this can happen to me when I'm drinking and it definitely can happen to me because when I don't have alcohol to disconnect me from self anymore, I don t have alcohol to quiet the brain so I have a mind that s really loud and full of ideas. I wanted to open with that topic because we don t tire so easily. The way I do when I m arranging life to suit myself. And on any given day, stone cold sober, I wake up in the morning instead of going to God, I go right to social media, right to the phone, right-to-work, right email. And I have ideas. I have all these ideas of what your life is supposed to look like and what my life is supposed look like, and I'm going to make it happen. And even if I'm not exerting any physical energy, I could be sitting at a desk at work all day long. I come home from that day utterly exhausted, utterly exhausted of deserting my will onto every situation, even if it's only up here in my mind. And it's so uncomfortable and it's so painful. And that chasm, that disconnect between me, you and God gets greater and it gets greater. And I don't realize it's happening. I'm sinking back into the delusion that I have power again. I'M SINKING BACK INTO THAT DELUSION. And so when I started having this experience, when I understood, when I was so defeated and surrendered. And honestly, that didn't happen for me until eight years sober. I had a prayer and meditative life, but it was just basic. For years, I was just shooting out a prayer in the morning, shooting out of prayer at night, randomly throughout the day, occasionally doing this nightly review, but I was doing it in a way that was more to please my sponsor. I'm going to shoot out this nightly review so she knows I'm doing it. She knows I'M DOING MY 11-STEP NIGHTLY REVIEW, right? It was more to get a pat on the back and I wasn't really sitting there and communing with this power and inviting this power in my life. I wasn'T really looking to see where my defects of character, my objectionable behavior, where my thinking mind was causing problems and where I was creating my own chaos and my own disturbance, my own disconnect. And I wasn't sitting quietly asking for these corrective measures. And more importantly, I wasnít taking that into the next day. Trying to bring better intention into the Next Morning is like in my own awakening. Like how do I want to show up differently? How can I invite this power into my life to show up differently and have different, you know, better relationships with the world and its people? I wasnís doing any of that. And then what happens is as Iím not paying attention to this stuff, it all piles back up. See, I'm sure you had somebody more eloquent than me break down the 10 step and the beauty of this spot check inventory that I can look at all throughout the day where I can watch for selfishness, resentment, dishonesty, fear, and why that's so vital. When I'm not watching for it, it's going to pile up. I have this inventory process in four and five where I clean up the big stuff. I do this huge house cleaning. And when I come in here, I'd never done anything like that. So it was a lot of work. It was a lot of heavy lifting. But as I like pull this stuff away and sort of let go of all of it and hand it to God and to you, I start to feel like some freedom come in. But the problem is over time, all that stuff will pile right back up if I'm not taking a regular inventory, if I'm Not continuing to look at this stuff, if i'm not in this constant self appraisal where i'm looking at ways where God, I can invite this power into my life and improve. So eight years sober, I end up back in a self-imposed crisis, crying out again to this power. And at this point, I'm almost back in a place where I've almost abandoned the God idea entirely. My life was entirely run on self will again at eight years over. And I experienced this moment where I knew that I was either going to walk out the door and I was going to pick up a drink or I was going, I, or I needed to get help. I needed someone to help me. And I called another woman in Alcoholics Anonymous and she answered that phone. And even with my mind telling me all of these things like, oh, you have eight years sober. Like you already went through your steps. You don't need to do this. And that woman answered and she took me back through these 12 steps from the very beginning so I could get completely unblocked again. So I could have a new experience and open back up and be cracked wide open and have this power back in my life. And I can't tell you that this experience was comfortable. In fact, it was really painful. It was embarrassing at times because coming in, I have an inventory of all the stuff that I've done when I'm drinking. But at this time, this is all stuff I've Done Sober. So I carry a lot of shame. And then all my eight-step list was People and Alcoholics Anonymous. So that was even harder where I had to have the humility to pick up that phone that weighs 2 million pounds and say, hey, I owe you an amends. And would you be willing to meet with me. But as I go through this process, I walk away from each of these amends freer and freer but I know I have to change something. I know I have changed something because frankly, I'm not willing to go through this every couple years. I'm not willing to go through this painful process of burning my life to the ground stone cold sober and then having to go back and clean up all that wreckage. right? I can't even tell you at first that my motivation for diving deeply into 10 and 11 was purely, I mean, honestly, oftentimes I don't do this out of virtue. I do this because my life depends on it. I doing this oftentimes because I don t want to end up in that place of pain and suffering again. I d do this for self-preservation. And then what happens is a byproduct as I do the work that God enters in despite my best efforts. In spite of me, God will work through me, and then the joy comes through. But when I'm starting to do this, and when I'M starting to get really involved in this process of steps 10 and 11, and I know I keep bringing up 10, but for me, they're intrinsically intertwined. Because here's the problem. If I have this hyper-awareness in step 10 of watching my thoughts, and Iím totally aware of what the problem is, and ìI donít have a power, I donít seek Godî in step 11, Iím just super aware of my defects. Thatís all it is. Iím just really aware of mine. mind. It gets really loud. I'm really aware there's a problem, but I don't have the power to do anything about it. And if I have an 11 step practice that is all seeking God, and believe me, I've done this too. I've had these periods of my sobriety where I've gotten deeply into outside stuff, books and meditation, where I'm doing like two hour long breath work meditations and I'll get up from it and somebody will cut me off in traffic and I want to murder you because the problem is, all I do in those situations, I bring my will to this power and I don't have an awareness if I'm not watching. So I need these two steps together. But since I'm here to talk about step 11, I'll talk about that. If I have failed utterly at this 10th step, which I often do because oftentimes I get swept up in the day and swept up In life, I have this evening practice, which I am not perfect at. And I've kind of had to shift and evolve with this as time passes, like what is most meaningful to me when I retire at night, but the book starts with when we retire. I don't want to like speculate on why they do that for me. It feels as though it starts there because I don'T want to carry all the garbage from the day into the, into the following day. I want to be able to start with this clean slate and how can I do that if I'm asleep and unaware of what's been going on? So it asks us, you know, we ask ourselves simple questions. It's this little mini inventory where we resentful, where we afraid, where we dishonest. And I can do this in a constructive way where I'm not putting the whip on my back. Listen, there are days when I fall short. There just are. When my mind takes over, when fear takes over they happen. But I'm just doing this so I can get an awareness of where I can be better. Like where I may have fallen short, where I owe an apology, where I need to pick up that phone and have a discussion with somebody to, to like tell on my mind, tell them my ego. And, um, and as I do this, like I just look at it and I do This in multiple different ways. Like I said, I, you know, for years I was shooting it off and then, you have apps, we have all these different things we can use. I've tried them all. I've done them in emails. And lately my practice, cause I'm going to talk about current stuff is my practices is I have a notebook that lays right next to my bed and I pick it up every night and I write it down. And the reason I write it in this notebook is this, it's between me and God. And I'm not trying to dress it up to make, to sound good for my sponsor, even in a subtle way. I can get really honest about how resentful I was. I can give really honest. That's not to say I won't have the conversation with my sponsor or another woman and other women in Alcoholics Anonymous because there is a question that needs to be answered. Is there something I need to discuss with someone? Right. But the truth is, is when I'm sitting there and it's just me and God and I'm putting pen to paper and the book doesn't say we have to write it by the way, it doesn't stay one way or another. This is just what I do. And I write it down, I can see it really clearly. And it's coming from the heart. And i'm not editing it. I'm not trying to get a gold star for my sponsor. I'm Not trying to do any of that. And then as I get to the end of that, I close that book up, I answer those questions. And they can also answer the other things too, like, what did I pack into the stream of life? And thank God for you amazing people because because of you, because of amazing people in these rooms, every single day, I have something to add to that because you taught me how to show up. You taught me how to be a productive member of society and how to be there, be a friend, be a sponsor, be a sister, be all these roles got assigned. So every single day I can put something in there. I have not had a day that I remember where I can't. Right? So I take all of these things at the end of the night and then I can sit quietly with my creator and I can ask this power, invite this power into my life to reveal to me what corrective measures I need to take. And maybe they don't occur to me immediately. Sometimes I fall asleep in the morning and they're on me. Like as soon as I wake up, for instance, I had a moment, I'm just going to be honest here. I was at a conference, um, you know, this weekend in Delaware and it's this, this person was speaking and I spent, I was sitting with another woman and I said something that was super gossipy and not kind to the woman I was sitting with. And, uh, it didn't really occur to me until like I put it on the paper and I didn't really know what the corrective measure was. I just sort of lay it all with God and I woke up the next morning and I was going back to the conference the next day and going to see the same woman. And immediately, not only was it to, you know, amend the conversation with this woman I spoke to because I involved her in this gossip, but, but to just speak kind and loving words to people like that was on my heart as soon as I wake up. Cause on awakening, like there's a, there's clear cut instruction on what to do when we wake up in the morning. And I needed that. I didn't know how to pray. When you come into Alcoholics Anonymous as someone like me who has a transactional God, my prayers are like this, like, hey, can you fix this person or this place or this situation for me to my liking? I will literally make God, you know, this idea of like what's going on between 60 and 63. Like that defeats the whole purpose of this. Like, you know, trying to get God to change him, make him sober, make Him better, trying To get God To get me the job, get me the stuff, the things that I want. And the truth is, it's like, I don't always like God's will. I talk about this a lot. You know, if I, you know, I didn't like God when my sister died coming up on four years sober. And I really hated God's will when my brother died two years ago. Like these are things that I wanted to change. I wanted this power to change these outside circumstances for me. So if I'm not taught how to invite this power and how to pray, that's all I'm doing. And then when God doesn't follow through with what I want. I abandoned my belief in this power and my reliance and my trust in this powerful because it feels personal. It feels like God did this at me. He took my brother from me, took my sister from me. The world is happening at me the biggest problem with alcoholics is we take life so personally, right? We take reality personally. And so I needed this clear cut direction in this 11th step to be taught how to pray on awakening. What is it? You know, the first thing it asks, this is like wired into my brain. The first thing it asks us to do is that our thoughts be, ask God that my thoughts be divorced of self-pity, self-seeking or dishonest motives. Meaning I'm married to these things. I'm tied to them. They are in my DNA, in my makeup. I wake up on a default mode of self pity and self. Like that's how I'm waking up. And I need this power immediately to get in between me and the mind, me and the ego and intervene on my behalf. Cause I can't do it. I've got to be surrendered. I'm going to start this, this day from this place of surrender. It asks us to consider our plans for the day. And I, you know, I'll argue that not only like, what should that look like on the outside? Like what should my actions be, but really what should, you Know, how should I treat people? What should my behaviors be? How loving should I be? How helpful can I be today and ask God for the power, you you know, sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God, praying only for the knowledge of his will for us and the power to carry that out. Because if I'm not careful, I'll ask for all the other things. But if it's simple, what is the knowledge of God's will for my life today? How am I supposed to show up? How would God have me be and give me the power to do it because I don't have it? That's simple. Now, there are pages and pages in the big book that tell us different ways we can ask different methods. We can use pausing when agitated or doubtful and asking in that pause for the right thought or action. And it's important that I remember the asking part because here's the thing about the human ego. I can pause. I'll pause for 24 hours. And if I don't bring God into that pause, it doesn't matter. The ego will be on the other side of it. I'll still be there with the resentment waiting for you. I'll still be there with the fear waiting for you. I'll Still Be There With The Passive-Aggressive Comment Or The Snide Remark, I Can't Fix That Stuff, I Got To Invite That Pauses And Some Of Those Pauses End Up Indefinite Because I Never Have, You Know, Sometimes The Most Spiritual Thing I Can Do Is Literally Nothing, Just Absolutely Nothing, Just No Response, Sometimes That's It, But I Have To Be Willing To Do That And I HaveTo Be WillING To Take These Things That I'm Undecided About And that I don't know about, you know, and ask God for this intuitive thought or decision and continue to ask and try to seek the knowledge from my heart and not my head. My head is always, I have to practice these meditations all throughout the day, these pauses, these getting back to the breath, getting back to the present moment, because my head is always offering an answer. It's always going to offer, sure, you should do this. You should say this. You should buy this, right? That'll make you feel better. instead i need to pause and like okay what is the right response here what should i do and kind of pause and breathe until it feels right and good in my heart and i'm not always going to do that and even when i do do it sometimes i'm still going to be reacting off the ego and the mind without realizing it in fact the book promises us that we're still going to make absurd mistakes doing this i'm gonna like i could show you my relationship history I'll tell you how many times I made absurd mistakes thinking it was God. And, oh, look, he's the one. God brought him to me. No, no, nope. That's not what it was. I'll make all kinds of absurd mistakes thinking that I'm connected to God, connecting to source, connecting to my creator. And that's okay. That's the beauty of Alcoholics Anonymous. It is okay. Without these mistakes, without falling on my face, without getting complacent and doing all the things that I've done. I think I've done almost everything you can do in AA wrong. And without those experiences, I don't think I would have grown as close to this power as I have. I don'T think I WOULD grow this as close to you as I HAVE or the women I sponsor because there's nothing to hide anymore. As these women I SPONSOR now come to me and they tell me of their mistakes and how they thought God brought the guy to them and all that. I GET IT. I DON'T HAVE TO SHAME THEM EITHER BECAUSE I UNDERSTAND THAT. I understand that enough. As I do this, as I do this on a regular basis, what starts to happen? And I'll include 10 in this just because it was 10 working with 11. As I started really practicing these steps, and again, this is not perfect. There are nights I come home and I'll go up to bed and I'm like, I don't know. I'll slick on Netflix, which is why, and I know I'm jumping around a little, but it does say when we retire. I heard this amazing speaker, Don L. He's a wonderful man, years ago, early on in my Sprite, he said something about when we retire is like when I'm, when I've already done for the day, not when I am two seconds from going to sleep and this saved my life. Cause you know how many times I come in and I, you know, I'll just turn the TV on and I'll start and I'll fall asleep in front of the TV or read, open a book and start reading and I will fall asleep. When we retire it's before any of that. Like I come In and I know my calls are done for The Day and you know my interactions with you guys are done for the day. And then, you know, could be, you know, 630pm, it could be done. And I do this review. So I remember to do it when we retire. But as I do This consistently more as as consistently as possible, everything starts to change for me. Everything. See, I know that the 12th step is vital. I know That it has saved my life. I also know that spending years in Alcoholics Anonymous, running around and trying to help people in order to escape my internal condition almost killed me. It almost killed me. Right? So in order for me to have something to transmit, in order for me, to stay free and remain free and connected to this source that connects us all, I need to do 10 and 11. This has to be a living, breathing working part of my program one day at a time for the rest of my life. This is it. This is where the good stuff is, right? And you could argue that it's like just running through the steps quickly. There's different ways people talk about it. It's basically four through nine every night. I know that I am doing a mini inventory. I Know That I Am Taking A Good Hard Look At Some Character Defects, Some Objectionable Behaviors. I Now That I Am Bringing God Into Them. And I KnowThat I Am Amending Anything That Needs To Be Amended, right and I also know that you know in each of these steps the one thing it asks us to do right after 10 step that end of the 10th step as I resolutely turn my thoughts to someone I can help and right after the end of 11th step what does it say it's preparing us to do what to go out into the world and carry this message to other alcoholics that's what it's prepared us to do and so if I want to be prepared every single day to carry this message to other alcoholics, to practice these principles in all our affairs. The 11th step is vital. It is a must. It is something that I must continue to experience. I must keep going. I must see God. I must read other books. The big book is just the beginning. That spiritual kindergarten that our founders talked about. I need to be willing to find out what resonates and what speaks to me. And that's why I won't go off on that part because that I believe is intensely personal to all of us. We were promised here when we get here that we can pick our own conception of God and the ways I connect with God may be different from yours and it doesn't matter. But how can I, I have to be willing to seek those paths, deepen that relationship with this power, grow in my love and connectedness with this power. And as I do this, my whole world opens up and I experienced the world, my life and Alcoholics Anonymous on a level that I have never yet experienced. And my hope for me and my hope For you is that as I continue To grow, my love for you, this Program, this fellowship will only deepen And so will yours. And that's all I have Thank you I'd love to see I'd like to see some hands Sarah, what a beautiful talk I really, really adore you I want to ask you a question While we're waiting for hands to come up And I want people to know that I will call on you Look at Mike B put his hand up come on, Mike. I'm going to ask my question after you. Well, I was going to let ladies go first, all this Mike alcoholic Sarah. Thank you so much. I've I've seen him some other meetings over the last year or so. My question to you is do you have specific 11th step buddies that you go to when you, when you're going to take those constructive measures? He said, you know, you need to discuss them with someone else. And then how do you prevent the discussing with someone from becoming gossip? That's a great question actually, because I'll be very transparent. I have misused both the 10th and 11th step in this way before. So I'm glad you brought that up. And also too much discussion in my experience built the problem. My ego feeds on that. So what I do know is like, I have specific people, I'm sorry, something is my throat, but I have my sponsor, but number one, she's amazing. Um, and she really is a woman who holds space for me to say these things out loud. There's not a, you know, and that's the beauty of it. And I have a group of both men and women in my life who I know I can bring these things to where they're not going to turn around and start feeding this. And also I think as far as preventing it from becoming gossip, if I know the other party that I'm speaking with is familiar with anybody else involved, I just leave the names out of it. That's it. I don't have to be specific. God knows who I'm talking about. So there's no need for me to say, oh, so-and-so I can just say, well, I was speaking with a woman tonight and I was gossiping. So I don'T have to say where it starts back up again. So that's been helpful. Thank you, Mike, for a great question. Sarah, thank you for a great answer. Lorraine, please come in. Thank you all as hi, I'm Lorraine. I'm alcoholic. Thank you, Sarah. Beyond words. Thank you for this beautiful share. I'm so glad it's recorded. It's one of those ones that I will put on and listen to on a regular basis. You said so many things. I was trying to get a question so I don't get in trouble. Because I really just want to share and tell you how amazing you are. But so you said that you've had many surrenders. I always ask this question when somebody talks about different surrenders, because I picked up again after 10 years of sobriety and I did not realize, but you put a beautiful pin on it tonight when I was so strong with my meditation practice and my God and my conscious contact. And, you know, I forgot about, I don't know, the third step. So I was just curious about any, I don t know, I didn't get your sobriety date, but like what your surrenders have been like and how you realized that it was self talking to you again to get back on track. And my prayers are always for a change in perception because I know that's what I always need is that. Yeah, that's a really excellent question and honestly my surrenders have happened almost as a i i think the only concession i truly made when i came into alcoholics anonymous in the beginning was that i could never successfully drink again like i couldn't safely drink but when these surrenders hit i would i would have rather put a gun in my head and take another breath like that's how bad it was but i was too afraid to pick up and um you know i had an awareness coming up to it like there were there were signs that i was stepping away from this work and i could see the defects of character that were glaring and I could see the relationships around me starting to fall apart. That was the thing. That's why I brought up why 10 and 11 are so important together, because I was hyper aware of the defects of character. I knew what was wrong, but I wasn't inviting the power into my life. I wasn'T seeking God. I went to my mind to fix it. Well, I'm acting out in this relationship. Well, let me fix it with my mind. I know what I need to do. And I actually started using the 12 steps to manage my life not a power greater than myself. If I just act differently, I started using it as just a behavior modification program rather than what it truly is. It is a God-reliant program where God is supposed to be the director of all the principle of my life. And all I was doing was like, okay, well, I'm supposed to act this way, so I'll try, but I just didn't have the power. And when I was surrendered, I didn't willingly surrender, by the way, I am going to be clear. I was surrendered by pain, by embarrassment, by all the inside stuff. And I just became broken enough. And I'm actually really grateful. I'm really grateful that I experienced that brokenness. I needed every single one of those surrenders to get as close to God as I am now. Thank you. Carol, please come in. Hi, I'm Carol and I'm an alcoholic. And I can't remember specifically, but you said something along the lines of when you share your opinion, you're really sharing your unmanageability. And there's a person that I sponsor who is really close to the same age as my daughter and has experienced some of the same things that my daughter's experienced. And I find myself at times doing just that, you know, my opinion based on my emotions and not the actual steps. So what would be a good way to still be able to sponsor this person without letting my heart, I don't know if it's my heart or my mind, letting my personal feelings affect my responses to her? Thanks. Oh, that's a great question. First, I ended up in Al-Anon because of that question. So Because what happens is, is like I become emotionally attached and I love the women I sponsor and I connect them to people I love in my life. And what happens this is I think I know what's best for them, even though I don't know what'S best for me, right? I don'T know whatS best for my daughter, even thought I love her dearly. And so I've had to actually implement all of this work, not just in my relationships with the women I sponsor, but with my daughter as well. So they're both the same. My daughter is 31 year old woman. She no longer needs my direction and advice, probably never did. and the women in my life, they don't need my direction. They need my love and my experience. That's what they need. And you know, I'll take that back. They don't necessarily need direction as in direction on how to live your life. As far as direction on where to go in the book for the answers, how to get to God for the answers. That's the only direction I could provide. If my direction is like, you shouldn't date him, even if it's a horrible idea, by the way, right? Even if on the outside, every red flag is there and I see it as a warning sign. It's, I don't do it anymore because I had loving people who let me have those same experiences and I needed them and I grew through them. And I now have this experience. So what I do now is I simply, if I've had the experience, the direct experience, I share that. If I don'T, I suggest they speak with, you know, I know tons of women in this program and like, Hey, maybe you should talk to her. But the one thing I never do is, um, or try not to do anymore is try to, uh, parent them. Yeah. Great, great question and great answer. Hey everybody. I'm Dina alcoholic. I was going to say that was unbelievable. It was a whole thing. I was like, slap your mama, wake up, Dina. I loved it. um a couple of things that you said was uh bring god into the pause i definitely need some more practice with that because i do pause but just the way he said it was like being you know and then um running around in order to escape my uh internal conditions you know how much more aa how muchmoreallthiscanido and then i don't have to do that and so that hit home and i really appreciate your sharing that uh manage uh manage well rest satisfaction my sponsor i can see her say that to me with that action so i loved your share and i'm so glad to be here thank you very much thank you dina lauren you are up thank you alice hi my name is lauren i'm a very grateful alcoholic hi sarah thank you so much for your share i am so happy that my higher power delivered you today i saw you speak when i was really early on in my recovery and so many of the things you said then i use still today and i share with my sponsee and i just i can't believe we're reunited so thank you um one of the Things You Taught Me Early On That I Carry With Me Is That Recovery is not the only thing in our life but it's the most important thing and I remind myself that daily and I heard that in your share today as well with what you shared in your own experience and I'm curious when you've gone through those periods of life creeping in and the responsibilities that are important and that can't be avoided but they're starting to take over and creep into that recovery time what do you do to make sure recovery stays that's the Most Important Thing. Thank you. thank you so much you know that that has to for me it has had to I've had to kind of look at some of my core beliefs on like and my initial beliefs on what recovery really was so when I come in and I have this experience where I'm taught recovery is in your feet you always need to be in a meeting you always needs to be helping the newcomer and that's always great stuff listen I want to be very careful that I am not knocking any of that I had nothing going for me when I got out like my family didn't want to talk to me. I was on state parole, couldn't travel all this stuff. Here's what happens is though, is like a life, you know, grows up back around us that through the fellowship, through our families, these things come back in our lives. And so what is recovery? Right. Is it constantly sponsoring? Is it constant being in the rooms of Alcoholics Anonymous or is it what the big book says that a much more important demonstration of these principles can be better seen in our respective homes, occupations and affairs. And So while I've had these experiences where I've absolutely had to show up. Like when my sister died, I absolutely had to drop everything I was doing and go be there by my parents' side and do whatever they needed me to do. When my brother died, same thing, have to be present for those people. And I need to show up for these moments and I cannot be in a meeting and I can not be answering phone calls while I'm standing at a casket. It's not happening, right? So what is my recovery? My recovery is the maintenance of my spiritual condition. And how do I do that through steps 10 and 11? I continue to do this work. I seek God, I seek connection. I seek love, right? I seek truth and I continue to clear away anything that's in the way. And as I do that, those times where I cannot physically be in a meeting and I can't physically be sponsoring someone, I'm connected with a power that's keeping me in safe and protected in a position of neutrality, which I should have mentioned the amazing promises out of step 10 tell me that if i'm doing this work and like i can go anywhere i the important work we do here is that that the maintaining my spiritual condition and while working with others is vital for that i this relationship with this power i can connect to this power wherever i am when i'm on the subway when i'M on an airplane when I'M at work in a bathroom like it doesn't matter i can always have access and connect to this power and for that. And that is recovery to me. God is everywhere. Come on, Calvin. Oh, I muted you. I'm sorry. Okay. Thank you, Alice. Thank You, Sarah, for a strong message. Thank you thank you thank you and I was thinking about how you know I when I was a peewee in the program you know I always you know when I learned about the book and stuff I started checking all the boxes and I don't have to check the boxes as much no more because now my consciousness works I know right when I've hurt you or said something crazy to you or something off soon I know right away you know and and your topic was a great topic a great topic we're not burning up energy uselessly and that comes and that's an amazing thing when it comes into your life it's amazing thing you brought such a strong message and I'm glad to be here tonight to hear you and I really appreciate you thank you so much Sarah Sarah I get to actually ask my question I'm so excited about it so you know I'm a note taker And so I heard that, you know, I become surrendered by both internal and external conditions. Right. The crisis that I create. Nobody did it to me. Right. But I also heard that this thing, God's not external. And then I heard you say that it's not adding but subtracting and the value in mistakes. So the two things I'd want you to just take a moment to talk about is what do you mean? it's not about adding, it's subtracting. Because for people that are new, that might sound crazy. And what do you mean the value is in making mistakes? Like I'm supposed to get here and I'm opposed to being a saint, right? Would you talk about those two things as we close out for the evening? Absolutely, I would love to. Starting with the subtraction process. So like I said early on in my talk, I had a lot of ideas about God when I came in here. And in a way, I was always seeking God. I didn't realize I was Always Seeking God, but I was always seeking connection, right? I don't know if you've experienced this, but there's that feeling inside like something's not right. And if I just have this, if I Just Have Him, if I have friends, if i have connection, turns out I believe that that's me seeking God, right. I'm seeking God and when I pick up a drink at a young age, boom, I feel it. I feel it, like connection power. It's there, it's I'm okay. Breath, I'm OK. But then you take it away from me. And then finally, I realize it's not working and I can't use that anymore. And I come into AA and you're all talking about this God. And I've still got these ideas about God. And I'm still got all this stuff that I'm using to make myself OK. But what the steps do through processes of like inventory, what I'm doing is I'm going back and I'm questioning my old beliefs. some questioning the idea of God. Um, am I, even before the inventory, I look at my conception of God and like, amI willing to set that aside? Am I willing to just believe or am I even willing to believe there's a power greater than myself? Right. So I kind of set aside all the other stuff like the punishing God, the rewarding God, all of this other stuff. And in the beginning, frankly, you know what that meant when I set it aside, I didn't really believe in anything. I just saw that it worked in you. That's all I had coming in here. But as I did this work, and as I started doing things like inventory and seeing things from a different angle, at some point in the process, as I'm letting go of all this stuff, the resentment that I carry, the judgments that I carry, all of a sudden, I'm let this go through this process of inventory, subtracting, subtracting, removing, removing. I take away this big protective ego that I have when I go out into the world and I make amends, that shell, that casing that I keep around me that I can't admit I'm wrong. And I do that and I break wide open and I start to experience connection and relationship. All of a sudden that power is existing within me. I feel it. It's almost like something I can'T put into words unless you've had the experience, but I experienced God in spite of myself. As I do the work, I felt the power working in me. I felt all of our promises kind of touch on it. We're going to know a new freedom. We're gonna know a New Happiness, not going to regret the past nor wish to shut the door on it, which brings me to the second question. No matter how far down the scale we have gone, we will see how our experience can benefit others. So I have the shame of the mistakes I make when I come in the rooms of Alcoholics Anonymous, which is I abandoned my children. I drank during my pregnancy. I harmed my children, right? It did all they cheated on me, both my spouses. It does this, all this stuff. So I have all that when I come in and when women, when I sit with women in their inventory and they share that with me, that's what a gift, what an absolute gift that is. Cause this woman is sitting there with me for the first time. She's never told anybody this stuff and I can say, yeah, you know what? Me, me too. I did that. We're talking about healing here, healing through the language of the heart, through the me too. I get it like, whoa, massive. But then I make the mistake sober and I'm sponsoring. It's so funny because I was talking about it with a woman this weekend, eight years sober. I'm such a train wreck. I was driving to my boyfriend's house to punch him in the face, to catch him cheating on me yet again. I kept taking him back. Like that's the state I was in stone cold sober. Right. And I kind of have this moment where I break wide open. I, I hit that place of being surrendered and I'm like, I can't do this anymore. I can live like this anymore. This is going to kill me. I Can't do it. You start going through this work. And one by one, I call all the women I've been sponsoring up until this point. I'm like, Hey, this is what's been going on. Right? I've been, this is how I've been behaving. And you may want to get another sponsor. And every single woman said to me, thank you for telling me this because now I feel I can tell you anything. And since that moment, I have never withheld a single piece of information from the women I sponsor because every single time I fall short, they get it. They understand me as a human being and we connect on a deeper level level and we can both feel that power and that connection that god that's what i mean by the mistakes being these gifts thank you sarah i adore you ferdinand i don't think we have time like do you have a really quick one yeah yeah real quick sarah thanks for your share um in the spiritual experience it talks about that we made a profound alteration in our reaction to life that such a change could hardly have been brought about by ourselves alone. Give me an example of how you experienced that type of profound altercation with the help of the fellowship. Thank you. By basically just following the leader, following what was put in front of me, picking up the spiritual kit of tools, and then all of a sudden I woke up one day and then I was reacting to life. Like when I got the phone call about my sister's death I didn't run, I didn'T hide. And I intuitively knew how to handle a situation that wouldn't would not only have baffled me, that would have crippled me. I knew where to show up. I knew what to say. I know how to show for my parents. I was guided by a loving intuitive force and nothing else could have created that other than other than a God, other than a power greater than myself. Nothing. There was no explanation for that. And the fact that I didn' t once not once think about picking up a drink. Bernadette, thank you for a beautiful closing question. And Sarah I love you. I'm looking forward to seeing you on the Broad Highway. Michelle back to you.