The 12 Steps (Part 1 of 2) – Earl H.

Oh, you're one. I am not a trained killer, so I don't immediately... Oh, okay. My name is Earl. I'm an alcoholic. Hi, everybody. So, the steps. Jeez. Is Howard here? There's Howard. One of my heroes. Well, Howard. I love Howard. Anyway, so the steps. You know, I think it's interesting to me to have a guy get up and talk about the steps For me, it's... I got the steps the way I got them. I got those steps the same way they were passed down to me by my sponsor. I got some of the... And I'll carry on for a bit about... This is the way that I work through the steps, this is how I was taught, this is the ways it works for me, I mean, this is how I engage in this process. And there will be six other guys that will go, oh, well, that ain't right. You know? They'll say, well my sponsor took me through and we did it this way and this way and Christ, you're killing people with that way. And it's often this way and that way and then this guy's got this way. And I must personally know 15 guys that go through the book in a different way. They perceive it a different ways. They teach it a difference way. They share it a different way, and I don't think there's a wrong way to do it. I mean, I think that the point is to go through the steps as outlined in the book and wrestle with the concepts that are afoot there. I mean that's the whole idea. And for me, I'm just – and everybody's got a different personality. Some people are very, very big into the minutia, and they get into it, and they dissect it, and then they take it apart, and then you put it back together, and that works. That works for them. They get the desired effect as a result of doing that. Me, it's a little bit different. For me, I've had to kind of keep my eye on the prize. You know what I mean? And the prize for me was to find a way to be comfortable sober. I mean, kicking was the least of my worries as it turns out. I mean I can remember I think two years before I got sober I had been admitted to my second-to-last detox. It was a little bootleg sanitarium in Hollywood where you give them $150 cash cash and they strap you to a gurney and shoot you full anti-convulsants and just let you rock. And as you're losing your mind and thinking you're going to die, you reintroduce yourself to God and you say, look, you know, it's me. I know we haven't talked in a while, but I'd like to cut a deal here if I could. If you just get me through this sane and alive, and both seem to be in question, I will never, ever, ever drink or use again. My ass is kicked. I can't take the madness. I can take the violence. I admitted I'm an alcoholic. I admit it. I admit I'm a alcoholic. And I would get up off that gurney after 72 hours and I would stumble to my car, and I'd be drunk that night. I drank for two more years. I could not stop drinking. Knowing that I was an alcoholic didn't mean anything. It didn't seem to have any impact on my ability to stop. I didn't know what it meant. I don't know know what an alcoholic was. I didn't know anything about alcoholism. I didn't know that I suffered from an allergy to the body and an obsession of the mind. I didn't know that. I thought if I kicked, that was it. But what I couldn't get a hold of as a result of the denial I was living in was that stopping wasn't what it was about for me. I had to find a way to not start again. How could I not start again? How could this process of recovery be laid down upon the process of my life. How could I do that? And I found that for me, and I thought Clancy spoke about it brilliantly as always last night when he talked about how the difference between him and the bodies that he would step over on his way to work and on hisway home. And that being willing to take an action outside your own best thinking in opposition to your own bad thinking. I've got to find a way to stay stop. I will not say stop unless I can find away to be comfortable sober. The only way for me to be comfortable sober is if I am relieved of the greater aspect of my disease, the mental obsession to drink. The thing that makes it impossible for me to be comfortably sober. I have to be relieved of that. I've been taught that the only way to successfully relieve me of that is to work the 12 steps as outlined in the big book. We got this circle with a triangle this unity, recovery and service and it's an ancient spiritual symbol that stands for mind, body and spirit brought together as a whole human being, therein lies the balance I've sought my whole life and never had. AA adopted it. It's the same thing. Unity of the body, I bring it here. The recoveries of the mind, I work those steps. Having had an awakening, having been restored to sanity, soundness of mind, the leads of the obsession to drink, service, I can practice these principles. I can carry the message. How can I help you? How can i help you when you come to me and say, I can't stop drinking, but can you show me how? I can say yes, and it has absolutely nothing to do with Ezra O'Season. out of this, which is good news for anyone. It's out of this book here. Let's just go through this book and see what we, and what's really interesting is, is that I've been through, I don't know how many times I've gone through the process in the book. I don'T KNOW HOW MANY TIMES I'VE, I'VE LED WORKSHOPS, BEEN A PARTICIPANT IN WORK SHOPS AND ALL THIS STUFF. LISTEN TO SO MANY PEOPLE AROUND HERE THAT HAVE SUCH A GIFT FOR SHARING THIS STUFF AND, AND PASSING ON, YOU KNOW, CATCHING THAT BUZZ THAT YOU GET AS AN ALCOHOLIC, AS A SOBER ALCOHOLIC, WHEN YOU BREAK FREE AND YOU, AND And you're free, which is like the whole point. So I had to keep my eye on the prize as I went through the steps because what I'm trying to do is I'm try to walk the earth a free man. I'm tying to no longer be a slave to alcohol and drugs. I'm tried to be relieved of the obsessive thinking. I can't have that beast whispering in my ear anymore telling me that a couple of drinks will solve the problem I currently have, whatever that problem may be. I've got to get that out of my head because sooner or later, right, the shit's going to hit the fan and I'm going to discover that I am not in charge of the fan. right and when that happens i better be armed with some tools that will allow me to get through that experience without creating significant and possibly irreparable damage in my life like me taking a drink i got here once and i've stayed for 22 years i am firm believer that there is absolute having never done it but having seen it so many times because i've been been able to get here successfully and stay sober for a significant period of time is absolutely no guarantee that if I were to go back out and drink, I would get back here again. The last Diet Coke on the island. When we get to the four-step, I shall discuss that in further detail. I have a terrible resentment. All right. So step one, what's the problem? I mean, that's what the beginning of it is for me is like, what is the problem here? What is it I'm dealing with? What Is that I'm up against? Because you know what I mean? I'm aware of a whole bunch of great tools, but if I don't know what the problem The problem really is I don't really know what tools to apply to the problem that effectively solve the problem. I mean, a screwdriver is a great tool. A screwdriver will fix a lot of problems. But if I have a flat tire, it's of very little use to me. I've got to get the right solution to the right problem. So I've gotta be really, really well-schooled in what the problem is. And lack of power is my dilemma. Lack of power's my dilemma I may be normal in every other area of my life, but when it comes to the question of drinking, drinking, I'm nuts. I'm not. I can make rational decisions that move my life forward and every other airborne it comes to drinking. I mean, I seem to be completely powerless over alcohol and my whole life is unmanageable as a direct result of that one thing. But there's when I look around in my life and I think, well, it's so easy for me to project my problems onto someone else or compare myself to someone else and say, Well, I don't have a problem. He does. I mean, you know, he's sleeping in a car. You know what? I'm sleeping in a bus. Much smaller accommodations. I don't have a problem. He does and on and on. I mean, so it's I have to do that. And in the book, the book goes on at great length about describing to me the nature of alcoholism, describing to me about the obsession of the mind and the allergy of the body that I drink and I activate the physical phenomenon of craving. And that just takes over. I can't tell you, when I start drinking, I can't tell you how much I'm going to drink or when I'm going to stop because I don't know. I could be an absolutely delightful, charming individual. You could have me over to your house. We could have a little wine. We could have a few cocktails. I could just be delightful. And then I could come over to your house the next week for another little gathering. We'd have a little wine, we'd have a couple cocktails, and I'm trying to throw your couch through the front window. We have no idea how we got there or I've taken your car and I am off. or I'm attacking somebody and trying to kill someone and we don't know why and when asked a couple of days later why did you do that I don't now I don' t know so I never ever I never know what's going to happen so it seems to wreak havoc in my life at its own pace like it has its own mindset it has absolutely nothing to do with any plan I put together it just is this independent force in my light and it manifests the soul sickness manifests itself in an obsession of the mind and the algae of the body if that's my problem Lack of power is my problem. What's my solution? A power greater than myself that could restore me to sanity, soundness of mind, relieve me of the obsession to drink. Sounds like a good deal to me. Now I've tried everything on my way in here as I was effectively burning my life to the ground. I tried everything. I have a high IQ, at least I did early on. Sometime after 16, that started to drop steadily. Italy. But I would apply myself to other problems and self-will would avail me something, right? Not in this case, not in this place. And I had to accept, am I going to live a life based on spiritual principles or am I gonna, you know, continue to wander through this life attempting to blot out the intolerable nature of my existence? And I paraphrase, but, you know, and that was really what it got down to me was live or die, live or die, you know? And what's so great about alcoholics, I think, is when you tell them, look, here's your choices. You can either live a life based on spiritual principles or you can die this terrible alcoholic death, you know, and a lot of alcoholics will ask you, well, how terrible the death are we talking? I got to weigh this out because it's just the thought of taking. It's like you're taking my breath away. You're taking My Breath Away. So there is that really horrendous moment, I think, than accepting step in step one. It says on page 30, it says I must accept my innermost self. I'm an alcoholic. Yeah. You know, I think I did that two years, three years, four years, eight years before I stopped drinking. You know, it was just the crushing blow, that ultimate defeat that led me to be willing. And the book talks about having being beaten into a state of reasonableness. I mean, that's what it took for me was to be beaten to death, but somehow still breathing and willing to say, okay, I'm willing to take action contrary to my own best thinking. I'm unwilling to go to a sponsor and say, or a treatment facility initially for me on a free bed. And they said, go left. And I went left. I didn't ask them why, or please explain to me the nature of left as you see it. I didn'T get any, they said left. When I just went left, my ass was kicked. And And they said, if you don't want to die, you better go to Alcoholics Anonymous. And I said, okay. And I came to Alcoholic Anonymous having kicked the physical phenomenon of craving lifted, but the obsession of the mind was raging. I came here so full of alcoholism, so crazy sitting in the back, and I had no idea what you were doing. I didn't come here because I wanted what you had. I had not understanding of what you have. I just knew I could no longer live with what I had. And I think that's a great way to get here. I don't know what you have, but it can't be any worse than what I've got. Bring it on. So he said, well, you know, we do these steps. Fine, show them. What's step one? Lack of power is my dilemma. That's my problem. Okay, what's my solution? It's going to have to be a problem. I mean, I'm sitting on the couch reading the book and going, yep, yep. That's the problem. That's it. That's goingto have tobe the solution because I've tried everything here. Left to my own devices. I'm a dead man and I've accepted that. So, yeah, you say it's goingtake God. Okay, let's go to God. I renounced God on a mountain in Mexico on November 6, 1974. Renounced God. Swore I'd never love another human being again as long as I live, and there's no way you're going to love me because I'm not telling you who I am. So I came here just ready to receive the gift. You know? Really thinking clearly. And I got in the back and sat in the background and was going to burglarize your conversations. He said, it's going to take God. I went, fine, great. Want to get God in the mix? Great. Let me tell you about God. And I mean, what I professed when I got here was that I had no relationship with God. I hadn't renounced God. There was no such thing as God. There was not benevolent force that was going to impact my life in a good way. Maybe you all as a group could have an impact on me, but this God thing was out. And I carried that as long as my first sponsor would tolerate it. And he waited for precisely the right moment. And he loved these moments. He loved doing this to me. and I was ranting about God and he said, Earl, you can't be mad at a God you don't believe in. And I found that to be a cruel and vicious remark because it just hit me like a two by four between the eyes and I just looked at him and went, I'm going home now. It was just brutal because he was right. What I had was a relationship with God it was just a, it was a bad relationship as a result of my attitude. So then they say, okay, could I come to believe that a power greater than myself could restore me to sanity, soundness of mind, relieve me of the obsession to drink? And the answer was, okay, I'll roll with that because I don't have any choice. I've been, I'm not doing this willingly, gladly, happily. And as Clancy talked about last night, it doesn't make any difference how I get to to the action. It's just that I take the action is as my sponsor told me about taking direction from him, direction that was contrary to my own best thinking. What he said was, you don't have to like what I tell you. You don't want to think it's a good idea. You just have to do it. If you do it, you'll get the result. So my attitude towards the steps was if I do this stuff, it doesn't matter if I, if I announced, I do not believe in God and then get down on my knees and turn my will of my life over the care of a God. I don't believe in what I did by the time I got to the third step. Notice we are moving through these babies, man. Step one is I've identified the problem. Step two, I've identify what the solution clearly is going to have to be. I'm not happy with that, but there seems to be no other way to go about it for me. I'm strictly me. All right. Step three says I'm going to have to make a decision to do something about this information. What do I do? I get them them and I'm on the couch reading. Problem, solution, yep, yep. Step three, I get down off that couch. I get out on my knees and I read this third step prayer and I turn my will in my life over to care of a God I don't understand. Don't understand him. See evidence of that God in my Life on a daily basis, clearly a God evidence of that everywhere, right? Do I get it? Do I got God? Nope. I've tried. I taken a lot of psychedelics man. I have I've tried to wrap my head around infinity, and it just won't go. I get to sit there thinking about it, and I get way, way, way out there until I just scare the hell out of myself, just back in the room, man. A little too far for Earl. Just freak myself out, right? But I see the evidence. The evidence is there, and the evidence comes as a result of action that I take, right, because this process, what this process does, taking this contrary action, doing these things that would never even occur to me as an individual, as an alcoholic man, that would not occur to Me. What happens is this change begins to take place. I started changing. I didn't know it. The guy sitting across from Me going through the process with Me, he noticed it. It was starting to scare him a little bit because I was starting to change. I was having the same reaction to him. Wow, man, this is getting spooky. You know what I mean? Christopher's like balancing out over there. You know anything? I mean, it's not just going from victim to assassin. You know what I mean? He's just not... He's having these calm days, you know? And so we're going through the process, right? So I did it. I did step three. I just got down on my knees. I opened the book. I took a deep breath and I said the third step. To the best of my ability. I've done it thousands of times since. But I mean that was the beginning for me to just be willing to take this little action of just down on the knees, say this thing, back up on the couch. It was a crack in the armor, man. There was a crack in the armor. Did I know that? No. I saw this as ridiculous. Down on the knees, God, thanks for listening. Okay, back up on the couch, right? What are we doing here? And then you read, and you're reading the book, and there's a line right after you do this where it says, essentially, we hope you were serious about what you just did. Yeah, great, now you tell me. I felt like that place on the roller coaster, you know, where you're in the car and it's going click, click, click, I felt like to click and just stop. Here we go. No getting off now. Turn my wheel. How I've come to view that is if I look at my life as this pond, it's just this little pond. It's just the Earl Pond. Up until I got to AA I was throwing rocks rocks and mud and dirt, just drugs and alcohol. I mean, I'm just throwing this stuff in the pond and I'm seeing it sink to the bottom and I think, well, that didn't have that big of an effect. Well, the fact is, is that every rock that hit that pond, a ripple effect occurred. And whether I intended it to occur or not, regardless of what my intention was or was not, the action that occurred was unavoidable. And that was the rock hit the pond and the ripple effect of that touched absolutely every single area in the pond. There was no avoiding it. Everything was being affected by that rock hitting that pond. And I just kept throwing poison in there and poison in THERE. And it left no little area of the pond unaffected. It all became poison. And what I didn't know was, was that the minute I got down on my knees and took that action, that first action for me, and I said, God, and I did the third step prayer and I got back up on the couch, physically did that, I threw something else into the pond. And that ripple went out. And it began to just very, very subtly, very, Very simply in a very small way affect the nature of this pond. Right? And then I got up and it said, Well, I hope you were very serious about what you did. And I'm thinking, Well, you know, I don't know. You didn't ask me that. You didn' t say be very serious before you take the third step. I didn' T say that. So I did. And I thought, Well you know what, that was the best I could do. apparently we should continue from here because what I kept hearing was from my sponsor was keep moving baby keep moving keep going in that direction because he figured if I sat down at any point I was dead. He was one of these kind of sponsors when I asked him to sponsor me he said yes and I just started crying because when I ask him I realized it's been so long since I've asked anybody for something so long I didn't know it had been that long until I did it. God it's Been forever since I have reached out to anyone and as I'm crying he looked over my head to his assistant and said, Oh, wonderful. He's destroyed. And I thought, no, no. See what I've done now? I've turned my life over to this madman. I've made it once again, a terrible decision turned out to be pivotal in my life. I was with him long and I was with my parents. Great man. Anyway. So it says I've got to embark now upon this plan plan of action or everything I've done is a waste of time, right? One, two, three drunk. One, two, Three drunk. I can do the first three steps and be sitting in a bar with plenty of other guys sitting in the bar willing to discuss step two with me over a couple of tall ones. You know, that's step three is a bitch, isn't it? Yeah. There's a bar in Santa Monica where if you come and bring them your one year chip, they'll let you drink all night for free. How cold blooded is that? Right. You get welcome back to the dark side real quickly, man. Right. Because it's like alcoholics that want to like torch that joint anyway. So it says I got to embark upon this four step. So I'm reading in the book and I'm doing this four stuff stuff and I'm completely baffled by it. Right now. I've been to school. I mean, the college I can read. I can understand information. I read, you know, difficult stuff, you But I'm reading this, and there's just something in my brain that's going, you know, don't listen to that. Don't pay any attention to that, but something's just blocking me. I can't read this stuff, so I've got to go to outside sources, and I've Got to start doing the thing I swore I'd never do. I've GOT to start following around those step guys, you Know, those book thumpers, those guys that talk about the program as outlined in the big book, the people I've avoided at all costs up to this point, right? These are not the people. These guys are no fun, right. Right. Little do I know, they're the keepers of the biggest buzz a guy like me could ever know. Right. Keepers of The Big Buzz, man. Those are the guys. Go find them. Right. There's a whole bunch of them on that table right up there. Anyway, when you look at it, you go, yeah, this guy talks about the steps great. Hey, wait a minute. These guys are great. Hey, that guy's wonderful. That guy in the traditions, teachers, amazing stuff over on that tab. Anyway, so it says I got to do this fourth step before it gets fun. It's the beginning of this process, this action plan that's supposed to bring about the promise of step two in my life. So, fourth step. I've got to swallow some large chunks of truth about myself. I'm going to do an inventory on resentment, fear, and sex. Traditionally speaking, as I was taught it, this was a four-column inventory. Look at Peggy. There's one of the greatest things I've ever experienced in my wife is going on. I'll let you in on a little secret. There's a person here who's a great teacher. An absolutely fantastic teacher. A guy who spent a lot of time in Los Angeles, highly regarded in the 12-step community in Los Angeles, moved out of town, and is now highly regarded. And for good reason. He's a remarkable teacher, has an incredible mind, and he sees it differently than I do. He doesn't see it the way I see it, right? So we got into it yesterday. yesterday. But when I mean get into it, you have to understand we're reasonable men. I came to him and said, I see it differently, but I have an open mind. I want to hear about how you do it. I wantto wrestle with how youdo it. Iwant to understand howyou do it, because maybe it'll change the way I do it maybe. Maybe they'll change it completely. Maybe it'll have some small impact, some large impact. Maybe there'll be another way that I want to do. I think that there's three in four column inventories. And he says there's four, three column inventories. Right? It all adds up to the same thing. It's just kind of how you get there. Right. So we're ranting back and forth. So ever since then is every time I see him as he walks by, he goes, and when I got up here, I sat down, I looked at him and I went, and what's a great thing. I mean, we're a couple out. We're a couple of hopeless alcoholics, right? That should have been buried decades ago. And And here we are arguing about the nature of the 12-step process. I mean, it's the greatest thing I've ever seen in my life. I love this stuff, right? Because it's good natured and I have nothing but love and respect for him and he's very, very nice to me. He's like a teacher of mine. He's been sober significantly longer than I have. So, in this four-step, in a four-column format, You know, I write down my resentment. I resent Club Med. Why? Call them too. They've run out of Diet Coke. What areas of my life are affected by this? Absolutely not of any particular importance, but you know. Let's just say I resent my father. Why? He beat me. Right? What areas in my life were affected by that? A lot. not my security, my self-esteem, my personal relations. Right? My, my security. Right. Um, my, did I say self esteem? Self esteem. Yeah. My ambition. You bet. Right, several of the seven that are lit that I see as being listed in that book. Uh, uh, four, what was my part in it? Where was I selfish, dishonest, self seeking and frightened. And I write this down in black and white and I write, but I do it in rows, right? I do the column. Who Who do I resent? I write them until I'm done. The last inventory I did had 518 resentments on it. Thomas Jefferson was on there. I mean, I saw what that man did with his life. Who could live up to this? He set the bar entirely too high. I hate the man, Thomas Jefferson. I got it all out, right? And then I wrote specifically why I was resentful towards these people. Then I wrote down the areas of my life affected. And then i wrote down my part in all of this. And I did an inventory on sex, right? And not who had I slept with, but who had I harmed sexually, you know? I mean, if I walk up there, if I'm two years sober and I walk up to some woman and using my smooth, you know, suave, two-year sober manner and I walk up and I say, I like you. And she says, you're scaring me, go away. I have been rejected here and I mean somebody says to me, what do you think of Becky. And I say, I hate her. She's a terrible, terrible, mean-spirited woman. Now, I've harmed her. I haven't had sex with her. But as a result of my sexual advances to her, I have been rebuffed. I've spoken poorly of her in the community. I have harmed this woman. She is on my inventory. Right? I deal with the sexual inventory. And the reason that they pick these areas, I think, is if you want to see where an alcoholic will absolutely whack out, These are some good areas to check out. Self-righteous anger, resentment, sexual behavior, fear, right? I mean, I'm medicated self-centered fear from the time I was 12 years old. And had I known alcohol would have done that, I'd have started drinking it at around four. If I could have got my hands on it, that'll make this feeling go away. Toss it over here, right. Works perfectly. So I do this stuff, resentment fear and sex. sex. And what happens is, is then I go to my sponsor and I don't read it like this. I read it in the rows. I have this resentment. I resent this person. This is why these are the areas affected. This was my part in it. I resented this person, this is why it affects these areas as a person. And I mean quickly, there is a remarkable rather unattractive pattern presenting itself showing me this. this. I'm being forced to look at my side of the street because my whole life it's been about, you did this and you did not do that and you shouldn't have done that. And how come when you said you were going to, and then you didn't. And then let me just point all the time, right? I am taking absolutely no responsibility for all of this. I am justified in my 30 years. So this is what happens to you when you turn 30. I don't It's the truth, right? And the rest of us in our little 20s, we just got to roll with it, right. See, there is a bigger buzz up ahead, right So I do this inventory and then before God, I read this to another individual And I remember my first fifth step I had finished my fourth step when I called up Donald and I said I finished my four step, I'd like to get it with my fifth step And he said, all right, well, you know, I've got some time Tuesday. And I said, no, no. You don't understand. I'm not leaving this stuff laying around. We're getting together now. They said, fine. I've Got to speak out in Eagle Rock or somewhere. Come on over and read it to me in the car on the way there. Fine. So I've GOT this document in my car. And I go over and I get in this station wagon with him. And off we go to Eagle Rock. And I'm reading this inventory. We had to pull over twice because I was so upset over actually telling this stuff to another human being. Because this went, talk about contrary action. Saying these things to anotherhuman being was beyond anything I ever thought would ever possibly have to happen in my life. I could, my brain was just screaming at me. You don't understand. These people have tricked you. The federal government is running AA. This is how they get people to give this information up to their agents. This is how they track this information. I mean, it's just wrong to do this. It's wrong. Based on my way of looking at things, this is wrong. There is no value that could outweigh the damage possibly done by doing a fifth step. As I sit in this car doing one. Because this guy is my link to the human race and I'm convinced at this point, if I don't do this process, I'm going to die drunk. Right? I'm going to died drunk. There's just overwhelming evidence that that's the case. So I'm reading this and he's pulling over the car so that I can get sick when I get out of the garden and I get back in the car and we read some more and pull over, pull over. Oh God. And he pulled him back in a car and read the whole inventory. We get to this place. He goes, they got to eat before the meeting. We pull into this hamburger stand, right? And we're eating, we get hamburgers and we're sitting out on these tables and there's a bunch of families and stuff. And everybody's sitting around eating hamburgers and I'm reading my end, finishing up my inventory. And you know how, when you're scared, your voice kind of goes up when you get scared. And then this happened. And dann I did this and this was going on and people are like going, kids, kids. And the people, the families are getting up and moving away. And it's like me and Donald out there. Right. And I finished my inventory and I am so emotionally emotionally raw and drained and exposed and frightened. And he looks up at me and he smiles and he says, wonderful. Now we don't kill people here one day at a time. That was the first direction I was given by my sponsor. And I said, okay, I can do that. And i can, i can tell you, i have not killed anyone from that day to this. Andi did not kill anyone prior to that. I have have never, to my knowledge, killed anyone. I was planning a murder when I got here. Very seriously planning a murderer, very, very committed to the process of seeing this particular individual dead and he his counsel to me was we don't do that here one day at a time. And I said, OK, and I laid down my plan and stuck with the plan he had in mind for me, which which was Alcoholics Anonymous. And today I walked the earth a free man, and I firmly believe had I done that, even if I'd gotten away, I would not be free today. That's just me. That's for me. I wouldn't be. I'm not the kind of guy that could willfully, premeditatedly do something like that and not have it scorned for the rest of his life. Anyway, so I did this fifth step, and as we got to the meeting, then we get to the meaning and I'm just vibrating, right? Right. Because I'm looking at him and thinking now I have to wait for him to die because he's the carrier keeper of my secrets. And I'm thinking he's looking rather fit. And this could take a while, you know. So we go to the meeting and the secretary says our speakers here, Donald, good to see him. And is this our first speaker? And he points to me and Donald says, yes, it is. And I look at him. And I looked at the secretary and I don't know who to get in the next thing. And, you know, the meeting starts and I stood up at the I'm the five minute speaker. They had a five minute Speaker and I'm in and I got up there and I said, my name's Earl. I'm an alcoholic. And I just did my fifth step with my sponsor. And well, that's all I have to say. And I sat down and sat down next to Don and looked at me, looked at him. He said, sensational. Wonderful guy. And I'm just vibrating. I mean, I feel like I'm naked, right? And that was the beginning. And there have been several inventories since then over the last 22 years. There have been many, many fifth steps that I've listened to. I mean, and I think it's important in terms of the steps. It's not just me doing them. It's me doing they're not going to be successful. It's doing them and then turning around and taking the next guy through and letting this guy have it at his beginning and letting these guys not see it as I see it and letting those guys not understand And this guy being willful and resistant and hostile and angry as he does it, that he doesn't have to have a good attitude. He doesn't has to think it's a good idea if he does. I'm in. I'll participate. I'll help him through that process and I will carry the message to him as it was given to me. The great part about this is, is that I got what I got in the beginning. I've been given so much regarding the steps since then by Joe and Charlie, by Howard P., by Luther W., by Clancy I., by Scott R., by a woman who had two-and-a-half years sober as I sat in a meeting in a very disgruntled state of mind with 19 years sober. And she got up and was the first speaker in a meaning with two-an-a half years sober And she blew the top of my head off because she was seeing it differently than I had ever looked at it before. And she added color and depth to what was mine in terms of my relationship with God and my relationship and my fellows, because what the steps does for me is that all the stuff that I put between me and you and me and this God that I don't understand was my responsibility to go about the business of getting that stuff out of the way so that I could hook back up with my, have a sense of self that was even remotely close to what in fact was occurring. Have a relationship with you and have a relationship with God. I mean, I remember I was five years sober and all I had ever done was go to AA meetings. I went to seven to nine meetings a week minimum. I had two panels, right? I was sponsoring guys. I never turned down. I mean, I was just so deep in this thing, building the foundation upon which I stand today. And I was informed that there was a convention in South Bay, which was about 30 minutes south of me. And I wouldn't I was so scared to do anything but what I was doing because I was afraid I would get drunk. Right. At five years sober. I mean I'm a slow one, man. I got here totaled and I went down to South Bay by myself telling no one. and I bought a little registration thing and I went into this meeting and I walked into the back of a meeting that had over 2,000 people in it. I've never seen anything like it in my life. The energy was astonishing to me and I stood up against the wall just trying to breathe in this environment. I mean, the vibe was just overwhelming and there was a guy at the podium and his name was Franklin W and he was from Olive Branch, Mississippi. It's like burned in my skull. It's one of those life-changing moments that Peggy talked about, right? And I'm standing there and see short-term memory does in fact return. I remember that you said that. It's like, I'm over here going, wow, good Earl. I'm very impressed with myself that I remember it. And I love listening to Peggy. Peggy's a teacher of mine. Dick's a teach of mine There's plenty of them around, right. All you got to do is show up and be willing. And I was open-minded enough that Franklin W. was at the end of his talk And he said, and I'll sum up Alcoholics Anonymous for you in six words. Those six words being, trust God, clean house, and help others. And I had a spiritual experience right there. Just blew the top of my head off. All these little pieces of all these things I'd heard around AA that were in the book, that were In The Fellowship, that people were talking over coffee just went. And it was this thing that I knew could sustain me through anything life could throw at me. that I had a shot at being an actual human being on this planet, not hurting people anymore. Being a part of the solution instead of part ofthe problem. And I vibrated on out of there. Sixteen years later, last year, I'm 21 years sober and I'm speaking at a conference and I turned into one of these guys, speaker boy, you know what I mean? They fly around and throw up there and wah, wah,wah,wah and then they throw you down, you don't know what i mean? Throw you on another plane, my favorite thing to do. Fly in airplanes. Which by the way, new resentment, And I'm on the plane, Miami scare. We're rolling down the runway and the plane goes, and takes off and I'm going, what the hell was that? Instantly, I'm not happy. 10, 15, 20 minutes into the flight, Why, the pilot of Miami Scare comes on and says, oh, by the way, that was just the engine stalling. The number two engine stallings, no big deal. And that's it. That's what he has to say. Now I'm saying, first of all, how many engines do we have? I don't know. Oh, if he'd have said number two of the 11 engines that we have, I'm good with that. I don't recall seeing a plane built like that. Five on each wing and a big one on the tail. I had to talk that out on the plane. I resent the pilot and whoever was involved in building this particular aircraft. crowd. You find your way through this stuff. You know what I mean? By the time we got here, I was good. But now that we're talking about resentments, it kind of chirped up there a little bit. So I thought I'd share that with you. Anyway, what the hell was I talking about? You know? Thank you. And thank you Peggy for what you said last night. Yeah. I guess the point I'm getting at is that whatever step I'm on, if what I'm Getting from that is a willingness to be propelled into the next step, I'm in good shape. If I'm willing to swallow large chunks, if I'm going to look at what the problem is for me, if I want to have the teachers that are in here talk to me about this and continue to talk to you about this, I can go through this original process and I can stay an active member of Alcoholics Anonymous. I can be relieved of the obsession to drink. I can engage in a process that daily allows me to experience a reprieve from that illness so that I walk the earth absolutely not suffering from the disease of alcoholism at all. I don't suffer from alcoholism. And I know the debates and stuff. Am I recovering? Am I recovered? Personally, I'm both. I'm recovered. I no longer suffer from the diseases of alcoholismo. And the process of recovery that is in my life as a result of my constant involvement in this process, I continue to grow. I continueto learn. earn. I continue to remain forever a student of Alcoholics Anonymous because the days are going to come where Howard and I are going to sit down and he's going to say, you know, I got another way of looking at this. And you know the spherical nature of this, this is not this linear flatline experience, man. This is the Zen thing, man, this spherical living growing experience that is my my life as it relates to Alcoholics Anonymous, this experience of AA. This is just so chop wood and carry water. It's unbelievable around here. I chop the wood and I carry the water. I look at the Japanese rock garden. Now I'm a Westerner and I look in a Japanese rock yard. And what I see is Asians trying to get over on me one more time with a rock garden, you know what I mean? And they got the Western boys standing there staring at a bunch of rocks, You know what I mean? And they're in the background going, look at that fool. We're going to have the rocks. But see, because of this process and what I've learned around here, I can stand and I can look at the rocks and all of a sudden I see a relationship between the rocks And I continue to look at the rocks, and I see a relationship between the rocks and the ground. And then the ground and that little thing over there, and this and that. And all of a sudden, it's a community. And all OF A SUDDEN, it'S a mountain range. And all Of A SudDEN, IT'S a universe unto itself. And I'm catching a buzz looking at a bunch of rocks. Love the opportunity to catch a buzz at any time. And if looking at the rock garden will do it, it'll do it. If I'm told to carry these buckets of water over to that well, pour them in. Then pick those two buckets up, fill them with water, and carry them over to this well and pour them them in and take these two. And if that's right now, that sounds on the surface like, OK, how boring is that? Right. Done it once. You're thinking nothing new here. Yeah, there is. There's the next time I do it. There's an old saying says you can't step in the same river twice. And I think that the steps are the same way. You can't you can'T do the same 12 steps twice because as you go through the 12 steps, it brings about an experience. And that experience changes me as a human being. I go back to start at step one and I'm looking at it from an entirely different perspective. I have changed. I see it differently and I go forward. I remember the night I went to a meeting to meet a friend of mine and I got there at the last minute, she was sitting up front and I slid in a chair next to her sitting right there. And the meeting started and they said, and tonight our speaker will discuss step one. And I thought, oh, great. Step one, if there's any stuff around here, I've gotten knocked. It's step one, I need no discussion of step one and And now I'm trapped. I can't stand up and go, sorry, pal, I got this, and walk out the door. I'm Trapped for the Meeting. And this guy's going to go on for 20 minutes. Turns out that his name was Jack P., and he had 43 years at the time. And he talked for 20 Minutes on Step 1. Again, Papa Earl's head is blown off, and I'm back to the drawing board. Right? And here's the thing around here, the beautiful thing of this. this. I'm back to the drawing board on step one happily, gladly back at the, at the drawing board because he's changed it all for me again. We're going a little deeper this time. There's worlds within worlds here. I know there's stuff. He said, he said about step one in that 20 minutes that just went, but there was enough that I heard that stretched me a little further caused my consciousness to have to expand just a little bit more to grab ...hold of what he was talking about. And I was off to the races again and off to the races, again. So I'm happy to stay a member of Alcoholics Anonymous, remain open-minded, willing to see it another way, so that when the next guy comes along and says stuff to me and I wrestle with these concepts, like I do with Howard, and I discover that the way he's seeing it is directly applicable to what's in that book and it is, yet I see it differently, then this is all good stuff. We get to mix it up in the good water. You know what I mean? We're playing, we're throwing, we'RE standing there throwing stuff in each other's ponds and we're not harming each other. Nobody's trying to lead anybody else to the dark side. You Know what I Mean? We'Re all trying to move forward and remain free. And it's just great, wonderful, beautiful experience. It sure beats the hell out of the gossip and the talking crap about people. And you know what i mean? And deciding that this guy is a good, he's a good speaker. He's in, this was a bad, he'S a bad man and He's a good man. You know what I mean? Instead of, forget the man, what's the message going on? Is the message good? Is the method solid? Yeah, I'm in. Give me the information. And that's what I think is great about the steps is that you embark upon this thing and you begin to wrestle with these concepts that are absolutes that none of us will ever attain. It's not the point. The point's not about getting there. The point is about being willing to go that way. So I like going that way I like being a part of this. So step one, what's the problem? Lack of power. Step two, solution. Power to resolve the problem is step one. Step three, I make a decision to do the things necessary to have that solution occur in my life. Four and five, I begin the action plan by addressing me, my side of the street, and I swallow large chunks of truth about myself. And at some point in this deal, we'll do six through 12, right? See ya. Thank you.