The Bondage of Self – 2024 Prayers & Promises Workshop – Part 4 of 7 – Peter B.

My name is Peter, recovered alcoholic preferably alive and sober and part of a safe place for Alcoholics Anonymous I do not have an LSD story but I have a Robert Johns story Robert John's a die hard Grateful Dead fan and he would always try to turn me on to the dead and I says why and he would always get on me going to every show and I said John you're not in a good place following the Grateful Debt this is not good and my wife and I are going to Tampa one time we're driving from Boca Raton up to Tampa I got to do one of these things an all day workshop and it's about a four hour five hour drive up to Tampa and she says honey can I listen to the Grateful Dead and I says why are you going to do this to me for and ruin a good relationship and she's no no let me explain she's telling me about Breakdown Street and all this stuff and so you know guys happy wife happy life I put on the Grateful Dad and I caught a couple of good tunes I'd never heard before I just keep it on I kind of like this. On a trip back four hours, I just put on the Grateful Dead. I called up Robert John. He says, I'm all in. Grateful dead. He said, you're finally getting better. So yeah. June 23rd, 1988 is when a loving God separated me from alcohol. I'm very grateful for this gift of sobriety. Very grateful to be a member of Good Standing and Alcoholics Anonymous. And I want to thank Raquel for this invitation to the district for putting it on and Craig for treating my wife and I really good since we got it. Picked us up at the airport, took us for breakfast. We went to eat last night. So it's been a blast. Spent a time with friends. The speakers have been great and I'm grateful to participate a little bit here about these prayers and promises and where I currently am. I do have a home group. It's in Fort Lauderdale, Florida called Alcoholics and God and I dohave a sponsor. His name is Bob Bazans out of Minnesota and I will tell you other than my first six months in Alcoholics Anonymous I was living in Minnesota and i was in a sober house and going to lots of different meetings had no clue about what a home group was how important it is I knew nothing I didn't know who Bill and Bob was I didn'T know what steps and traditions I knew NOTHING and I was just hanging off for dear life it was somebody asked me one time a youngin asked me what were your early days in AA like? And I said, survival. It was that clear to me that without you, I'm in serious trouble. But I was calling guys and leaning on some of the real old timers who had like four years sober to the answers to my questions. When I came home, I hooked up with a gentleman out in Minnesota who's wonderful. But when I came back, I was like, home from Minnesota, I got a sponsor and I've never been without a sponsor. And because Alcoholics Anonymous, even though I kind of felt like God hasn't been listening from time to time, I've not been without God. The future of my security cannot be apart from God. And so that has been something that has not only displayed to me by other members of Alcoholics synonymous in their walk, not so much their talk. And what I've learned here is the talk, the walk is the sermon, but in their commitment to God. My job today by watching these men who walk before me and my own personal experiences, my job today is to please God. That's it. Because when I'm pleasing him, I seem to be okay with me, which means I'm okay with you. when I was new in Alcoholics Anonymous I did what a lot of the members did and you want to fit in you want To be part of and you parrot a lot Of things even though I couldn't truly grasp it and they would say things like sobriety is their number one priority and I would say the same thing hey raise my hand my name is Peter I'm an alcoholic sobriete is my number one priority and I meant it and I mean it today but it's not my number one priority see what I've learned is the truth is the truth until you discover a new truth. And if I'm waking up little by slowly getting in the light, things will be pushed aside for something new that's truer and more current relates to my current experience. My number one priority today is conscious contact with God, not unconscious contact with god, not sleepwalking through life and thinking I'm awake and getting into relationship and taking jobs and doing like that and it's all about me and I'm concerned with me, my journey, where I'm going, what I'm supposed to look like, what I feel like, how much money I'm supposed to have. See that means I'm consumed with me and I'm focused on me which means I am not focused in on God. So conscious contact with God when I'm awake to God it seems to be I'm traveling awfully light. Let me tell you the front end my sponsor says often he's not a model nor an example and I take the same stance. I make lots of mistakes and I am NOT perfect. You're looking at someone who is about to talk about six and seven who fits right in there because I'm broken and flawed. I'm the car when it drives away, leaves an oil spot. That's me, your fearless leader for the next hour. And for a long time in early Alcoholics Anonymous, I would think because I was in AA and doing the steps and praying and doing all the things we're supposed to do, that somehow it was not only beyond reproach, but I wasn't supposed to experience any kind of turmoil, any kind of fear, any kind of uncertainty, any kind of doubt, that meant I wasn't a good AA member and I should somehow weave into this place of perfection. And it just became a struggle towards perfection rather than a journey towards humility. There was a tremendous feeling of an aha moment of liberation when I came to terms with, and I left a lot of claw marks in this is that I am broken and flooded, just how God designed it. Because if he wanted someone perfect, he'd make it. But in this broken condition is the greater need for God. And don't we identify with our brokenness when we share? When someone says what it was like, we usually lock right into that. Whether it's Park Avenue or Park Bench, what happened, the spiritual transformation, and what we're like now, it doesn't mean we're levitating. It's a lot better. But even when it's like now we still have our stuff from time to time, We get into that, but we talk about a solution. And that's where my past becomes some of my greatest assets in helping someone, especially with families when they don't know what to do. Why can't he stop drinking? And I share how come I couldn't stop drinking. He says, okay, our son, daughter, loved one is not a unicorn. We get it. Tremendous amount of freedom in that. In fact, I would try to will myself many times into not feeling any kind of uncomfortability, any kind OF skepticism, any kind Of fear. I'm going to double down on positive affirmations. I'm gonna double up on my meetings. I'm even gonna double-up on prayer and at the end of it, it seemed to be the more I tried to get away from what was troubling me, the deeper I got into it because I was using me to navigate out. And one of the best things I can do, whether I'm talking about defects of character or just life, is give a total surrender to this power. I don't know what to do. I'm yours. I'll do what you want me to do, I'll say what you wants me to say, I go where you want me to go. I'm your's. A servant in need. Because I'm going to be 36 soon in Alcoholics Anonymous, it doesn't mean I've risen above alcoholism. We get to transcend a lot of the things that we're eating our lunch. But once an Alki, always an Alky, and life happens. But it seems to be the more in the light I am, I can navigate better through life. And I can't do that by just attending AA meetings. That's been my experience. Some cats can do that, God bless you. I'm not here to change anyone or challenge anyone. Well, I am going to challenge. It's an honest program. unintentionally but I just can't navigate to life by going to a meeting and having go to I have to go to another meeting because it's on me again so on awakening we pray our book tells us that it's clear instructions on awakening and this is when we retire at night they give us two prayer spots in the 11th step it talks about when agitated or doubtful, we turn back to God. But pretty much it's unawakened and retiring at night. There's a lot of hours in between that day when life is happening. What am I doing about that? So I hit my knees and I'm Moses and I get up and I're Rambo. And I get out there and I've got to go. And I'm going to do life and I am back into self-reliance again. And one of the things that was brought to me by one of my sponsors, a gentleman at Adetexas, he says, who's praying in the morning? I said, what kind of question is that? He said, who is praying? Are you praying, because that means you're praying with your mind and there's an angle. I'm trying to get my hands around life. I forgive them but I really want them to change. I want this job so I can have money so I could live like the high life. It's not that I just need a job. It's me who's praying with my mind rather than going to God with my soul and all my brokenness. And the other question I was asked is do you realize who you're paying to? Because I can treat people like God and God like people. Do you know who you're praying to? That this omnipotent power has given you time and is at your beck and call throughout the day, and yet I discard him. I go to this God to please get me sober, but to be happy, joyous, and free, I go down other avenues. I go for the money. I go für die Relationship. I go för de Popularity in AA. I go for money, property, and prestige to keep me happy, joyous, and free. I don't go back to that power. So am I serving God or the part of me that thinks it's God? It's a subtle shift. I don' t even know what's going on. Unless I'm writing some inventory and sharing with someone, I get to expose me on that and see how slippery and how tricky this mind is, this four-letter word. It's the greatest predator I'll ever face. It'sthe greatest predator on the planet. The world is upside down right now because the thinking has taken over. There's a great author, his name is Eckhart Tolle, and he said something so bold as this. You don't even need a mind. You know when we tell people bring the body and the mind will follow? I'm still trying to figure out why we offer that advice. If we think about it, whoever, I got up really early this morning. I was up at three. And it's about 1.30 now, it's a lot of hours. If we reviewed our day from the time we woke up till right now, how much of your mind was taking the lead? How do I look? How do sound? I'm too tall, I'm to short, I'm fat, I am too thin. I'm gray, I do this, I do that, and it goes on and on and on all day long, takes you right to bed. Did you ever do this? Wake up in the morning, and as soon as you open up your eyes you're right in the middle of a heated discussion? arguing with someone who died 30 years ago open up it says on awakening we think about the 24 hours a day i'm ready to go postal on awakening and that follows me all day long and it takes me to bed did anyone drive here alone in the car anyone drive you know you didn't And if you think about the ride over here alone, how many people were you talking to in the car? About 45 people in the back seat. You know? And we're heated. We've got delusions of grandeur. It's a whole soap opera going on. That's why when they ask an alcoholic, how are you doing? I'm exhausted. You don't have a job. Why are you tired for it? Because I'm talking to these people all day long. Until I walk into home group and they say, how are you doing? I'm wonderful. I owned all the way here. Then we get back in the car and those people are waiting for you as soon as you get in the car, by the way. June of 88, just to qualify a couple of minutes here, I belong here. June of88, I had been through six treatment centers up until that point. I wasn't the guy who came into AA and got six months or a year sober or 90 days and blew up and had to do it all over again. Over six treatments, I've been to seven treatment centers, but during the course of my first treatment center to number six, what I was able to muster up on my own power was two days of sobriety, and it was purely right-knuckle sobrietry. That's my story. I came to AA means Maggie knows my first home group, the Free Spirit Group. I remember going in there and standing against the radiators in the back of the room drunk as a skunk and raising my hand and sharing and critiquing everyone and dropping F-bombs and all they said was keep coming back. I mean that's my exposure to AA. People are crazy. And I got more drinking to do. And for quite a while, in the year of 1988, I found myself as the direct result of drinking non-conference approved dry goods and this rebellion that is part of my alcoholism. I would not submit. I'm ready to make the supreme sacrifice. Our book talks about this. Until, as my sponsor said, we get surrendered. it's a place where I feel like I'm gasping for my last breath and I want to live, I don't want to die and in that place of surrender I don' t ever have to hit that kind of bottom again Richard Broad talks about how we fall up in that place into the hands of God but it's scary as heck and most of us don't do that most of use die but I was homeless for a while panhandling on the streets and I found myself living in the back of an abandoned building in Alphabet City, a lot of you guys may know that. And back in the 80s, it was not a good place to hang out. You know, you had the junkies, you had The Winos, the crack scene hit. It was a bad place. The only people who lived there didn't have the resources to get out. They were living in the projects with people like me hanging around, a menace to society. And I wasn't a gun guy. I wasn'T a rageful drunk. I wasn'Ta fighter guy. But just the lifestyle inflicted pain and misery on people. I poisoned Just the untreated alcoholism poisons wherever we go. A big book says years of living with an alcoholic will make any child or wife neurotic. The whole family's become ill. I poison people. And what's really scary, I can do that sober because alcoholism doesn't come in a bottle of whiskey. Alcoholism sits up here in the head. I can die from alcoholism without ever putting a drink in me. One day God's going to give me my last breath. And when that day happens, I want to die with alcoholism, not from alcoholism. It gets a life by taking mine, that's what it does. And so the big book says I'm suffering from an illness which only, very specific, I'm suffering from illness which ONLY a spiritual experience would conquer. There's little navigation in that statement. And only a real alcoholic was in that place and I'm desperate to do anything because Because in a place of desperation, the ego gets crushed for a moment. It's okay, whatever this spiritual experience is, I don't care what it is. I don' t care where I have to go. I don''t care what kind of steps I need to do and change my life. It's got to be better what I'm doing. If I always do what I always did, I was going to get what I've always gotten. I'm willing to shift that. I don ''t know how I'm going to do it, but I'm wiling to do that. See when I was out on the street, if someone waves something I never saw before and says that's going to electrify you. I didn't do a due diligence report. I just says, how many works? One, give me four. I'll figure it out. Then I come into AA and I get very picky about stuff. Well, what does any lens mean and what is the spiritual experience going to mean? You're not ready, sorry. AA is a place for the dying and I could be living on Park Avenue with two new cars in a garage and have a six-figure income and I'm dying because it's in here. It's that pain in the soul. And that's the springboard that gets me to a sponsor that says, I need help. It's the thing that gets me to my knees and says, I need hope. So here I am living in a hallway and I've been exposed to the H&I folks coming into treatment and sharing their experience and hope. In my first six treatment centers I said, how lame is this? They're coming into this hospital. It was out here in Long Island, Amityville. And giving up a night to talk to like 15 people who are rocking and rolling and detoxing. Half of us are on the nod. We don't even hear, why would you do this? And they would talk about these wonderful things they would do in their social life, like bowling. Kill me now. Or going to a picnic or raising children. or they got a really good job and they're happy at their job. I don't understand this. I don' t want a job. I just want the money. I'm panhandling. I'm doing whatever I need to do to get money to get to the liquor store. The dry goods were behind me. the last couple years of my life was whiskey and Valium. That's what I was doing. If I was up, I was drinking, drunk, in the pursuit of getting money for it was constant and I couldn't get out. And there was a time when every once in a while like maybe at three o'clock in the morning when you're roaming through the streets through Chinatown or Little Italy or the Alphabet City and it's not pretty, it's nice especially back then. I haven't been down that way in 100 years, but it wasn't nice. And I remember thinking, if I was to get killed tonight, run over by a car or shot or stabbed, I'm a John Doe. I have no ID. I got the clothes on my back that had been on me for way too long. I haven'T had a bath in God knows how long. I don'T know the last time I sat down and ate. I'ma John Dole until somebody, they find out, they fine who my family is. And I remember how lonely. In fact, when you're like that, people don't see you anymore. You don't sea the homeless. You just walk by them. I was a homeless guy. You cease to exist. And it was a moment of clarity of how alone I really am. And that was more frightening than walking into a dark alley to do something, to cop something, or going to a bad neighborhood. That was just awful. But I couldn't get out because Whiskey Call, King Alcohol says we need a drink. And I know if I don't drink, I'm going to start to get sick. And if I do not get more pills in me, I am going to go through withdrawals. That is not going to be good. I need to get a drink and worry about that stuff later. I will pay any price tomorrow to seek comfort right now. We can do that as a sober alcoholic. Pay any price to seek comfortable right now because I cannot deal with what happened right now I am not in a good place. I'm not okay with God, I'm okay with me, I'm no okay with you, I am not okay with the world. So they call sex sprees and food sprees and money sprees, and gambling sprees and sprees just to give me some cushion between me and this life that's headed at me like a tsunami. So I'll do this and get a little relief. I'll figure it out tomorrow. I'll worry about the consequences tomorrow. And tomorrow, tomorrow, tomorrow, and tomorrow is today and it's too late. My first drink was euphoric. It was wonderful on the street corner in Brooklyn. You can tell I'm not from Oklahoma, by the way. I speak, bytheway. You've got to hear this accent when I'm in Oklahoma. They need an interpreter. Boy, you talk too fast. First drunk was wonderful. Hanging out on the Street Corner with the older guys, I was listening to rock and roll in Motown, it was cool. It was before MTV and disco ruined everything, it was a cool time for music. And I drank cold 45 beer, got loaded, it was absolutely wonderful. I experienced something I never experienced before, I never wanted to be sober again, ever again. And I chased that elusive feeling into jail, never did prison time but jail a lot, and institutions, and tried to take my life in Staten Island, some fleabag motel one time. wanted out it's it's a rude awakening when for me uh the many times when I came to terms with I ain't getting out this is it there's no way this is the sobriety things ever going to happen for me and I looked at around after my sixth treatment so while I was in my sixth treatment center a total of 36 hours and ran out the door of the damage the awakening of damage I did to my family. Prior to that, I was blind to it. But now I looked at it, oh my God. The abuse I inflicted upon them just in my behavior. And I saw and I says, but I'm never getting sober. Let's just die and get out. They'll mourn me for a while and get on with their life. It's the best way to go. I didn't have the courage. I didn' t have the strength to be courageous. God has given me the ability to have strength to be courageous today. Not me. It doesn' t come from me but to me. And I want it out. And here I am laying in this, now the back of this abandoned building and there were many times that we think, how did I get here? 14 years old, I was a gifted musician. I was the kid in my neighborhood who was going to make it out via music. Lot of hopes, lot of expectations. Then I get drunk and it washed away a lot of that angst I was feeling, a lot of turmoil. My mom committed suicide when I was 14, she was one of us. I was terribly afraid of my dad. Tough guy. And he intimidated the heck out of me. I'd rather not be around him, we never got along. I was being molested from ages eight to 10 about. I drank, it all went away. and here I am at 28 years old in the back of an abandoned building and you come to terms with it I'm a bum, literally a bum you know like a growth scraggly hair on your face hair's oily got that film, you know that film we get when we're out there fingernails are dirty I got construction boots and the right boot's missing a front blood stained soil pants on, I'm cold and sweating at the same time I'm going through withdrawal and I don't even know what I'm dying of alcoholism how dark it is before the dawn because when June 23rd 1988 showed up it was a shift, it was something that happened and we talk about in our 12 steps having had a spiritual awakening as the result of the 12 steps I was under the impression that in the steps I will get enlightened and we do but the pilot light or the catalyst the jump start is in a moment like for me June 23nd 1998 Nate, when I plead to God, please take me from this. I don't want to die. That was the shift. Whether it's Park Avenue or Park Bench, there's a moment. There's a movement that's given to us that we say, I can't do this anymore. I'm willing, and maybe we don't articulate it this way, but the sentiment is I'm going to do anything not to be this way anymore. Prior to that, it's kind of around. Marion talked about it earlier. On one day she gets drunk twice, the next day she's sober. Can't make that happen. But it happens. and so I came to on the floor of this hallway and I go to get up off the floor because I'm shaking I gotta go panhandle Bill says the courage to do battle was not there it's battle it's not a fun time and it wasn't there and I went back down on the floor, I kind of collapsed I always share, I always like to say the feeling was if someone came behind you, hit you behind the knees and your knees buckle and you go down. That's what happened to me. And I began to weep. I'll never forget this. I couldn't stop crying. I don't know where this is coming from. The last time I wept like this was at my mom's funeral, but it's been a bunch of years. When you're out there, we kind of go cold, stoic, no emotion. They die. Our aliveness is deadened. and it happens in Alcoholics Anonymous if I'm consumed with me and I'm in conflict with the world because I'm not getting my way I'm a conflict with you because you're not doing what I want I start to isolate and that brings pain and suffering, I get more consumed with me, my aliveness is deadened because my thought life has taken over I can't hear God, I forfeit every invitation that God sends me I can hear it, I'm In The Wrong Room all the time And it was as if my life passed before me, not so much like that but I remember in these tears thinking about what happened to me. As this promising young kid, a musician, you know things like that, it was a good little ball play, never in trouble and look where I am. My hand wasn't combed, so that was a big issue. That was a problem. Now back then, if you were a man talking to me about God, religion, spirituality, I looked at you as a man, as weak and cowardly. I would look askance at many who claimed to be godly. I would bristle with antagonism, all with men. Because my belief system back then, and they only, by the way, that thought life will create our current reality. My belief system back then was God was for women and children, not for men. Men go do what they do. You have God, you're weak and cowardly. And I would just look at men like that as why? Besides, God is cruel. I was never an atheist but I had really, really a lot of contempt about this powerful God hey, he gave me a dad who was basically a gangster he gave my a mom who committed suicide she was addicted to narcotics, alcohol, mental health what kind of God does this and puts me in a hallway in abandonment? What kind of god is this? I hated God but it was June 23rd 1908 which I found out when I got into my seven treatments and I was oblivious to June or June 23rd that very same God who I mocked and spat at and had contempt for was the very same god I went to in his and gave me mercy please take me from this I don't want to die see we I talk about it here a lot of us talked about but for the grace of God we talk about God's love God's power a lot we should talk about god's mercy quite frankly where my point of view on On Alcoholics Anonymous, yeah, it's God's love. It's God power working through us and our trusted servants. But we've done a lot of things over the years that we should have been closed down for. There's always people who want to take the lead and run AA in the wrong direction. There's Always Controversy in some home groups. It's G-d's mercy that keeps us together. Where else are we going to go? He said, you screwed this up. You don't know where to go. I'll throw more mercy at you. That's what he did for me. this unlimited amount of mercy that we can show for other people with unconditional love I'd screwed up everything if God was a human power he says well I'm done I mean I've given you 55 chances man enough find somebody else God says come on in and we get to that place where desperation screams louder than the ego drunk and sober and that's sincere and we don't need any fancy language because the intent at which I reach God reach out to God is really what counts it means I'm speaking from the soul and not the mind and then suddenly I can be rearranged there's no debate there's not a lot of talk there's there's no qualifications there's I'm not holding on to any rungs and it takes what it takes please take me from this I don't want to die is what I said to God and my dad found me on the street which is a whole nother story and i got a job to do six and seven here but um i without skipping over the details my dad found me in the street and i was like oh my god he found me down the street and i gotta tell you i was in there i don't know ten days two weeks i was thirsty i'm being told to live a certain way But I don't believe anyone else is doing this. And even in recovery, it feels like I'm standing alone and I'm exhausted by trying to get to God. I can feel that in sobriety. I'm exhaustive with the prayer. I'm exausted with the image. I'm exhilarated. I'm exhausting with the meditation. I'm exhaustion with mass. And I feel like I am standing alone and I am tired. When is God going to show up? And then God shows up. And sometimes there is a moment of clarity to realize I went from an abandoned building to be a husband, to be good brother, to be son, to be little business owner. No one's looking for me. I have clean clothes on. I'm self-supporting through my own contributions. I eat throughout the day. I have tons of freedom. Oh, so God's been working for like 35 years because on my best day out there there, I couldn't even tie my own shoelaces without 20 people helping me. And sometimes instead of looking where I want to go, I just start looking to rear view me and how far I've come, how far God has carried me. Because anyone who shares, who tells us they've been the perfect AA member for 20 or 30 years is lying. We fall short. That's why there's step 10 and 11 in our brokenness. I will cause a traffic jam with two people on the road. That's what I do. So I get into Alcoholics Anonymous in 1988, and I find a sponsor in Brooklyn who was not well received in Brooklyn because he came out of the big book, and it was a lot of put the plug in the jug. And he had edges. He didn't care about your feelings. He'd rather speak the truth than lie. That wasn't very popular. You know, drunk come in and they don't want to drink and he goes, just hang in there, we're going to pray for you. He would say, where are you at the steps? Where are you with God? And they didn't like that. I love that. I love the structure. All my sponsors up until my current one are very, very structured and rigid. I needed that because our book says I'm an alcoholic because I'm disciplined. We let God discipline us in a simple way we just outlined. He works two people. It's called a sponsor. That's the type of person I need. It's not for everyone. And we begin a journey through this book. And coming out of the fifth step, there were some things I saw about me which I knew were objectionable. I don't like about me. It's difficult. It's ego deflating when we're doing a fifth step. The spirit loves it. The part that's uncomfortable is the ego. I don't want to go in there and do this again and tell you about how I saw things, how I feel things, but it's necessary. It's like taking an antibiotic. It gets icky. It bothers your stomach. It tastes terrible. You don't take it, you get really sick. So you eat and take the medicine. You feel better in a week. And I do this fifth step. They talk about the hour of quiet time and it's interesting. In the sixth step, there's no promises. In the seventh step, There's no promises, there's some prayers. But I can tell you experientially that the nine-step promises we talk about, the ten-step premises we talk about are not only a result of one, two, three, four, and five, but the work we do in six and seven. Two paragraphs, imagine you remove them. You can't make amends. I mean, you can make amens, but it's all going to be about me. We go out to make amENS after doing the six and seventh in a total surrender to God and some prayers they give us a different person amends is change I'm not the person who committed this harm is not at your door right now that's how I was always told to dress up to go make amends look presentable not like I'm going to commit a felony as soon as this is over yeah have you seen some of the dress codes at our AA meetings lately getting up there and reading how it works with a baseball hat on? I mean, I want to know where the sponsors are. Where's the respect? I was told dress. Unless you happen to be working in, oh God there's Joe Ayo and the men's, those things happen. So I saw a lot of things in step five, especially after that hour quiet time that I got really uncomfortable with. And so step six is this. It says if we can answer to our satisfaction look at step six we're not in there yet and the satisfaction is the stuff in the questions in the promises and the questions i should say in step five basically what bill says at the bottom of page 75 is have you left anything out are the stones properly in place etc have you left anything intentionally pete and if i'm clear at that point i've done the best i can in that our quiet time something interesting bill writes it says we can answer to our satisfaction that's almost the promise he doesn't say check in with the sponsor i'm in this hour quiet time i just come out it's me and him he doesn' t say go to the home group if i can answer it to my own satisfaction it leans on i've had a shift in consciousness here that we can do this right now, just us and God. Prior to that, don't do anything on your own. Right here it says go ahead. If I can answer to my satisfaction, I look at step six. We've emphasized willingness as being indispensable. I can't do without it. It's a necessary ingredient. It says are we now ready to let God remove from us all the things we admitted are objectionable? can he now take them all every one I don't need a bigger God here to do this I just need a smaller me need to be right sized positive affirmations remember where I come from I'm going to practice the opposite all those things sound really good they last about 15 minutes because as agnostic says I lack power the needed power as marshaled by the will is not going to work I need him can he now take them all every one you know I'm walking into home group and I got I have a box of big books in a new coffee pot and I'm working like this the keys to the door dangling from my teeth and I trip and fall and someone says let me help you I'll take some of that off you no no I got it and I stumble another 10 feet and trip andfall this goes on 4 or 5 times and finally 15 guys say can we take that off of you now and what the book is saying, can he now take them all every one? Are you done? Pete, are you done You don't have the power to get this stuff released. Back to step one, that kind of pain and misery, okay. I'm going to try you God. It says if I still cling to something I will not let go. Ask means every time you see ask in a book it's a pray. We ask God to help us be willing. There were some things in there I was afraid to let go of. I had to go and ask God to help me be willing. God, please, I'm holding on. Show me how to be willing here. And one of them was trusting. When I grew up, my dad and my uncles and my dad's friends would tell me in their own way, you don't trust anyone. The only thing you trust is the money in your pocket. I got that drilled into me. And I come and tell you this, just trust everybody. Trust God, clean house, help others, trust the sponsors. No, no, we're going to go to a limit. I don't have this total trust. I didn't even know this guy. And if he's an alcoholic like me, I'm not telling him everything. But pain and misery makes me willing. And how to go-to-God? I'm having a problem with trust. And little by slowly that knot loosened up. And God has brought me to a place, Scripture says we don't cast our pearls before swine. A big book says in a general way what we're like, what happened, what we like now. Some things are only for a small circle of friends. But I'm in a place on most days I don't care if someone's going to sit there and keep a scorecard on me. I can't be bothered. I must be that important to you that you need to spend time talking about me. Have fun. I'm going to the beach. Defects of character shortcomings. Our big book talks about self is self-centered, self-seeking. All the self. Dirt Step says relieve me of the bondage of self. Self is taking the lead on everything. Self lives right up in here. I don't even know what self... Self is driving me to places I shouldn't be, to say things I shouldn' say, to be quiet when I should speak and vice versa. Self owns me. Leave me of the bondage of self. In page 62, it's self, self, self, all self. But I had a great sponsor because we're going to go beyond that, what these defects of character are really talking about. So it's the seven deadly sins. when I'm living in defects I'm seeing through them and that bad vision leads to poor actions I'm hearing through them leads to poorer actions I'm speaking through them and if I can streamline that I'm operating out of the mind and the external world owns me I'm singing through the mind I'm thinking through the mind. I'm hearing through the mind. I'm behaving through the mind rather than the soul. The soul is always right. It knows where to go, what to say, how to do, what to be. That's the soul that's the journey. The journey is kind of like going home to purity honesty and selfishness and love. That is the journey. It's an inward journey but prior to that I am listening to the mind. It's loaded with pride and ego and seven deadly sins. It's the self. I got to take a look at that. Am I willing to have God remove all of it? Not some of it. This isn't about trimming off some dead branches or some leaves that have turned yellow. This is about, once again, getting uprooted. The whole thing needs another spectacular upheaval. If not, I'm just going to reinvent myself and have a little bit more knowledge, information, but I'm still lacking a transformation. What happens is I get a lot of information. I get programmed by my program rather than transformed or revolutionized. How free do I want to be? I go to an ocean with a thimble. I come home with a Thimble full of water, and God says, let me do this for you. It's going to hurt a little, but you'll be placed in good soil. And you realize the importance of our relationship and relationship with other people, but you can't do that until I uproot the whole thing. How free do I want to be? Lots of times we look at 6 and 7. We talk about it, give it some lip service, and it means, oh, I go back to doing me. When no one's around, when adversity hits, I act out of the mind. It's the only thing I know, and I don't trust God. I got a buddy of mine in California. He said something pretty bold. Most of us say we believe in God and trust God. We really don't. Or when I got a pocket full of money and Robert John gives me a couple expensive cigars, God is good. When there's no money and I can't afford to buy a cigar and rent is not going to get paid this month, there's not God. I'm a brat. I look at pride. I'm God. Why do I need to surrender my will and life over the care of God if I'm God? Why do we need to serve in the right thing when I'm got everything goes through me When I wake up in the morning, I know what people at work are gonna do and I'm locking and loading for them. I'm god People should serve me and come to me recognize my great value and alcoholics anonymous how popular I am how popular I think I am. I must be needed by you. You need me. That's God The speaker thanks John and Mary and Bill but forgets Harry and Harry goes, I don't like this meeting. I'm pissed off because he's God, he didn't get recognized, right? You know when a sponsee gets up there and you've worked so hard to create Soberstein the sponsor, he thanks everybody but you. I'm dropping him. He's firing him. Forget it. Ungrateful little you know. I'm God. It's the mother of all seven deadly sins. Out of that begets everything else. Pride. Everything I've read on seven deadly sins defects to character from spiritual people to self-help people to religious people all talk about pride is at the top of the list and here's the thing about pride I don't even know what's working in my life you do anger anger insists I'm right I gossip about people I slander people I critique people and I think I'm justified in doing so I'm angry you know why they're getting attention I'm not I'm not it's a roadblock to peace to love and understanding it makes me rebellious inwardly or outwardly I'm angry I'm marinating a pan about to blow at any minute I go off the handle for no reason inwardly or outward I got a lot of dialogue going on I'm hungry I got pride and anger going on no wonder why I can't feel God I don't know what's going on with me but I'm certainly feeling the effects of it envy I count other people's blessings instead of my own it leads to coveting I want to take what you have I don' t want to work for it I want what you had but I want do what you did gluttony we all know that one my sponsor said it best alcohol goes into the bod says, or you can drink for two dollars. You give me four dollars worth. I'm a gluttony. I eat till I'm sick. I drink till I wind up in detox and go do it again. I am gluttonous. More. When I drank, I got stuck in more. I couldn't get out of the more. I need more. I can do that in sobriety with anything. Greed. I have two loaves of bread under my arm and you're starving. I offer you none. And I drive by the homeless people. I got $150 in my pocket, and I won't give them a $5 bill because it's my money. I don't have time to do that. Greed, I want more. Greedy with my time. The kid's going to graduate elementary school, but I got home group tonight. I'm an alcoholic. Honey, you go see his graduation. No, you Go to the graduation. my son or daughter is begging me to take him to an event, a recital or a concert or a ball game but I can't because I'm working on my 90 meetings in 90 days, that's greed if I'm lucky enough to have children that are still speaking to me and a home to go to lust doesn't only mean infidelity or if I'm going down alleyways to seek some sort of pleasure that I'm embarrassed to tell anyone about? What about lust for power, property, money, prestige, stepping over people to get there? Putting myself out there in a way that's kind of compromising a lot of my integrity because I need to get that. And slothfulness, lazy. I haven't gone for a walk around the block in about 20 years. But I eat a lot. I don't go to a doctor. I knew some cat in California. He was regarded as like a big book thumper guy, sponsoring people. And he knew the book. He knew traditions. He knew content. It was like a walking AA encyclopedia. I knew his sponsor who used to get on him a lot because he was about 200 pounds overweight. and one day I was sitting next to him when he sat down his pants they kind of rolled up a little and his calves were like purple he looked like he was about to explode he was so unhealthy slothful but what about spiritually slothfull I went to a meeting last week I'll go tomorrow I'll start the steps tomorrow I prayed and meditated a while ago. I used to have a sponsor. I'm going to get a sponsor? I don't go to my church, you know. I don' t like the church anyway. I come up with good excuses not to go. By the way, if I speak for myself, I'm not going to church because I don''t like God, then get over the resentment because that will make me drink. I'm making a decision out of a resentment. That never works, but I'm too lazy. You know, if you ask me on a Sunday morning, hey, Pete, can you speak at my group anniversary where is it? It's about a three hour drive. The meeting kicks off at nine o'clock. So I figure I got to get up at around three, get in the car by four to get there. Because it's a group anniversary. About 500 people show up. Oh, I'm going. Can you go to church on Sunday? Really? Where's church? Across the street. Oh I'm busy. I'm slothful. I'M SLOTHFUL WITH THE SPONSOR, my sponsors inventory prayer meditation this is the stuff that devours me so go back to page 76 for a moment and i look at the seven step prayer we talk about prayers and problems there's one big prayer here it looks like the third step prayer it's pretty much an extension of the third step prayer which didn't have an amen but we have an amen here so for now this body of work is completed for For now, I want to emphasize for now, because we're going to go back again, most of us, and do it. But for now we're gonna close up this searching and going out there and repair. We're gonna be out there, if you will. Knocking on doors, making phone calls, and we'll do whatever we have to do to repair the wreckage of our past. So I can kind of slide into this world in a spirit. How can I live now knowing how I lived then? One of the biggest defects is me walking around thinking I don't have any defects. Or worse, I can control them. I'm going to work on my defects. Good luck. I'm working on lust. How's that working out for you? I got 17 dates this week. I don't know. I'm looking forward to it. I'm not working on greed. I put a dollar in the basket and I make $150,000 a year. I'mworking on sloth. You see what's going on sometimes? Lord's Prayer, I'm walking out. I've got to get to the parking lot. I want to get home. Lord's Prayer, not that important. At the end of the meal, I'll walk out. Guys, I go to a lot of conferences, a lot. And I see two things going on. And please excuse me being so bold here. The Lord's prayer, a third of the room walks out. Most of them are youngins. Who's the sponsor? And there's no more line or very little for the speaker. We'll catch him in the parking lot. We'll see him in the lobby. I'm too busy to wait on line and thank him or her for traveling across the country to give an hour of their blood, whether you like to talk or not, or even in a home group, to say thank you for keeping your commitment. Too busy. Where's the sponsor? Slutful, greedy, prideful, all that stuff. and we just roll over and let it happen. Thank the good Lord. I've been to Jimmy's group and my home group. We line up down the center and there's a line to thank the speaker. Back in Brooklyn, I walked out one time, my sponsor ran outside and said, get back inside and thank the Speaker. What do you think this is? And he said it in front of like 50 people. I was just humiliated. Step seven. When ready, we say something like this. It begs the question, when is ready? When am I ready? I mean, first time I did it, when ready, just move on. When is ready. When I'm willing to have God remove from me everything that I admit are objectionable. When I're willing to be ready. When I am willing to let God put his hands on me once more and completely turn me inside out again without reservations. God, you do what you want with me. It's better than what I've done. You carry me this far. It's kind of like when I'm doing four and five, I actually think I'm doin' four and fives. I'm not. I got a pen in my hand, but I'm writing down stuff that would take it to the grave stuff. The pen has become a spiritual translator. It's God workin' through me, and I miss it. By the way, through the whole four and 5 process, or one, two, three, four, and five. I've been staying sober. How is this possible? So I'm gonna go back to that same power and say, I'm ready. Whatever you gotta do. Take me like the wretch I am and fix me. In your way, in your time. None of my business. I'm not in the results business. Quick story, and I'll finish up this prayer and get out of your head. I want to do that. I want change things. I believe if God listens to me and follows my game plan and get the results I want, God exists. And if I don't get the result I want God's angry with me or God doesn't exist. So I listen a certain way. And I think I can manipulate God. If I pray hard enough, he'll do what I want. I can't command the Spirit to do anything. So there was a guy sitting on his couch every day just vegetating every day like during COVID. We just binge-watched everything. And he's laying there day after day after Day after Day rudderless. And one morning he wakes up and the Lord is in front of him. And he wakesup, he sees the Lord, he drops to his knees. Lord, what are you doing? He says, I've been watching you. He's going nowhere. He said, I want you to do something for me. He said anything, Lord. He said tomorrow morning outside your front door I'm gonna put a big boulder. Boulder, yeah. He said I want to push the boulder, can you do that for me? He said yes, Lord, next morning he wakes up, opens up the doors, a big bowl, he puts his sneakers on and starts pushing. God said push the bowlder. So he's pushing and pushing sunup to sundown, nothing. Next day does the same thing. This goes on for months. one day he opens up his eyes and satan is standing in front of me so what are you doing and he says well the lord told me to push the lord you're going to listen to the lord he's cruel he's a jokester he says hey buddy you've been pushing this boulder for over 90 days it hasn't moved an inch god is tricking you once again you know what you're right i'm going back on the couch well you know who shows up the next day the lord and he said well i'm not He says, what are you doing? God sounds like he's from Brooklyn, by the way, if you know where he's closing. He says what are you doing, and he says, Lord, nothing, nothing. You told me to push this boulder. I've been pushing sun up to sun down for like over three months. It hasn't moved an inch, and the Lord replies to him, I told you to push the boulder, I didn't tell you to move the bouldering, that's my job. My job is to use proper use of the will and go to God and say, God, you take me like the wretch I am, I don't care where I'm going, As long as I can walk in your light, I don't care where you send me, what I have to do, what I need to say, because if I'm in your life, I'm not going to be harming anyone. In fact, there's a prayer my wife worked with. You're going to enlarge my territory. You're gonna keep me safe from harm and I'm going to hurt anybody. This I know. So go to work whenever you want. I'm standing here in the raw. It says, my creator, I am now willing you shed of all of me, good and bad. It's a beautiful prayer. i'm not telling god take the good and take the bad and leave the good it's none of my business it's a total third step surrender here my career i am now as i'm on my knees pray that you uh should have all of me good and bad i pray that u now remove from me every single defective character which stands in the way of my usefulness to you and my fellows i'm asking god make me a really good worker for you. Out of that comes something the last number of years now, the importance of relationships. No, it's starting with my relationship with God and my relationship with you. I can't stand when words come out of my mouth talking about John or Bill that I can'T go there. It hurts too much. I'll state the truth but after that it's criticism it's too painful I'm supposed to be an agent for God that's what the book says I'm either all in or I'm not there's no half measures I pray that you now remove from me every single defect a couch stands in the way of usefulness to you my fellows what powerful words grant me strength God as I go out from here getting up off my knees to do your bidding, your bidding your will not mine be done this isn't about me anymore I'm I don't want to sound falsely humble here but I'm not that important my story is my story I want to live my life, not my story it's boring I've seen it a million times I know how it plays out I need to go to work for God not only in Alcoholics Anonymous where I'm supposed to be serving people serving a group in a million different levels but out there too my wife and i when we see homeless people unless we're in harm's way we roll down the window god's given me not a lot of money but enough to get by i have a five dollar bill ten dollar bill i gave a twenty dollar bill the other night i had a beautiful dinner with a bunch of friends super duper expensive had a pocket full of money there's a homeless guy eating out of a thing uh leftover food he pulled out of the garbage I gave him money. That's God's kid. So we see the homeless, we roll down the window, and we say, what's your name? The whole world stops for a moment because they've been recognized. You're a person. You don't look good, you don't sound good, you don'T smell good, but you're still a person, you're STILL attached to God. That didn't come from us, it came to us. And someone there very, very matter-of-fact just slipped them some money. I don't care what they do. It's none of my business. But my job is to not only serve here but out there because that guy might be coming in one day and say he's the panhandler on the bridge, and Pete fed me. I don' t need him to say that, but maybe that meal got him in here. Grant me strength as I go out from here to do your bidding. Then we have a little amen. What a beautiful prayer. I came out of an hour of quiet time going into six and seven and it required more than the seven step prayer my sponsor Mark Houston probably the greatest man I ever met in AA him and Don P just just the way they did stuff they gave you dignity they made you feel you're really important to them and they always talked about the death of self for successful living dying of self before the physical death I never experienced it before and I'm in the y'all quiet time I'm in six and seven okay God I'm ready this is objectionable you know seven step prayer the whole thing and something happened where I start to get really uncomfortable what am I doing where am I going who is this God who is this sponsor? Why is this lineage so important with all this stuff? And I'm starting to feel uncomfortable. And there was a very thick thread that ran through all of it. I do not want to be that guy anymore. I was really uncomfortable, and I called up my sponsor. I broke the hour a quiet time, and I call up Mark. I says, here's what's going on, and his reply was this. It sounds to me like you're having an experience and hung up the phone. He called me back later, and he kind of paralleled it with if Silky would have walked in and told Bill, well, let's talk about this white light. Let's get you medicated. We may not be here. Mark knew something was happening, and I'm going to leave this guy alone. But what was happening to me was to some degree everything that I was up until that point was falling away, shedding a very thick skin and it hurt and it was uncomfortable. I was being challenged about everything. My ex-wife was on a four day drunk run and wasn't home. This was a Saturday. On Sunday she came in in the afternoon in the same clothes, reeking. Now, prior to that there would have been an argument in that house and I knew the marriage was over. There was gonna be an argument, my manhood was at stake. I had to make a stand here. Staying or leaving, there had to be a fight. And when she walked in the door, I just looked at her with pity. I was hurt, I knew this was the final, We got divorced a short time later. It was over. But I said, this is what we do. We ruin marriages. We ruin relationships. We ruin everything when we're in the grip of the grapes. And I had pity for her. Wasn't going to reconcile at this point. It was not nowhere near that anymore. It's time to move on. And God saved me from me. I just looked at it as he would look at her I've never been the same not better than anyone but I this inner condition has never been the same. Six and seven we have prayers in six and seven but those prayers lead to revelations, lead to this revolution to this transformation allowing me, what we're going to talk about in a little bit walking into nine a changed person where those amends are now authentic and they touch the hearts of somebody else that's all I got, peace