The Higher Power Sized Hole – FOTS Step 11 Workshop – Part 4 of 25 – Zena S.

hard to come sit in my seat. My name is Zena and I am an alcoholic. Oh, my goodness. Thank you so very much. It is such a huge honor to be asked to share anywhere about my experience, strength and hope. And it is truly an honor to me to be able to share with you guys. So thank you so much for giving me just a little bit of your time um i i am so i i have a little dog he's my protector he only about this big literally every car that drives down the street she's gonna bark so i apologize in advance for her great protection you know um god's covering is a lot more quieter than hers but then again his power is much greater so um that's just my disclaimer you know anytime I share my experience strength and hope I am quite comfortable with allowing God to do whatever he's going to do since I finally finally finally after years and years and years of attempting not to I finally understand that I don't get to choose about that anyway. And so to be able to relax and just settle into whatever God is going to share with you through me, I get excited about. However, my conversations with Teresa this week got me a little apprehensive. I was like, who are these people? Are these like your average alcoholics you know are they like extraordinary alcoholics these are regular drugs right you know so um my sobriety date is 9-2-88 and um and i was introduced to this information through a different fellowship however my experience with the 12 steps does come from the big book of Alcoholics Anonymous. I'm very big on respecting the house that I am in. I understand that I'm in an alcoholic house, and I pray that because my story is not always alcoholic-specific, that you will be patient with me should I not be able to speak it in that way. luckily for me we talked about step 11 and in step 11 uh they don't care what substance it is it's like in step let do you know god or not that's the question do you Know God or no that's the question you know um I do want to qualify just a little bit to let you know I didn't show up like this with my hair combed and my clothes clean on time and speaking in complete synthesis when I made it to the detox unit in Pomona, California in September of 1988. I was caught by surprise by the reflection in the mirror that I saw because it was the first time I had disrobed in front of a mirror. And I can't say when, I don't know if it was days, weeks or months. I know it wasn't days, that's not true. It wasn't day. It absolutely had not been days. It had to have been either weeks or month that I had disrobed completely in front of a mirror or taken a shower. And so, you know, the gasp at the reflection in the mirror was quite surprising. I did not recognize my own reflection. I was taken aback by the condition I had done to the temple that today I call my body. and all I could do is I collapsed in tears at what I had done to myself and also in confusion because I didn't know how I had done that nor did I know did I see it coming on there was absolutely no clue to the condition and I was gray from dehydration and ash and I had no hair I was three shades darker and the disease of alcoholism was very very apparent on my physical self. And that was just an inkling of what had occurred at the spiritual level. I was emotionally and mentally and physically bankrupt and at a loss. But I set out on this road of recovery, and I committed to giving it all that I had available initially to prove that it didn't work. That was my first motivation. It's like, you guys are tripping. This don't really work like y'all say it do. Because I was raised with a God of my understanding. It was just a little bit skewed because my grandmother was a Christian minister. My father was a Muslim minister and those two religions don't always mix. But they gave me a great base for who I am today. Because today I don't hold judgment on what religion you practice. um do you know i go back to my original question do you know god or not and i'm gonna say that a lot do you know god at all um and for those of you who don't understand my little my little uh slang is yes or no just in case because you never know who's listening you know I don't want nobody to be left behind uh do you know god yes or no so you know um uh step 11 saw through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with god as we understood him praying only for knowledge of his will for us and the power to carry that out there came a time in my recovery where um because my life was always chaotic i have five adult children today but when i first got sober the youngest was two and the oldest was 12, three girls and two boys. And I was a single parent. So my life was always chaotic. And I came in here with a lot of the representation of low self-esteem and low self-worth, not really valuing who I am as an individual or human being very much. But the day came and I can't remember when, I don't know if it was at 10 years, 12 years, 15 years, it was before 20 years. But somewhere in the first 20 years, the day came where I was sitting in my home and life was quiet. Life was so quiet that the silence was deafening. And I thought that I was having some kind of strange mental breakdown, which by the way, I did have in recovery, but that's not this meeting. If you'd like to know more about that, we can talk at another time. But on this day, I called one of my girlfriends that are in my support system, get a support system before you need it because when you need It, you won't get it. And so luckily for me, I had a support System in place and on this data, I thought I was losing my mind because I thought i was hearing voices in that silence. I called One of the girlfriends and I said, you know, I think something's wrong. She's like what's going on? And I was like nothing, she was like, well, what are you feeling? I was like nothing. She was like well is anything happening? I said no. She's like what's in your environment? I said nothing. She said Zena, I think that's peace. I had never experienced quiet that I can remember at any point and so it was quite disturbing to be in an environment where there was no drama, no chaos, no trauma, no screaming, no alcohol, no parties, no kids. It was quiet. And so we laughed and laughed and laugh because from the moment she said it, I was like, ah, I bet this is peace. If you don't have a reference, you don'T have a reference, and you're not going to know until you know. And I had been working these steps for a number of years at that point but it had never been that freaking quiet man and I really thought I wanted to cry but I didn't have any tears so I thought there was something very wrong and it was my experience with my first experience with peace um and I determined at the end of the day I didn'T like peace it was too doggone quiet who wants to be this that's like no I you know what this is unsettling I don'T want to be THIS freaking peaceful can I get something going on You know, anyway, so that was my first experience with peace. I cannot remember the first time that it occurred to me that the 11th step came in two parts. Well, it came in multiple parts. I always resonated with the part that says sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God. And even though the sentence continues, you know, the step continues from there. That's always where I stop. So I was always in this seeking place. I was almost looking for something, you know? I knew I had the Muslim God my father talked about, the Christian God my grandmother talked about. I had done, you know, amateur study on metaphysics and things like that. I had done a little bit of yoga. I have done a a little bit of martial arts, which is a religion all in itself. You know, I had done this seeking process where I was looking and looking and working, you know, for a God to understand. And it hit me like a ton of bricks, probably in book study one day when it was quiet and someone was reading it and and it and it occurred to me praying only for knowledge of his will for us and the power to carry that out I was like you know I keep looking outside of myself I have this God-sized hole in my gut that I keep trying to fill with everything but God you know I want to fill it with when I when I was drinking I tried to fill It with alcohol and that worked until it didn't. And when it didn t, I found you guys and when I found you guys, I understood I couldn t drink anymore but I still didn t know what to fill my God-sized hole with. I didn t even understand that it was a God- sized hole. I just knew that there was an emptiness that I experienced all the time with consistency and I didn't know how to offset that. All the steps didn t seem to address it. Working with others didn t seemed to address it. Being of service didn't seem to address it. These things would set it to the side momentarily, but I would never have a consistent feeling of just being at peace or stable, so to speak, is what I've learned to call it now. As I traveled through this thing called recovery, I've tried filling it with food. I've tried filling it with sex. I tried filling it with all the altruistic activity of helping others and I've come to know that that can be codependent which is a whole another conversation that we don't have to talk about here but that's what it wound up in me because my alcoholic mind will address everything that I engage in alcoholically so anything that I get into will work that worked I will continue to try to feed off of that and get that thing to keep working over and over and over again because I for a very long time did not know I was trying to fill a God sized hole with all these other things in that God sized space nothing can fill it but God that's it that's all there's no other way around that and so for anyone who's not who is not tapped into power greater than yourself or understanding of a God don't trip just hold your seat. Hold your seat, he got you covered whether you know who he is or not, so don't trip, just hold yourself, hold tight, don't drink no matter what, but when I was able to label that emptiness as a God-sized hole, I began to understand God from a totally different mindset, from a totally different perspective. And it adjusted the way that I did my seeking. I didn't seek outside myself anymore. I began to find practices that would, that could be conducted just me by myself in the art of being still, which was new. Even in recovery, It was new to be still because racing thoughts were habitual for me. If I didn't have racing thoughts, I thought I was going crazy. So it took some adjustment to get accustomed to having my brain slow down, to having My heart rate slow down to having moments where there is absolutely nothing going on and knowing that everything is good. You know, that was the first knowledge that I had when Teresa asked me about the topic. The reason why I wanted to talk about knowledge and power is because it took some years of undoing who I had become through all of my alcoholic behavior before, during, and after that first drink. It took some undoing of the things that I had put in place trying to fill that God-sized hole with everything except God, and so just knowing when I look to the side, I got my book over here, so I'm not distracted, but just knowing his will. Finally, when I heard the rest of the steps. It's so weird how the brain will only resonate with pieces and parts of information. I can only imagine the secrets my brain is holding from me right now, just from all the things I've discovered it was holding from before. It was like, you weren't going to tell me? You're just going to leave me out here all exposed without no knowledge? But okay, again, a whole nother story that we can have another time. But, you know, when I took that second half, because I had spent years with the first half, I took That second half. And I began to just pray for knowledge. It wasn't even God's will. It was just knowledge because I have been operating from places of ignorance. I was surprised to find out that my emptiness was a God sized hole. And I was surprised that I was a full-blown grown adult with almost grown kids, several exes and a whole bunch of living before that information became a part of my awareness. It's like, well, dang, how long I got to live? Please don't let me die before I find out the rest that's going to allow me to live a life of peace and serenity. Anyway, me and my God, I love him to death because he let me just talk to him from who I am. And I'd be like, bruh, what's up with what's going on right now? I am not happy. Do you know, that's how me and God get down. We get down like that because you know what? He's my friend today. And today our friendship is solid and we can talk just natural like that. But when I was nurturing that friendship, my prayer life was just about knowledge. You know, help me with my awareness. Help me to just understand what I'm coming into the awareness of and help me not beat up on myself for not being aware of it prior to the moment that I discovered it. And then I went from there to having knowledge of his will for me. And you know, that was a process of me thinking, you know do I make this decision? Do I make that decision? Is Is this God's will? Is this Scott's will or these voices I hear in my head? Is that me? Is that God? Is that my mother? Is that all the conversations y'all? I'm telling you, schizophrenia is like rampant in my existence. It's like I look regular, but it's a gang of people sitting in this chair only dressed in my clothes and my face right now in front of y'al. But it's okay because I've learned to be still. I tell everybody, take a seat. We had a meeting. Don't say nothing. We got things to do. But, you know, it was through that process of asking, which is what my prayer is, me asking God to please help me in one area or another, whether it's understanding, discovery, you know whatever um it was in that process of asking you know when i would hear these various conversations i learned to say okay god is that you is that me or is that them you know as strangely enough there would always be indicators to uh to let me know um that it was him and when it wasn't him because generally i used to think that if it was scriptural you know if it's in the bible then that must be him you know because that's what the christian religion will tell you if you want to know if the thought you're thinking is a god thought check it against the word of god well what about people who are not christians do god not talk to them too you know that that's the question AA taught me to ask. You can't tell me that my only verification is biblical when I know a gang of God-fearing people who are not Christians, so y'all gotta come. I was like, thank you for sharing that. Who do I get my answers from? Because these people are trying to steer me in the wrong direction. Did you hear what they said? He's like, I heard them, Zena. You're good. Let's just keep you and me. I'm like, okay. So what I discovered, and this is my own, thank you, this is my own. I created this idea for myself because it works for me. The will of God in my life is anything I want that is good, that is right, that ist loving, that is kind that is tolerant and and and whatever that thing is uh be it in the physical realm or the spiritual realm the verbal realm whether it's just me to myself or me with others or me with the world um god will bless it if i if the big book says i can go anywhere that a free man can go if my motives are right. God's will will always be whatever my right motive is trying to do, even if I do it in the wrong way because that's all I know. For me, God is patient with me getting an understanding because what I discovered y'all and I'm gonna just get close because I think it's kind of like a secret. What I discovered is we in this until death. And when I get it absolutely perfect, I'm gonna lay on down because I'm going to be done. So if this is a lifetime situation, why I'm in a hurry to know all the answers today. Give yourself a break. It ain't gotta be all today. You got till the day you die to get it right. And as long as you keep trying from now till the date you die, then you end the game and you batter up, batter up. We got it. God is not tripping. At least that's what it is for me. And then to go on, when I was able to understand that the book was so freeing because it gave me an opportunity to create my own conception, the conception that works not just with me, but it works with me and my personality. It works with me in all the voices it works with me and all of my insecurities it works with me it works when who I am and how I'm twisted my conception works with me because I'm not always normal and how clean was it for me when I finally was okay with people who are normal, are not normal. I was like, oh, okay, I can relax. So that's the knowledge of his will for me and the power to carry that out. I know I was at least 15 years over before it occurred to me that knowledge was not enough. I thought since I had acquired this grand, you know, altruistic behavior, you knows, to go to God for the knowledge of his will for me, and then I would self-will myself the power to carry the stuff out. And it's like, imagine having the heart for god to do the right thing from a place of love kindness and tolerance for the people that you encounter and you keep getting punched or you keep being sucker punched or you keeps getting knocked off your rocker or you keeping accused of having a different motive when that's not your motive you know and and the rest is that the knife step uh did very well for keeping me from causing harm, because I do not like having to go and say sorry, especially to people who have hurt me. But I've done all that work, and so I'm very quick to hold my tongue. But I couldn't understand why I kept being, not attacked, but I kept having poor outcomes when it came to me doing what I considered to be the right thing. And I couldn't figure out why are my outcomes not as beautiful as my motivation? Why don't I see the evidence of everything that I'm desiring to give? And it occurred to me because I was operating from my own personal power. I would access God for the knowledge, but I forgot to ask him for the power to carry it out. It's like, oh, wait. Oh, that's still self-will run riot. That one went over my head, hit the wall and had to come back for me to get it. And so when Teresa asked me about my topic, knowledge and power are so big to me because today I understand that asking for the knowledge of God's will for me is an incomplete prayer until I finish my sentence and ask for the power to carry it out. Because it's a dangerous thing to have an alcoholic with substantial time have the knowledge of God's will, and then they set out on their own self-power to carry out God's Will. And how demanding can we be when people don't want to surrender to the God's will? We keep telling them that I'm trying to expose. Don't you know I'm time to give you God's real right? Why are you fighting so hard? It's like trying to force the little old lady across the street when all of her business is on the side she's standing on. And, you know, it's like and she's screaming, you don't help. Help. I'm being kidnapped, and we're like, quit fighting, lady. I'm trying to help you. I'm trynna help you, lady." It's the same concept. You get her across the street just to find out, oh, you weren't trying to come here? My bad. I was trying to be altruistic with you. I was just trying to help, you know. But so having the power to carry out God's will sometimes means standing down and doing nothing when I think I have the answer. And if I didn't learn that nowhere, I learned that with five grown kids of an alcoholic, me, because my five adult children who were raised by me, who did not have the benefit of being taken by child services and put into a healthy environment, they stuck it out they were in my disease with me um from beginning to the end and um and their personalities display that today but um they're just now starting to get to the side of me that was part of recovery because for a long time all they looked like was the alcoholic me um but when When knowing that God is in charge, and even though I have the answer but no one has asked for my assistance, reminding my ego that it doesn't get to bulldoze people with solutions they have not requested becomes the work of the 11th step for me. being able to sit still in all my knowing and understand that it's God power that will make this different, right, better or other than what I'm looking at. Not Xena power. But being able to adopt that behavior, that mindset, that way of life, that practice of prayer and meditation, prayer, me talking to God, asking God questions, sharing my fears with God, sharing all of my challenges with God. All of the, my concerns, all of everything I have going on. And then my meditation of being quiet, being still, listening for his voice, listening for indicators of the direction he would prefer I go into. It is a dialogue for me and God in the 11th step. It is not a monologue. It's not a Monologue from me to God and it's not A Monologue From God to Me. It is A Dialogue. we nurture our relationship. And, and, and I had to understand that I wanted to know, I want, I wanted zu know God. I wanted tu know the personality of God for myself. and I used to say and I wanted God to know me today I understand the arrogance of that idea you know God knew me before I got here he knew me already and so today my desire is that I know the personality of God, and I know that God knows me. And that is the up level of the 11th step for me. It's how I continue in the practice of enlarging on my spiritual life. And knowing that it's imperative that I continue to increase that activity as the years go on, because the longer I stay sober, the farther away from the last one that I get, which diminishes the level of desperation, which was a great motivating factor at the beginning. um and so today being this distance from the last one it's imperative that i increase enlarge and improve on my spiritual relationship with god because just like um i've been sober in two weeks on september 2nd i will have 32 years and i don't say if it be god's will it is God's will. It is not God's Will that I be drunk. It's God's will that I'll be sober. So if I cooperate with God from now until September 2, I will have 32 years. That's it. But with the amount of with 32 years between me and my last, my last pick up. The level of desperation, because also I've had a number of years in a row where I experienced peace and joy and stability. I experienced a sense of calm and chaos. I am not, I can't say I'm not affected by what's going on, but I am NOT disturbed to the point of disruption and my emotional regulation by what's going on in the world today. My level of peace has been consistent in our current climate in the world today, and that's because of the work that I've done in this book. It's also because as the years go by, I continue to enlarge upon my spiritual life. And what that looks like in practical activity is I don't just read the big book. I don'T JUST READ THE BIBLE. I DON'T JUST read the Quran. I READ OTHER SPIRITUAL BOOKS. BUT I ALSO ASK, IN WHAT WAYS, GOD, CAN I UPLEVEL OUR RELATIONSHIP? AND TO PUT THIS IN LAMENT'S TURN, if God were my man I'd be like how we keep it sexy after 32 years what we got to do different you know do I need to put on lingerie so you still be attracted to me well you know do I have to put a different purpose because I don't want my man to get bored same thing I don' t want God getting bored with me I don''t want to be bored with God and I treat it the same way. You know, just like if he were my man, I would want to keep things new and exciting between us in our relationship. Same thing with God. I want my relationship with God to be new and exciting and fresh. I don't want God to go around going, yeah, that's Zena. Yeah, that is my woman yeah okay I'm God and this is this is Zena yeah I want God to be like you know I'm God and THIS is my woman Zena I want her to be excited that I am who I am in the way that I walk the earth you know um and so um right now I am and and I have um I have an accountability partner are doing this with me because I've learned that support always makes things better. But I am reading A Course in Miracles. I don't know if you guys are familiar with that particular book. It's not the big book, but it does enlarge my spiritual life. So she's my accountability partner with that. My sponsor who reads a number of different authors has me reading this other book, Hind's Feet to High Places. And it's about a little girl named Much Afraid who comes from the valley of fearings, you know, I'm like, dang, you know, and she's trying to get to the mountain high, but she has a club foot in a dead eye. And it's like, you know, how do I go? She has to go through the she has to go to the land of beautiful to get there. And you must be beautiful to enter. But you know she's like I can't go with this club foot and this ugly eye and ask the shepherd who I identify as God, you know, How do I get there? And he's like you know keep trust me. You have to trust me I can go with you because I move too fast. I will give you two comforters. The comforter God gave her was suffering and sorrow. This book is ridiculous, but if that is not my life as a freaking alcoholic, I don't know what is. It's like suffering and sorrel taught me humility. It taught me to be humble. It told me to patient. It talked me to just like, wait a minute, you know, suffering and sorry may not be comfortable, but they are such great teachers. And if I'm patient in it, I can get through it with grace. You know, if I just, it's like, oh, is this the path that you would have me walk? Okay, I'm a grasshole of the hands of suffering and sorrow. My mom just died. My mom died in December. My mother had Alzheimer's for six years, and I watched her deteriorate for that period of time, and it's, like, there's a picture of me the day before she went into the hospital that last time, of which she never came out. There's a figure. I'm sitting on her couch with her. And she's just leaning, she's leaning on me and she's rocking from side to side. And my brother is sitting across and I'm looking at her and her words are garbled now. So she can talk still and she can convey a message, but she can't really communicate because her brain is deteriorated just to that degree. And I look up to my brother and I said, do you know that this is it? God is not going to cause her to suffer. He's only held her here this long so that you and I have an opportunity to get our stuff together, so that we can lay her down with respect and integrity the way she lived without having to do fish dinners and GoFundMe pages. And so now that we've got our stuff altogether and we're, are you ready? And my brother was like, no, man, I'm not ready. I'm like, are you ready? Cause she's tired. She's done. She's down. There's no more left in her. And she's not who we know. And sure enough, she was only, she was on down for 14 days in the hospital, but that 14 day, they had her on a respite respirator and they were going to track her. And I said, no, we're going to do hospice and get her ready. And I have planned this big family party in the ICU. you my mother hated lots of people in loud noises but I was like me and my kids and my brother we was gonna do this big party we had planned it for 12 o'clock we were gonna take her off the ventilator they were gonna make her comfortable and we were just gonna stay until the end at four o'clock that morning they called those like it's done and all I could think of is my mother said did not tell you I don't want no damn party I know you're not bringing all these people you know what? I'm out of here. I told you don't be bringing all these people. And as much as it hurt, because my mother was my heart, I mean, that was my dog. As much as they hurt, I could not, I was like, when they called, I said, hello. And they said, Ms. Defter, I says, she's gone, isn't she? And then she said, yeah. I said did she just leave? They's like, yes. Me and my son are on our way. I hung up the phone, and I'm like, all right, ma, you win. You win. My bad. I thought we was having a party she was like no I said no I'm done you know but only only with the peace of God was I able to to sustain in that sorrow in that suffering and have joy unspeakable to know that she was free and we were free and what she did is she lived her life in a way that made sure that we were good from now on, me, my brother, and my children. Not even financially, but she equipped us with the tools and the talents and the know-how to get things done and handle our business. And so if you want to know what all this has to do with step 11, this is my elevation. It started right here with me seeking through prayer, talking to God, meditation, listening to God to improve my conscious contact with God as I began to understand him, which I understand him as one who has me covered no matter what I think, no matter how much I feel and no matter when it looked like on the outside. I am covered. I am good. Even when it hurts, I am cover. I am a good. When I don't like what I'm looking at in my life, I begin to say out loud so my ears can hear, so my molecules can understand. I trust God. I don' t care. I trust god. I don''t care what it look like. I don ''t care with the people say. You''re not going to make me not trust god? You''r not going make me hate? You'' re not going me operate from a place that''s anything less than love? You'''re not gonna force me to be living in fear? I will not. God has brought me too far. He has done too much. He has reconstructed my entire being to the place where I get to stand up, suit up, show up, get it done, get It done to the best of my ability and oh by the way impact lives while It's getting done so that not just my life is changed but your life is change and the people that encounter you their lives are changed and the people got encountered them their life is changed there's a ripple effect by the 11th step that i have lived what god has done with me and i am grateful beyond description there are no english words in the dictionary to express the level of gratitude that i live and walk with and how i engage with others i just had to take a moment i didn't mean to go to church all y'all but it's like that just hit me um that's my understanding though and and my prayers are very very simple i no longer pray god give me the house give me a car get you know fix my kids you know get my brother right um and that's not my prayers anymore because i do not know if the journey of struggle that my kids and my brothers have to walk is not part of their blessed future. So why would I pray them out of their experience that could be molding them for who God knows they're going to be that I don't? So my prayers are very simple. All I ask is, what is your will in the moment that I'm standing in? Because that's the only place I have access to God in my present, right where I'm standing. The real estate I own is the real estate. I'm spending on this. It does all. If I can keep my focus keyed in on where I am standing, I will always have access to God at the time that I need them because I only really, really need them in the moment I'm staying there. What's going to happen tomorrow? What used to happen yesterday no longer matters. It does not matter. I can only affect change right here, right now. So my only prayer is knowledge for his will for me in the moment I'm standing in and the power to carry that out in the moment I'M standing in. And so my question, my indicators, because sometimes I can't decipher because there's so many people talking in my head. So in those moments when I can'T decipher the voices, I ask for indicators. What are the indicators, and then I raise up. I look around, and I see what's around me. You know, there may be a billboard. There may be a license plate. There maybe a commercial on TV, and if I'm keyed in the moment I'm standing in, I will hear an indicator of the best course of action to take for the moment I'm standing in. Living like that, living like that has gotten me through this pandemic, this social injustice, this political chaos. And I released my job March 9th. I had a five city tour planned. I launched a new business this year And I was, you know, I packed up my show and I was taking it on the road. And I released my job and we had a very emotional goodbye. You know, they made cake and they hugged me and, you know, we cried and I said goodbye to them. I gave them all their stuff. They said goodbye TO me and gave me the rest of my stuff. And I came home and I Was like, okay, mom, I'm going to do this. I finally have the courage. And a week later, they shut down the world. I was like, whoa. I was, like, God, you knew that was coming, right? You wasn't going to tell me? I can at least keep my little paycheck until we got through this. God was, Like, no, you would have never done it. I'm, like. Okay, I see what you did there. I see. I see What you did. But that's all right. That's all Right. If you got me, then you're going to have to have me because I got nothing else now. and God has carried I've made more money in these last five six months than I made all last year I haven't even got clients yet, I got three clients I just started I trust God over anything I may think and anything y'all may say because my experience with the 11 step is that God is more reliable than anything else I've ever been introduced to and if I stick to it all our lives will change because everything i do i don't just do for me i do because i am called to the purpose my feet have called been called to the carpet um on behalf of everyone that comes into my path where am i adding time you guys it's about time and on a note perfect okay uh see how god did that because i don't have no clock i don't know nothing and that's how reliable he is it's like i ain't gotta keep up with nothing because god got it he said he know it but in closing i just want to say i am so appreciative I was a little nervous, but I don't get to not show up ever. I don'T ever get to NOT show up and and and the one thing I'm clear on is when I do show up in whatever condition I'm in when I show up the only thing people see when they when they when their eyes land on me is the covering of God and what he has done in my life. And so you, too, can have that experience. Work the steps. Don't do it alone. Trust God. It works. Thank you so much for letting me share. Mr. Reggie White, come on up, please. thank you Ali Reggie White I'm an alcoholic Zena my god sweetheart you really brought it today I you know I have just I was moved by that I'm upset with you because now I gotta change some of my actions based on some of the things you said my good as usual and that's one of the big things we miss about now our workshop is wonderful god is good we are on zoom we're still here we get ralph and ronnie every week because we're on zoom but one of the things we missed what you guys don't know is xena getting up in her standing on her feet with her hand up and see that's when xena's about to get on one like she was on right now and xena i only have one more thing to say to you make sure this workshop that you treat us like you treat god and that you want us not to get bored and i expect to see you when we get back you're gonna be in there and your best teddy or something thanks for letting me share thank you reggie next person mr strange come on up please leon strange come one up all right i'm muted now You're good now, buddy. Okay, my name is Leon. I'm a strange alcoholic. I'm going to keep this real short. Zena, thank you for being a part of my life. And thank you for bringing what I needed here today. I watched you when you came in. You've been a partof my life since you came here, but you brought me what I need to hear today. Thank you. Thank you, Leon. Just a reminder that how you find the recordings, people have been asking me, it's on the Fellowship of the Spirit Toronto Facebook page. It is a private page. You can't find it on Facebook. You have to know a member to invite you. So please find a member to invite your friends. If you don't know anyone, I left my first and last name. You can add me on Facebook, thank you. Next person, my brother Andrew, come on up, please. My name is Andrew. I'm an alcoholic from Markham, Ontario. Zeno. Wow. Thank you. It wasn't an honest share. It was a pure message. It was just pure spirit just coming through. And I thank you for that. And as always, I almost didn't make it here tonight. But my God made sure that I was here. You mentioned something. I do have a question. You mentioned you read this book, A Course in Miracles. My question is, is it something you do on your own or do you do with a group of people? Because I find it a very heavy book to do on my own. With that, thank you for being here. Thank you for your share. Go ahead, Zina. Thank you so much for your question and thank you for listening. I've attempted to do the book alone since 2006, and it did not work. I'm in Chapter 8 now. I have one accountability partner. She and I read the text, and we read the exercises throughout the week, and we have a conversation on Monday mornings about our takeaways from what we've just experienced and we we hold each other to get it done we're committed to it so and i've been trying since 2006 so i would not try it alone no thank you for the question thank you as you know please just stay unmuted okay mr ralph white come you guys finally let me unmute my name is ralph white i'm an alcoholic oh my god xena you uh whoo you moved me i've been on this entire series i don't know if i missed maybe one or two people and i since i was one of the people that was on here theresa ali everybody else i don't want to disregard anybody but i have enjoyed you as much as anybody doing this 11 step um you brought an insight and and um just fresh perspectives and a power today i was looking at people and i just felt you uh i have a question uh and it's not specifically 11 step but i know it has to go hand in hand wanted you to comment a little bit on um the effect of nine step amends on taking you to 11 step uh so my my very first ninth step was of course field it was so so many amends that i had to make and and of quite a few of those amends were to people who had harmed me one was to a rapist and um i never want to put myself in the position to have to apologize to my rapist again it's like wow I I I it took me a it took me a very long time to understand my responsibility in in that what part I played what I discovered is that even though I didn't play a part in the rape itself what I did is I used the rape as as motivation to be unhealthy going forward for many many many years and I didn't get free from that behavior until I made that amends and my sponsor and I worked together on how to get that done. But I have had to make an amends to people who thought they were right, and I believe that they were wrong. But in the effort of cleaning my side of the street, I did what I needed to do. And just holding my tongue, step 11, hold my tongue. It keep me from saying a gang of stuff that otherwise I would have to come back and say sorry about to people who I be thinking don't deserve it. You know, the committee that be talking in my head, be like, you ain't got to say nothing to them. You ain't gotta, you know they was wrong. They know they were wrong. Zena, hold your tongue. I let God fight my battles. That's what 11 Step does for me and how it's related tonight for me. I hope that, does that answer your question? Okay, thank you. Thank you Ralph, thank you Zena. Sherry would you come on up please? Hi my name is Sherry and I'm an addict and alcoholic and it is by no mistake that Zena is my sponsor oh my god i have big love for you um Zena is somebody who you know i know you heard in her share that she does operate from personal power and, you know, from God's direction. And I love how the God in you has shined on the God. You know, I relate to you about, you Know, all the different voices in your head. You Know, because I have that same thing, the voices in my head that judge me so fucking harshly, and nobody sees me like that. You Now, and you have loved me, like back to life. And I'm so fucking grateful um for you I was too you know looking at Ralph and you know just the people that related to you and I felt you in my spirit and I'm så glad that I was able to come to this meeting yes you know it's like I'm going through some stuff right now that's tough but you know I love how you've let me know and I also believe that you know God has recovered you know and i get to trust him always no matter what and he's gonna bring me through this like he brought me through everything else and i'm gonna come through sober and better and i'd get to do it with integrity and grace and i appreciate you know the example that you've made for just that you know i'm sober today by the grace of god if you're here and you knew please stay thank you so much i love you thank you sherry i love me i love so much jesus thank you for being here Sherry. By the way, there's some people private messaging me. I think you want to message everyone in some of these messages. Please change the setting to everyone so everyone can see those beautiful messages. My sister Lana. I can't see. You know that, right? I keep trying to see. I can't read. Hi, everyone. I'm Lana and I'm an alcoholic. And Dina, very powerful message. identified a lot with what you shared and uh and i was just thinking about how how uh beautiful um you shared your message it was it was very touching and and i know for myself that um uh you and i have the same amount of time and i Know for myself as the years have gone by um the relationship with i have that i have with my higher power has changed tremendously you know And knowing that I can call on my higher power whenever, you know. And I know I've been away with my daughters and my grandchildren on vacation. And the girls were butting heads. And, you Know, I wanted to fix it. But I knew not to. I knew Not to jump in the middle. You know, just keep your mouth shut. And this morning, you Now, when I was doing my prayers, it came to me you know how I was born into an imperfect world and I'm gonna leave here in a perfect world right and my kids are who they are and they are the best people they can be you know and it made the whole the whole dynamic of my day change you know so I know the the importance of prayer meditation you know I can I can pray for something right but knowing that the meditation part is when i get the message from god but sometimes you know i want the message and me i just prayed about it let's let's get it done right but you said it so perfectly you know if i can just keep my mouth shut and and just do do what i'm supposed to do and the message will come i will get that message but i have to be patient. And that, of course, is not my best, you know, but I practice it as best I can. Zena, phenomenal woman. Thank you so much for your share. God bless. Thank you, Lana. Marlene, I believe is from Ohio. Come on up, please. Hi, Marlene. Alcoholic. Zena. My favorite show is Zena the Princess Warrior. and I felt that exuding from you, warrior girl. I did have not a question but a statement. As I was listening to you, I heard a lot of 12-step, having had a spiritual awakening as a result of these steps. And I was wondering if there's new people. I don't know if new people are here or not. Do you think that the 11th step that's written in the big book of Alcoholics Anonymous, specifically on page, I was just reading it, page 85, do you think that was your guide in terms of helping new people understand the process? Because I really felt the 12th step with you, which means that there is this comprehension of the steps and the work. um I've been working the steps consistently throughout my entire recovery I'm in a workshop that goes 1 through 12 um uh page by page line by line and and and that particular that one meeting when I attend that workshop I am going through the steps for myself I'm not there to help nobody I'm not there to get nobody straight. No, it's about me on that day. And that is how I keep refreshing the information for myself. I sponsor from my experience, my experience with the 12 Steps, my experience as it has evolved over the years, my experience As It Relates, not just with the12 Steps but with everything that has been a part of my recovery and it is God directed. I would not be able to, nor would I have the willingness to do it were it not God directed, so yes, I think is the answer to your question about do I use this information on page 85? I use all of them. It all encompasses. I will say this if I can. My very first sponsor told me when i finished step one and started step two i needed to get a newcomer and take them through step one quit playing uh people started getting loaded and i said i'm getting people high or i'm giving people drunk people are not staying sober what do i do and and the question was are you still sober because you don't have the power to get anyone else drunk And so, you know, you do a step, you share a step. You do a Step, you Share a Step. Will it be perfect? Probably not. When you do all 12 steps, will it be perfect? Probably not! Do what you can when you can, why you can, because tomorrow's not promised. That's all. Thank you, Mike. David E. Come on up, please. David Alcoholic I just want to say Zena Thank you for sharing I have known you For 27 years I got lost A little bit And Today you just Reeled me right back in You know From the day Ralph told me Well Dave Just meet us At my mom's house I have always watched you And you have always had class And you've always had solid recovery And I appreciate you And I swear to God I'm straight right now I knew I knew I needed to be at my computer At 5 o'clock And it's like they threw me a line At 5 O'clock And by 6 you reeled me right on in And I appreciate it And I'm probably going to say it again Sunday so I love you and thank you for letting me share Thank you David Thank you Samantha would you come on up please Thank you Hi friends I'm an alcoholic and my name is Samantha Zena that was a beautiful message this evening and I took notes but what I missed was the name of the book Not the Course of Miracles which I tried reading many years ago while I was still using. And you can imagine how that went. But the other book, what was the name of the other? The other book is Heinz feet to high places. Okay. Um, and, and I have a quick question that, um, thank you, uh, to highplaces. Um. And that is, you mentioned something about like not needing to rush the process but I didn't did I get that right yeah you can try to rush it but there's there's 24 hours in the day there's nothing you could do about that there's gonna be 24 hours no matter what you do no matter how fast you go or how slow you go it will be the same exact 24 hours and you can't do no more in the 60 seconds that you are given than you can do in the 60 seconds that you're given. So slow down and relax. It reminds me of something my first sponsor used to say to me that Rome wasn't built in a day because I wanted it like that, you know, and it doesn't work. I know it doesn'T work that way. And you touched me talking about your mom. My mother has Alzheimer's as well and she lives with me and um and i'm gonna give up the space for somebody else to speak to you but thank you so much for sharing your you you touched just to speak today especially with your mom having alzheimer's with you you could try to rush it if you want it is not gonna work there's nothing you can do so you might as well grin and bear it and make each moment a joy because that's all you're gonna have when last it'll make you feel better thank you samantha brenda free come on up please hey everybody hi xena thank you so much i've never heard you before or anything so i'm just like i'm on fire i'm just i um i love so many things but i was i remember when i I was probably 10 or, I don't know, 10 or 12 years sober. And I felt like I was just really hitting a wall around my mom and my head. And I can't stop, you know, talking about something outside of myself to fill that hole you were talking about. And a priest friend asked me, he goes, so are you praying for the knowledge of God's will and the power to carry that out? You know, kind of what you were telling me. talking about tonight. And I'm just like, wait, that's a step I've seen, you know? And it was like so much focus is on the first half, you now do, do what can I do? What can I do? And I'd say for me, that struggle is not a struggle for me. The where I need to put my energy is praying for the power to carry that out. And because knowledge, I understand, like you said, I'm going to stop and stop looking, listen, what's in front of me to do and all that. And but I need the power because if I'm just getting the knowledge and I really heard this from you tonight, and thank you, Jesus, that you said it, but I get that. I can pray for that knowledge and i can see that in my day and different things that come into my world, but the power to carry that out. So I'm not going to get the knowledge and do it myself. Hello? What? You know, I'm going to give that knowledge, and I'm gonna ask God to help me. I'm going to ask God to give me, I'm gonna ask God to give you that power to do it. And it just, I mean, I know that intellectually, but I tied the bow in a knot with a bow on top. As you were talking, I was like, okay, I just put it all together 31 years, I just put it all together. And I just, it's powerful, you know, it powerful because it's God's power, man, it stopped me and when it is me kind of messy, kind of gets a little messy. I'm grateful to be here and grateful to hear you and see all the faces. Thank you. Thank you, Brenda. Leslie, come on up, please. Hi, everyone. It's great to be hier. Thank you Zena. Just an amazing message. And I want to just say the thought that my mom is in care. She's old and she's had a hard life and she tired. um and that thought that you brought forward tonight zina reminds me of page 164 in the book where it says um see to it that my own house is in order and i've had that that kind of impulse operating in the background with me that i have to get my house in order so that my mom feels free to go because i know that she's hanging around or at least i feel she's hanging around because she worries about me right and um i just want to say how much your message moved me but particularly that uh as an alcoholic i'm always thinking about me me me and um i'm i'm so fortunate today to try to think about other people and how my actions or inaction affects other people um so zina thank you and i just think it i i hope that even as the pandemic lifts eventually that we can continue to to meet here on tuesday nights for step 11 it's really been making a big difference for me thanks a lot everyone thank you thank you leslie good to have you here kashina come on up please hi i'm kashin i'm an alcoholic zena thank you so much oh my god i was like i'm so glad they're recording this because i'm going to listen to it like over and over i was cracking up the whole time because i was just relating so much i was just like cracking up and i did have a question like i'm sure that you might have answered it but it was so much and i was like i gotta listen to this again when you were saying the voice like figuring out the voices right like is that me is that them or is that you god when did you start being able to feel confident and knowing like oh that is that's god like when did your parent knowing that well well when i first started questioning is that me is that you or is that them god uh the voice i selected that was god was not and the way that i knew is because stuff kept turning to crap that was the great indicator It's like, oh, that must not was God's voice. Oh, okay. The voice that sounds like this, that was not God. That's probably me. And I think it's God. And so I picked a different voice. And as things, my indicator is always outcomes. Outcomes are my indicators. And, you know, and, you know, I do want to say this, you know because of God's sovereign grace and mercy. Do it. If you're wrong about if it should be done or not just the quicker you do it the quicker you will know if it should be done if it's god for you or if it is you for you and god will keep you covered but you know just do something don't do nothing do something and you will begin to know indicators that is the answer to your question the outcome are my indicators thank you Howard yeah hi everybody I'm Howard I'm an alcoholic uh Xena thank you so so much I could listen to you all day um your uh brings back a lot of memories with my mom she died about 10 years ago and I used to sit with her uh she held on for like 30 days without any food and I used to say mom it's okay to go it's okay to go it's okay to go and she did not want to go she didn't want to go and you know finally we got a phone call and you know I knew she was at peace and you just oh man you just really touched me tonight with that thank you for the books I wrote them down that was one question I guess my other question is you talked about indicators and my question is how do you stop yourself to get the indicators because I just, I'm a little over two years into AA and I want and I want and you know, I pray to God every morning. My God is like my little buddy. He's with me all day long and that's what I call him. You know, hey little buddy, you know what are we going to do today? And you know let's have a good journey and let me help somebody today. But how do you stop yourself for the indicators? Does that make sense? It does make sense And I don't stop myself at all. I don'T STOP MYSELF FOR THE INDICATORS. MY AWARENESS HAS BECOME MORE AND MORE KEEN OVER THE YEARS. AT TWO YEARS, I DID NOT HAVE THE AWARENNESS THAT I HAVE TODAY. I DON'T KNOW WHAT STEP YOU'RE IN OR WHERE YOU'RE AT WITH YOUR SPONSOR, BUT I CAN SAY BE PATIENT WITH YOURSELVES BECAUSE GOD IS NEVER LATE. HE IS NEver, ever, ever late. And wherever you are, it's where you're supposed to be. What I've done is plant a seed. That seed will grow if you continue to water it. You don't need to focus on making it happen because the truth is you don't have the power. I don't mean to laugh, but you don' t have the power to make it happen. Now you can try it and maybe your experience with the powerlessness of being able to pull that off, will reinforce your memory that you need to wait and see if you can identify an indicator in your immediate peripheral. I don't know, but I can say be patient with yourself. That is never late ever, ever. Thank you, Howard, for your question. Montia Robinson. Hi, I'm Montana, an alcoholic. Zina, thank you so much. Your talk was so good. I like harassed Teresa for the Zoom link for this. I'm so glad I came. Something in my gut was like, go to this meeting the way she announced it on sunday um you said so many things that were so spot on i had a similar situation with my grandmother having alzheimer's and just sort of like doing amends during that my question is sort of building on kashina's um black lives matter drew me into a much bigger 11 step i'm alone in my house and like i can't be thinking about this all day right but when i sit down and meditate like and i try to become an observer of my own thoughts it's not good i don't like it when i get up i don'T always feel good afterwards like is that normal i've it's weeks and i'm like i DON'T LIKE WHAT I'M SEEING so if your question is is it normal to not feel good after sitting and observing your thoughts i can say honestly when my whole existence is about me being self-absorbed about me and what i think what i feel what i do then nine times out of 10, I'm going to feel nauseous at the end of that process because really it is physically sickening to constantly think of self all the time. And it's only when I step outside of that and think of somebody else for a change, Zena, please, will my nausea be set aside and so I guess that's yes it is a normal outcome if you are if you spending long extended times self and you use the term observing your thoughts. I don't know what you're wanting to find out from this observation but I guarantee that the outcome doesn't serve anyone including you and you would much better experience a sense of peace to step out turn your focus turn your eyeballs from observing your thoughts and getting to know others I just want to speak to this because you brought it up the Black Lives Matter thing, I ask my prayer is that I am equipped in the area that I am capable to be of service to the capacity that I can. I'm not being moved by anyone else's agenda because God has me doing what he would have me do. That's all. Thank you, Montaya. Thank you. on that note, that ends our Q&A. I'm going to hand it over to my co-host Teresa.