The Insanity of a Moving Target Philosophy – Sean A.

Thanks, Lenny. My name is Sean, and I'm an alcoholic. And that's the end of the facts. All the rest of this stuff that I'm going to talk about this entire weekend is my opinion. And I'm not a spokesman for Alcoholics Anonymous, and I'm not an expert on alcoholism. But I got some opinions. And I try to keep them contained to my experience, but sometimes I drift, you know. I mean, for instance, that was the worst amends I've ever heard. For Lenny Meg. Wasn't that shitty? It's almost his fault, kind of, sort of. He implied I gave him the wrong information. Did you catch that? I really identify with that. Sounds a lot like me. I want to thank you for asking me to be here to do this. I mean, this is a real honor. I mean, there are no big deals in Alcoholics Anonymous, but Manuka is a big deal. You know, it's a big deal. One of my heroes in sobriety. He is Bob B. from Minnesota. And I've been listening to his tapes from here for a long, long time. And I've always wondered what this place looked like. It's just great. I basically hate these kind of things. You know, a bunch of guys getting together. I'm standing over there, and I've been around here for a while, and I've been practicing the principles. And, you know, doing a fairly decent job. I haven't had a drink in a long time. But, you know, I'm standing there thinking you guys all came in the same bus. You know? And you guys all know each other. You're all going to hang out with each other. You're all going to talk. And I'm going to kind of drift around here, you know, feeling like I used to feel, you know, that I don't belong here. And, I mean, it's just amazing how fast that stuff comes up and just kind of, you know, shoots around this kind of brain of mine. And then what I usually say is, thank you for sharing. Now piss off, you know, to myself. I've got it. The committee in my head is kind of... The committee in my head looks like the village people. You know? As to God. I mean, what I'm capable of getting into is just unbelievable. I... Some of you guys are newer, you know. And when I was new, I used to see guys like me doing this kind of stuff. And I'd think, God, you know, they must really have it together. I mean, they must really know what they're doing. And let me tell you a little something about what this is. This kind of thing. First of all, what I'm participating in here is that what I'm doing is the least important 12-step work there is. I mean, it is real easy for me to stand at this podium and look good. It's... You know, I'm pretty far away from home, so you can't check out the facts too quickly. You know? And the most important 12-step work is, you know, 2 o'clock in the morning and some guy's crummy apartment, talking to him about sobriety while he throws up on your shoes. And, I mean, that's the stuff that this thing is all about. That's what this is really about. That one-on-one. That's what this is really about. That's one thing. One drunk talking to another. I'm not here to teach. I'm not here to lecture. What I've got to do... My responsibility and why I look forward to doing this is... I'm going to be talking about the steps and how they apply in my life and what I do to stay sober and be part of a community and be married and be a father and all that kind of stuff, you know? So I'm going to be standing up here kind of cleaning out my pipes, you know? And you guys are going to have to witness it. You're stuck. I mean, you paid your bucks and, you know, the roads are icy. So what can I tell you? But I want you to know what it's like inside to be sober where I am today. And I reserve the right to change my mind at any time about what this is and what's going on. You know, I... I reserve... I reserve the right to hear something from you this weekend that'll... that'll move me in another direction because that's always what happens with me. It would be real easy for me to... I've been talking from podiums for a long time at AA meetings and at conventions and all that kind of stuff and it would be really easy to put together a string of party pieces for you and entertain you about sobriety. But it's important for me to explore and expose myself over this weekend and let you know who I am. And what I want you to be able to do is after each of these sessions, I mean, I'm going to keep it to a point and then, you know, tomorrow when we get into these kind of things to stop and get some dialogue going, some questions and answers things. So if there's, you know, everybody... We all come here with something going on in our lives and if there's something that I can share my experience with, I will. I had no idea that I was going to be sober this long. I mean, I just didn't plan on it and really, guys, you know, if I'd have known I'd been sober this long, I'd have really done a better job of it. You know, I really would have tried to be a better example, but it just accidentally happened. And here I am. So let me give you an idea of how I got to your care. I really need this. I really need to be here. I really need to be here. My life has gotten a little out of whack lately. I'm working really, really hard. About a year ago, I started a new business and I've been working 24 hours a day, 8 days a week. And, I mean, it's all gotten out of whack and I'm working really hard to get it back on track, to get it balanced. I mean, that's what this sobriety thing is about. It's a real battle to get a life. It's a life that's just gone off in some horrible direction, back on track and keep it balanced. And I really believe what the big book talks about. I really believe that the reason we're here and that we do the stuff that's recommended is so that we can be restored to normal life. So that we can be husbands and fathers and members of communities and bread earners and taxpayers and voters and all that kind of stuff. You know? So that we can become invisible as drunks. So that we can blend into a society. So that we're no longer calling that kind of attention to ourselves. So we can be of maximum service when some guy sitting next to you at the lunch says, God, I wish I could quit drinking. And you say, I know how you feel. And you tell him a little about yourself and he says, you are drunk? You? You? You know? It's so wonderful that they're surprised that I'm a drunk. You know? Because they all knew. They all knew that I was before. I was born and raised in Victoria, British Columbia. And all I ever wanted out of that town was out. My father was a drunk. My mother was a saint. And we grew up in that stuff. My father was a drunken sailor. He was either at sea, both literally and figuratively, all the time. I mean, he was a... a kind of depressive, quiet Scotsman. My mother came from a great, huge, rambunctious Irish family. And one of the things that I noticed and stored away in my little memory bank when I was a kid was that when my father drank, he became a singer. When my father drank, he transformed. And when he drank, he could make music. He was a charming, lost man. And... I stashed that away. And I was raised with all that kind of sense of not belonging, of not being part of. And I mean, I was clear that I was part of this family. There's a psychiatrist named Stanley Gitlow who's been studying us for a number of years. I guess probably about 40 years now. And I once heard him talk, and he talked about an associate of his had... had... had made a statement about her alcoholic patients. And he went back. It was a stunning statement for him. And he went back and kind of looked through all his files at the... at the... at the alcoholics he'd been working with over the years. And when I heard the statement, I kind of went back over all the fifth steps that I've heard. And I've been around long enough that I've heard a number of them. And... and it's... and it's... and it was certainly true in every fifth step that I've ever heard, and it's certainly true in my story. And every alcoholic that I've ever known has had some kind of interrupted relationship with a parent of the same sex. For us guys, there's something wrong with the relationship with our fathers. Either they weren't there emotionally, they weren't there physically, they were dead, they were abusive, there was something wrong with that relationship. That it didn't click, it didn't connect. And that's a relationship where a young man learns intimacy. That's where a boy child goes to his father and says, this is who I want to be, Dad. And his father says, yeah, let's... let's... let's do that. Let's... let's figure out how to do that. And that just didn't happen for me. And it didn't happen for any of the guys that I know. You know? Now, that doesn't necessarily make a guy drunk. It does tend to make him a little neurotic. But if you add a couple other elements there, you've got something that's a dangerous mixture. One of the things physically about us alcoholics is that we tend to be hypersensitive, not only emotionally, but actually physically. We tend to perceive colors more brightly. We tend to hear sounds louder than the norm. We tend to be more sensitive to actually physical pain. Now, if you ask... if you... if you've got somebody who's hypersensitive and somebody who's kind of lost, and you've got that kind of combination going on in a young man who's coming up to a... to a point in his life, you add a socially acceptable drug, and in my case, you had an instant alcoholic. An instant alcoholic. I was 14 years old. And up until I was 14 years old, I was terribly uncomfortable. I was always uncomfortable. I was an unwelcome guest. That's what I felt like all the time. You know? I was uncomfortable. And when I was 14 years old, I discovered comfort. Southern comfort is what I discovered. And it was fabulous. It was fabulous. I mean, I've talked to a lot of social drinkers. And they don't remember when they started drinking. You know? I remember the instant. I remember what I was wearing. I remember where I was. I remember what the glass looked like. I remember what it felt like. It was like taking a bite out of a thunderstorm. It was fabulous. You know? You know? That lightning crackled all the way down and there was this deep roll of thunder right at the bottom, you know? And I understood at a gut level why my father was willing to go to jail so much. You know? It was wondrous. And the thing happened to me that doesn't happen to social drinkers. I changed. I changed. I didn't care that you'd come in the same bus. You know? After I'd had that first drink, I was convinced you'd come in the wrong bus. It was wonderful. That first night, I blacked out. I threw up. I came to underneath the bush somewhere, sick of the dog. But I'd had a wonderful time. I could hardly wait to do it again. Could hardly wait to do it again. Because the thing that happened to me that first night was the thing that happened to me until the last time I drank. I was able to make change without compromise. I was able to make consequences. I was able to make decisions with no downside. I could live a life with no regret while I was doing that kind of stuff. You know? My life was suddenly hurtling in a direction. Now, one of the things I've got to tell you is that I'm here tonight because I loved the drink. I mean, make no mistake about it. I loved it. I loved the effect. I loved the festival. I loved the tradition. I loved everything. I loved everything about it. I mean, I just, I went right into that world. I loved it. And the thing is, is that the reason I loved it so much is it worked for me. I hear people from these podiums say, drinking stopped working for them. I don't know what they're talking about. Because if it had ever stopped working for me, I'd have stopped doing it. But there was always a moment when I drank where I was everything I needed to be. Now, I could never tell you when it was going to happen. It could happen after the second drink. It could happen after the fourth. It could happen with a combination of prescription drugs and marijuana. I mean, it could happen with any kind of number of, you know, chemical combinations. But there was always a moment when, ah, you know, that, ha, ha, ha, yeah, where I was, oh, God, you know, tough but tender. Yeah. Smooth. But aggressive. Sexy but sensitive. You know? A poet and fast with my fists. You know? Just, it was just fabulous. It was just wonderful. I was there, you know? I was in a tuxedo, man. You know? It was wonderful. And then it would just start to kind of, you know, slide a little. So I'd have one more, you know? You know, in Star Trek, when they hit warp speed and it goes, whoosh, you know? That's why I'd have one more and then, whoosh! It would be an hour and a half later. And I, you know, I'd kind of come to and there'd be 15 people standing around going, ha! You know? And I knew I'd done it again. Just overshot it a little. God. Yeah. Yeah. And I never did anything interesting. I mean, you know, I'm not, when I first got to, when I first got to Alcoholics Anonymous, I really felt puny about my story, you know? Because I, you know, I never stole a tugboat. You know, I never, yeah. Never came to in Kuala Lumpur, you know, with five hookers. You know, I never went to death row like a regular guy at AA. You know, I just, you know, I just, I just, I, I just did a series of embarrassing, humiliating, sleazy, tacky, smarmy, slimy little things over and over and over again, you know? Occasionally interspersed with spectacular achievements. You know? Because I always thought if I did something extraordinary, I'd be equal to you. You know? And I don't know when that started for me. I don't know why I felt that I was starting from so far behind the rest of you. You know? I just thought if I did something incredible, you'd let me in. You know? And, uh, by the time I was 17, I'd, my, uh, my, my mother had become concerned that I was working too hard during exam times and she, uh, she gave me one of her diet pills. God bless that woman. Because up until that point, I was a really lousy drunk. I got very drunk very fast and very little. But by the time I was 17, oh boy, when I started dropping those amphetamines, I could stay up all night and do it all. I mean, it was just a wonderful combination. And by the time I was 18, I was 18 years old in 1960. And I mean, it all started happening, man. It just started happening. And I'm the generation that made drug abuse middle class. We, uh, we took it out of the hands of black musicians and brought it into the family rooms of America. We, uh, you know, there's still some old-timers around Alcoholics Anonymous to hear us talk. We messed up a perfectly respectable disease. You know? I'm always amused by the pure alcoholics basically because I'm an impure one, I guess. The, uh, you know. I've always wondered if they'd have the same access to drugs and the same kind of opportunities that we had if they would have stood around saying, no, no, no. I prefer to kill myself on white lightning. You know, I, uh... Man, I just, I loved all that shit. So by the time I was 18 years old, I was, uh... When I was 18 years old, I declared myself an alcoholic and I didn't know that I'd done it. But I said the phrase that only an alcoholic says and if you're newer here or if you've been in the program a couple of years and if you've gone through what we all kind of do, or at least I did, was after a couple of years of working this thing, you know, occasionally I would have the thought, well, you know, maybe I overreacted. You know, maybe I was just kind of a, you know, a bad social drinker, you know, and I've got to get on with my life. You know, I've got to get back to work and, you know, all these meetings are not, you know, starting to think of kind of drifting out of this thing, you know, just... Yeah. But I'd said the phrase when I was 18 years old and if you've ever said it, you're a drunk. If you've ever heard anybody say it, you're listening to a drunk. And I'd been drinking for... for three years, four years. I've been taking drugs for a year. But the idea of living without chemicals was starting to become impossible to me. They were a cushion. But... But I said the phrase that only an alcoholic says and that phrase is, I can control my drinking. Once that phrase has gone past the lips, it's over, man. You know, because social drinkers never deal with that concept. Social drinkers, if they make a really stupid move drunk, stop drinking. Isn't that weird? Yeah. And I was making some really stupid moves at 18 years old. So what I was considering was cutting down or changing the combination, controlling it. Now, the big book talks about control and enjoy. And I don't know about you, but I never got control and enjoy in the same room at the same time ever. Ever. You know. When I was cutting down or watching it or being careful, I was miserable, man. Just miserable. You know. I think... I think what's worse than a Chinese water torture is when some old fart in AA suggests that you just drink two drinks a night. I mean, I think that's... I think that's diabolical. You know. I mean, my first reaction to that is how big are the glasses? You know, let's... Yeah. So controlling drinking is just... I think that's... It's hideous. Yeah. Now, enjoying drinking. The only way I enjoy drinking is wildly out of control. You know. I'm the guy stark naked howling at the moon. You know. That's how I drink, man. I want... Woo! Yeah. I want it out there with no consequences, no regrets. Let's just rip through life here. Let's just tear it up, man. I'll deal with all the rest of this stuff later. That's how I drank and used. And I had a ball. Now and then. By the time I was 20 years old, I decided I had a talent that the world couldn't live without. When I was 21, I went to New York. And... Within three weeks, I had my first Broadway show as an actor-singer. And, I mean, that's more than a fat, ugly kid with crooked teeth and thick glasses from Victoria, British Columbia ever dreamed. And there I was. By the time I was 24 years old, I'd been on Broadway several times. I was featured in one huge musical thing at the Winter Garden Theater. And every night, I would stand on an empty stage to a sold-out house with a 45-piece orchestra. And they played a song, and I sang it with a spotlight on my face. You know? And that's beyond anything I ever dreamed of doing or being. And I got drunk every night. Didn't fix me. Didn't fix me. I was tearing around New York. You know? I was going to all the right parties, balling all the right people. I was doing all the kind of... You know, I was just living a life that was just insane. It was the middle... It was the 60s. I mean, I was doing all kinds of... You know, I picked up a little non-habit-forming marijuana habit, and I was working the docks. Not that... Not, you know, where the boats come in. Doctors. You know? I think it's stupid to buy drugs in alleys. I mean, you get... You can go to jail for that kind of shit. You know? What I did was, I got medical books and memorized symptoms for the kind of drugs that I wanted. And I always had three doctors. And I always went to them and, with my sincere blue eyes, told them my problem. And what I very quickly learned was that doctors don't know how to end interviews. They don't know how to end visits without writing something on a pad. So they would write something on a pad, and then I'd go to the other two and get them to write the same thing on the pad, and then I'd go get them filled, and we'd meet for drinks, and swap pills. I got a red one. Do you want to try a blue one? You know, we do that. I like that kind of shit. I was the kind of drunk that if you invited me to your home for dinner at some time during the evening, I would excuse myself and go to your bathroom and go through your medicine cabinet. And 20 minutes later, you'd find me sprawled on the bathroom floor in a coma, or you'd have to peel me off the bathroom ceiling, depending on what I'd found in your medicine cabinet. Now, I was 24 years old. I was on Broadway. I was popping vitamins. I was in great shape. I was jogging. I was living the great lie of alcoholism. And the great lie of alcoholism is, you can do this, you can do this for another week, Sean, and then you've got to get your act together for a week, and then you'll be all right. And what I didn't want to look at was that it was killing all the people around me. Because I didn't run around with anybody who didn't drink. I ran around with people who drank. And the people that I drank who were young and bright and healthy and attractive and all the kind of stuff were going down. Were going down. My best friend in New York was one of the cutest chorus boys on Broadway. I was the other one. And he was a diabetic, and he was a diabetic. And he was a diabetic. And he drank like I did. And when he was 24 years old, by the time he was 24 years old, he was blind and he was senile and he didn't want to live anymore, so he pulled the plug on his kidney machine. And that's how he died. Another friend of mine used to do suicide attempts. Do you remember suicide attempts? They were so hard to time, those things, you know? Take the pills and make sure you get the phone call in so you don't actually die. And Terry was always doing that. He was always cutting his wrist and doing all that kind of shit. And one night he did, he, he took a whole lot of pills and made a phone call. But the paramedics had a little trouble getting into his apartment. They had to kick the door down. And he was out, so they gave him some oxygen, but they gave him just a little too much oxygen to bring around and blew his brains out. And he's been a vegetable in a vet's hospital. I assume he's still alive. It's 30-odd years. You go into his room, all you can hear are the machines. And that's alcoholism, you know? And the way it goes, the way it kills us young cute guys is, is, is, you know, we, we lose count of how many second oil we've had with how much scotch, or we forget to turn off the gas, or we, we hit bridge pilings at 90 miles an hour. You know? We have accidents. And it doesn't look like alcoholism, but that's what it is. And I, and I was careening through life. At 24 years old, I was drinking a quart of scotch a day and I had my little marijuana habit. And I was in terrible trouble. My life looked like it was, you know, my life was the most exciting thing you've ever seen from the outside. And I was in terrible, terrible trouble. I couldn't sleep. I couldn't wake up. I couldn't do it. I mean, you know, it was a nightmare. And so I started looking for solutions to my problem and I went to a shrink. He helped me. He got me down to a quart of scotch a day and he gave me a prescription for, no, he got me down to a fifth of scotch a day and he gave me a prescription for Valium and another one for second oil. God bless that man. And he really did help me sleep. I don't put down psychiatrists just that they're incapable of helping practicing alcoholics because we're incapable of telling the truth. It's that simple. I mean, you know, I told the psychiatrist what I told the last arresting officer. Two beers. Anybody in a uniform or any authority asked me how much I drank. It was two beers. Now my wife who's in Al-Anon says that if anybody admits to three drinks, they're not an alcoholic. Ha ha ha. Ha ha ha. Ha ha ha. Ha ha ha. Ha ha ha. Ha ha ha. Ha ha ha. Ha ha ha. Ha ha ha. Ha ha ha. Ha ha ha. Ha ha ha. Ha ha ha. Ha ha ha. Ha ha ha. Ha ha. Ha ha. So anyway, I was starting to read spiritual literature and, you know, doing all that stuff. Trying to get well. Trying to get well. And, uh, and, and, I mean, this poor shrink, this poor guy was trying, was trying to help me, you know. Was really trying to help me. What I decided I needed was a good woman and I found her in an elevator and, uh, we were both going to do a, uh, a musical, a show. We were both hired. And, uh, she was one of the dancers. God, she was cute. Phew. Little blonde. And I saw her the first day of rehearsal in her leotard. God damn. Hmm. And, uh, she didn't notice me until three days later when my back went out and I crawled into rehearsal. I had a, I had a chronic back problem. And zing went the strings of her heart. I didn't know that for an untreated Al-Anon, a drunk crawling across a hotel, lobby was like coming home. She, uh, she realized at a very deep level that I needed her. And we did that eye lock. You know, that A.A. Al-Anon eye lock. Oh, Jesus. You know, it's a terrifying moment when an Al-Anon recognizes potential. I mean, once it happens, you're dead meat. I mean, it's over, man. You know, you haven't got a chance. You know, she just knew that I was perfect with a little work. And, uh, so I became her hobby. And, oh, man, we started our dance of death. And, uh, it was great. I mean, I, I, uh, she drank, too. I mean, God, she was great. I didn't know anybody who didn't drink. I wasn't going to marry anybody who didn't drink and she could drink. And, uh, so we started and we were living in New York and our friends called us the Campbell Soup Kids. We were the cutest kids on the block and we were at parties and the theater and it was all exciting and all wonderful. And we did a national tour that took us out to California that ended in Los Angeles and I decided we weren't going back to, uh, to, uh, New York and, uh, we got married and she settled down. And, uh, one day we were having martinis and she took a sip and she said, this is boring and she put it down on the coffee table and she didn't drink again. She didn't go through withdrawals. She didn't have any problems. It just, it just didn't interest her anymore, you know. And then she noticed that I drank. And then we started that thing, you know, that thing. God, awful thing. And by that time, of course, I had, I had no choice anymore. I mean, it was no longer a luxury for me. It was now a necessity. It was medicinal. It was part of my therapy. It was drinking. I mean, it kept me glued together. I knew that if I stopped drinking, something would happen in my life. I didn't think I'd climb a tower and blow away 35 people with a gun or anything. What I thought would happen is they would find me kind of sitting on a park bench somewhere, smiling into the sun, and they'd take me to an institution and I'd never get out. You know, I just knew that something would just snap and it would just, it would just shift over. You know? And I, and I couldn't get back. I'd had some kind of sense of that feeling, you know? I was having a lot of stuff going on in my life that I didn't recognize. For instance, I would stay in bed for a week. I wouldn't get out of bed for a week. I was tired. You know? Now they call it clinical depression. They didn't have a name for it then. I just couldn't do it anymore. You know? And what was happening to me was, and I now, no longer could predict my drinking. I, I was at the point where I could have half a glass of wine and I'd get bombed out of my skull or I could drink a pint of scotch and nothing would happen or the really terrifying thing that was happening was that I was getting up in the morning and having a glass of water and I'd be drunk again. And, and I, I, and I was, man, I was working hard. I was working hard at not being a drunk. I was doing everything that I could to avoid coming to this place. I mean, I did not want to be here. I did not want to be here, guys. This was not what I was shooting for. And, and so I was doing everything I could to avoid looking at the problem. I mean, I had enough stuff going in my life that it didn't look like it. We had a little house in the Hollywood Hills. I drove a, what I like to call a classic Mercedes. It was an old Mercedes. I lived in Southern California. I used to drive, I mean, literally, I was one of those, I would, I would drive around in Southern California with this Mercedes with the windows up and the blazing heat so that you, you wouldn't know that I didn't have air conditioning. You know, that kind of shit. I mean, you know, I don't know who you were. I don't know who cared. But it was important to me that you thought that I had air conditioning in this car. We don't arrive here too tightly wrapped. You know, it's, you know, it starts to unravel in really strange places, you know, with this disease. And, we were starting to have, I was a blackout drinker. I'd been a blackout drinker from the beginning of my drinking until the end and I was, I was now, Southern California was terrible. It was terrifying for me because, because it, I hadn't, I hadn't driven in Manhattan but I was now driving and I was a blackout drinker and I, I would drive from point A to point B and, you know. And I, I started a ritual toward, in, in, at, in the beginning of the 70s where I would, and I didn't know I was doing it until I was five years sober and five years sober I was standing outside my house one day in the pouring rain in my bathrobe looking for the morning paper and I thought, what the hell am I doing here? And it went, whoa! And what I was doing was a real old ritual for my drinking was I used to get up no matter how hungover I was, no matter how horrible I felt, I would get up, put on my bathrobe, walk out the front of the house, pick up the newspaper and walk back up the driveway and make one quick turn around the car to see if there were any blood stains or dents, to see if the, the front of the car was caved in, you know. And if there had been caked blood and hair on the front of the car, I don't know what I would have done. I don't know what it would have done. I was expecting it. You know, I was expecting it. And that's the kind of terror we swallow. It's the kind of terror that we push down so deep in ourselves that it becomes part of who we are. That it becomes unnoticed. You know? That thing of first thing in the morning looking in the mirror above the sink in the bathroom and seeing a waste of skin. You know? Just looking at that failure. Just looking at that destructive, manipulative, lying jerk. You know? And then with the power of a drunken mind turning it into some kind of productive human being while you just stand there looking at it. You know? And I was spending a lot of time recovering from drunks and planning them. And I made up some rituals for myself that were very, very important to me toward the end of my drinking. One was that I never drank before five o'clock in the afternoon except on Sundays and holidays. And the other one was that I always drank from a glass. That was very important to me. My father was a drunk and we used to find wine bottles wrapped in brown paper bags. And I knew that if you drank like that you were drunk. And that's how it was going. We were starting to have fights. The kind of alcoholic Al-Anon fights where you where you I was never a physically violent alcoholic. I'm an emotionally violent alcoholic. I have a shark-infested mouth. And I've really done some vicious, vicious things with it. And we would do that. And Bonnie's from an alcoholic home. I'm from an alcoholic home. And we knew that that dance. We knew that thing where you do those fights that escalate to the point where you know if you say that one thing it'll blow up. And you hint that you're going to say it and then you back off from it. You know. And then she does the thing and you know that she's going to she's going to hit that thing that'll blow it up and she almost gets to it and then she backs off. We did that kind of stuff. But a couple of times when I was in blackouts I went over the edge. And I would come to and she was very, very strange. And she was dealing with whatever she was dealing with. Her denial and her insanity. And I mean what I was watching was this incredibly cute blonde, tough, funny talented, talented woman that I was married to was shriveling in front of me. She was turning into this strange that had this weird woman who had these outbursts of anger at inappropriate times and wasn't getting her hair done so she always had to those were scarves and her nails were bitten to the quick and she was you know she wore crummy old dresses because the money wasn't we didn't know where the money was going you know and her lips were disappearing. That happens to Al-Anons you know their lips disappeared. You know. By the time she arrived in Al-Anon she had no lips. And I always looked just fine. I was always kind of semi-medicated all the time. You know so I was always kind of you know well dressed and kind of just handling it. You know. If you looked at us as a couple it was clear. That she was the one that had a terrible problem. You know. And about six months before we got to this fellowship we had a vicious fight. A really, really vicious fight. And I came to the next morning and it was up. It was over. She had realized. She got it. She realized that it was it was the booze. And she got terrified that there was a terrible problem. There was a terrible change in her. She withdrew. She just shriveled in. And I said I started praying for the first time in a long time and the prayer was dear God let this stop. Just let this I want off the merry-go-round. I just just let it's got to stop. I can't do this anymore. You know. And on April 23rd he answered. And on April 23rd 1974 I was arrested by the West Hollywood vice squad on a sleazy little charge. Stopped looking for love in all the wrong places. I don't think the Hugh Grant story is all that amusing. I I I I I I I I I I I going I hope he gets over from it. I did. I I was taken down and fingerprinted and photographed and released on my own were cognizance with the front of my pants from the waistband to the knees soaked in my own urine and I mean it got my attention. And I went home that night and I she wasn't there. She was off saving somebody who didn't need to be saved. And and I was alone. Thank God. God. Thank God. Because if she'd have been there we'd have talked about it and we'd have figured out that it was their fault. Because we had formed that union. We were protecting each other from the consequences of who we were. And we'd have worked it out that it was somehow not my problem. That it was theirs again. You know, it was bad breaks. But she wasn't there. And I poured what I hoped I got as my last drink. It was straight vodka and a wine glass. And I saw very clearly who I was. There was a moment. You know, they talk about a moment of clarity. I mean, there was a moment when the clouds part. There's a thing that happens in an alcoholic's life where it's just, it is so clear it hurts your eyes. It hurts who you are. It's so clear, you know. And I saw it. Part of it I saw. That there was this horrible gap between who I was and who I wanted to be. I've always known the kind of guy I wanted to be. I was taught. I was taught morals. I was taught a belief in God. I was taught a belief in miracles. I was taught. I was taught. I knew all that stuff. I knew the kind of man I've always wanted to be. You know. And I could see it. I just couldn't get to it. You know. I couldn't bridge that gap. I was a drunk. I'd been to many places. I'd done too many things. I'd seen too much. I'd experienced too much. We come here. We come here with more knowledge of stuff than we can, that we should have. You know. We should never know the things that we know. And I also realized that somewhere along the line I'd committed suicide of the soul. That the pilot light had gone out. That it was me, alone. That I was going to have to do something. I was out there, alone. In the wind, at night. And I said, I wonder if I'm an alcoholic. I'm an alcoholic. The incredible thing about, that we're all just drunks, is our unbelievable ability to overlook overwhelming evidence. And then I said, I hope to God I am, because if I'm not, I'm lost. Because I had done everything I could to avoid coming to that. I'd been, I'd been. See, what I did was, whenever I was in trouble, all those years I went to moral superiors. I went to people with knowledge. You know. People who could help me. Professionals. You know. I went to priests, and bishops, and monseniors, and Christian brothers, and nuns, and, you know, psychiatrists, and psychologists, and sociologists, and gurus, and therapists, and spiritual leaders, and nutritionists, and policemen, and lawyers, and judges. And I explained to them my problem, you know. And some of them really, sincerely wanted to help us. Some of us had a lot of learning. Some of them had a lot of learning. And some of them really, were interested in people like me, and wanted to help people like me. And they consulted their books, and they said, this is what you should do about your problem. Well, as soon as somebody points a finger at me, and says, this is what you should do about your problem, I bite it off at the knuckle. I can't hear it. There's something, now there's nothing wrong with Ann. There's something wrong with me. There's something wrong with the way I perceive stuff. So I was desperate. I couldn't get any help, because I couldn't hear it. It was like, it was like, it was noise. I, I, I understood what they were saying. I just couldn't figure out how it connected to me. But there was a woman that I worked with. It was a woman that I worked with, and she had six years of sobriety, and I'd been watching her for a year. And Suzanne was a stunning example of this program. She was great. She had a wonderful sense of humor. She was bright. She was creative. She was a neat, neat lady. And she made dumb bones about the fact that she was drunk, and that she was an alcoholic synonymous. And she, just a little beyond me. And the next day on April 24th, 1974, I went to work. Um, I was in real estate sales. And, uh, what we, what, what you do in real estate is, is, is all the listings that come in for a week. You go drive around and you go look at them all, so you're familiar with all of them. You're familiar with all of the inventory. It was my turn to drive. And I drove this car this morning. And three women got in the car. Now, I had, I had not planned this or anything. Three women got in the car. One, one was Mary. Mary was about, she was in her sixties. And Mary was this charming little Irish woman who drank every day. Just had a couple of drinks every day. And there was another woman named Chris who was going through a divorce, and she was having a real hard time, and she was drinking a little. Too much. And Suzanne. Suzanne gets in the front seat next to me. So we're driving, looking at all these houses, and they're having a discussion about drinking. They're talking about situational drinking and alcoholic drinking. They're talking about drinking, drinking, drinking, drinking, you know? We finally got back to the office. And I took Suzanne aside, and I said the last phrase. I said, I'm an alcoholic, and I got 20 minutes before I go to pieces. And she heard the screaming. And she 12-stepped me. Now, she did not take me to a treatment center. She didn't do any of that kind of stuff. She did a classic 12-step call. It was one drunk talking to a nine. She canceled all her appointments. She took me to her apartment. She sat me down at her dining room table. She made a sandwich for me that I couldn't eat. And she said, I got something. I was, you know, just a little jumpy. And she gave me something to calm me down, and I can taste it to this day. And they used to give it to us when we were new. And I don't know whether they still do it, but it was orange juice and Karo syrup. And she had the big book. And she read chapter 5. She read chapter 3 in the 12th edition. I thought, my God, that woman's going to read that entire book to me. And then she told me her story. Now, my story was sleazy, but hers was disgusting. I mean, her story was a nightmare. And she didn't look like anything like this story. And the miracle happened. I thought, my God, if she could not drink, maybe I can. And she said, do you think you can not drink the rest of the day, because I'll take you to a meeting at 8 o'clock tonight? And I said, sure. And instantly thought, my God, what have I done? What have I said? And she said, that's fine. We'll hang out today. So I wasn't going to get rid of her. And she said, do you believe in God? And I said, yeah, I suppose so. She said, that's good enough. And she told me what Alcoholics Anonymous was about, and she told me what to expect. And she brought me to my first meeting. Before she brought me to my first meeting, she said, we were sitting in her dining room. And she said, do you take anything else? She said, I want you to understand what sobriety is. This is almost 23 years ago in Southern California. She said, I want you to understand what sobriety is. And I said, what is it? She said, we don't drink or take any mind-altering chemicals. And I said, what does that mean? She said, nothing that affects you from the neck up. She said, we count sobriety as clean and sober. And I was real disappointed at that news, because I had kind of planned on kind of touching down into sobriety kind of lightly on a pink cloud of Valium, just kind of settle in, because I knew that withdrawal would probably kill me. But she said, no, no, no, no. No, we're going to do this this way. And I didn't have any other options. So I have not had a drink or a drug since April 24, 1974. Now, I didn't know that you could relapse or any of that kind of stuff. I thought, this is it, man. I mean, you've got to do this thing. So I shook it out in the rooms of Alcoholics Anonymous. Now, the interesting thing that happened to me was we were starting to come into Alcoholics Anonymous, those of us who would try to turn ourselves into toxic chemical waste dumps and the impure alcoholics. And we were the ones that kind of invented kind of double diagnoses, kind of double identification kind of things. You know? And for a long while, there was a real concern that addicts were taking over Alcoholics Anonymous, as if anybody aspires to Alcoholics Anonymous. You know? There's an organization I want to target. Give me a break. So because of the love and tolerance I found in this room, I just love addicts. I mean, I just love addicts. It just kills me. There were a lot of them in Southern California when I got some. You know? Have you ever talked to addicts? I mean, first of all, the mathematics you've got to have to keep converting to metric. You know? You know, the grams and the, I mean, just the measuring. I mean, to find out what we're talking about here. You know, that's hard. You know? And they were all dealers. They're all dealers. I don't know who's buying. I mean, but they're all dealers. You know? And so I just, you know, and I love, you know, when nobody gets nervous, you know, if you're an addict, terrific. You know? Come to our open meetings and sit down, shut up, and listen. And nobody gets excited about all that kind of stuff. It's great. You know? And what happens is addicts will come and sit and listen and start picking up the stuff that's going on in these rooms, you know, and start listening to the language of the heart. Start hearing the causes and conditions. And what's interesting. What's interesting is very quickly they turn into addict alcoholics. Well, as soon as they say that, then they get to read chapter five. You know? As soon as you attach alcoholic to it, it's great. Then they reach chapter five, you know, and then they get a sponsor. You know, they start working the steps and start going through it. Maybe you get to be treasurer or, you know, literature person. And pretty soon they, after they've done their fifth step, they turn into alcoholic addicts. You know? So, yeah. And then they go to the John during a business meeting and get elected GSR. I'm the what? You know? And they start getting involved at that level of service with traditions and all that kind of stuff and they find out what we're about. You know, what Alcoholics Anonymous is about. And what they find out is how this thing, how this wondrous organization works. And they're like, you know, I'm a fan of alcoholics. And they become alcoholics. Because what I, what you find out is that, is that it, that this psychology has no, it doesn't matter here, you know, or religious beliefs or any of that kind of stuff. The only thing that is of any value as far as recovery goes is sober experience. That's it. That's the resource. That's the resources here. You know? How do you stay married if you don't drink? You know? How do you hold down a job? How do you walk into a room of eight people? You know? How do you walk into a room of 80 guys without having three belts before you walk in? How do you do that stuff? I don't know how to do that. I didn't, I, I, I didn't know how to do that when I got here. Everything I did was connected with alcohol and drugs. Now the ones that have got the sober experience are the ones that have got the time. And when I came in, the ones that had the time were the alcoholics. They called themselves alcoholics. That's what they said they were. You know? Yeah. Yeah. BECAUSE THEY SAID THAT SAYING I AM AL BOXED DOWN GOING adapt into what others might regard being drinking alcohol was the wrong answer. That thought of breaking out of that grip, one scий shit outside of myself and saying you better get some rest sitting in the bathroom and sleep and stuff like that. I need to be awake. I really need to get out the body. You know? At that point I thought, Myезuya! You know? This is what I similar orit's not funny. I was there again a few times a month watching the vehicle go behind me. Actually you're watching a window of steering wheel. insert a unknown knowledge out of my little friend's hands. I remember thinking, Where my guys right? Who's crazy and that luxury dusted it out quite hardly in my поy citation! Bad. The primary logic is never thought to be human. I told them I was an alcoholic. Just an alcoholic. Because that's all I was. I just got to take it in different kinds of forms. And by declaring myself in, I tapped into the resource. And I was so desperate when I arrived. I was so desperate when I arrived. I allowed myself to be taught. I just allowed you to teach me. Because you did the things that the moral superiors had never done. They said, this is what you should do about your problem. What you did is you said, this is what I've done about my problem. Take what you can use. And I started to listen to that. But the miracle phrase in Alcoholics Anonymous, the miracle phrase, and the thing that I've been looking for all my life, was you said, I know how you feel. I've been looking for you all my life. I've been looking for somebody to say, I know how you feel. I'd explained it. I'd explained my conditions to lots of people. And it baffled them. They thought it was, it was bizarre. I came to you and told you what was going on and you said, I know how you feel. Now as soon as somebody says that, I settle right down and I can hear what you've got to say. And what you did, was you started teaching me the 12 steps. You started teaching me the 12 steps and then you said, you started teaching me the 12 traditions. You asked me to be of service. You explained to me that I'd only get to keep what I give away. You told me that this is one day at a time. You told me that I was to keep coming back. You told me that I was to put as much effort into being sober as I had into being loaded. You told me all kinds of stuff that made sense to me. And I've been doing it ever since. Since April 24th, 1974, I've not had a drink or a drug. And I've been actively involved in this fellowship since then. To this day. Now, to this day, it's almost 23 years later. I've been sober longer than I drank. And I've got a life that is unexpected, that is extraordinary. It's extraordinary. It's extraordinary. I'm still married to that woman. We celebrated 25 years of, of, of, of marriage. 25 years of marriage this year. We've been together 27 years. She still fascinates me. She still makes me laugh. She's still got the cutest ass I ever saw. She's still, she's the best. She's absolutely the best. She's an active member of Al-Anon. She went to Al-Anon a week after I got sober. And she's been involved in that fellowship, actively involved in that fellowship. She's an extraordinary human being. I just, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, She's just a constant surprise and joy and challenge to me. She's just incredible. I love Al-Anon. I love Al-Anon so much that I don't go to Al-Anon meetings. I, I, I think that Al-Anon needs a safe place from drunks like me. You know, I just, I once had a guy that I was sponsoring we were talking about relationships and he said what the hell do you know about marriage you've only done it once and I said you know you're right I probably don't know a hell of a lot about it I have a 14 year old daughter she's going she's plunk in the middle of it and it's been incredible this last year or so this last year in this last year she smoked marijuana once told me about it she said I smoked grass the other night dad and I'm going oh really and I said how was it she said nothing happened you know nothing happened I said oh yeah I said did you get the munchies she said yeah yeah I did man I couldn't sweets I was eating like crazy and I thought God give me the words I mean just you know we got to get through this one so that I'm not reacting and I said yeah there's trouble with smoking grass you know get the munchies get fat that did it say that to a 14 year old girl thank you God and last year last year she was out with some friends and a friend of hers called and said Kate's going to stay over at my place tonight I said oh really put Kate on the phone so Kate got on the phone and I could tell in an instant and I said you're coming home and she said no I'm not I said yes you are no I'm not I'm staying here I said I'll be downstairs at that apartment lobby in 10 minutes you get your ass down there so we drove up Bonnie and I drove up working our programs like crazy and she walks to the car you know that wonderful you know remember that walk you know you don't look to either side because you'll fall over got in the back of the car the car suddenly reeked of Listerine you know we didn't say a word she walked up to her room up the stairs got into bed real fast and I had to go to work so we didn't have a chance to talk until the next night I came home from work and she had been incredibly helpful that day and you know we'd done a lot of work we'd done a lot of work we'd done a lot of work we'd done dinner and dinner was cleared away and I said we need to talk about last night and she said what and I said oh come on Kate come on you know and she said okay I'm busted she said I'm going to experiment dad somebody gave me somebody gave me a wine cooler and I tried it she said the trouble with it dad is it tastes like soda pop and I drank three of them and she said all of a sudden I was drunk and she said I didn't know what was going on I mean it just and she said I threw up and there were parts of it that I don't remember and she said it was just awful and I said well that's good and I said did you have any fun she said well yeah I said good and then a couple of days later she came storming home from school because some of the mothers had been talking about the fact that Kate got drunk because Kate's kind of a leader in her school it's not a job she applied for she just is so we now laugh that she's got the shortest drunk o'clock in AA you know drank one night blacked out threw up and ruined her reputation so but the neat thing is all that stuff's being talked about all that stuff is out in the open and on the plate you know it's just there so inside my house I'm okay inside my house I got a relationship with a woman that I'm proud of I've got a relationship with my daughter that's just terrific you know we're getting through this thing you know I started a business about a year ago and I haven't taken a penny out of it and I mean it has been terrifying it's been terrifying and it looks like it just turned around it looks like it just turned around it looks like it just turned around some unexpected stuff has happened in my life my work now is I have an internet company that is involved in high tech stuff I mean I've got I have people I employ people and I don't know what they're doing you know and they can tell me anything they want I don't know what they're talking about and I also publish a community newspaper I it has a very large I'm a little tired of it I'm a little tired tonight because we were up getting the paper to print it was printed this morning and last week I I did a little television show as an actor I I got a job I mean I got a life that's just beyond anything I dreamed about and I've got an incredibly complicated life and what you're looking at is a guy that lives an incredibly complicated life that's that that is peaceful in my gut you know nothing's churning around in there even on the bad days I mean it kind of clenches a little but I mean there's nothing that wants me to destroy my life anymore and that's my miracle that's the miracle in Alcoholics Anonymous that's in the short that's who I am now I haven't told you any of this stuff to impress you what I've told you all this stuff about me is so that you know who I am so there may be some points where we connect that's what the whole idea of this kind of talking about where we came from is about to be a part of the story that I've been telling you all this time and I'm going to give you some of the things that I've been telling you about in the future it's not you know can you bottom this you know you know what it is is just simply let you know where I come from and what my experience is and who I am and that from the point that I got here to Alcoholics Anonymous at the most despair I've ever known in my life to the point here where while I've got a life that's going far too fast for me and it's got too many curves and bumps uh... is the most exciting life I've ever had in my life and I'm going to tell you about it in a minute I'm going to tell you about it in a minute I'm going to tell you about it in a minute the most exciting thing I've ever I mean I I can hardly wait to get up every morning I can hardly wait to get at it again I mean you know that kind of that kind of thing that I loved when I was drinking I got it now sober I mean I got that thing let's do it you know I got today what can we shove into it what can we cram into it what can I find out what can I learn how can I be of service what can we do here what's going on you know I love that I love it I absolutely love my life and the reason I love my life is because people like you you're my teachers you always have been you continue to be the reason I'm here this weekend is not only to share who I am but I hope to God you're going to share who you are because I need to find out how you're doing it I need to find out who you are I need to find out the points that we connect I need to be connected to you because you're the only people who have ever ever taught me what I need to know you're my resource you know so the log just dropped it's time to quit thanks I appreciate it good morning my name is Sean and I'm an alcoholic good morning good morning good morning good morning good morning good morning good morning what we're going to do today is go it it's it's a unique day we're going to tone down and turn it into aroundización what I thought we'd do is is start talking about the steps here and and and how I've taken them and how I continue to take them and what they are in my life and and what they mean I I just want you to know that I have no wisdom I have some experience but I got no wisdom I mean if you're looking for a teacher or a better example I don't blame you but bet a me I mean what what I've done is is is I've been around a while and it became very clear to me very quickly that the guys that seem to have the most successful lives in Alcoholics Anonymous are the ones who did the steps and believed in God and went to meetings and were of service. And so I started doing that kind of stuff. I think it's important if you're new or if you're having trouble with these steps to understand what the steps are. The steps are just simply a list of things that we've done. That's all. It's a list of things we've done. They are not instructions. They're not required. I mean, it's not, if you don't take these, you're going to get drunk. That's not what this thing is about. It's just what we've done. Now, when they first laid these things out, you know, those 100 drunks, you've got to understand that, I mean, these were laid out by drunks, you know. So if you're looking at the 12 steps and they look really hard to you, let me tell you, they're the softest, easiest way we could come up with. You know, it's the easiest way we could figure out how not to drink. And the... And the... The time period that you take them or how you take them or any of those kind of things are completely up to us. You know, we... God knows we get creative. I've heard all kinds of... I've heard all kinds of weird things about how you take the steps and, you know, different parts of the country. There are parts of the country where they say you don't take the steps until you've got a year of sobriety. I don't know how you get a year of sobriety without taking the steps, but, you know, I guess it worked for them, you know. Reading the history of Alcoholics Anonymous, when those dudes showed up near... In your hospital room, you took the first five steps within about four hours, as far as I could figure. But there were some... There were some things that became necessary for me to do. My life was a nightmare when I got to Alcoholics Anonymous. It was a disaster. Everything had gone wrong. You know, the wheels were off. And the woman who 12-stepped me, Suzanne, took me to my first meeting that first day. And it was exactly as I was... As I... I was afraid it was going to be. It was in a church basement. It had gray walls and a low ceiling. It was filled with smoke. And all those people I never would have drank with were there. And I... I got sober in Southern California, in Hollywood, and they have huge speaker meetings. And the first meeting I went to had 400 people. And it was like being dropped into a shark tank. I'd never seen so many teeth coming at me in my life. I mean, it was just unbelievable. And I was... I was terrified and acting cool. And, you know, I just didn't want you to know that I was... You know, that I was about ready to burst into tears. And so I just... I bluffed my way through it. I shut down and got through it. And, my God, it must have been a slow night for newcomers that night because it was just... People were shaking my hand. And one of the things that I noticed about you was that you would shake my hand and you wouldn't let go. You know, you'd shake my hand and then you'd hang on to my hand and then you'd tell me weird stuff like, keep coming back and easy does it and one day at a time. I didn't know what the hell you were talking about. And I also noticed that you were touchy. I mean, God. Ah, man. I mean... People's hands all over me. I mean, I just... And you got real close when you talked. Just, you know, you get right in your face, you know, and look right at... It scared the hell out of me. You looked directly right into my eyes, you know. And then say all that weird stuff, you know. Oh, man. But something happened. Something happened that first night. And I'm really grateful that it happened for me. I got something. I got it. I don't know what it was. There was something going on in that room that I had never experienced before in my life that I'd had a hunger for all my life. And I guess what it is is that that first night I figured out that I was understood and accepted here. That whatever it took for me to be here and to be sober, that you understood and accepted me. And I sat next to a guy who became my sponsor and he started telling me a little about his story. And I mean, the first day, a miracle happened. I was sitting there and he started telling me a little bit about his story and his story was exactly the same as mine. It was unbelievable. 400 people, the one guy sat next to me was exactly the same as me. I thought, wow, isn't this incredible? One of the things that I didn't remember until months later was when Suzanne was 12-stepping me and telling me about the program and all that kind of stuff and getting me that orange juice and caro syrup and stuff. She kept jumping up and running out of the room. And I thought she was one of those ones with kidney damage who probably had to pee a lot or something, you know. And it wasn't until years later that I found out that as I was telling her, my story, she was getting on the phone and telling Jack. So, of course, Jack's story is the same as mine. He knew mine. He was sitting next to me at my first meeting. You know, and if you're new, I got to tell you, they talk about rigorous honesty around here and the old timers just lie like rugs. I mean, they're just unbelievable. And the way they get away with it is they say, more will be revealed. You know? Unbelievable. I was totally set up. Thank God. Thank God. If somebody hadn't taken the time to do that, I'd have drifted into that great big meeting and drifted out. But she took me around and introduced me to everybody and I had taken the first three steps and I didn't realize it. And, of course, the first three steps, the first one is that I was, you know, powerless over alcohol. My life had become unmanageable. And that powerless over alcohol thing was, you know, by that time it was clear to me, but, I mean, it had gone on a long, long time, a long, long time ago. And, I mean, if you're having problems with the first step, the idea of, of powerlessness and unmanageability, which is, which is, which is tough for guys to swallow. I mean, you know, because we're, we're supposed to be powerful and be able to take care of ourselves and our women and our lives. You know, we're supposed to be John Wayne. All my life I tried to be John Wayne and one time, I remember watching television years ago before he died and Barbara Walters was interviewing me and he was sitting in this, this room with flower wallpaper on this dumb little French chair. This great big guy in this stupid little chair in his own house, you know, and talking about how he'd always been terrified of women. Oh, man, you know, I've been trying to imitate the wrong guy. You know, he couldn't even do it. So, anyway, the idea of, you know, what I had to admit that first day was that once I had a drink, I could no longer predict my behavior. And, and, and that was true. That was true. That was true. That was true. That was true. That was true. That was true. That was true. That was true. That was true in my case. Once I'd had that drink, that one drink, you know, and I used to think it wasn't the first drink that got me drunk. I thought the first drink gave me a choice. You know? You know, I had that rule that I never drank before five o'clock in the afternoon, you know? And so I'd have my first drink at five, after five. Yeah. And, you know, the first drink, you just, ah, and I go, boom, and then I go, ah. Yeah. Well, maybe I'll have a drink. Nah. Nah. Well, nah. Well, and I would, you know? So when you told me it was the first drink that did it, that really, I was really upset with that because I thought it was probably the second or third. But what I had to do was that I had to admit that I couldn't predict my behavior. I mean, I really couldn't predict what was going to happen to me. I was one of those guys who didn't drink at lunch because if I drank at lunch I didn't get back to work. I was one of those guys who was absolutely amazed at the guys who would have two beers after dinner, you know, after work, and say, come on, let's go have a couple of beers. And they'd have a couple of beers and they'd go home. I couldn't believe it. I don't know how you do that. I mean, how do you have two beers and go home? You know, I'd stop after work and get home on Thursday. You know, I, so I just never knew what was going to happen. I didn't know if I'd get drunk on the first drink. I didn't know if it would take five drinks to get loaded. I didn't know what, I just didn't know. So the powerless over alcohol and certainly over drugs was clear to me. It was also pointed out that one of the requirements for that first drink was to understand that when I drank, I had a personality change. I had noticed a whole lot of people who drank worse than I did, what I perceived as worse than I did or certainly more than I did, who didn't seem to have the kind of problems that I did. Once I was sober long enough to look around and start looking at that, there were lots of people in my life who drank a lot. But they didn't change. You know, they didn't transform. I did. Man, I became a different human being when I drank. And I think that's the real key. That's the real thing. I mean, another human being emerged and, and, and, the, the other thing about me as far as a drinker goes and as far as that, that, the, the, the drinking thing is that I, is that I tend to have an adverse reaction. You know, alcohol, alcohol's a depressant. You know, alcohol makes my wife sleepy. My wife is not a drunk. I mean, my wife has a glass and a half of wine and wants to snooze. You know, I have a glass and a half of wine and I have a glass and a half of wine. And it goes, ba-boom! You know, and I'm, wah-hoo! I'm out there. It acts as a stimulant to me. You give me a sleeping pill, I get wired on it. You give me an amphetamine and it calms me down. I have a weird kind of metabolic reaction to this thing that I suspect happened somewhere along the line. I don't know whether I, I don't know whether I was born this side of the invisible line. I don't know. I don't know when it, I crossed it. I have no idea. The only thing was is that by the time I got to Alcoholics Anonymous, I could not drink. I could not drink with impunity. I could not drink knowing that I would be okay. I drank and things happened to me and parts of it were missing and I did extraordinary things and sad things and all that kind of stuff. So the first part of the first step was easy for me to take. And the fact that my life was unmanageable, I mean, the unmanageability of my life was that I arrived at my first meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous, I looked fantastic. I looked fabulous at my first AA meeting. I walked in in a $250 sports jacket from Saks Fifth Avenue. This is in 1974. I had on a French gabardine slacks, Italian loafers and a designer tie. I mean, I weighed about 160 pounds. I had done, I had several national commercials running on television. I was, I'd been paid a lot of money for a day's work as doing a modeling job, a photography job about a week before I got to Alcoholics Anonymous. I looked fantastic. I really looked fabulous. And I walked in and everybody knew that I was a drunk and I didn't realize why but there were a couple of things that were going on that I wasn't aware of. One of them was, I had been, I had been drinking straight vodka the night before and I had on a lot of lemon-lime cologne and it was the end of April and it was a warm night in Southern California and I had just this light sheen of sweat on me and I smelled like a gimlet. And I, and, and the other thing that was going on was I had newcomer eyes and the only other place I've ever seen eyes like that other than on a newcomer in Alcoholics Anonymous are on a dog loose on a freeway. And I was just like, I was just, I was absolutely terrified. Just, you know, you know, the whites of the eyes all the way around, you know, and trying to be cool. Hi, how are you? Nice to be here. Hmm. You know, oh God. And, and my life was a disaster. I mean, there I was, you know, there I was in all those expensive clothing and I still had fingerprint ink, you know, on my fingers. You know, what's wrong with this picture? It was just bizarre. My, my, my marriage was over. My, you know, I, I had just enough, just enough, you know, I was driving that classic Mercedes and if I, if I had to replace a tire, I'd have had to declare bankruptcy. You know, it was just, it was just stupid. There were, there were nights when we didn't eat, but I was driving this Mercedes. I mean, it was just absolutely nuts. And what had happened was my life had imploded. It had just, that, that whole frail superstructure that I had erected to keep you from knowing what was really going on with me had crashed in on me. And so, despite how I looked, despite how I was trying to keep some kind of, some charm going here, the, you know, despite the fact that I was trying to treat it like a Kiwanis club meeting, my life was over and I understood that was the level. So I got to take the first step right there, right then. The thing that happens in Alcoholics Anonymous is after the work of the steps, life does not, does not stay unmanageable. Life had become unmanageable at that point. With the taking of the steps, life starts to get manageable. Life starts to get real and life starts to work. The, the results of life have become unmanageable in my, you know, you know, how, how things are going to work out are still none of my business. So the first step I was able to take at a profound level and I was really, really glad. There's a, there's a voice that we all live with, that little kind of quiet, there's a voice that, that I don't know about you but it talks to me between wake and sleep. There's a voice that talks to me just as I'm about to wake up in the morning and there's a voice that talks to me just as I'm about to sleep at night. And it's the one, it's the one that tells me the truth. And it's the one I've ignored all my life. But it's the one that tells me the truth, you know. And I was in such, I was, I was in such terror when I first got to Alcoholics Anonymous that that voice was louder for me. And that voice was saying things like, it's over man. It is just over. It is over and these people know what they're doing. Listen to them. And I'm really glad I did. I got involved with an extremely active group immediately who started us in doing stuff. The second step, I was assigned a new best friend when I got to Alcoholics Anonymous. I mean, if you guys had told me I had to stand on Hollywood Boulevard stark naked and set my hair on fire to, you know, to stay sober, I'd have done it. I was that desperate. So they gave me a new best friend. I didn't know I could say, no, I don't like this guy, but oh, okay, I have a new best friend. His name was Rich and Rich, I could drive. Rich couldn't drive because he'd had his license taken away from him and Rich couldn't talk. And, and I couldn't shut up. So, so we were, we were new best friends and we would go, and Rich also had six months of sobriety. So Rich had the, had the privilege to say anything he wanted to me. But if I said anything to him, he would say, don't take my inventory. So it was a great relationship. It was just great. So we would drive to meetings. You know, Rich would sit in the passenger side like this and I go, you know, it was just fabulous. But, there was a Friday night meeting in Beverly Hills called the Rodeo meeting and it's on the corner of Rodeo Drive and Wilshire and it's a very, very spiffy meeting. What they usually do is the refreshments of this meeting are usually done by the newest caterer who just got sober in Beverly Hills. I mean, this AA meeting was unbelievable. They had finger sandwiches and watermelons that were cut out, you know, into baskets. I mean, it was just crazy. And he never wore the same outfit, you know, subsequent Friday nights. I mean, it was, it was unbelievable. And, and Rich, Rich was getting a little bald and so, so Rich used to kind of torture his hair forward and then bend it and then push it and spray it. You know, it was in the early 70s so it looked like a hair helmet and it took a while and so I, I was picking him up the first couple of weeks I was sober. I was there to pick him up for the meeting, you know, be here at, you know, okay Rich. And so he was torturing his hair and I was standing around and, and, and he had a great big huge medical dictionary and, and I was thinking about the second step, you know, about being insane and I, I'd been going to meetings in, in, in Hollywood, you know, and I mean, I mean some of those stories I was telling you, I got this wimpy story I never did anything. You know, I just got drunk, threw up, black out and made a fool of myself. You know, and these guys were talking about, whoa, heavy duty, you know, swallowing their own eyeballs. I mean, really heavy duty stuff, you know, and I, I was going, hey, maybe, maybe I'm just a, you know, a heavy social drinker, you know, and, I could think, God, don't call on me. I, you know, I just didn't do anything here and, so, he was getting ready with his hair and I, I looked up a definition of insanity in this big, huge medical dictionary and it had a great, big, huge long definition but out of the middle of it popped a, a sentence that enabled me to take the second step and what it is, it, it, is, quote, a seeming inability to learn from one's mistakes. A seeming inability to learn from one's mistakes and that was me. You know, you know, I'd come to after having done it again, you know, and I didn't look back. My whole philosophy of life was a moving target is harder to hit. Never examine anything. Just get on with it. Just keep moving, man. So, I kept slamming into the same brick wall over and over and over again because I didn't know why I'd gotten there. You know, but I knew if I ever looked at it, my life would unravel so I kept moving. So, that was the way I took the second step. I mean, that was the insanity of my life. A couple, a little while later I looked up the definition of sanity and the definition of insanity, one of the definitions that gave me something to shoot for was the ability to analyze and anticipate the reaction to one's actions. The ability to analyze and anticipate the reaction to one's actions. In other words, I mean, you know, I was always surprised if I slapped you in the mouth that you got angry. You know, I thought you'd understand that I was upset. You know? I mean, it never occurred to me to stop before I was about to do or say anything and think, I wonder how people are going to react to this. What I had done as a drunk was tear through people's lives. Just rip, I mean, you know, I was a human weed eater for Christ's sake. You know, I just went ripping through your lives leaving people upset, devastated, you know, angry, all kinds of things and I was always surprised. I was always surprised. Now, a power greater than myself, I was told that I didn't have to go to the big one. That what I had to do was look around the rooms and there were powers greater than me all over the place. Somebody with 20 minutes more sobriety than me is a power greater than me. Somebody who's got a couple of ...