The Old Ideas That Kept Him from the Sunlight – Jimmy A.

thanks glenn good afternoon everybody my name is jimmy i am an alcoholic grateful to be alive and sober and it's always been customary where i come from to uh let you know that i got a home group it's called the design for living group on the jersey shore i have a sponsor i have a service sponsor i sponsor a lot of guys but most importantly i've been sober since my first meeting of alcoholics anonymous and that was on march 28 1987. so extremely grateful for this way of life extremely grateful to be here thank you glenn for the invitation good to see everyone and uh no that daily reflections reading is so appropriate you know uh glenn asked me a little bit earlier you know how's everything i'm like oh it's all right you know i mean it's life's not great right you Know it's been uh the spring of uh in summer so far of uh 20 through 2023 has been quite a doozy uh you know about two months ago i had major uh unexpected major dental surgery followed by a uh i contracted an audio immune disease which is still not known but what it has caused is vitiligo and i don't know if you're familiar with vitilago it's where you lose all the pigmentation and i Don't know if you can see my head but my whole scalp is no color to it no more now that might come back it could come back who knows um so dealing with that and then four weeks ago i had major shoulder surgery i just got out of my sling today this morning at therapy i mean and uh and on this friday in a couple of days my wife will be going under major surgery in new york city uh so you know um bill writes into 12 and 12. you know when we approach step 10 week we commence to live we committed to put our aaa way of living uh to practice practical use day by day foul weather and fair weather then comes the acid test can we stay sober keep an emotional balance and live to good purpose under all conditions and i'm here to tell you yes you can you know in the midst of a storm in the mist of heavy artillery uh you could stay sober and be still a purpose and still abuse and still be emotionally okay you know and you'll get that guy or you'll get that girl that'll come up to you and say well if you just read page 417 click your heels acceptance understand that nothing happens in god's world by mistake and uh you'll be good i mean uh in a sense yeah that's right yeah acceptance is the key to it but we all come to acceptance in different ways some of us come happily my case is more begrudgingly right i mean acceptance is the fact that you know we all go through things and uh you know i'm going through this with my wife and uh and again that doesn't make me exempt or just doesn't exempt the human emotion when we're dealing with stuff yeah acceptance i could still have anger i could till have fear i could still have you know self-pity but what that's reading that bill is really saying is that in the midst of a storm i could stay emotionally sober i could say emotionally mature i could stay emotionally balanced in my life. And who knew that that would happen? Who knew that can happen? For a guy like me, I've always run for my problems. I've been a runner like probably many of us. When it gets hot, I got to go. So we could stay, I could stay in the midst of this thing that we're going through, this little storm and be okay. But you see, there's a real contingency here and the contingency is that i have to get unhooked from the thinking mind the mind that's creating the stories uh the mind thats painting a picture you know uh working with a bunch of guys we're doing these these spiritual exercises and you know the difference between fear and you know uh anxiety you know fear is fear we all have fear but the thing that really gets us is the anxiety, right? And that's the story. That's the mind that just creates a story. So I just put that out there right now, just because you know, you know I've heard it a million and one times is that my alcoholism doesn't come in a bottle. It comes to my mind and my mind will create all sorts of different delusions about a lot of different things, right. And one of the first illusions I ever really understood or maybe accepted or maybe really saw for the first time is nothing's my fault. And I know there's no one on here that has ever blamed anyone else for the way they feel or what's going on in your life, but maybe I'm just that unique that nothing has been my fault and I could bring you all the way to the day I was born because I was born perfect and I was quickly handed over to these two character defects called mom and dad and I used to blame my parents for everything because who else am I going to blame, right? Eventually became the first girlfriend, eventually became your buddies, eventually became the boss the month you know so the list is from here to glenn's house in uh tennessee of all the things and all the people that i blame for everything right and this victim of this delusion it's uh you know i look back you know I'm 65 years old i look back at you know all my parents ever tried to do for me is to give me morals give me values you know uh give me a good education and in spite of what they did in their own way you know what happened to me is i introduced my parents to a way of life that they never even knew existed you know and uh and i grew up in northern new jersey i grew up on the uh on the jersey side of the hudson river right across from new york city um i grow up uh you know in the 60s i grow up in a neighborhood where the only requirement for membership in the neighborhood was five or more kids it seemed like that was the only place i didn't even think there was any other place in my neighborhood uh i grew up in a very blue collar very union type of neighborhood all the men are workers all the women stay home to take care of all these kids uh everyone's a cop everyone's a fireman everyone's an union worker you know and and you know it's it was a great place to grow up you know my parents and for some of you are that are a little bit older you might remember my parents opened up the door my mom opened up at eight o'clock in the morning says get out and And, you know, you're hung out on the streets till it was time to come home. And, your parents knew you would get fed somewhere. I mean, but the problem with that is you become a product of the street, right? And over a course of period of time I wanna be like a little wise guy like with all the other guys the older guys I see in the neighborhood eventually my dad and my brothers they're not my idols anymore. My idols in my life as the neighborhood bookie he has a nice car. He always has a beautiful woman on his arm. He has a wad of money all the time. those are the kind of people I inspire to be, you know. And, you know, with all these kids and with all these things that are going on in the neighborhood, there's always a birthday party, there's always a christening, there're always a graduation, there's something going on at every event is one thing. It's king alcohol. And from an early age, six years old, seven years old eight years old. The disease of perception I suffer from. I'm looking at alcohol and the way men and women drink to me it looks like this is going to be a lot of fun. This looks like freedom this looks like you know there's no problems in life it just seems like everyone's wearing life like a loose garment that uh you know this idea of you know just drinking and camaraderie and friendships and all uh you Know It Looks Like Something I Can't Wait To Do When I Get Old Enough To Do And I Don't Know What Old Enough to do Means I Just Know That There'll Be A Time Now I'm Growing Up In This House And I'm Grown Up With This Guy Called Dad Who's Cunning Baffling And Powerful My Father's Uh My Father Came From That Generation Where You Know There was no emotion shown. There was no, you know, there was no hugs. There was no you know you know fireside chats about the birds and the bees. My dad was a very tough, tough man. He was a Korean War vet. He was you know like I said from that generation hard work, you know what provider but not really you know someone that you would you know cozy up to you know and but what I witnessed as a six year old eight year old ten year old is the ease and comfort that comes at once by taking that first drink and I excuse it just seems like every lawn guy just showed up in my neighborhood to cut the lawn so you hear a lot of lawnmowers uh excuse me for that but my dad's you know he comes home every day and he's pissed off about something i i swear he probably suffered from some sort of ptsd but they never you know diagnosed it back then in those days you know so my dad would come in the house he's huffing and puffing he was a butcher he always had blood on him you know you was you know wore those white aprons and you know i used to think i used a joke sometimes you know did my dad you know slaughter a cow today or did he grab somebody out at a red light and just start beating the guy up i mean that's the kind of guy he was you know you just never know he's very unpredictable but my dad would walk in every night five o'clock like clockwork and my mom would make these two pictures one called martinis the other one called manhattan's now what i would witness at a young age is the ease and comfort that comes at once by taking that drink because my dad would take that drink and like many of us on this call right now he became a different person after that first shrink he became the guy that wanted to have a catch in the backyard he came a guy that had a sense of humor he became a guy that you know there was something different about him almost a dr jekyll mr hyden personality was going on he just became different but don't let me fool you there were those days and those days looked like this my dad would come into the house huffing and puffing about something he'd take that first drink and then all of a sudden the kitchen plates would be flying across the kitchen the kitchen chairs would be fine across the kitchens if he grabbed one of us young kids we'd be flying it across the So we were just laying in our beds, me and my two brothers and my two sisters. We'd get under the covers and we would just wait for the storm to pass because we never knew what was going to happen in my house. It was so unpredictable, right? Now that doesn't make me an alcoholic, but it makes me a kid that grows up with a lot of fear inside of me. The fear of my father, the fear of rage, the fear of anger, the fire of anger. The fear, the evil and corroding threat. Not only that, I'm a guy that grows up with a lot of insecurity about myself. You know, like I said, we don't have those fireside chats. There's no self-esteem or esteemable things that we talk about the ways you can feel good about yourself. So, you know, I just feel like crap all the time. I don't know why it's just the way I'm built, I guess, you Know, but most importantly, what I'm walking around with is something that I was going to kill me. And that's secrets. You see, I come from a family, I come from an neighborhood where nothing leaves your house, nothing leaves in neighborhood. So So from a young age, I'm internalizing emotions that I don't even know how to handle. I'm externalizing anger. I'm eternalizing fear. I'mternalizing these secrets. I'm maternalizing insecurities. And I don'T KNOW ANY OF THIS STUFF UNTIL I LAND WITH YOU GUYS. I'M JUST PUSHING IT DOWN, PUSHNG IT DOWN AND WAITING FOR THE EXPLOSION TO HAPPEN. AND THAT EXPLosION HAPPENS 52 YEARS, 53 YEARS AGO. I DON'T EVEN KNOW HOW OLD I AM. 52 YEAR AGO AS A 13-YEAR-OLD KID. NOW, I TRULY BELIEVE EVERY ONE OF US HAVE A MOMENT. It could be a big moment, could be a little moment. I think mine's kind of a little moment, but when things just change the course of our life, you know? And for me it was being in fifth grade. You know, my parents really wanted the best for me, but I could never see that. It's always, I took everything personal. And so they took me away from all the people I felt comfortable with, all my friends in the public school system and they put me into the Catholic school system where I knew nobody and all of a sudden I was dealing with priests and Catholicism and these things called nuns and back in those days they like to grapple a little bit they like to fight you know they weren't so pleasant these people you know so again i'm walking into this thing but you know i'm going into sixth grade i'm 13 years old you know and this is where my life just takes that that sharp turn to the left you know uh i'm in a cemetery one day and you know with five guys that i still know to this day you know and here comes that first bottle it's called 45 malt liquor you know and i put my hand i stretched my hand out and grabbed that bottle with a lot of fear because i didn't know what was going to happen if i started the drink that perception of fun and freedom and all that they wanted that kind of went out the window so i put in my hand today and i start drinking on that colt 45 malt liquor next bottle that comes around is mohawk blackberry brandy and i started drinking on at blackberry branding what i can tell you about my first night drinking is i puke purple for about two weeks i took a beating from my father my mother grounded me for life but the hook was in that magic elixir worked for a guy like me on that night because what happened to me like probably everyone on this call right now is that thing that was going on inside of me that thing that i did not understand those unmanageable spiritual disconnected that fear of everything just kind of like ah settle down it just settled down you know and uh everything just seemed to be okay right and now i know looking back 52 years ago i'm alcoholic right out of the gate and why do i tell you that with such assurance because i know what i suffer from today i know the physical allergy i know about the phenomena called cravings i knew on day one i couldn't control the amount once i started to drink you know i knew that that second leg of the puzzle was put into place that night that thing called the obsession where the idea is so strong. It overcomes all other ideas. I couldn't wait till next weekend. I couldn't to be with my friends and go to the football game, go to dance, get some booze, you know, do whatever we're going to do and have some fun to recreate that first night even though that first night had consequences that weren't too good. I couldn't just fill that hole in my soul again and fill that void, you know? And little do I know, you know, I'm stepping right on a path that goes straight to pitiful and incomprehensible demoralization otherwise known as aka health you know and uh over the next 16 years of my life you know uh my the progression of my alcoholism the progression of my drinking was coupled with the progression of my behavior and living out on the streets and doing the things I was doing I was getting a lot of trouble I was stealing a lot it's not like my parents ever sat me down and said hey Jim this is you know how you rob a car or Jim how you're rob an apartment or do illegal activities we used to the trains back in the days and you know sell that stuff out about trunks i mean it was a lot of criminal behavior you know and you knows not that i'm making that uh not that I'm you know looking at that in in a in a minimal way i'm just it was important and i paid the price for that kind of behavior you now but the thing was it was just about the camaraderie camaraderia of the guys and being with the guys, and drinking and thinking that this is a this is is a great deal you know my parents put me into a prep school you know a high school and I tell this story for two reasons well first is this is where I'm introduced to the morning drink I was a basketball player who uh I got hammered the night before a really big game and uh and I remember being on that bus the next day and I was with a guy who happens to be an AA himself today and you know he pulls out a bottle out of his gym bag and says you know how you get feel you know how you feel better and stop those shakes. And I said, what's that? He goes, just start drinking again. And so on the bus going to a basketball game, I started drinking with this guy. And you know, that just became normal, common practice, right? If you have the shakes, you know the old term, you know drink the hair of the dog. I started to understand that at the age of 16, 17 years old, that if you want to feel better, just started drinking again. You know, another incident I had in school was you know anyone of authority I always looked askance at right that's a nice fancy word I always look at like a like a problem right because of my old man and you know I just anyone of Authority just pissed me off you know and I just didn't know how to deal with people that had that you know upper hand and whether it was a coach yelling at me you know in at a basketball practice or a football practice or or a priest you know I tell this story you know a priest confronted me once and uh you know after a few words you know I wound up grabbing this priest and I knocked him out right and again you know people laugh sometimes and people like you know all I can tell you is I didn't go to hell right away okay and why I tell that story it's because it's very important that's where I planted the stake that's Where I earmarked the time that I became my father and from the day of that punch to the the day I landed it and maybe even a couple years into recovery I became my old man I either got angry at it or I drank at it and every situation every person every confrontation every circumstance in my life I either Got pissed off angry rageful or I just said screw you and I just drank right and just tried to just you know get rid of your existence you know my life and that just was a along with all these other character defects which i don't know what they are i think this is the way we all are right the way i'm growing the way I'm feeling all these emotions all this stuff that's coming out of me and see there's not enough booze in the world to get past that stuff so I'm just a chronic alcoholic who's drinking around the clock but here's the delusion again I don't think alcohol is a problem you're a problem that's a problem everything else is a problem but it's not me right and what happened is I wound up getting out of school you know a little caveat my mom was the secretary to the principal in that high school that's the only way the reason why i got away with what i got a way with you know and uh and off the college i go i like to say the greatest 10 years of my life but the truth of the matter is i lasted in university in pennsylvania for one year and i came back to new jersey and what's a guy to do you know got no education i've got no trade you know and all i do and all I know is that you know there's a bar on every corner where i grow up so i go down to the corner bar and that seems to be like headquarters for everyone right the mailman's there the cops are in there the firemen are in their teachers are in there everyone's in there before their job before their occupation and we're all lying at each other and we'll talking about all the dreams and aspirations and goals we have right but the fact of the matter is i'm an 18 year old kid and a 19 year old kid sitting in a bar and i'm doing something that i don't understand until i until i land in the rooms of alcoholics anonymous the thing that's tripping me up every time i can give you a bunch of circumstances i could tell you a lot of stories but what i don't understand is i take that first drink on a daily basis and when i take the first drink all bets are off and see that's a really stupid thing when it came to alcoholics anonymous what do you mean the first string gets me loaded you know yeah it's the last 20 we hit us a million times it's so last 20 of the outside issues i have no concept of that first strength that's really the thing that's light in the fuse and getting me gone so i just sit in a bar all day and you know i'm just drinking i'm drinking i really don't leave until closing and then off 30 after hours and that means it's a miserable existence like you all know i mean it's like alcohol has me in its grip and i don't know what to do and i got odd jobs here odd jobs there you know i usually blow up and make mistakes and get fired for everything i'm doing because of my drinking you know the way i deal relationships ladies is uh you know I'm in a bar one day and i see a pretty girl against the wall and i seen my sister in a barn and say i'll buy an illegal substance if you introduce me to that girl and reason why i do that because i start to live the life of a double-edged sword you see there's half of me that's blaming everyone for what's going on in my life and blaming everyone from the way i feel blame it everyone for my lack of funds blaming everyone blaming everyone blame and everyone but you see this another half of me the other side of me and the other site is the guy that's always searching something out there for something out there to fix the hole in my soul right here i think booze is going going to fill it I think alcohol and drugs and women and money and cars you name it anything of a materialistic value was going to make me feel better about who I am and maybe just change the course of my life but the truth of the matter is I continue to take that first drink so I'm under the delusion that if I just get married settle down like a lot of guys I know are settling down I'm 25 years old at the time um get settled down meet a woman you know get the white picket fence maybe get a real job you know i think i think you know i believe i truly believe to my core that that's going to you know be this the answer to my problems and i get married to this woman and uh four months into the marriage i walk out of the marriage because i don't because what i didn't understand is i had the inability not to drink i'm powerless but i don't understand powerlessness until i land with you guys i don'T UNDERSTAND THAT EVERY TIME I TAKE THAT FIRST DRINK I CAN'T STOP I DON'T UNderstand anything about the physical allergy i don't understand any of that stuff and i'm baffled by this this thing that's going on but again being who i am it's everything else that's causing the problems in my life and what happens to me is i you know i'm four months sober and i take off and i go down to boca raton i run i run out of marriage because that's what most good cowards do they run i walk out of the marriage and i goes down to boca ratón florida where i have friends and you know some of them have some you know well-off families and i mean this condo i'll never forget I'm on the beach. I'm looking out the glass windows. I could see the beach, I could see the boats, the bikinis. I mean, it seems like everything a man would want, right? But I'm getting that now. They're not going to throw a horseman every day. You see, I'm being so driven by my shame and my guilt and my remorse of the way I'm showing up in people's lives and things that have occurred in my life and the people I'm harming in my life, you know, that shame and guilt and remorse. Most alcoholics have shame based identities. We know that. Right. But I've just been driven by this. And then, you know like i said the knock at the door the four horsemen of terror or frustration bewilderment despair it's there every day but i'm under that delusion that all i need to do is crack open a bottle of donnie walker red and see i'm at this point in my drinking where i don't even need to take the first drink i just know cracking that seal i can feel the grindiosity come back but i take that first drink and then that little kid comes out again that little child that was born perfect and all of a sudden it's her fault it's my parents fault it just it's glenn's fault it whoever's fault it is because i don't know how to take stock honestly right this is the difficulty when we land in our rooms of alcoholics anonymous and we're asking inventory our lives i don t know how to inventory my life i could write a life story where i'm just blaming everyone i don t know how look at my part or my mistakes in that stuff right so this is what's going on for a while and you know i eventually come back to new jersey and what do i do i don have a job i I have no trade. I have not hooked to get into a union, and I make a decision. And the decision was I was so filled with shame of what I was doing and the way I was living is that I decided to live on the streets for the next 18, 19 months of my life. I lived homeless on the street in New Jersey or northern New Jersey and lower Manhattan, and then I lived that life, you know, pitiful, incomprehensible demoralization. It was dehumanizing. It was traumatic. You know, I always say if I had a glass, you know, a glass basketball or soccer ball, let's just say, and I just dropped it, it would shatter. That was my life. And I couldn't see it. I could not see it, that's how strong this disease of alcoholism was. I couldn'T see that drinking was a problem. And, you Know, and walking the streets, panhandling, stealing, doing, selling blood back then. I mean, doing whatever I needed to do to get the next drink. And I didn'T know what was wrong with me. and i walked in a bar one day i was 29 years old at this point and i walked in the bar and uh and i met this old guy and he looked at me and said hey jimmy they're hiring guys like you in newark airport guys like me finally being seen for my potential here guys like me there used to be an airline called people's express and people's expression used to hire guys like us now you have to be old to remember that airline but people's expressed hired guys like bus and the job was to get the luggage that was over there hopefully on the plane that was over there I mean it was a real challenge right it was like the segue here if you flew through Newark airport in the 80s and you're still waiting for your luggage well I can make amends after this talk but uh but that was the job right and so you could just imagine Newark Airport people everywhere we're going into this room it's like a half-assed interview guy says just go back out I mean I'm off the streets I mean what was the I didn't even expect to get hired I'm off the streets and uh and I remember sitting in a chair and you know for years I couldn't tell you if you asked me Jimmy what was you what were you feeling in that moment I couldn'T tell you it's just utter defeat I guess that's the answer right it wasn't until I came into the rooms of Alcoholics Anonymous and opened the big book to page eight read Bill's story where Bill put words his first step experience was I really believe puts words to all our first step experiences that when he says no words could tell the loneliness despair i felt in a bit of morass self-pity quicksand stretched around me in all directions i met my match i've been overwhelmed alcohol was my master for the first time at the age of 29 years old as i sat there with wind blowing through my soul maybe just maybe drinking's a problem and after a few minutes a complete stranger sat next to me and after several minutes this gentleman looked at me and said what's your problem and for whatever reason well i know the reason today only god's grace i spit my life story up on this complete stranger and he looked at me he said i have the answer for you i said what'S that free cell phone free beeper days he pulled out a piece of paper wrote down a street you know where this is i said that's my old neighborhood put a number in front of that street and he asked me a very strange question he goes is it possible for you not to take a drink today i was honest with the guy i said yeah i want to drink right now it's like 10 o'clock in the morning don't drink today and try to be in front of this address at seven o'lock tonight and all i could tell you and there's no other answer for it but for the grace of god at seven O'clock that night with my knees knocking my stomach churning my head going a thousand and one miles an hour of all sorts of delusion even was i even in the airport today i wasn't even sure i was so shot out standing in front of that house a 1979 chevy impala pulled up and it was the stranger driving that car and in that car was a bunch of other strangers and they pulled up on me and they rolled down the window and they said the most spiritual thing you'll ever hear an alcoholic son get in the car and i got in the call of these gentlemen and they took me around the corner it's less than 500 yards i could have walked to this meeting but they walked me into my first meeting of alcoholics anonymous my grammar school where i had all sorts of contempt towards god towards goodness towards you name it anything that had any kind of week of any kind of happy goodness anything fluffy i mean anything like that i just could i had contempt towards walking into grace doesn't always feel like walking into grace felt like I was walking out of chaos that night I didn't understand the enormity of what I was about to walk into I didn' t understand the enormously of how my life was going to shift on that day because when I walked into that meeting it was March 28th 1987 I haven't had a drink since that you know the day before and now I walked in that meeting this grandma school i was having flashbacks i remember walking down those stairs and walking past the cafeteria and i remember being a sixth grader a seventh grader eighth grade i remember having those goals those dreams those aspirations but i also remember taking that first drink as i got down to the end of the hall i smelled coffee and i'm always generous when i say coffee because some of you old guys will remember they used to make this thing called sanka sanka was like something the astronauts used to drink but it was Sanka and uh you know and then I met the most important person you'll ever meet in a meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous we called him the greeter this gentleman extended his hand to me and I grew that and I grabbed that flimsy reader and he pulled me into you and all of a sudden my world opened up to something I never even knew existed and all of a sudden the kindness of strangers took over walked into aa when it was a time where we didn't talk about the big book a lot of speaker meetings a lot you know 12 and 12 a lot of discussion meetings no real workshops like we see today and big book study meetings well none of that was going on it wasn't really until joe and charlie came through the northeast i guess it was like the you know early 90s when things started to you know everyone became militant crazy again you know started to hit people over the head with a big book we all go through that phase a little bit but things started to that night something happened that stranger became my sponsor that strange that group became my home group the jersey city young people i was 29 years old i think i was the youngest guy in the group that just shows you how things have changed but more importantly when i walked in that room that night those men and that greeter and the women gave me something back that night that i think we owe to every newcomer that walks into a meeting or anyone that really walked into a meeting they gave me a piece of dignity they didn't care what i looked like they didn't get what i smelled like they didn't hear that every other word was a profanity they said keep coming back kid and i did and the kind of sort of strangers those men that took me under their wing i always like to joke they didn t know the difference between a phone book and a big book but i'll tell you if you needed something they'd be on your front porch in a heartbeat those gentlemen put me up in a motel for a week they went out to a department store they bought me clothes they took care of me they took me under their wing and on day two you know i woke up at this motel that came to get me and you know I learned what a trusted servant is that day because this guy Richie who became my sponsor you know, I told him the truth I said I'm scared now why is that such a big deal because real men like me real strong street guys like me we don't share emotions we internalize everything and to say you're scared that you have fear to another man that's that's unheard of in my world but i said richie i'm scared i want a drink he goes i know you do and what this trusted servant did that day was called up his wife and said take me off the calendar i'm going to be with a newcomer for three days for today and he took me to three meetings he fed me three times i must have drank 700 cups of coffee that day but i felt like i was a part of something at last i felt like though i didn't understand what your language was or the a.a lingo or i just knew there was some sort of feeling of safety when i sat in a metal chair held a cup of coffee and listened to you guys tell your stories there was something safe in that all right day seven i'll never forget it like those first seven that first week i could remember like it happened yesterday day seven of my new home group my new friends my new sponsor still don't know what the hell's going on and i'm at a business meeting this guy rich is all excited he runs up to me he goes i want you to take the job as the ashtray cleaner ashtay cleaner you're out of your mind that i didn't say that but that's what i said in my head you're already a minor why do i have to clean ashtrays and i had a valid reason for that because believe it or not i put everything every possible substance has been in my body but i've never smoked a cigarette in my life so why do i have to clean x-rays i didn't get it right and what i didn'T get was that these men were trying to build a responsibility a commitment to something a commitment on my sobriety and what i could tell you is from that day day seven to this moment i've been tethered to alcoholics anonymous through a commitment whether it's been my home group whether it'S been the district whether it's been the area i've been involved in the third legacy of service right because that one spiritual truth i found out is that in order to get out of the darkness of your life you have to serve others i didn't know that i made everything about me but it just seemed like it was a lot of ease and comfort when i helped you and that's how my sobriety started i got back with that wife i got a real job i mean everything came back to me amazingly fast right physically i mean uh i got job i made i got good job really a union job right and uh i had money in the bank i i got car you know we had those two little aa babies i mean life looked from the outside look it didn't look great but to the untrained eye it looks like normal living is a solution to alcoholism but see here i am in a meeting with a rope i'm just looking for a bridge to jump off because at five years without a drink i'm dying in the rooms i'm dying of something i don't understand about i'm done with something that we're not even talking about i'm dining untreated alcoholism you see i'm under the delusion that abstinence is the solution to a spiritual malady and say i don'll not understand that right i'm still that same guy that's walking around with a belly full of fear a belly filled with insecurity a belly full secrets god forbid and i'm not telling my sponsor any of this because i don't talk about this stuff i don know how to talk about these stuff so i internalize everything internalize everything without a drink if you came up to me immediately say hey jim how you doing you know like the veins will be popping out of my neck hey everything's great everything's fine but what happens to me is i give this talk and uh you know at the end of this talk there's the line everyone thanks your hand and uh this guy came up to me and i am six foot four he is six foot he looks at me and says you are screwed you're screwed, but a little bit salty language. And I want to start a fight in the meeting of alcoholics and honors because I don't know how to face resistance with no resistance. I don'T even know how TO FACE CONFRONTATION WITHOUT VIOLENCE. I'M JUST A VIOLENT GUY AND NOTHING HAS CHANGED IN MY LIFE OTHER THAN I'M NOT DRINKING, YOU KNOW? BUT I TAKE A STEP BACK AND I LOOK AT THIS GUY IN HIS FACE AND I SAID, YOU'RE RIGHT, I NEED HELP. AND I FIND MYSELF IN A LITTLE APARTMENT ON THE HUDSON RIVER LOOKING OVER looking over to new york and i'm getting a spiritual test from this guy first question he asked me jim how long can you hold your breath how long can you be in a 12-step program and not work the 12 steps what does your relationship with god look like well i'm catholic i guess i believe in god but what does god have to do with any of this stuff you know what makes you alcoholic uh um the best i could stammer out of my mouth in that moment was i drank too much at that time i had no idea about the physical allergy i had No idea about The Obsession of Mine i had NO idea about THE SEARCH ENGINE the spiritual malady deep down inside every one of us i didn't know that drives everything right i didn' t know any of THIS STUFF then he asked me a question that you know some people have a hard time believing but this is the way it was in my neighborhood. He looked at me and said, where's your big book? And I looked at him and said I don't have a big book. No, I didn't even say that. What am I saying? I said, what's a big work? And I'm sure there was a big book on a podium at a literature table at meetings we were never encouraged to open that book up. So I never had a big one, right? And then he asked me a question or was it really a question was a consideration. If AA works, why do you have so many problems? But the truth of the matter is I'm not working AA. not drinking i'm going to meetings which is very important a very important suggestion but i'm not living in a program of recovery that's going to take away these emotional feelings that i have or the causes and conditions of the things that i suffer from i got a boatload of stuff and i don't know how to talk about this stuff but what happened on this day this guy bill grace he came from saint paul minnesota man that was armed with the facts about himself man of depth and weight comes from the same place that my sponsor comes from today ironically right and uh starts to paint the picture talks about the two goals of aaa in his opinion two goals that i truly believe in today first goal don't pick up the first drink that's the obvious one but it's the second goal we all want to attain and that's just step into the sunlight of the spirit because that's where we're going to experience real freedom from the bondage itself That's where the walls start to come down and we start to have relationships with other people. See, the old-timers used to say this all the time that alcoholism is nothing more than a soul sickness caused by a separation from God and disconnect from each other. I've been walking around with walls built around me for years. You're not coming in and I'm not coming out. I'll only tell you so much. I'm not going to share anything of deep emotional value. No, we don't do things like that, right? is a price to be paid to get into the sunlight of the spirit. It means that I need to walk into the darkness of my life and I got to uncover, discover and discard the things that are blocking me. Daily Reflections was read this morning. There's a line in Daily Reflexions or in one of the paragraphs on May 1st if you ever read it. It says this, it's a side of myself that I refuse to look at that rules me. I must be willing to look out the dark side in order to heal my mind and my body because that's the road to freedom. I must walk into darkness to find the light and walk into fear to find peace. See, living in the darkness balks at investigation. But in order to get free, I have to walk into the darkness. You see, what the old timers used to say, things like this, that alcoholism or AA is like a big bonfire, right? A lot of people are walking around the fire, but eventually the fire is going to go out. But if you really want to change, if you're really want to have a relationship, if you were really want to bring down the walls of indifference, you have to walk through the fire and get your ass burnt and feel the uncomfortability of change. And see, there's only one requirement for that. I got to be willing. And see this one thing that I can't do for anyone here and none of you guys could do for me. And that's to give me willingness. Willingness is an inside job. And what makes us willing? Well, our good friend Ralph likes to say a good whooped ass will make you willing. But circumstances make us willing. Being sick and tired or being sick and tired, being sober in the rooms of Alcoholics Anonymous and still having a lot of troubles. That doesn't mean we're trouble free. It just means that where I'm being weighed down like an anchor, ball and chain around my shoulder. Why is everything happening to me? Making everything about me, not being able to live in that place of emotional sobriety or emotional maturity or any kind of balance that my life is like a teeter board dependent upon what's going on that's how i'm going to react i don't know that i can get free from that stuff and so i sought to walk into the sunlight of the spirit and i mean into the darkness of my life and i start to look at some things downstairs at my kitchen table well it's not sunny out now but on a lot of days when i sit with someone i kind of paint that picture we sit at my table there's a long hallway to the glass door in front of my house and i tell them that's really the goal is to step out that glass door into the sunlight right but in order to step out in that sunlight you've got to walk through this hallway and you've gotta start moving things you gotta start looking at things that you've never looked at you gotta do something which i thought was a weakness but it's really strengthened disguise i had to become vulnerable vulnerable to another man you see i have a lot of pride like a lot of us i don't want to tell people how i feel i don' t want to talk about what's going on in my life i want to just bury everything and make believe that everything is fine but that's not serenity that's not sobriety that's on alcoholics anonymous because if anything has really showed up in in the last 36 years of my sobrieties that we need each other and we need to get to a place where we could have sometimes uncomfortable conversations about what's going on in our lives so i learned about this first step i started to read about doctor's opinion. He took me through the doctor's opinion. Silkworth was right by me. I shouldn't say lives by me, I guess he does live by me his grave site is right by my house. We had a big book retreat last weekend or two weeks ago and a bunch of us all went to the gravesite to do a little Dr. Silkwork memorial to thank him for the life we've been given because without him validating Bill's white light experience who knows that we would even be here right now but how many times do i pass the glenwood cemetery and i look in as two of you girls sitting in there on a beach chair two guys sitting on they were folding chairs and one's reading to the other and i know what you're reading you're leaving the doctor's opinion finding out what we really suffer from this this hopeless condition of mind and body that we can recover from who knew you could do that right so as i sit there and i start to understand that powerlessness that i suffer from no wonder why i can't stop drinking i got a mind that can't start but i got a body just wants to keep going right nowhere in our literature doesn't say anything about aa getting us to quit drinking this is quite the opposite if you read our literature it says we're powerless lack of power is my dilemma i have no mental defense against the first strength you see what i believe that aa's design is to wake us up to the great reality and whatever your higher power is you need to have a spiritual experience spiritual awakening personality change psychic change interchangeable words whatever you need in order to recover and see the wake-up call is bringing me into step two and bringing me into the chapter of agnostics and to start examine a lot of the old ideas that i've been walking around with this you know i come from that 60s catholicism of god's a punishing god and god's going to send me straight to hell for everything i've done i had to learn to let go of a lot of old ideas about a lot things and see the guiding force of my life these ideas these emotions and attitudes you know call young talked about that with roland hazard right they have to be replaced in that little story Hazard talks about, you know, having a new simple attitude. And what's that simple attitude? If I can set aside my old ideas, if I can get honest with myself, if i could search diligently the promises, I could find God. And that's what Bill Grace was sitting with me telling me that if I go into the darkness and let go of a lot of old ideas start to examine the things in my life, get down to causes and conditions, get done to all these resentments, get them to the hundred forms of fear, get it down to all the unhealthy dependencies that you put on others to make you feel good your unreal expectations i had a look at the trauma of living on the streets for two years it almost killed me it changed me as a human being it's a miracle that i'm even able to talk about that stuff now because i it was so traumatic to me and the harms i've caused others and get it all on paper get down to the common manifestations of living a life on self-will and when i was able to do that i was ready to do a fifth step My original fifth set was the most powerful day of my life, other than my two children being born. Because I was in for a long talk and I was also true. And also one thing I was very definitely, one thing that truly understood that I would never walk through that glass door downstairs if I had a secret in my back pocket. So I knew that I had to put it on the table. And on a particular day, it was a long time. I told this man everything. I didn't hold back anything. And like the book instructs, take that album, take the book off your shelf if you want. I didn'T do that. I went to a place called Liberty State Park, which is right on the Hudson River. And I walked out on a pier and I read those five first proposals, asked myself the question, are all the stones properly in place? But then I looked to my right. Less than a quarter mile to my left was the Statue of Liberty. looked across the Hudson River right in front of me was the World Trade Center look to my left maybe a half a mile was Ellis Island symbols of freedom and here I sat as a 32 year old man with tears coming down my eyes with the arms of God wrapped around me and I understood that for the first time in my life that you know what I'm free I'm great there's a big trap here probably the biggest trap and Alcoholics Anonymous. So after I did that fifth step, I felt pride of comfortability. Everything's good. Back with the wife, back with the kids. Everything's great. Good, right? Getting overtime, coaching baseball, coaching basketball, involved with my kids' lives. Nothing wrong with that. But what happened is I started to overtake my primary purpose. And little by little, I didn't know that I started the drift. Don't let the life that AA gave you take you away from your AA life. We hear that a million and one times. And all the good things, I started to hang myself with my blessings. You know, the ocean's right here. Take the boat on the ocean, point it east. I can see the horizon. I could see the sunrise every day. It looks like a beautiful picture, but what I don't recognize is that I'm drifting from town to town to the town. And that's what happens for many of us in recovery. Life is good. everything's in place but I start to balk on some things and I start to rest on my laurels and all of a sudden I'm 10 years sober and I walk out of a marriage because I found the woman who understands in AA. I'm the guy that builds a beautiful spiritual structure up for myself and I tear it down with a senseless series of sprees and let me tell you, you don't need to be drinking to blow your life up in Alcoholics Anonymous just sponsor a bunch of guys or girls, you'll find that out and i blow up my life at 10 years without a drink you know uh i'm behind that eight ball again dishonesty lying giving my sponsor 30 of what's really going on living that double life that the fifth step even talks about right by the time i'm 13 years over i walk in a bar because i'm fed up i'm sick and tired of being sick and tight i walk into a bar you know and again i don't want to drink but just like dr bob i'm stuck between a rock and a hard place i don't want to drink but god damn it i gotta get the pain to stop so i'm gonna take a drink and i order a drink at the bar and i'm staring there the angels pop up the angel and the devil drink it don't drink a drink almost like a blackout i don' t even know all of a sudden a hand goes around that glass and pulls it back and when i look up the bartender just happens to be a member of alcoholics anonymous and he says to me what the hell you're doing basically throwing my life away i took my tail i put it between my legs and i walked out of the bar and two weeks later i'm in a meeting where i met this guy called peter m many of you know him and for the sake of the time and the story you know my life was recreated through his help and we're looking at a lot of things in my life i had to get down to causes and conditions i had look at a lot of the old ideas that drove me you know ideas emotions and attitudes are one of the most important things we need to examine in our in our recovery and why i say that is because you know i think my life should look a certain way sometimes i think My life should look a Certain way when it comes to my family or to my relationship or to My job or to to my money, or even Alcoholics Anonymous. And the minute that it doesn't look the way I think it should look, that's where the conflict and that's what annoys starts to go on in my head. And that's when I start to separate from God. And all of a sudden, my life is all about Jimmy. And the question is, when I started to examine that stuff, and I see the truth about it, you know, am I willing to live on terms other than my own? Am I willing to live life on god's terms or am i back to living life on jimmy's terms and that's a really hard thing to see sometimes especially when you live in the delusion that going to meetings i'm sponsoring guys speaking here and there doing service work you know it's a real fine line of dishonesty with myself. And if I don't see that, I fall for that trap. And, you know, so my life got better, you know? Little by little, my life just got better. You know, I went through a divorce. You know? I like to say, you Know, there's not a person on this call right now who hasn't had some sort of adversity in their life. And whether it's a family issue, whether it is a health issue, whether it's a financial issue or job related issue or whatever issue, we've all had our turn in the barrel. But what I've learned here is that the evidence is all around me of men and women who have gotten through their problems with a simple reliance upon God, practicing these principles in all our affairs, having a network of men or women that I can go to and talk about what's really going on and not to internalize this stuff and think that I'm so unique now that I am 36 years sober i don't need to tell you guys that's you know this has been a little rough go for the last two months that that's that's alcoholism protecting itself right again alcoholism doesn't come in a bottle comes in my mind my mind has to put the ego is a powerful thing i love what bill writes and how it works at some of these we bought we thought we could find an easier softer way but we could not with earl the earnestness out of commands we beg you to be fearless and thorough from the very start some of us have tried to hold on to our old ideas and a result was nil until we let go absolutely why can't i let go of things in my life sometimes why do i resist change even though it's so goddamn painful found out it comes down to one word for me called pride and my pride is the essence of my self-centeredness my pride leads to procession to all my character defects and pride and ego will always step into place when i'm in spiritual stagnation so just stop praying for a while stop meditating for a little while stop sponsoring for a while stop doing what we do in here and it's a real slippery slope and it was a real slippery slope for me but i started to get you know back in order my life started to get back in older again you know i went through that divorce the adverse uh add uh you know the problems of life you know in 1999 i was in a huge accident which i'm still paying for had over 40 surgeries in the last 20 something years uh i always like to kid around say i'm five foot eight but with all the metal on me i'm six foot four it's a miracle how that happened uh but the truth is you know i've had my turn in the barrel you know like all of us and i've walked through that and i haven't gotten loaded over that you know uh going through with divorce like some of us have, you know. Two years ago my mom, she passed away, you know, that's a real strange thing. My mom was like a workout freak and at 90 years old the doctor came to her and said, she needs a knee replacement. We're like 90 years older. She goes, she's in better shape than all of you. And my mom got a knee placement and when you put someone at that age under anesthesia it kicked in her dementia. And I became the parent of my parent. I mean, how crazy is that? Right. And my mom just slipped away, slipped away to the point where we, me and my wife, Mary Beth couldn't take care of her and we had to put her in an assisted living and then COVID hit and 43 people in the facility got COVID and died. And my mum was one of them, you know, and, and dealing with that, you know thank God for the rooms of alcoholics and arms. Thank God. I listened to your stories. Thank god. You know, I don't make things about me and I try to be of service to everyone, but you know what I said I walked into that day that I'll never forget this day till the day I die I um two minutes I got that's what I got two minutes going I got you um and I sat with my mother you know and held her hand and talked to her and all that stuff and she looked like a skeleton and just you know thank god I've heard the evidence around me of you guys walking through that stuff how do you walk through this stuff without without you know just I don't know without just going crazy right you know and you know god takes one life away then my daughter came to us and we she said hey we're pregnant so we have our fourth granddaughter now you know she's nine months old what a bundle of joy that is i mean it's just that's a trick everyone all your grandparents you you all said wait till you see what happens well i'm saying it and i love it so it's uh thank god for that but you know this whole deal man living life on life's terms or living life on God's terms. Sometimes it's easy, sometimes it's tough, but you know, we get to do this one day at a time and I'll end on this. You know, the old timers used to make a lot of promises. One of the big promises was you come all the way in and sit all the Way down. You're going to have lifelong relationships and lifelong friendships. And how true that is. There's so many people gliding. There are so many blendos. When you go around the country, there's so many people that you become friends with. They're just solid members of Alcoholics Anonymous. But the one thing that did promise me was when i had 90 days and in new jersey the way we celebrate 90 days there used to be a 90-day pin it was a triangle with a g on the top aa on the bottom and a dot in the middle and what would happen on day 90 is you go to the podium you had a jacket inside because that's the way where you are aa etiquette still exists believe me you'd go to the podium and your sponsor would point to that little insignificant dot say hey that's you right but he made this promise and i make this promise if you're here today new or suffering or you know double-digit sobriety going through the ringer you know what the promise was this if you could put one hand in g god and one hand and a a and live in the three legacies of alcoholics anonymous you'll never have a hand to pick up a drink and how true that's been i've been through the wringer i've had great times good times hard times where it's called life it's cold life and because of the rooms of alcoholics synonymous and friends like you guys you know we live this deal one day at a time and uh and that's all i have so thanks a lot thank you