The Solution Is in Following the Directions – Bob O.

My name is Bob Olson, and I am an Al-Khalid. Now just settle down. You're going to be all right now? Let's see. I'm a member of the Happy Way group in Englewood, Colorado. I didn't pick the name. Sounds like a bunch of people on Thorazine. i would have preferred it would be called the beaten into a state of reasonableness group but i didn't get to choose that so i live with it um it's by the grace of god and the fellowship of alcoholics anonymous that i haven't found an excuse to take a drink today nor have i found a need or an excuse to take a drink since May 28th of 1973 and for that I'm truly grateful. Well, this is interesting. Last time I spoke at a young people's conference was in Las Vegas, Nevada, which was about six or seven years ago. And I had just come from a business meeting in Chicago and flew into Las Vegas. And when I got off the airplane, there was a lady standing there in purple spiked hair and orange and red and green clothes that were really bright. And I thought, my goodness. And she was holding a little sign that said Bob Olson on it. Yeah. came to Alcoholics Anonymous last time in 1973 came the first time in 1968 I think I was around AA for about 5 years couldn't get sober and just never could get that together I'd I knew the solution was here and I knew I was in trouble and I new the problem with alcohol and I just couldn't get all that together and and so every once in a while when I got really drunk I would start feeling sorry for myself and I would I would sentence myself to an AA a meeting. And I would call up Alcoholics Anonymous and ask them where they had a meeting somewhere near where I lived, and I would go over there and I'd be pitiful. And all these people would come up and rub my back and my shoulders and tell me everything was going to be alright. And that is not true. Okay? I don't do that. That's a lie. You know that more than half the people that come into Alcoholics Anonymous, they don't get sober. And telling somebody that you're going to be all right is blowing smoke up their backside. I don't do that. I tell them they're going to die. They come in, well, it says that in the book. And if you don't believe that, read the book, okay? People come to me now and they say, well, I'm dying from alcoholism. And I go, yep, you sure are. and they go well what can I do and I go I don't think there is anything you can do and they'll say well what's going to happen and I tell them you're going to die but you may go insane first and they say does that happen and I'll go if you've got alcoholism that's the only place that goes now why would you tell them that see at some point I don't care how screwed up they are at some point they will turn around and they will look at you and they'll say did that happen to all drunks and you go uh-huh and they will say then why aren't you dead and then you got okay because they just asked you how you got sober now if you don't know how you you got sober. You've got nothing to say, okay? This is a real funny, Alcoholics Anonymous is a really funny deal. You know, I haven't had a drink for over 24 years now and Alcoholics Anonymous gets simpler and simpler and similar and simpler to me. The truth about this was that in 1935 when Bill Wilson got sober he's poking around trying to figure out how to how to stay sober and he found out something. He found out that there were groups who periodically down through history had gotten sober and they had all gotten sober on the same basis and the basis was by using spiritual exercises or spiritual principles that they got sober. We're not the first ones who came up with it, okay? People got sober in the 1800s with The group called the Washingtonians was one of the most singularly successful groups that ever got people sober. They went from zero to a quarter of a million members in ten years, which is tremendously quicker than Alcoholics Anonymous ever did. And they did it on the basis of practicing spiritual principles. And you know when the Washingtonian's were in business about 15 years, they decided that if you could use spiritual principles on alcoholism that you could use it on everything else, too. And when the Washingtonians were 20 years old, you couldn't find one because they lost their singleness of purpose. This is about alcohol. This is a good thing. This is not about alcohol There's lots of other stuff about other stuff. This is without alcohol. When we lose our singleness of purpose, when we don't address alcohol anymore and we decide that we are good for everything, we will go the way of the Washingtonians and we will go the way of the Oxford group okay they got in business they were in business when we got in business and there were lots of drunks that got sober in that group but they had in the late 30s in the 1930s the head of that group saw what Adolf Hitler was doing and he decided that he was going to take exception to that, which is reasonable and started a whole new direction called moral rearmament. And at that point it ceased to be effective on alcoholism. Now Alcoholics Anonymous has not lost its singleness purpose since it started and we don't want to do that now. Because if you're anything like I am you came from a long line alcoholic and see people in my family have been dying from alcoholism for generation upon generation upon generation upon generation and I'm the first generation that isn't dying from it okay and what happens I have five sons what happens if one of my kids has alcoholism and the message isn't clear and precise anymore what do what I'm I'm destiny that child to a to an alcoholic death if we aren't clear and precise in the way we present Alcoholics Anonymous we're gonna go away okay and there's a lot of us that are going to go away now why do I know that you know I can I went to Alcoholics anonymous for five years and could not get sober and and finally got so sick in May of 1973 that I was terrified of ever taking another drink. I had reached a point in my sobriety, in my alcoholism, where I couldn't take another drink because I knew it was going to kill me. I have reached the point where alcohol was toxic to me and my system was in such lousy shape that if I would have added any more alcohol on top of it, I would have truly died. And the no hope position there was that I knew if I didn't take another drink, I'd die anyway. Because I knew what happened when I didn' t drink. If I stopped drinking, I knew that what was coming. It had happened to me before. I started going into DTs and then I would experience convulsions and I didn''t know whether the the convulsions were going to kill me. When I got sober, there weren't any treatment centers. So they either put you in a nut ward or hid you out someplace and hoped you survived it. And so what they did with me was they took me to a halfway house and plopped me down in front of this priest that was running it. And he said, are you an alcoholic? And I said, yeah, I am. And he said, are you done? And I didn't know what the answer was. I mean, I'd tried to be done for years and I couldn't stop. And I said, I hope I'm done. And he says, do you want what we have? This is a really funny question. I don't know that. I don' t know what he's got. Do you want it? Yeah. what's the basis of that decision it's got to be better than what I have okay I couldn't live one more day on the basis of what I was doing I couldnít physically live anymore anyway I was pretty sure I was just going to die and he said do you believe in God and I said no and and he says then I suggest you go find one if you if youíre pretty sure youíre done the whole concept of looking for anything it's a little funny I mean what's the point and he said he said I suggest you go find one and I said you know I wouldn't even know where to look and he says just figure out what you'd like God to be and I said okay and he say now we're going to take you back to your house and if you need some help, let us know. My wife had left me with my two sons. She'd taken off. And they took me home. Now I sat down in that house and I knew it was going to happen because it's happened before. I knew that I was going to probably die and there wasn't much I could do about it and I just waited for it to happen and I didn't have to wait very long. I went through DTs by myself, and I went though hallucinations, and I did not go into convulsions. But I saw stuff coming out from under my refrigerator that you can't even see on Saturday morning cartoons. I saw ants bigger than this podium crawling out from underneath my refrigerator. And I had taken three huge cans of Raid and emptied them in a little tiny kitchen and god damn near asphyxiated myself. I picked a two-door refrigerator up by hugging it and carried it halfway across the room to get it away from the hole that I knew those ants were coming out of. When I came down off all this stuff, I couldn't move the refrigerator back. but that's what panic will do to you you'll find strength you never knew you had for 72 hours I knew every minute that it was the last minute and I do it automatically now if you have alcoholic gastritis it always feels like you're having a heart attack and I knew everything was going to seize up and I was walking around with my hand over my chest all the time knowing it was the last minute I had on earth and I kept praying to this God that this priest told me about and I prayed on my knees and on my back and on my stomach and standing up and in old English and new English and anything that I thought would get through to God. And 72 hours later they came over to see if I was still alive and I was and they said we need to make you we need to keep you busy here for a couple of days and one of the guys owned a stock car track, a flat dirt track and so he put me on a corner of that dirt track during races with a fire extinguisher and it was perfect because you know what a flat dirt track looks like there are clouds of dust and dirt and rolling cars and things on fire and confusion, just massive amounts of confusion. And it was exactly like the inside of my head. And I just stood out there and you know a car would have rolled right over the top of me. I didn't even know how to operate the fire extinguisher. But standing on the corner I thought you know this is like living in hell okay but that's what the inside of my head looked like a couple days later i went back to the halfway house and the priest was sitting there and he said what do you think about god and i said yeah i don't know i mean isn't that a little presumptuous trying to figure out what god is and uh he said would you like god to be and i He said, I'd like him to be like a father. And he said, that's interesting. That's one of the choices. And he said, why would you do that? And I said, because I never had one. I mean, I grew up with four or five different foster families and sometimes with my mother but I never had a father around to speak of and I think it would be nice to have a father that gave a shit. And he said, well, I think that's exactly what God is. Okay? The book says that we had to fully concede to our innermost selves that we were alcoholics. This is the first step in recovery. The delusion that we're like other people or presently may be, which means forever will be, has to be smashed. You know, I'm not like other people. I'm alcoholic. I do really tragic, bizarre things when I drink. In fact, I've never talked about this. I've talked about getting in trouble with the law. So when I was 17 years old, I was living in Wisconsin and people down the road there in the next town kind of irritated me about something so I took a rifle and shot out their power station and knocked out all the power to this city. And then somebody ran up to me and said, you can't do that. And I stuck a gun in their face and a rifle and told them I was going to kill them. And the state of Wisconsin being so delighted with my behavior sentenced me to two years in the Green Bay State Reformatory as a result of that and then told me that if I was willing to go on the service, they'd forget it. So that obviously is a good choice. Obviously looked like a good choice, but they didn't tell me they were starting a war. When I was 17 years old, I was vice president of the junior class. I was head of the Luther League. I was, I started Junior Achievement in my hometown. I was on the student council and then I started drinking. And three months later I was sentenced to two years in the Green Bay State Reform Center. I have a really radical personality change when I drink. I go do stuff that nobody wanted to do. we hurt the people that are closest to us it isn't anything more than their proximity it isn' t because we want to pick on the people we love they're just closer if you're around an alcoholic you're living next to them paint a bullseye on your forehead because if you're closest you're going to get all the abuse and it isn't because we don't like them it's just because they're closer I was sober about seven or eight months and I knew I was going to drink again because that's what I do there wasn't anything different in my life except I was scared to death that i was going to take another drink and die and i knew that it was truly just by the grace of god that i had survived the last one and and i know i'm going to drink again and i went to a meeting and that was a sunday night young people's meeting which will show you how long ago that was i went through a sundays night young peoples meeting there was a guy up there named don peter was talking about about doing the work doing the steps and i i'm listening to him and I know I'm going to drink again. I didn't even know why the hell I was still going to AA. And he's saying, this is a program of action and there are clear and precise directions to get sober here. And that's how I got sober and they showed me precisely how they recovered. And I'm sitting there and looking at him and I'm hearing a whole new story. And after that meeting I went up to him and I said, tell me about what you were saying about directions and precise and all that stuff and he said well that's what this book is about and I said will you show me what you did and he says yeah you're going to have to sit down across from my kitchen table with me once a week until we get through this and we're going start at the forward of the first edition where it says to show others precisely how we have recovered is the main purpose of this book. And he said, I will show you precisely how I recovered. And there was hope in that. Now, have you ever gone to an AA meeting where anybody ever stood up and said, I can show you exactly how I recover? I have. I do. You know, this is not a mystery. The trick is that people like you and I come into Alcoholics Anonymous and go, that's nice, but I think it would be a little better this way. And so when I went to this guy, I said, Don, I'm going to drink again. He said, no, you're not. And I said、 yeah, I am. I mean, I got this whole history. And he said、 are you willing to do this stuff? And I Said、 uh-huh. And he had sat down with me for 30 minutes and he started at step one and he outlined every one of those steps and he told me exactly what I was going to have to do to do them. Step one is about understanding conceding, which means to give grudgingly our alcoholism. Step two is coming to believe. We don't care what you believe as long as it's bigger than you are. And step three is making a decision to live by spiritual principles. You're going to have to get down on your knees and memorize the prayer and hold my hands and say this deal. And he went through all of the twelve steps and he said now is that what you want to do? One of the big problems that we have, and I work with a lot of people, and they give me the psychopath. Okay? I love them. You know why? I mean, I went to like the Maryland State Convention, and this guy comes up to me and I know him like he's my brother. This guy's got a look in his eyes like he is going to go off like a Roman candle in the next three seconds all the time. This is a guy that walked up and shot a guy in both lungs because he wanted to make sure he killed him, okay? That guy was his drug dealer. And I'm looking at this guy and going, thank you, God. And he said, I said, how'd you wind up with the duty of hauling me around this weekend? And he says, well, my sponsor said that there was this guy named Bob Olson coming to town and that you were just like I am. and I say he was right understand that we all kind of crawl out of the quagmire anyway I don't even know where the hell I was which is okay when I went to my sponsor and said I'm going to drink again he said why do you think that and I said I don' t know what to do and he said Bob Holland you've been around AA and I said since 1978 or 68 and he said well what did you do and I said I went to meetings and I talked with people and that's what I did and he said well no wonder you're going to drink and I said why is that and he said you know you've done everything in Alcoholics Anonymous Bob but follow the direction now why is it that people like you and I refuse to follow the directions? I don't know what the deal is. We've got something wrong up here that makes us go, yeah, that looks good, but we'll get to that when we get to it. See, because when they started this organization, this fellowship, they said if we all get together and follow these spiritual principles, we don't have to drink again okay and and they would take people in the early days of aa they put almost everyone in the hospital okay and they bring a couple of aa members in there and they sit them down next to him and they'd say tell us about your alcoholism they'd all tell stories about their alcoholism until the person understood that that's what he suffered from and they said are you willing to believe in anything because you're really going to need a higher power this is a spiritually based program which incidentally there is no spiritual part to this program alright this whole program is spiritual this is about getting close to God because only God can take care of our alcoholism ok lack of power is my dilemma I don't have any power I'm dying from a degenerative and fatal disease and I can't stop it if there's got to be a God here if there wasn't a God none of us would be here none of use would be sober well he said you never followed the direction so that's what you're going to do now now that's when I got sober that's why that's how I got over and I stayed sober and I do this step once a year every year I've done it 24 times, okay? And I start at step one every time and ask myself, am I really an alcoholic? Maybe I've been deluding myself all these years just because I had a bad run of luck, okay. And I have to go back and look and see if my behavior was really alcoholic. And then I have asked myself again, the whole basis of my life today, the central fact in my life is a willingness to live a spiritual life. And I have to go back and ask myself that same question about am I even willing to believe? That's what the book says. First it says lack of power is our dilemma and then it talks about power. It says that we don't have any and then he talks about a willingness to believe and it talks about new power flowing in. and it describes the power it says that power which is God so if you run into somebody that has a doorknob or a tree or something as a higher power tell them that they belong in an insane asylum this is about God it's not about trees and it's no about doorknobs and it' s not about anything else there is a God and he' s there and if you will move towards him he will move toward you the only place in that book which is interesting it talks about how to use power some people in AA because of their term in sobriety or whatever get a little power mad the only place in the book to my knowledge that talks about how to do how to use power is back in the family afterwards where it says It talks about laughing in inappropriate places and stuff like that. And it talks about having a good time in an AA meeting, which is what you guys are doing, right? And it says, why shouldn't we? We have recovered, and we've been given the power to help others. It's the only place where it talks About using power. See, I don't have the power To save myself. I don' t even have enough power To say my own life. But I have the Power to help other people. not to cure them not to fix them just to walk with them there is a piece in there that says crushed by a self-imposed crisis we could neither postpone nor evade we had to fearlessly face the proposition of God either is or he isn't he's either everything or he's nothing what is your choice to be my self-impoved crisis is not my alcoholism my self-imposed crisis is that I can't fix myself now I have this degenerative fatal disease and I can not stop and my crisis is I am dying and what am I supposed to do about it I mean if I could stop it I would have stopped it I can cannot postpone it you know I cannot say give me three weeks off because I am just sick enough where it is going to kill me and I can't evade it I can say wait a minute I'm going to fly out to Columbus and I want to leave my alcoholism in Littleton because I'm it my alcoholismo is me why do we have to face the proposition that God is or he isn't well here's why I can fix myself no human power can relieve my alcoholism now I can't fix me and you can't fix me and we are left with this question about okay who's going to fix me okay if I can you can there better be a God or we're all SOL okay that's it and until people until I came to a decision that I was totally powerless in the face of my alcoholism I couldn't get any further than that okay until I was beaten senseless by alcohol I couldn'T get past it there was about the time I was taking the third step there was a convention an international convention that came to Denver and you know international conventions are huge now you know that one in san diego was in the head god knows how many 60 70 000 people but back then in 1975 we had 17 000 drunks that showed up in denver all at the same time and um and we heard this guy named mac cheater who was dead now who was from winnipeg and he was talking about a group called the Golden Slippers in Winnipeg. And the Golden Sliippers had that name because none of them could stay sober, okay? And they all meet together but they'd all get drunk and then they'd sometimes one at a time I suspect, sometimes together but nobody could stay silver and their friends were dying And it became an object of some real concern to them. And they didn't know how to do it, because they had an AA group, but when they got together in their AA group they talked about their wives and their jobs and the other stuff, or their husbands or whatever, and then they'd go out and get drunk. And so they knew they had to take a really serious step. and they decided that they were going to do something that they had never seen in Alcoholics Anonymous before and what that was, was they were gonna quit talking about the steps. Okay? And they were Gonna Quit Intellectualizing About the Steps and they were Going To Quit Verbalizing About the Steps and they Were Gonna Take a Whole New Approach Towards AlcoholicsAnonymous. They Were Gonna Do the Step. An amazing thing happened. They all got sober, and they all stayed sober. It was absolutely amazing. In 1975 when we heard them talking about that, we decided that we'd get 15 people together and that we would do that as a group. We started the group in the basement. About time we got to the third step, we had 15 people in a circle doing the third step together. Okay? Let me tell you something. Share something with you. A year and a half ago somebody came up and said, well you, we got lots of new people and these people all have to go through the steps and there's a few of us that have been around here for a while and we want to go through the step. Will you do like a step workshop and we'll all go through the steps together. And I said, sure, just let me know when you've got to put it together and make sure that both men and women can get in it and make sure it's open to anyone who wants to get sober or da-da-da. They said okay and then they called me up and said, come on down Bob, we're going to have our group starting next Sunday night. So I went down there. There were 75 people in this church basement. You want to really have an experience? Get on your knees with 75 people and take the third step prayer together. I'm surprised the roof of that church didn't come off truly there was more power in that room at that time than anything I've ever experienced now the book says selfishness self-centeredness, that we think is the root of our problem, that truly is the route of our problems we are selfish, self- centered people and that's the way we live our lives and that why we make other people mad and they retaliate seemingly without cause that's why we make everybody mad we're going around doing our stuff you're going to have to do my stuff that really makes people angry because they're too busy doing their stuff my sponsor came to me and explained to me in fact I hadn't read the book with all these people and looked at selfishness and self-centeredness being the root of our problems and then we got down and talked about the actor who wants to be the director and run the whole show. And then he read The Third Step Prayer to Me and he said, he said next week I want you to come back here and make a decision this week about whether you want to do this or not. But I want it I want for you to read this part where it says think well before making this decision knowing that you can at last abandon yourself utterly to him. did you ever abandon yourself utterly to anything and I said alright and he said read the prayer so you know what it means God I offer myself to thee to build with me and to do with me as thou wilt that means God you do anything you want your deal okay you take me anywhere anyhow any way that you want now you show me what you would have me be and that's what I will be okay relieve me of the bondage itself and I may better do thy will my bondage itself I can't stop looking at myself I am fixated on myself I can see you for one second because I'm too damn busy looking at me i am so self-centered that i think that the whole world revolves around me and that i am the center of the universe that's why i think i'm god okay got to give it up i have to turn out one of the one of greatest exercises is in the 11th step when we turn our thoughts to someone we can help because every time I'm fixated on myself I start making mountains out of molehills I start pole vaulting over mouse turds because I think I'm so damned important I can't see you because I'm just too busy looking at me and relieve me of the bondage of it take away my difficulties that victory over them may bear witness to those I would help of thy power, thy love, and thy way of life may I do thy will always bearing witness means being an example let people look at me and see that 25 years ago I did not have a prayer in hell of surviving one more year okay let them see that from some stumbling inarticulate blob that no one would talk to that God made whatever I am today which is whatever he wants I don't care okay one of the things that you know when we talk about attraction rather than promotion that's what it's talking about bearing witness people watch you running around with clear eyes and knowing where you're going and living by a set of principles and they see you and they go what the hell happened what happened to them what made the difference and then they come up to you and they know that you can fairly shout with a solution you know like the trash in AA that bullshitters hang out with bullshippers and staff workers hang out with staff workers this is what works here okay and if you're someone coming to Alcoholics Anonymous and you aren't recovering your intuitive thought will tell you he has it and so he's talking with a solution of how to bust the crowd of people who love him and you know you just walk in there and you see it you know you walk into an AA and tell within five minutes he's got a solution he does and the people that move towards the people with the solution are the people trying to get over, and the people who don't are the people who are still trying to learn the same bullshit they learned on the street. That's terrifying. Let me get on it. I've been talking to a patient once in 20 years. And recently, mine too, a couple of years ago, mine too was up on me and on my back. And he said, don't do that anymore. So I had to go to all the places where I told him I was going to talk and sit down. And I have to be after this, and now I'm not going to do this anymore. And the thing that I'm afraid of is that I am not going be clear. Because I know that in the last three times that I go out and do this, that if I'm not clear, I might as well not go. And so if you think I'm a bit abrupt or a bit opinionated, it's because I am. Alcoholics Anonymous is about getting closer to God so God can take care of our alcoholism because we don't have the power to do that. And I don't know how to get close to God. That's my big dilemma here. And so all I can do is take someone else's ideas and try and do them as closely as I can. And one of the worst things that I can do in Alcoholics Anonymous is take some sort of poetic license, some liberty with this program because the great spiritual virtue in following these directions is by not adding anything at all. It's by just doing it by the numbers. Well, my sponsor said, go home, think about third step prayer, come back here a week from now and tell me if you want to do it. Okay? And I said, alright. I came back and he said, well, you want me to do this? I said no. And he said why not? And I told him I don't want to give God that kind of power in my life. I said he said okay does that mean you're not going to do it and I said no you asked me if I wanted to do it I don't want to do it but I will do it because I don't want to drink again and he said then get on your knees and hold my hands and say that prayer and mean it and I said okay and I did that okay I felt like something I felt like something changed he told me it would change he said don't do this unless you really want to do this because your life will change and I guarantee you don't ever stop in the middle of the steps because half a loaf will kill you here okay don't never go halfway through the steps because you'll know just enough to screw you up so if you're going to do these steps start at 1 and get to 12 because it's real dangerous is to get halfway through and decide you don't want to do it anymore. Well, I stood up and he chuckled. Well, I thought it was a pretty solemn moment and I didn't think it was appropriate for him to interject humor at that point. And I said, what's so funny? And he said, you don' t want to give God that kind of power in your life? And I said no. And he said, he's got all the power anyway, Bob. This is just an exercise in who's God and who's the drunk. I went, ah. Because this is about perspective. If you don't give yourself to God, you don' t know who you are. Did you bring your legal pad? And I said, yep. And he said, now, you understand that you've got to start writing inventory right now? And I said, okay. And he says, you see here where it says that unless this is at once followed by a rigorous attempt to clean the house, it will have little permanent effect? And I says, uh-huh. And he goes, that means if you don't write inventory, it's going to wear off. Okay. well see I I thought that I had gone to some great length to make that decision and I was hoping there was a place in the book that says now take three months off because this has really been tough and you need some rest and relaxation doesn't say that any place there is no place in that book that says stop here doesn't even say pause here so I took out this legal pad and he said write down everybody that you have a grudge against and I said that's a lot of people and he says well you can work on it at home too and so I started writing down I had a grunge against almost everybody I ever met about comparing myself with them and I always came up lacking I'd always find a reason to not like you by finding some way you were better than I was and I'd keep looking until I found it so I wrote down all these people and then he said write down all the institutions that you have grudges against and I said do you mean like the police and the courts and all that stuff and he said yeah and then He said write down all the principles that you have a grudge against. And I said, really? What is that? And he said, those are your belief systems. How about anything you believe? He said, let's start with what you think about women. Okay? And he says, what do you believe there? And I told him and he said well that's really out of the stone age. and I wrote down the ten things that I believed the most in life. Now, I inherited a bunch of those and about eight of them were wrong. When I have people write inventory today, I always make them write principles because those are the things that we believe and we are chained to what we believe. And when the book keeps talking about a new set of ideas and principles. It's talking about changing those belief systems that have held us captive all these years. I sponsor people, and they come in and they go, well, I don't know if I can understand this stuff. And you look at them, and you can read it on them. And you go, did somebody tell you when you were a kid you were stupid? And they go yeah. They all say yes. So they said, you know, especially if they're big guys. I get these psychopaths. They're all about 6'4". And you go in and you say, somebody tell you you were stupid and clumsy when you were a kid? Yeah. Hey, stupid! You know if your parent says that? You want to believe it, even if it's bad. I don't tell my kids. I tell my children, I tell them my kids are handsome and smart and they're going to be the most successful people in the world and they'll just be wonderful and have great personalities. You know what? You go tell a kid they're stupid, they're going to believe you. And I don't know how many 40-year-olds I've sponsored that thought they were stupid that were some of the brightest people I've ever met in my life. Now why the hell do they have to be anchored to that belief? Because it's clearly not true. And the only way that you can set people free from those beliefs is by having them stick it in an inventory and find out what the truth is. You know, an inventory is like having a lawn sale. You just put all that stuff out there and put a name on it and put its value on it. And when you write inventory, you're going to find out that there's a lot of stuff that has no value at all. It's really about just getting it in the open. That's what inventory is. It took me about three months to write an inventory. I was a salesman at the time, and I was traveling a lot, and I'd go to a motel at night and write inventory. And I really hated a lot of people. In fact, I didn't like hardly anybody. And when I got back, I went to my sponsor, and I said, well, I'm done. And he said, Well, you wrote down the names and why you didn't want to do it. You didn't even like them, but what did that affect? Was that your self-esteem, your security, your ambitions your personal relations your sex relations your pocketbook what does it affect and I went well I don't know and he said well write that down so I went out and wrote that down and I came back and I said I'm done and he says no you're not now you go back in each one of those resentments and you write down where you were selfish dishonest self-seeking and frightened and I say well okay and I wrote all that down and I come back and I'm all done and he said no now you have to write a fear inventory and I said you don't remember do you and he said what and I say you know I was a bill collector in Chicago and I'm not afraid of anything he said really and I said uh huh you know me that's what I did and he said well the book must be wrong and I said why do you say that and he says well it says in here it's an evil encroating thread and the fabric of our existence is shot through with it and apparently yours isn't and I said nope it isn't and he said well humor me and I said alright and he said how about snakes and I said what kind of snakes and he said how about rattle snakes and I said well you'd have to be a fool to want to be in a closet with one and he said okay well write down snakes I said alright he said how about spiders and I said like black widows and he said uh huh and I said boy you don't want to get bit by one and he said, good. Write down spiders. So I wrote down spiders and he said, how about failure? Cheap shot. When I was a kid even my relatives would say you're just like your dad. You're going to go die in a gutter someplace, okay? Don't tell that to a 10-year-old. I mean, they'll believe you, okay. I grew up thinking I was going to go die in the gutter and almost did. And I said, well, you know, when I was a kid, they always told me that and I never wanted to be that, but he said, Well, write down failure. How about inadequacy? And I said You know, Don, I never thought I was as good as anybody else. And that's why I got angry at everybody. And he said, write down inadequacy. How about women? Well, and he said write down women. How about children? well you know what just the little tiny ones that they wrap up like a mummy because I'm always afraid I'm going to drop them when they happen to me and he said write down infant spot I said okay and he says how about the police oh you mean like when they're right behind you in the squad car and he's like yeah that'd be good and I said uh-huh and he'd say write down the police how about The Courts well you know I got sentenced in a penitentiary when I was 17 and I thought I got raw deal and he said good Bob write down the courts and then there was a long silence and he looked at me and he asked is there anything you're not afraid of and I said probably not so I wrote down everything I was afraid of and then I came back and said I'm done he said no you're not now you've got to write a sex inventory and I thought oh boy here's I'm going to shine here I got this one down I think and see I thought it was about sex and it's not It's about how you relate to other people. And you have to answer things like, was it selfish or not? Did you unjustifiably arouse jealousy, suspicion, or bitterness? And I had to ask myself all those questions and all of a sudden I found out that every relationship I ever had in my life was just for my own gratification. That I really didn't much give a shit about whoever else was in it. And that was the way I operated. That was theway I operated my whole life. And it was clear that that didn't work. See, my idea of a relationship was, screw it. You don't like it? I'm out of here. That's the way I had relationships. Now you have to be with somebody pretty sick to make that last a week. Well, I wrote down all these relationships and then I came back and he said, one other thing that I want to ask you to do, Bob, is I want you to write down, he said this isn't in the book, but I'm going to ask you to do it because when it describes the fifth step it says that we aren't going to get well until we tell someone our whole life story. And he said if there's something here that you kept to yourself put it right in the beginning of your inventory so we can get past it right away and you don't have to worry about it. That's the take it to the grave stuff. That's usually about sex incidentally. So I did that and I came back. Now, I called him and asked him if I could fifth step this stuff with him and you need to know something about me. I'm a loner. I always have been. I am not a person who makes friends easily. I'm the person who would choose to be by myself all the time. I did that in service. I was an observer for naval bombardments. I'd just go out by myself. I always got into singular sports. I didn't want to be on teams. I've played competition judo for 15 years. And I like to just be me and nobody else, just whoever I was going to play against. I started seeing how sick I was. You know, here's what happens in Alcoholics Anonymous, and it happens over and over and ever again. we get smart enough to see how little we know and we get well enough to see how sick we are okay and I really crawled out of the quagmire and that happens over and over and over again no matter how long you've been sober you will see that you'll get well enough to see how sick you still are when I was 10 years sober I was divorced and I met a woman that I wanted to spend the rest of my life with. And I absolutely knew that I was totally unprepared to have a relationship because I didn't have the first idea about how to do that. And I went to a woman that kept coming up in my 11th step. Her name kept coming up in her 11th steps all the time and I asked God, please God show me how to be in a relationship. And this woman's name kept coming up. And I went to see her and she says, well, it would help if you bring your girlfriend over. And i said okay so i went over there and she said, her name was Lori, and she said, is there anything you really don't like about Lori, Bob? And I said yeah. And she said this to me and that one really hurt. And she turned around and said, Lori did you say that and Laurie said no I never said that and I said yes you did I heard that and she said well Laurie what did you say and Laurie says well I said this and she says what did you mean when you said that well I meant this and I say well that isn't what I heard okay she looked at me and she asked Bob is there anything else you don't like about her and I answered yeah she said this to me too I thought that was kind of a cheap shot. And she said, is that what you said, Lori? No. What did you say? I said this. What did you mean? I meant this. That isn't what I heard. This woman looked at me and she said Bob, you have faulty hearing. And I said I've never had a hearing problem in my life. She said, no, no. You hear sounds all right, but what you hear is what you think they're going to say. So they get about four words out of their mouth and you make a decision about what they said and you go off at right angles about it and get angry and that was not what they meant at all. And I said, how do you get over that? And she said, well, you probably aren't going to like this. And there's a lot of other stuff I don't like either, so what is it? And she said when people say things that hurt you ask them what they meant. What do you mean by that? So for almost a year I walked around and every time somebody said something that really zinged me see I'm not afraid of looking like a fool I don't care. I want to know I want the truth I want be prepared for life and if I got to look a little stupid to do it it's alright with me so people would say something that zinged me and I'd say excuse me that one kind of stung this is what I heard you say is that what you said? and 99.9% of the time they'd go no that's not what I said at all and you'd go what did you say? and they'd say well I said this and you go oh thank you I went to my sponsor with the inventory I sat down with him he was one of the only people I'd ever let close to me in my life you know I lived with four or five families by the time I was ten and by the same time by the way by the end of the time I was 10 I was shut off emotionally I mean I didn't give a shit I just, you know, you get a new set of parents every two years. It's just like it doesn't make sense anymore. It's not like parents. It's like living in a hotel. So I let him in. I let my sponsor in. And then I went back to him with his whole inventory and I knew he was going to hate me. And the one person that I'd allowed to get close to me in my life was goingto hate me and I didn't want to drink. So I went in and I laid this whole thing out in front of him. And when he was done, when I was done I expected him to stand up and go Bob, there's a couple things I want you to do and he'd go okay and he would say don't come to my house don't talk to my wife don't tell anybody I'm your sponsor. You know what he did? He got up and hugged me and told me he loved me. it was unusual for me to have a man telling me that they loved me but I understood what he said okay I went home with that inventory because I read the book right there he said here's what you do next you go home taking the book down from the shelf is what it says so I put it up on the shelf and took it down because I don't want to miss anything You know that sounds stupid, doesn't it? But if you are going to follow spiritual exercises directly by what it says, you do what it say. I know that's sounds stupid. But I don't want to miss anything because I don' t know what it means. So I took it down and said that you check your first five proposals, the first five steps and see if they're solid. And I looked at them and they were. and so I asked it said in six to ask for the willingness to be rid of these things which had kept us from the sunlight of the spirit and I did now right in there is where it talks about people like you and I drinking again okay and it talks about resentment and anger and it says when harboring such feelings we shut ourselves off from the sunlight of the spirit it. The insanity of alcohol returns and we drink again. And for us to drink is to die. You know how people like you and I die? We gather up resentments, the number one offender, we grab them up, resentments and anger, and we give them safe harbor. And for people like you and I that will kill us deader than anything you can think of. And then I did the seven step prayer about God, I'm not ready that you have all me good and bad. And I had spent two hours considering what I did because that's what the book says. We sit down and consider all that so I considered it. And my sponsor told me what he heard in the inventory. So I saw where all my real defects were, or where some of them were, and I considered them. And then I asked God to remove them, and they didn't all go away. They still haven't all gone away. Some changed, some gone away, some didn't. And then, I went out to make amends. It says we made a list of all people, persons we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all the next line in the book is we did it when we took inventory. If you don't write your inventory out of the book, you don' t have an amends list. If you use somebody's guide, there are people, there are psychologists around who want to put their thumbprint on Alcoholics Anonymous and they usually do it by coming out with little forms that you use when you do the steps. the form to use when you do the steps is called the big book in anything else in my estimation is bullshit thank you well meaning but bullshit nevertheless oh I'm glad I said that I made a list i went to my sponsor said which ones do i owe because i don't have any reality check with this i said here's here's the people that i think i owe amends to and here's the reason why because he told me to write down how i had harmed them specifically because he said don't be wasting these people's time if you think you might hurt their feelings tell me specifically what you did to harm them okay so i wrote it all down went over there he He said, this is right, this is right. That isn't. That's right, that's right, what are you going to do about your dad? So my dad is living in a hospital having a stroke and he hasn't got any kind of continuous thought. The guy is a vegetable. Why would I go make amends to him? And he said, when you were a kid, you were telling me that your dad used to call you every year on your birthday? And I said, yeah. and he said what was that like and I said he was so drunk when he called me that I couldn't even tell what he was saying I just knew it was him and he says what did you do and I say I'd hang up on him and he asked why did you do that and I answered because he's a drunk and he answered you're drunk that's sort of infallible logic that I hate in Alcoholics Anonymous. So, he said, you need to make amends to him. And I said, for what? And he said for holding him at an arm's length your whole life. And I thought, and I said he wouldn't understand. And he says, I don't care. This is about cleaning off your side of the street not cleaning off his side ofthe street. What he did is his business. This is your business. Get in your car, drive to Wisconsin, go to the hospital and tell them you owe an amends and do whatever is appropriate to make that right, to balance the books. What do you tell your sponsor? No. So I got in the car and went there. And I went in to see him and there was this little old gray-haired man. and I went up to him and said, I'm your son Bob and he brightened up and I said, I need to talk with you and he was in a wheelchair and I wheeled him off in his little room sat down in front of him not expecting him to understand anything and said I'm an alcoholic and when I said that his face fell and I said that I'm part of a program called Alcoholics Anonymous and part of the recovery program is that I need to make amends to people that I've harmed and I've harmed you the way I harmed you was by holding you at arm's length my whole life because I didn't understand your alcoholism until it was our alcoholism and I don't have to drink anymore and I'm sober for a year and when I said that he brightened right up my dad died not very long after that he died from gangrene he had adult onset diabetes and they had to amputate his feet and they called my uncle Leif who was his brother and said he's losing circulation in his extremities. We're going to have to take his hands off or probably have to takes his legs off up to his thighs and at some point we're going run out of pieces to take off here and he's going to die. Now do you want to do that now or do you wanna do it later? And it was my uncle's estimation that they should let him die then, okay? And I've never questioned that. I don't know what the right thing is there. So they did, right? And see, my dad couldn't speak. My dad had had a lifetime of alcoholism and his stroke had taken everything away from him and he had no ability to speak. And he had lost his extremities and he hadn't any ability to do anything but sit in a chair. He had no way to communicate. And he knew that they were going to let him die. And he couldn't say that. And so when people would come anywhere near his wheelchair, he would scream in desperation. And see the four horsemen of alcoholism? are terror, bewilderment, frustration, and despair. And despair is the worst of them all. And that's how a drunk dies. My dad was married nine times. Women thought he was the best thing since sliced bread until they got him home. And when he died, not a one of them showed up. he had cut a swath through everybody's life and nobody showed up that's how drunks die if you choose and it is a choice here if you chose not to participate in this program be prepared to die that kind of death that's the truth 10 is about watching it's about continue to watch for selfishness dishonesty resentment and fear and when you see it ask God at once to remove it these are the instructions in the book okay ask God at once to remove it make amends if you've harmed someone and then resolutely turn your thoughts to someone you can help turning your thoughts to someone you can help takes us out of here. If you read Emmett Fox, he talks about turning your thoughts to God. Alcoholics Anonymous says turn your thoughts to someone who can help. Either one is fine. As long as we turn out of here, as long as I get my attention on what can I do for you. It doesn't even say go help them. It just says think about helping them. It works just good, but it's nicer if you do help. Eleven is about discipline. I don't believe personally that 5% of the total people in Alcoholics Anonymous follow the instructions on the 11th step. And they're not difficult, they're very clear. But it has to do with this. When we get up in the morning, we plan our day. we ask God to keep our day free from self-pity, dishonest and self-seeking behavior we plan our day which means actually it says we consider our plans for the day what I do is I plan my day the night before and then I consider it in the morning because it's easier that way I pray for the people that I want God to pay attention to. And it says, show me all through the day what my next step is to be and please give me whatever I need to take care of the problems. It's all in the instructions. It talks about what you do at night. When we go to bed at night and we review our day, we see if we've put more into it than we've taken out of it. Which has to do with are you spending time trying to help somebody else's life become a little better? if you want to have a happy day sometime go spend your whole day doing something for somebody else and I guarantee you at the end of that day you'll feel like you've been somewhere and that you did something it says that as we go through the day we pause when agitated or doubtful and ask for the right thought or action it's one of the neatest little spiritual exercises you can ever do when somebody gets in your face or something isn't working your way step back and say, God, show me what's going on here. You know, if you get into a difficult situation, I don't care if you don't physically step back, but if you step back emotionally and say God, show me the right thought or action here. It will prevent all kinds of problems. It says that we have attitudes through the day. The attitude is thy will not mine be done and I'm not running the show anymore. Okay? Twelve is really, everybody talks about twelve stepping and I do a lot of twelve stepping and most of the people I get are people who have been in AA for a while and don't have a clue. They're people who've been hanging around rooms like this and their life hasn't changed a bit and they wonder what the hell's going on. And they are people who will come up and go, I'm going to drink again and see that's what I did. I'm going to drink again. And I know where they're coming from and most of those people that I talk to today are people who've been around for a while but I work with newcomers too and especially the psychopaths. You know what my job is? I have a seminar business. I treat convicts or I do seminars for convict on life skills. They're an interesting group of people. I understand. Three nights a week they lock me in a room with 25 convicts and then we see who comes out okay it's fun one of the greatest gifts that Alcoholics Anonymous will give you is a willingness to risk okay people are terrified we live in fear we won't go anywhere we won' t become who we can become because we're afraid to step out or do anything for fear we'll fail I got news for you they don't shoot you for failing failing isn't not succeeding at what you try failing is not trying and this program will give you the ability to stand up on your own two feet and walk through your fear and become whoever the hell you want to be and there are no limits can you practice these principles everywhere I mean if you're going to live by spiritual principles live by spiritual principles don't live by spiritual principles in an AA meeting and then don't live at spiritual principles at home or where you work because if you do that if we do that we're hypocrites okay that's the way that works either do it everywhere or don't do it anywhere there's a guy named Rosten that said life is not about being happy the most important thing isn't being happy I will agree that it's nice to be happy and it's important to be happy but the most important thing in life isn't being happy the most important thing in life is, did you make a difference? Four and a half years ago I was in a coma in Littleton Hospital and they were trying to bring me out of it and didn't know if they could do it. And as I was sliding into that coma which they told me I was going to do do you think I was thinking about what kind of car I was driving? Do you think about whether I was thinking about how many women I'd been in bed with or how much money I had in the bank or how big my house was or what kind of company I worked for or any other damn thing, you know that the thing that was primary in my mind was did it make a difference? Has it made any difference at all that I've been here? Okay. Has it made any different at all that you've been here. Thanks.