The Three-Fold Disease of Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Year’s 😆 – Bill L.

About This Speaker Tape

Convention - 2002

The 12 Steps, initially a surface-level intellectual exercise for Bill L., eventually became a path to deeper spiritual surrender. He dismantles the illusion of self-will describing his past as a series of manipulations where he played Higher Power to ensure the world bent to his desires. He traces his path through the wreckage of a failed marriage and the realization that he was incapable of loving anyone but himself. Through the lens of the Third Step he explores the 'bondage of self' and the necessity of moving from the mind to the heart. Bill L. emphasizes the practical application of the 10th and 11th Steps as a means of maintaining conscious contact using the metaphor of a radio beam to describe spiritual navigation. He concludes by urging the listener to stop seeking external knowledge and instead look within to find the 'box of gold' already present in their own nature.

Topics

Timestamps

• 0:00 Opening joke about the 'three-fold disease' of the holidays.
• 2:15 Discussion on the transition from intellectual step-work to a spiritual way of life.
• 6:40 Analysis of Step 3 and the danger of running a life on self-will.
• 10:15 Detailed breakdown of the 'Director, Principal, Father' relationship with a Higher Power (Step 3).
• 15:30 The 'Tandem Bike' parable regarding surrender and trust.
• 18:45 Discussion on Step 11 and the 'radio beam' metaphor for conscious contact.
• 22:10 Explanation of the Four Absolutes (Love, Unselfishness, Purity, Honesty) and their opposites.
• 26:50 Laughter: Story about his father hanging up the phone and the 'victim' mentality.
• 30:15 Closing parable of the beggar sitting on a box of gold.