Twelve Step Workshop – Part 5 of 6 – 2024 – Peter M.

My name is Peter, Recovered Alcoholic. Grateful to be alive and sober and part of a sacred place called Alcoholics Anonymous. Thank you for the invitation of getting me up here. It's a long way from where I live, Fort Lauderdale, Florida. My home group is Alcoholics and God in Fort Laudedale. We meet Monday and Thursday nights. And my sponsor is Barberzons out of St. Paul, Minnesota. Forgive the voice. It's a little raspy. It's really dry. I'm totally dehydrated and started at 2.30 this morning, so it's been a long day and flights and delays and that kind of thing, but upright and sober and sucking air, so I'm having a good day. June 23rd, 1988 is when the loving God separated me from alcohol. I'm very grateful for this gift of sobriety. I'm muy agradecido por ser un miembro de Good Standing in Alcoholics Anonymous, and to uphold the traditions as well as the tradition of Alcoholics Anonymous. I sponsor about a dozen men, and they all know I'm their sponsor, so that's a good thing. And if you're here a while, you know exactly what I'm talking about. But I do with the guys I sponsor, it was done to me. It's fairly structured on call times and meeting times and getting together to do step work and sometimes just have conversations with them and take them through the traditions and let them know what they belong to, especially the youngins when they come in their first exposure to Alcoholics Anonymous as to what this thing is that they belong to. Living in South Florida, there's just bombarded with treatment centers and sober houses and it tends to be transient. A lot of folks come down and the snowbirds go back and forth and their glimpse of Alcoholics Anonymous is about a dozen meetings in say Boca Raton or Fort Lauderdale not understanding the humble beginnings of Alcoholics Anonymous and that were global, obviously. And it's important to let those folks know that there was a time where you had no meeting list to select which meeting I want to go to. I don't like that meeting, so I'm going to go through that meeting. I'm not going to like that speaker. They didn't have that. And I just found it invaluable as it was done to me when I was new that a sponsor sat me down and let me peek into that and not necessarily take Alcoholics Anonymous for granted. We have this man's weekend. There's one I was telling Scott in Tennessee, Usual Suspects. And so we got a selection of things to go to and at the time there was a meeting a week and they prayed and 12-step. I gotta thank Scott for picking me up from the airport as well. I met Scott a couple of months ago in Redding, and if you don't know Scott, you should. He's just a really good guy, a good member of Alcoholics Anonymous, and my old friend Dave who's taping in the back. So it's good to see some friendly faces. What I hope to do this weekend, and God will decide all of this, is share with you experientially my journey through this book, my journey in this sacred fellowship and by the way if you haven't experienced the sacredness of Alcoholics Anonymous if I had one prayer for everyone tonight it would be that you stuck around long enough to experience the sacrednes of Alcoholic Anonymous we'll get to see lives get reborn and resurrected here for fun and for free no care what color you are, religion you are political party you are how rich you are poor you are we really don't care just welcome pour you a cup of coffee and come on in as my friend Ralph says come all the way in and sit all theway down it's called Alcoholics Anonymous but experientially share with you my journey through the steps my experience with this fellowship my experience in service what that looks like specifically the steps because that's my assignment this weekend not just to talk about the information but hopefully share with You the transformation the process of recovery is not just linear but more transformational. I met a lot of cats over the years who can recite the big book, could tell you what Bill had for lunch in 1942 on a Tuesday. You know, they're mechanics and that's impressive. You know you hear that, wow this guy really knows his stuff but the longer I'm sober, the older I'm getting, I like mechanics, I brought up mechanics but what I'm really interested in what does that look like live for you? What does that transformation look like? How tangible has your God become? Who are we praying to? Am I praying with my mind or am I praying with my heart? What does that look like? Am I just checking the boxes? What does a life of meditation look like do I have one experientially? Can I talk about what it's like living in the world of the spirit? Or go to the book and recite the book. Experientially, what does that looks like? What kind of transformations, awakenings, aha moments have I had living in the sunlight out of the spirit of 10, 11 and 12. What's my service life look like? Sponsoring people primarily, you know. You could be one of those folks who go through the steps one time and one time only living 10,11 and 12 and you got to be people who your folks who goes through the steps annually. I was both. I went through the Steps the first time with the sponsor and he was one of those guys now you live in 10, 11 and twelve forever if you do that and your joy is happening for you I'm not here to change you. I'm no a model or an example of Alcoholics Anonymous. I'm just here to share with you my experience, strength, and hope. But I did that for about nine years, and I hit that wall. I'm writing inventory, doing 10 and 11. I'm working with others, got a commitment. I'm doing all the things I'm supposed to be doing, and I can't get out of my own way again. I'm starting to get tight, and the rids are coming back. The rest of the discontented stuff is coming back, and I cannot put my finger on what the heck is going on. Ego is starting to show up. And usually if ego, there's fear going on. And my job in here is to go to God so God can feed the soul and kill the ego. And we start to do the opposite. We don't even know what's going on, and there was a gentleman who was up for Fellowship of the Spirit with Mark H., with this guy Joe H., and they were in New York, and I knew Mark and that weekend I asked him to sponsor me and my life changed forever. I've had a handful of sponsors in Alcoholics Anonymous but I was with Mark for about a dozen years or so and it completely changed my life and he says, we need to go through the steps again. So I thought it was blasphemy. You do the steps once, I was brought up, you don't do them again, oh my God, the AA cops are going to, the SWAT team's going to jump through the window, what kind of, And I will tell you, man, it was unbelievable what it did for me. And so it's been that way once and twice a year, go through the steps. Now, if you don't understand that, I don't want to give the impression that we redo the old fourth step again and just repeat, but it's not like that at all. But the best analogy I can give for that, if someone said, hey, Pete, can you hang around this week and paint this group room. It needs a repainting. And I said, sure. And so let's say Scott and I got together and we painted the whole place up and cleaned it out. When you guys come in the following week, it's going to look, it's got that nice pink smell and it's gonna look like a brand new interior of a car. It's gonna work. It's going look wonderful. And we can leave her like that. But if we come back in a year from now, there's going be some scuff marks. It's gunna get a little dingy. It's going to get tainted. It's gonna get dust on it. And in a year or two, it's gonna be another paint job. I can't rely on something I painted, say last year, to hold for the next 10 years. You know what happens? It looks like hell. I'm talking about my soul now. So I'm just gonna rest on doing the steps five years or 10 years ago and little by slowly, I'm starting to collect plaque on the soul and I'm completely unaware of it. And I start to get attached to a lot of other things that I think are going to make me okay. When I get there, I'll be okay. When I achieve that, I'm going to be okay when I get her, I start to pay more attention to my journey than the walk God has for me. I become very important and I'm supposed to lose interest in selfish things getting interested in my fellows. My little plans and the signs become big and I am starting to lose my way and I don't even know this is going on so I have found that going revisiting the 4 through 9, taking a look at 1, 2 and 3 and 4 through nine and getting rocketed once again it cleans off the plaque to the soul and I gotta get soul food in Alcoholics Anonymous you can pay a lot of attention to working and making that money and getting a new car and going to the gym or CrossFit and making sure I look really good and in South Florida you gotta work on the tan all the time and a lot of Botox, you gotta work on that stuff too but you pay a lot of attention to stuff like that but how much attention do I pay into my own soul the soul is always right it knows where to go what to say what to do how to be the mind is always wrong but I seem to be in a lot of conversations with my mind and that mind and that thought life creates my current reality and that's not a good thing my day hinges on what you think of me what you say about me how much money is in the bank What my boss thinks about me, my co-workers, the people who work for me, what she thinks of me, what home group thinks of Me, what the weather's like, if my car's clean, if My car's dirty. It hinges on all the external stuff. And that's a road to hell that way. I'm in bondage all the time. But when I'm paying attention to the soul and getting soul food, I walk light. I travel a lot lighter. Coming to terms with the ego gets crushed. The soul gets fed. I'm not that important. And that's not being falsely humble. Not that we don't count, but my stuff's not that important. Gain interest in others. Lose interest in me. I know my story. I've seen the movie, 100 reruns. I know how it goes. It's boring. But there's some passion and excitement about being of service to others. Now, I can't do any of that stuff. And if I can be so bold, none of us can. Self-reliance is as good as far as it went. and didn't go far enough, my book says. That ego wants to throw me into suffering lines. I'll figure this out. I know what I need to do. I'll find out what I'm going to do and I'll try to figure it out. When I hear a drunk said, I'll figured it out, I say they're in trouble. I know What I Need to Do in Trouble. What I need To Do is really lean into God, access God. In fact, my wisdom doesn't even come from men anymore. I listen, but it comes from God. That's what I Need To Be Really Listening To. and what the 12 steps, quite frankly, for me do, for me, all of Alcoholics Anonymous is about putting my hand in God's hand, if you will, letting me be reunited, integrated, experience a oneness with God. That's what this whole walk is about. Now, in some places, that might ruffle some feathers, especially if you pay attention to the world out there. Hopefully, that doesn't come in here because we'll lose everything, but it shouldn't really disturb me if God is the solution and going to meetings and getting a sponsor and getting a book and going through the steps and doing service are all different ingredients to get me to get right with God. The big book doesn't keep me sober, the 12 steps don't keep me sober. My sponsor in my home group and sponsoring other people don't keep me sore but when I put those all together I stay sober because all of those things get me to God if you will and then here's the awakening, the aha moment and realize getting to God, he was always there. It's an awakening of he was always present closer than my own breath. Who I'm looking for, I'm working with. But I had to get me out of the way and that's what this book pretty much does. It removes, it removes, the process of recovery I found experientially is never addition. It's always removal. It's subtraction. Less me, more God. More God, less me. I will tell you if you're new, the ego is going to fight that, and it's going to make up a lot of excuses. A lot of reasons to get my 15 cup of coffee during a meeting. A lot OF distractions. That's what the mind has to do. That's who the ego has to do because if it goes quiet, it means it dies and God awakens. For me, I'll tell you this. I've shared this from a million podiums the older I'm getting and the longer I'm sober point of view on many things changes you know I got sober 28 years old I thought I'd live for you know forever in July I'll be 65 and your point of vue changes there's a lot more road behind me than in front of me but in the awakening is a lot more God in front of me than behind me. But I realize how precious life is. When I'm younger, you just kind of just roll with it. I got plenty of time. And you realize how Precious Life is, how quick we're here for. It's a vapor. We're in and out. And for me, part of that awakening as I went through the steps again and got another layer to 10 and 11 was about personal relationships which Alcoholics Anonymous is about. starting with God and personal relationships with other people. What does that look like? How much tension do I have when I think of John or Mary? How much tension do I feel when they walk in the door? How much embarrassment, shame, remorse and guilt I have When I think about stuff from the past and how much fear I have when I'm thinking about something tomorrow or next week That's called tension And when that spring gets tight enough and that noise gets loud enough I'm an alcoholic, I got the old default button, double vodka, boom now and if I think I won't do that I've gotten really too far away from step one but personal relationships what do they look like for me I really can't do anymore the slandering and the gossip and the the gossip Bob would anger Bill talks about in the 12 and 12 the self-righteous anger even that person had it coming to them I'm going to get a little posse together we're going to rip Joe apart we're gonna rip Mary apart and it's justified I can't deal with that I can do that anymore I can't put my head on a pillow with that kind of noise because I may not wake up tomorrow, nor they. And I can, I can walk like that anymore. That stuff has to be cleaned up. The I love you to a bud, somebody who's close to me, is hey, you know, I love without expecting them to reciprocate is really okay to do. And to family members or my wife to let them know that. There's an old thing that if you're married, don't go to sleep angry. I did that for years. And I wound up divorced, unbelievable. But with my wife now, if we have a spat, that's not happening in the house. That's got to get fixed. I'm going to assume tomorrow when there may not be a tomorrow. So what do those relationships look like? Starting with God and other people, am I willing to go to any lengths to clean that kind of tension up? See, I can get up here and quote the big book all night long and yet I have a bunch of busted relationships that I feel tension with and anger with and resentful for. So what I'm saying, I'm a hypocrite. It's really important for me to share with you what it looks like live. And I do none of this perfect. You're looking at someone who's broken and flawed. I'm the car when it drives away leaves an oil spot on the ground. That's me. And there was a tremendous amount of liberation the day I got that. When I first got into alcoholics and alms, I thought, I'm in AA now. I pray and meditate. I'm beyond reproach. I walk on water. I won't feel any more anger or depression or sadness. It's that way now. I'm grateful for everything. And then reality showed up. And the great liberation was, I'm broken and flawed. That's just the way he designed it and the greater need for him. I'm going to feel sad. I'm gonna get upset. I'm gotta be joyful. I'm not stuck on page 52 and bedevilments. I'm not riding up and down Monday this way, Tuesday that way, Monday thisway, Tuesday... It doesn't look like that anymore. Sobriety. Fragile. I can go to seven meetings, ten meetings, twenty meetings a week, pray and meditate for hours, call a sponsor, work with them, do all the things we're supposed to do in here, but I still have a mind. Even though I'm recovered, I'm now cured. See, step 10 says the problem has been removed, but the truth doesn't go anywhere. The truth is I'm still alcoholic. Even though the problem's been removed, I'm Still Alcoholic, which means I have this alcoholic mind, yeah? And that mind wants to infiltrate everything. That's why if spirituality doesn't touch every single area of our life, it touches none of our lives, because they got this mind where the main problem centers. Don't write the inventory. Don't call a sponsor. Don't do this. Don't don't do that. And if you do too much of it, that says, who do you think you are? It's always trying to get in there. And it's always looking to lean and push the envelope, skip a meeting, don't call a sponsor, don't pick up the phone for that new guy, let somebody else do the 12 steps. And what happens is I start to create space between me and you. I startto create space between me and God. And then I start to isolate, and isolation brings suffering. And I start to feel pain. I start to get uncomfortable, and what I do to combat that is my illness goes underground and resurfaces in other areas. They're called sex sprees and food sprees and money spreesand gambling sprees. And when I'm in that place, I forfeit all the invitations God is sending me. I can't see them. Ican't hear them.I can't even see or hear you anymore. I'm at an AA meeting, and my body's there, but I'm not there. Now people start to see either. Hey, Joe, what's going on? I'm fine. I'm good. No, just a tough day at work. I'm dying. But the ego, Tebow talks about this, the ego has reemerged so much it won't allow me to say, I need to talk to you about something. I got stuff going on. And then I get drunk and for us to drink is to die. I need to be talking about what's Going on, but I need To Be Talking About The Message That Has Gotten Me To A Place To Recover. I Need To Be Talkin' About God No matter who gets upset with it. Let them go home and write the inventory. Let them get right with God. I need to be talking about God because when I stop talking about what I believe in, I stop believing in it. It goes dormant. It goes stagnant. It gets at your feet. I need soul muscles. I need soul food to do this walk. God is my GPS, not me. You think my alcohol has been pressed because I'm going to be sober 36 years in a month or so? You say, Dick, it cares. It really doesn't. It's got my whole life to get me. And the only thing that's going to get in front of me or between me and a drink and me in this head is God. And so that's what this is all about. June 23rd, 1988, God separates me from alcohol. My separation from alcohol wasn't a day where I said, I'm going to go to AA today. And if that's your walk, fabulous. I need to go to treatment. I need do something about this. My separation from alcohol was a violent one. I had been through six treatment centers up until this point. My first treatment center, I was around, I guess, like 18, 19. It was a little foggy back then. The older I'm getting, it's hard to remember. But let's say 18,19. That's a good starting point. And by the time 1988 showed up, I have been through sixth treatment centers. And over those years of in and out of treatment, I managed... I wasn't a guy who had 60 days or 90 days or one year and picked up. I had two days of continuous sobriety from my first treatment center to my last number seven treatment center. I came up with two days of continuous subriety. The only other spot I had was being locked in treatment or locked up. And interesting when you're in treatment, And you can tell you're not doing too good when your side of the door doesn't have a doorknob. Things aren't going good in your life when that stuff happens. And so that's how it was for me. But 1988, guys, just to let you know, the guy on page 21, the alcoholic, I was living in lower Manhattan, an area they referred to as Alphabet City because it had Avenue A, B, C, and D. And back in that day, it was not a good place to be. The only folks who lived there lived in the projects because they couldn't afford to get out. The rest of the neighborhood was full of junkies, drunks. The crack scene hit. This was it. I mean, it Was In Time or Life magazine, there was like a 10-page spread of the Lower East Side. How was I going into a war zone? and there's yours truly rolling around in there because that's where I hung out. But it got so bad for me, in 1988 I was living in an abandoned building in the back of a hallway and I was literally one of those bums on the street who panhandled and went into this abandoned building. In fact, the only light that illuminated the hall was from a street lamp outside. I come into Alcoholics Anonymous and we find this path to illumination and the steps illuminate the path. What a difference. But that was my life, going out and panhandling or stealing and whatever I had to do to get to the liquor store. I was drinking and eating pills the last few years of my existence out there, if you will. I had years with non-conference approved dry goods. I had marks all over me to prove that. I got away from that, but booze was with me from the beginning. In the last three years out there it was that and Valium. I couldn't get away from either one. If I was up, I was drinking. It was just like that in the pursuit of a drink. And June 23rd, 1988 shows up. Now, I don't even really remember being the month of June. I was so beat up. I was tore up from the floor up as we used to say. I had bloodstained soil pants on. I hadn't bathed in God knows how long and hadn't shaved. and I was cold and sweating at the same time. You know, going through withdrawals, I'm completely unaware of it. I don't know what's going on with me. It's June in New York. It's muggy. It's hot. I got a turtleneck on and a zip-up jacket and I'm chilly. I'm like freezing but I'm sweating and I had these construction boots I was wearing and the right boot was missing the front. It had no front. I used to have a tendency when I got drunk for some reason someone pointed out to me I used to have this thing where I would just drag my leg. I don't know what that was about. I'd just drag it, and eventually the boot, you know, it just fell apart. It hadn't come off my feet in God knows how long. And I talk about that now. That was me, but sometimes it feels like it was this other person that took over my life. It was awful. Lost contact with my family, like many of us here. The last thing my dad told me when I was asked out of the house, I was sitting in his car and he threw me out. He says, when you want help, I'll knock down a wall to get you help. He said, until then, stay away from this family. And I was appalled by that. I even hit him up for 20 bucks on the way out. He just gave me that look like, what part of this aren't you getting? And I Was On The Streets and it was June 23rd. How I know it was Jun 23rd because by God's grace, I got into my seven treatment center and a lot had to do with my dad. I've said this on a million podiums, God gave my dad enough courage, strength and direction to hang in there with me whether he threw me in or threw me out to keep me alive long enough to get to you but I was in the back of this hallway and I got up off the floor, I was starting to shake again, I had to go get money and panhandle and I collapsed on the floor and I begged God for mercy to help me. Please take me from this, I don't want to die. I wasn't thinking about Alcoholics Anonymous, by the way. We live life forward and understand it backwards and I look back on this now and I'm so grateful for it. I wasn'T sitting in that hallway crying. I was having this crying jag thinking, okay, need to go to detox and treatment and AA, do 90 meetings in 90 days, do the steps and by Monday I'll be Moses. It wasn'T like that. I just didn'T want to die And that was my prayer to God. Please take me from this, I don't want to die. I'm glad I didn't know what to do. Because if I did, based on my history, I would have figured out my journey and my walk and what I'm supposed to do and what I'm not supposed to be able to do and what's supposed to go, what I think I need and what i don't want, that gets me drunk. God removed everything, brought me down in the raw, I don't want to die. And to a series of circumstances, which God willing, I'll talk about this weekend, my dad found me panhandling on the street and placed me in my severing treatment center. And after 10 days of being in treatment, I got thirsty again. But God interrupted my death and sent me off to Minnesota. And I lived out there for a year, and I was exposed to you guys at a level that I never experienced before. And the message was probably being said in new york as well but i heard it what happens to people like me people like us as we start we don't have the big through the steps yet you know if we think about it the catalyst or the pilot light the the engine gets turned on towards this spiritual awakening in the very worst moment of our life you know when when the daughter or the son looks when the little want to say daddy you're drunk again or what's wrong with you or the wife or husband says get out or the police arrest you again just something sometimes we're just shaving and I can't look at this guy looking back that's the beginning of this spiritual awakening something happens to me and to many of us when that stuff starts to happen and not even into one yet or step three yet, but the soul is awakening because what God does in his infinite mercy is shut down the ears to the mind and opens up the ears of the soul. We're listening different. Have you ever noticed when sometimes you're sitting in a meeting and someone says something and the AA nods, you go like this? Did you ever do that? the soul is acknowledging what it always knew it's almost a a physical reaction it's going yes that's what we've been looking for we knew that all along it's not a conclusion where hmm that's interesting let me ponder this and then i'll go to my home group and share it like it was mine that's that's not what's going on it's an instant reaction because the soul is acknowledging what it always had because the mind for a moment is shut down. And as long as my mind is shut down, I don't mean closed-minded or better yet as long as I'm out of my mind, I'll be doing fabulous. We always say John's out of his mind, Mary's out of her mind. No, no, no. They're in their mind. If they were out of their mind, they'd be doing wonderful. When someone says I'm going to go give them a piece of my mine, tell them to give them the whole thing because they really don't need it. If, you know, if we think about it, from the time we wake up to the time we retire at night, how much time do we spend listening to this predator call the mind all day long? If you drove here to this little campsite in your car alone, you're still delusional because you weren't alone. because if you replay the drive over here while you thought you're alone, how many conversations will you have having with about 40 other people? Do you ever wake up first thing in the morning, your eyes, you just open up and you're in mid-conversation or an argument with someone who died 20 years ago or planning the day out, waking up coming too angry about something. That's what the mind does. If I lose that, There's one place to be, in God's light. In the third step, it talks about this. We enjoy peace of mind. I lose my fear of today, tomorrow, hereafter. There's a reason for that because I'm starting to operate out of the soul. And if you can get a visual where the soul is kind of making its way up into here and saying, go help Joe. It sounds like I came up with a good idea, but it was given to me. The other thing I had to learn was the difference between, I used to say I have thoughts. I don't have thoughts. They have me and they don't like to let go. I buy this jacket. I get it home. It looked good in the store. I got home. I didn't like it for whatever reason. I have a receipt. I can return it. I can exchange it. I think I can give it to somebody. I can throw it out. I do whatever I want with it. It's my jacket. I have an receipt. I bought it. I can't do that with my thoughts I love when people say start the day over because I'm having a bad day start it over all that does is remind me what a bad day I had and it's even heavier I'm trying to outrun my own shadow the only thing that's going to get in the middle of that is God I picked up a drink at 14 years old in Brooklyn that's where I'm from Brooklyn New York you can tell I don't come from Oklahoma by the way I speak but 14 years older in Brooklyn hanging out on the street corner with a lot of other guys that's what they did back in New York. You hung out on street corners, especially in the summertime. And it was a great time. I remember the older guys in mid-60s, late 60s. A lot of problems going on in this country but there was something really cool happening too. It was called music. We used to go down to the corner and listen to, you know, listen to the Beatles, listen to the Doors, listen to The Temptations. I mean, you had best of both worlds. And everyone was getting fired up and it was peace and love and everything was good. I remember that. I wanted to be a part of that, and at 14 years old, I pick up my first quart of beer, cold 45 beer, and my life changed. Now, it was changing prior to that because I have alcoholism before I pick up a drink, and right now, I still have alcoholismo. I don't have alcohol-wasm. There's a day God's going to call me home. I want to die with alcoholism not from it. And I got drunk that night. I remember feeling drunk, and I loved the effect produced by it. I never want to be sober again, and I chased that into jails and institutions. We don't realize, they didn't realize how much bondage I'm in until I tasted a little bit of freedom. When I got drunk, I tasted freedom, and I realized I'm only 14 going, I've been walking around in bondage, going to school like this, playing sports this way, making music this way. I want to experience that kind of freedom, freedom from everybody else, no freedom from me. A few years later, I make my first treatment center. I make my second, third, and fourth treatment center, I walk into my fifth treatment center, I got marks on my arms, I got marked behind my knees, and I'm taking narcotics, and i'm drinking, I'm eating pills, and I'm in some serious trouble. I got a police record now. My music career got dumped because getting drunk at high was more important. I remember a quick story. I was a drummer and got into a lot of percussion. I played a lot other instruments. God gave me this gift, but drums was my thing, and back in the day, I had what they called, the name was called Ludwig. It was like the Cadillac of drums, and it was the 80s, so you had these monster kits, and I was sitting behind one of them. It was mine. And these big fancy cymbals and all this. And I walked into on 48th Street, Midtown Manhattan. It was like Music Row. You'd see a lot of professionals, people that were recording artists going in and out of there. And I talked to a guy who was a music artist. And he said, I walked in to a store called Sam Ash. And he's, how much you give me for these drums? It was as if I was giving away my puppy. But I needed money. I'll buy them back I will pay any price tomorrow to seek comfort right now that's what alcoholism does drunk and sober so someone is deluded I'll get him back next week I gave those drums away they cost a fortune for $500 that will say be on a Monday on Tuesday I was broke the symbols I went up to a studio as they recorded, they said what's wrong what's going on with you? Why do you want to give these away? We don't want to buy them. He says, just buy them off me. They gave me $200 for all these cymbals. A half a cymbal was like, that's a tenth of what it was worth. That money was gone in 20 minutes and there went my music career as well. That's what I do. I'll pay any price tomorrow to seek comfort right now. See, alcoholism gets a life by taking mine. That's when it does. It just feeds off me, you know? I got out of my fifth treatment center and I had two days sobriety. I went home to my dad's house because there was nowhere else to go after nine weeks of being in the treatment center and I snuck out of the house on a Monday morning, took a car that did not belong to me, drove to downtown Brooklyn and waited for the liquor store to open. It was really early in the morning. It was probably like 4 a.m. in the evening or something like that and I'm pacing up and down the sidewalk and here's the setup and the ambush which is now closed and does. He says, we're going to get one pint of whiskey and just chill. We're going take the edge off. I'm a bundle of nerves. I'm restless here and discontented. My mind is spinning 100 different directions. I'm not okay. I'm physically sober. I'm no longer okay. I'm still not okay, hmm? So if I have just one pint, little pint of whisky, take the hedge off, and I'll go to this thing they're talking about. Liquor stores close. They got out of the car, and I'm pacing up and down the sidewalk, and I meet my demons eyeball to eyeball. I meet my alcoholism, if you will, eyeball to eyeball. Pacing up and down the sidewalk, and what begins to happen to me is, now, I don't need alcohol. I just get out of a treatment center, inpatient lockdown treatment center. Nine weeks in there, my body is not going through post-acute withdrawal syndrome. My body does not need alcohol, anything that's gonna affect me from the neck up. I'm good. The mind's another problem. The obsession starts to scream so loud it begins to feel physical, So now here's what's going on. My belly's not feeling good all of a sudden. My heart is pounding 100 miles an hour. My hands are clammy and they're starting to shake. And my forehead, I'm sweating. And I'm soaked. And I've got to get a drink in me. I don't need a drink. And mine says, yeah, you do. And the liquor store opened. Finally, I go in there and put my money underneath the glass partition, the bulletproof thing that they have in those swanky liquor places. And I get a pint of whiskey. I go outside, I don't go to the car right outside the liquor store I'm drinking down the pint and you know what happened when I finished I felt great I can breathe took the edge off that's what it's supposed to do it's a sedative that's why people have a drink and when they're nervous you know, have a Drink It'll Calm Me that's how it does except they have one and they calm down I need to keep going so what I had to do is walk back in the liquor shop and get a second pint of whiskey because as an alcoholic, I have something called craving. I get stuck in the craving, what I like to call the more. I'm stuck in more. I need more. I will pay any price for more. I'll make it up to you tomorrow to stay in more so I have the first drink and for some reason, the second one screams louder and the third one's demanded. I can't get out. Figuratively speaking, I'm sitting on the bar stool. I got to get home. Whether I'm drinking beer or hard whiskey, I got to get home. My wife's waiting for me. I can't make it home. My kids are waiting for, I can'T make it HOME. I gotta get back to work. I can'T get back TO WORK. I canN'T show up FOR LIFE because alcoholism OWNS ME. One more. One, the hell with it, I'm staying. I'll figure it out TOMORROW. I can''T get out. I told my kids I'm gonna take them to the ball game TOMORMORRow. I'm so hung over right now and they need a drink to chase this away and I have a drink and I don't show up in fact they beat the kids up for annoying me that's not how I want to show up for life but it owns me I have no power choice or control I learned this the hard way it was articulated to me in here in a more genteel way at times but I experience now okay I know what the hell is wrong with me how do I get out and I leave my fifth treatment center and I go on, there's drunk of drunks. I got arrested a few times. I've said this a bunch of times. If it wasn't for my dad's connections and money, I would have gone away, you know, like prison. I wasn't a hardened criminal. I wasn'T a violent drunk. I wasn' t a gun guy. But when you show up in front of the judge enough times, they say, you need to go away. You need a timeout. I avoided all of that. I just kept getting arrested. And my sixth treatment center, I walked out after 36 hours because the realization of what I'm doing to my family and myself showed up. Up until then, you know, come and go, I didn't care, but somehow the soul started to talk. The damage I've done to so many people, the busted relationships with women who were nice girls that I was dating, I destroyed everything I touched. What am I going to do? I'm better off dying, and I left treatment center and tried to die. I tried to take my own life in some flea bag motel in Staten Island, New York. And God interrupted my death, and I was on the streets, and June 23rd, 1988 showed up. What I've got to be acutely aware of now, that's why as recent as this morning, I go to God for the willingness to go to any lens 35 plus years sober, because I'm not relying upon me to go any lengths. Everything goes to God. We turn all things into the Father of light. All things, including what am I wearing for the meeting tonight? God, what do you want me to wear? I literally do that. I wasn't unaware of it. My wife said to me, what are you doing? She heard me say, okay, God, what are we wearing for the meet? She said, what's wrong with you? I can't turn some things into God and other things I don't. I'm either all in or I'm not. But how far away have I wandered from step one? Based on my actions, what does that look like? Have my meetings declined? I have a sponsor. Don't even have a sponsored. I check in with someone. I'm not trying to ruffle feathers here, guys. Just raise the level of awareness. There's not right and wrong. That's somebody else's workshop. If you don't meditate, we talk about meditate. Maybe you go home and say, maybe I can try some meditation. I don't have a sponsor. Maybe I should hook up with and get a sponsor, you know? I need to go through the steps again. That's all this is about for me. Raising a level of awareness. There's an author, Eckhart Tolle, he says, awareness is the greatest agent for change. How can I know what's wrong with my console and open up the hood? I bring it to a mechanic, he opens up, he says there's your problem. Okay, let's fix it. Now I'm running again. How far away have I wandered from step one? based on my actions, my meetings, who I'm hanging out with. If I want to know how good I'm doing in five years, take a look at who I'm hangin' out with, how much time I spend in prayer, in meditation, writing inventory, reading spiritual literature, how many people I'm helpin'. What does that look like? I'll even go, and I don't wanna, I'm careful about traditions, but what is my religious community? How often am I there? You know, alcoholics. I was one of those hypocrites. But for the grace of God, but for the grace of god, but from the grace to God, I love God. I never went to his house. Few times I went, I took everyone's inventory. I'm telling you about how great God is, but I don't go to his house. Imagine you and I are best buds. And we know each other for years and I'm running around telling her what's your name? Kevin. Kevin David. I'm telling everyone, Dave's a great guy. What a great man. What a good guy. What a big guy. Dave invites me to his house every week and I never go. What kind of friend am I? So I'm talking to you about God, God, God, God, God, I don't go to his house. I have a problem with God, I have a problem with religion. Well we have something called an inventory to fix those resentments. Because the church is not suffering because I don't attend but I'm an alcoholic. I'm dying because of it. Not because I don' t go but because of the resentment, the justified anger, the justified resentment, plaque on the soul, space between me and God. And I did, went through the steps. It was about, I don't know, 15 times through the Steps. I'm reading a fifth step to my then-sponsor and it comes to institutions and it's Resentment Catholic Church, cause, cause, course, cause... moving to the third column, ready to start the fourth column and he says, back up. That's sponsor code four, you're in trouble. he's how long you've been nursing his grudge for and i said well mickey and i gave him my case i presented my case as to why he should say you know what you're right and he listened to me justify why i don't go to my religious community i'm a guy who prays minimum twice a day meditates minimum twice today i read lots of spiritual stuff a lot of outside literature that even religious stuff but I'm not going to his house and then my sponsor presented me with some questions he says do you go to AA meetings I said yeah he's every AA meeting a good meeting I said no he's at that teen step that that teen steppers and I says yeah he said have you known anyone to get a coin that you knew was loaded I says a bunch of times yeah he says but you keep going back I say yes and you practice love talents forgiveness and acceptance I says yes and You bring a solution, yes. He says, good. How come you can't do that with your church? And there was silence on the phone because he had me like all his sponsors do. He says it sounds to me like you need to go there and make an amends. What do I do? Go to the Pope in Rome? What do we do here? He said, no, we have confession as Calumet Catholic. Go sit with the priest and tell him where you've been, what you've being doing. You're gossiping and slandering. So I do that on a Saturday afternoon. I walk into a little confession booth. I tell him, Father, I'm a member of Alcoholics Anonymous. I've been slandering, gossiping, and I never attend. In fact, the few times I attend, I take everyone's inventory. And he says this, I understand. And he went on to talk to me what seemed like a week was probably like two or three minutes. Tops. Because if you ever do that, they say you're sorry for your sins. Okay, they give you absolution. It's a beautiful event. You go do some penance and you're free and clean. he's talking to me about he didn't say you're going to burn in hell he understood and he tried to get my car in a new lane because where I was wasn't working and he gave me some pen and says listen this is part of an AA and part of a 9-step I need to ask you what can I do to make it right can you come to mass tomorrow morning and I did and my life changed I didn't see that going into the 4th step I didn'y see that go into a 5th step I didn''t see that in 6 and 7 nor did I see that in eight and making amends in nine. But God kept that to get through with that and then his whole world opened up. I've been going ever since. I told my priest, I said, look, I'm on the road a lot, a lot on weekends. Sometimes I can't get to Mass when I'm off the road. I'm not on the way on the roads. He understood what that was about. He said, what do you do when you go there? What do you talk about? I tell him. It's that important to me. There's three places I'm most comfortable in the whole world versus with you in AA. I'm better around you, I'm more comfortable around you everything makes sense around you. I can kind of open up my top button if you will and kick back put my feet up it's just, it's right. I met Scott for the first time in Redding I feel like another guy a hundred years he's driving me from Sacramento to Redding with my wife and a buddy in the car by the time we get out we're like like I know this guy my whole life That's Alcoholics Anonymous. The other place is when I'm with my wife, and the other place is when we're together. That's when I was in church. It just makes sense. I didn't see either of AA, my wife or church coming at me. And God said here. So I have a direction and purpose in my life. It's a long way from living in an abandoned building. So what does my step one look like? I've got to wrap this up in a couple of minutes here. We'll talk about powerlessness, not only with booze, but just in general. What does that look like now? Do I think I really have control? Because I walked in Alcoholics Anonymous, well, I know I have a booze problem, I know i have a substance problem, but the mind still wants control, and control is rarely willfully relinquished. It's usually involuntarily shattered when I hit the wall. Do I have a practice today? Do I practice fidelity to God? Do I put things before God and use God when I want? 43 pages in our big book talk about step one, plus doctor's opinion. The rest of them are broken up. 10 is about a page and a half, six and seven a paragraph each. 43 pages plus doctor's opinion I think that's about 53 pages thereabouts just on step one talks about body, mind and spirit what I'm up against that my alcoholism works on me when I'm sober it's working when I don't even think it's working. The only defense I have it says this, I'm suffering from an illness which only I'm sufferings from an illness which only a spiritual experience would conquer. Not work on but conquer, defeat one day at a time. How am I going to have a spiritual experience? On my own power, I can't. The needed power wasn't there. As marshaled by the will, that's not going to work. I don't work. The ego doesn't want to touch that one, but that's the fact. I don' t work. But God could and would if he was sought. That's my defense against the first ring. That' s my navigation tool through life. That''s how I'm able to have relationships with other people. I can be transparent with other people where am i with this god that's without a drink in me you put a drink and me it gets even worse we got this threefold illness hope to talk well we will talk about the body the mind and the spirit some folks say it's a two-fold disease it's not my book tells me if you are a twofold disease guy god bless you my books is three but whatever floats your boat that would ever get you through the night, that's great. But if you're struggling with that, maybe you need to take a peek at it. And I'll just close with this. What's the stuff? The current stuff. It's probably been around forever that when you put your head on the pillow at night, here it goes. Here we go. Money, relationships, health, age. Am I an alcoholic? Am I really an alcoholic. Regrets about to happen. We all got the different players. We all gotta stage thing going on and it keeps us up, you know that three o'clock in the morning like this? I'll sleep, I'm not gonna sleep. It's like then the sun comes up and it all goes away until you get in your car and you're driving to work and it starts again. Then you walk into your home group. How are you doing? I'm wonderful. Everything's just groovy, right? What's the stuff? It's called bondage. and yet if I revisit this book and sometimes we need to see outside help and talk about this stuff and see where I'm at fault and how much dependence I have upon me rather than God we can get free I've gotten free of a lot of that stuff I can't tell you that every night like there's nights where it shows up and I'm listening to it I didn't invite you in so what I need to do is hop out of bed get on my knees and do some more prayer I need his strength I need his power. And what I've learned is I need his mercy. We all talk about God's love in AA and God's strength in AA. You hear that a lot. God's love, God's grace, God strength. What about his mercy? I think the thing that holds AA together is God's mercy because we're always screwing stuff up, always trying to rewrite something and change something. And God's going, you guys got nowhere else to go. I'll give you another day of mercy. You know, we So step one, the foundation for this whole thing. The further I get away from step one like into step three and four, eight, nine, 10 and 11. So I'm kind of moving away from steps Have I gotten away from step one or driven deeper into step one and the need for power based on my actions? What does that look like? Do I still believe I'm alcoholic? If I still belief I'm alcoholic what am I doing to combat it? Am I hip to the three-fold illness? And for me, the main problem always will be the mind. This mind. It's a four-letter word. It's an out-thinker. I don't have the power to out-think it, to say positive affirmations, think good thoughts, do good deeds, because that gets old in about 10 minutes because my mind says now where's my reward? I can't be altruistic if I'm in my head. I can't be in this. I can'T be doing this if I'm in my head, but God could order if he was sought, and at the end of the day, that's what this is about for me and putting my hand in God's hand. Anyway, that's all I got, guys. Peace. applause We hope you enjoyed this recording. If you're interested in other speaker tapes or CDs from AA or Al-Anon, please contact us at Sound Solutions, toll free 1-877-893-2777 or visit us on the web at soundsolutionsrecording.com. We are also available to cover your recording and sound system needs. Thank you for allowing us to be of service and carrying the message. Thank you.