Who I Wasn’t and the Chisel of the Steps – Don P.

My name is Don. I'm an alcoholic. I needed that, thank you. I was telling Larry earlier, I've been a little disconnected for a couple days. But I feel connected now because I'm in a meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous and that's where I belong. I am a member and I belong to AlcoholicsAnonymous. December 26th of 1967 God gave me back my life as a free clear gift then he gave me Alcoholics Anonymous so that gift would have meaning and purpose and dimension because we belong to a movement that has literally changed the face of this planet. We have to be careful that we never, never think that's what our job is. Okay? But we've done that. I'm a student of AA history because I like to be tied to my beginnings. And I was in a meeting in Greenwich, Connecticut back in 1981, one of the earliest groups, third or fourth group in AA, and I was thinking about the big book and how that came about. You know Bob and Bill got together and counted noses on a regular basis because this was a very risky business they were in and one night they discovered there were 40 people had enough time in sobriety to believe that maybe something real was going on 40 people and that was such a momentous deal but they decided they better write a book about that and I would observe to you this afternoon that there are more people in this room right now than we're in all of Alcoholics Anonymous that day. Part of why I'm emotional right now is this lady over here. I had occasioned a few years ago to be doing this in Kanab, Utah. And as the talk went on, I noticed that there was a fellow from the Fifth Chapter group out of Los Angeles signing to a young man across the table from him. And that struck me, it was very touching. So afterwards I went down to talk to them. Now the fellow from the fifth chapter had not signed for over twenty years and they weren't together as I thought. This young fellow was three days sober and had come to that meeting knowing he could not hear a word that was said but knowing that this is where his answer was. And this other young fellow picked up on that. We communicate here. What a marvelous thing that is, isn't it? We communicate her. We don't just talk to each other. We really communicate here because of your kindness I was given the opportunity to go to Guatemala to a World Service meeting in October. And I learned more about communication there than I have in years. It started when I got off the plane. I'd learned a little bit of Spanish. And you'd think with all the traveling I do that I'd know how to get from the airport to the hotel, but I'm always anxious. And last night was no different because we got off the airplane in Lincoln, and that's as far as the airplane went. Or in Omaha. We were in Omaha, and to get from the plane to the hotel was an interesting experience last night. But here I land in Guatemala after a long flight, very anxious about this deal, and I turn the corner, and down the hall was the customs bunch. Now, I'd forgotten that my last experience with Customs put me in a federal penitentiary. But I paid them a dollar and went through their search and everything was fine. And then I'm stuck here in the ante room of this big airport wondering now what? Is there going to be anybody here to meet me? And I looked around and there were hundreds of people lining the second story up there. Some of them had placards and there was noise. And I went outside, I'd seen John Bragg our general service office manager up on the balcony. So I went out side and around and up the stairs and through the customs again where they searched my bag again to get back into the airport. And asked John what we were supposed to do he said well some of these people with placards are looking for you so I went back through customs and had them search my bag again. You know there's no proportion in my life if you're going to do something overdo it What the hell? And sure enough, I found these people. They had a placard with my name on it. Three of them spoke no English. But Guatemala City AAs had mobilized themselves into a welcoming committee so that all of us would feel welcome, and all of them got to participate. So we had five and six hosts each. Three of us spoke no language. One of them said to me, I learned just enough English to practice on you. And that's the last thing he ever said to me, so I guess that was it. And then there was Oswaldo. He was my interpreter. Oswalto spoke English and our purpose for being there became apparent. I don't speak English. I speak Colorado American. and the little Spanish I learned I recognized right away that isn't what he spoke and as Waldo and I did what we have been taught in Alcoholics Anonymous to do I got into his shoes and he got into my shoes and I set aside all the cute ways I have of saying things and the Colorado colloquialisms and all that and we began to communicate and I could spend the whole hour just telling you about the rest of that week. It was an incredible week. It changed my life, literally. And you're going to have to put up with that. You sent me. But I'm here this afternoon to share with you how I got here. Because for me to be here is beyond my capacity. I would not have picked Lincoln, Nebraska this afternoon. Not because there's anything wrong with Lincoln, Nebraska but I'd have picked some place where I could lay in a gutter and have fun. I did not know when I got to Alcoholics Anonymous that I was an alcoholic. I suffer from alcoholic blindness too. The fact that drinking had caused me trouble all over the years had never entered my mind because it wasn't drinking that had caused the trouble. It was you. Or the chili. I had a lot of bad chili. I drank alcoholically from the very beginning, as I understand it now, because I was out of control from the beginning. I don't have the slightest idea what controlled drinking is. I got drunk the first time I drank and I got drunk every time after that. And I never did like getting drunk. I'll tell you the truth for me being drunk is when everything goes around and you puke and there's no fun in that I learned along the way to either stop just short of that or get way past it so I used a lot of other chemicals too but I'm not a drug addict, I'm an alcoholic who had to find ways to drink I drank for the effect produced by alcohol I drank rum when I wanted to be a great lover because with rum I'm a great lover and if we were going to go out and fight that night I drank vodka because I get real mean when I drink vodka and when there was nothing better to do my favorite was to drink Coors beer and listen to Ferland Husky sing Four Walls and just cry like a baby God that was good good, good. But I always went beyond it. I came to Alcoholics Anonymous strictly by the grace of God and by God's will. Because in my own sick way, I had surrendered. Christmas Day of 1967, I quit. That is a rough form of surrender, but it is a form. I had taken a look at my life that week and recognized that all of my dreams were dead and buried and were never, ever going to happen, and that the dreams that my people had for me were never going to have. The stuff my kids had in mind was never going come to pass. I took my first real honest inventory that week, and I'm real careful before I take people in the inventory because my findings caused me to kill myself. I looked at the fact that there was no real good reason for Don to be here and that was the step past self-pity. It was real. There was no good reason for me to be there. Everybody I knew would be better off if I wasn't around because I just destroyed lives and I didn't want to do that. The question I lived with most of my life was what's wrong with me? And for that I love you because you gave me the answer to that. The state had me certified as a sociopath type 2 and the federal government had me verified as a sociopath and I just knew I didn't feel too good. I weighed 133 pounds and couldn't get out of bed in the morning until my connection got there to get me up. My boys and I lived in a $40-a-month basement apartment beneath a lady who had cats. I mean, she had cats, and her place was cleaner than mine was, and I saw it that week. Our Christmas presents were interesting. I'd managed to get a pair of cowboy boots and a shirt for my boys on credit, and my boys had wrapped up everything in the house in blue paper towels so I'd have a good Christmas. And that broke a piece of me. Our Christmas tree was a gem. The room was small, and we'd found a dollar in the snow and bought our Christmas tree with that dollar, and the tree was big. It tilted at the top. Very dramatic. God, I love it to this day. I love him. And that seemed a little strange, and it was... The tree was hung with stuff. I just recognized that this really isn't what I had in mind for me or my kids. But the kicker came when we got to my folks' house Christmas Day, thank God. My dad met us at the door and he said, I'm sorry, but your mother says I can't let you in anymore. She can't stand watching you die. For the first time in my life, I recognized what I'd done to my mother. And I broke. then dad snuck us in anyway and i had to look at what i had done to my dad because he jeopardized the happiness of his home that day because he loved us and i have been screaming out in my lie nobody loves us nobody cares and he made that a lie and i Had to recognize that and i saw what i'd done to my kids that's really not the way it's supposed to be where the kids can't see grandma and grandpa because of you all this wrapped up into a nice package that said don you aren't doing good get out so i took a massive overdose of drugs and all the booze they could find and lay down died and i was terribly disappointed the next morning the police were at the door and that was okay I had set myself up to be arrested because I really needed a rest I was tired well when you're in my state county jail is a marvelous place it really is the rules are simple for those of you who aren't through drinking in here there's a couple of you let me tell you how you get by that County jail is this. I lie to you for 10 minutes, you lie to me for 10 minutes and then we both go take a nap. And that's all there is to that. But that isn't why they were there. As a result of my alcoholism I had gotten very careless. They had nine charges. Here will you take that? My wife says I jingled my keys. The first one called for three years to life in the penitentiary, and I promised him the Denver District Attorney that he'd bring the rest of them one at a time, but I was through. They were real tired of me. Found out later the Chief of Police in Aurora said I'd get him next. And I didn't know I'd been doing that much. I laid in jail for five months and sobered up physically. I detoxed. And then they offered me a deal and I'm telling you this because I met God before I knew his name and the power of God went to work in my life long, long before I could before I know what it was because I had quit. I said I can't do this. I've met the basic requirement of recovery. I can do this they knew i was sick and i offered to if i'd plead guilty to a reduced charge they'd suspend my sentence and give me back to the federal people because i owed them four years and they'd take me to fort worth texas and fix what was wrong with me i'm not an idiot a hospital in fort worth Texas beats the hell out of the penitentiary for the rest of your life so the two forces that are always at work in me my ego said if you put me in a hospital with doctors and books I'll be out in six months because they'll tell me what's wrong with me and how long it's going to take to fix that and all the symptoms I have to give them along the way so they'll know I'm getting better and I've played that game since I was a little bitty boy I had also reached the place that we have to reach to recover. I was willing to go anywhere and do anything anybody said if it meant I didn't have to be me anymore. So I took their deal. And five days later I was in this Colorado State Penitentiary saying, wait a minute. This isn't what I signed up for. Because God, I think, knew that had I gone to Fort Worth we'd have treated the wrong problem and I'd have been fixed and I'd have come out and I would be stark raving mad today I don't think I'd die I don' t believe that that's one of my options anymore I tried that one and it didn't work I'd had to live in madness the rest of my life so I was sent to the place where I needed to go to hear what I needed to hear so I could be here today I believe any alcoholic anywhere that shows up at a meeting is in the right meeting because they will hear something that will get them back if they'll listen to the next meeting or they'll hear something that will get them through to the last meeting until they can finally hear what we're really saying well part of the procedure down there is that in the third week before you go into population they send three guys from AA over to talk to us about Alcoholics Anonymous and I was laying in my bunk and this guard says you will come down and you will listen and I didn't have anything else to do so I went down and I listened and this fellow said my name's Doc and I'm an alcoholic and that means that I'm powerless over alcohol and drugs and guards and all of the other circumstances of my life my life's become unmanageable and if any of you smart bastards think you can still manage your lives look at the reward the state just gave you for the nifty job you've been doing the miracle was that I heard him I heard what the man said. I don't remember a whole lot more about what they said that day. They did say silly stuff like, if you're an alcoholic, you don't ever have to drink again. You don't have to hurt like you've been hurting ever again in your life. Your very best thinking puts you in a penitentiary. You're not doing so good, are you? Yeah. And then they invited us to attend their 12-step study school. If we wanted to learn a new way to think and change our lives, for five weeks every Saturday and every Sunday, we gave up our yard and our movie privileges and went to school, the AA school. Well my friend Jim and I went because they were very careful when, a week following their talk we moved to our new cells and there was a note on us reminding us right after lunch there's this little school up here so we went and I encountered sponsorship kind, gentle, soft spoken that's a lie we sat down we knew guys and this fellow stood up and he said now for the next five weeks you new guys have nothing to say if you knew anything at all you wouldn't be here and they began to hand carry us through the process contained in the big book see I love the fact that we have the steps up on the wall but the directions on how to do those are in the Big Book and by putting them on the walls we sometimes miss the directions well my sponsor didn't miss the direction They sat us down and went through the directions. And they told me the first day, what's wrong with me? I was in my first federal penitentiary when I was 19 years old. Not because I'm a big-time gangster, but because when I start to drink, I can't find my way home. And there's a federal law against getting lost when you're in the Navy. And I just kept getting lost. I loved the Navy. I was really baffled because I loved it. The high seas, the planet breathes at night on the high seas and we were at war in 1917. That's exciting. And I got to drink with the big guys. And I get to drink and I got the swear and nobody cared. The place smelled bad and that was exciting. but they'd give me liberty and expect me back in 24 hours and I just could never seem to quite make it a minute late, 10 minutes late 3 hours late one time it was 23 days and they were really upset and I didn't feel too good either because by the time I got home they'd moved it all the way to Japan it's a long swim you told me why that happened it's because I have an allergy to alcohol we suffer I think this planet is the funniest place there is we live in a place where they put you behind bars for being allergic to something now if I were allergic to tomatoes and I ate tomatoes I'd break out with an itch my allergy is to alcohol if I put alcohol in my body the symptom is I break out with an itch for more alcohol and my choices are gone from my first drink my choices are gone I must drink and we still don't know why and I'd really rather hope they never find the enzyme or whatever the hell it is all I know is that that does happen to me and they said if that happens to you then you're alcoholic It only happens to alcoholics, and it only happens after the first drink. On day 22 I was in Pershing Square in Los Angeles, mooching drinks and quarters and food and whatever I needed to stay out there. I could not go home. I hadn't found it yet. Have any of you ever gone looking for it? out there. And I hadn't found it yet. You'd have had to drag me back in chains. On day 23, that madness was not there. When I turned myself in and faced the consequences of my act like any other rational human being, I had taken a drink 22 days before and it set the cycle in motion. So I understand that part of it. And i thought that was really grand news. But my sponsors weren't through with me they mentioned that that whole business as important as it is as academic if i never take another drink it'll never happen again so how come with a track record like i've got did i keep taking a drink well that's the second part of my problem i've got a body that goes crazy when i give it booze and a mind that keeps giving it booves that can't seem to remember what happened last time, or convinces itself it won't happen next time. They told me about my feelings. They described me as restless, irritable and discontented. And that's who I was, restless, irritable, and discotented. And they said, well, that's alcoholism. No human being on this planet can live with that feeling for very long. But I found relief with alcohol at the beginning. So did the guy drinking with me. We went there to drink for the same reason, after a hard day we were restless and irritable and discontented. And we'd sit down have a couple beers and then he'd go home. And at two o'clock when they closed the bar I was terror-stricken because I hadn't found it yet. And I knew I was supposed to be home, and I couldn't go home now. Because they'd ask me where have you been, and why have you been there? I didn't know. So I started moving around. I've got a mind that is incapable at certain times of presenting me with enough information for me to stay sober. Information won't do it. I can't stay sober on self-knowledge. I knew all there was to know about me, Christmas Day of 1966 and I killed it. That won't work for me. So I don't worry about psychiatry, won't work for me. It'll teach me about myself and I know more than I want to know. I'm powerless physically and I'm powerless mentally and emotionally and I have to have a permanent answer. No fixes. A failure at living and a failure at dying. Walking around in a body that still worked. I got to find an answer. It was somewhat desperate. And you said you had one. So now I know what's wrong with me. Now you tell me it's untreatable. God! I've got three untreatible diseases now. I'm a psychopath, a sociopath, and an alcoholic. But I don't need treatment. I need mercy. And I need love. And I need purpose. And you say, that we've got. And I need direction. Constantly I need direction. And he said, that we've done. My sponsor said they couldn't fix me. They said they'd introduce me to who could. I was really frightened of this insanity business. I really thought I was going to have to spend the rest of my life, sorting out what I had already failed to sort out. I'd become everybody I'd ever met and they were all talking at once. And you said well we don't do that here. First of all they said we don' t think you're a psychopath or sociopath. We think you are a good actor. Yeah. Get me scared back into a corner and I will show you a psychopath. Leave your trinkets on the table, and I'll show you a sociopath. One doesn't know the difference between right and wrong. The other one does and just doesn't give a damn. But you said that I suffered from alcoholic insanity, and I've described some of that to you in the belief that next time it'll be different. But my working definition of alcoholic insanity came from the big book of Alcoholics Anonymous and the story of the car salesman named Jim. who one morning was irritated with his boss and himself because he was now working for the company that he had once owned. He'd been in and out of AA several times, but had failed to enlarge his spiritual life, they said. Stopped in a bar to have lunch and maybe find a customer. And after lunch, Jim's mind said, I can have one ounce of whiskey if I put it in my milk on a full stomach. So we did. and it was so successful he didn't go crazy or nothing they said oh I'll have another and another and Jim ended up back in the nut ward my book says that whatever the precise definition may be we call that plain insanity how can such lack of proportion and the ability to think straight be anything else now I've got a working definition for my kind of insanity lack of proportion and the ability to think straight I'm rubber minded, I can't think straight my early sponsor told me Don even the truth isn't going to work for you because I take the truth in and my ego catches it and says oh I can use that next time and by the time I get around to using the truth it isn't the truth anymore it's warped because I'm warped didn't mean bad I'm worped I learned to think by watching Abbott and Costello movies I know who's on first but that doesn't do you too good in life they told me that the most important word in the second step for me was the word restore Bruce said Don you have not always been a raving maniac. And God in His mercy will restore you to your time of sanity and you get to start all over again. My book has words like recreate your life, reborn, restore. I get to go back to the beginning and start over. He also said we You will assume you went mad about three seconds after you were born. We're not going to sort a lot of stuff, we're going to literally start over. And I wanted what he had. And I'm a very practical person. I think the spiritual life is the most practical life I have ever, ever lived. I've had occasion in practicing the presence of God to stand in front of the bread counter at Safeway and say, for who I am today, which brand should I eat? And stand there until it comes to mind. I'm not serious about this. I am younger than I used to be so it must be working. Bruce got in and out of his cell anytime he wanted to and I wanted that. The And the reason I knew that is because when I was locked up, he'd come by and visit with me. And I wanted what he had. One afternoon he said to me, Do you know that it's possible for me to think one thought at a time? And he had me hooked forever more. I'd pay any price for that, any price. Do you now that it is possible today for me think one though at a times? are some very special moments in my life when I can sit quietly and I don't think at all. And that's one of the reasons I'm so very grateful that you let me come and share this today because one of these days I'm not coming back from there, and I just know that. But for now he kicks me out of the garden every morning. I wanted what you had. So I went off and I took a third step and had the worst experience of my entire life. It's supposed to go boom. If it goes boom, I can deal with it. But I took my third step and absolutely nothing happened. I might as well not have said it. And I can't deal with that. So I'd learn by then if your sponsor tells you to do something and you do it and you don't get the results you think you ought to, go bitch at them. I did. He said, Dummy, you oughta be grateful you didn't have a flash of light that didn't really kill you all your life. Because I've had some beauties. Some flashes of light. and he took some of his very precious time that day and did what we do here better than anything he shared with me how it had been for him you must understand this man was in there for the rest of his life for committing a double murder one morning when he was 17 years old but the man that was talking to me was incapable of killing anyone and that's why I picked him he had been changed that's what I wanted, to be changed and he talked to me about God very plainly as he understood him he says God knows you can't stand one more big shock right now anyway in the shape you're in probably come to you easy we went over some things and he found in me one last reservation God love him I believed at that time that if I really truly gave my life over entirely to God, I'd end up at the corner of Colfax and Broadway in Denver handing out Watchtower magazines and asking perfect strangers if they'd been saved. And I couldn't do that. So he said the words to me that when you hear it from your sponsor, quiver. He said let's talk about that. Strikes terror into the hearts of everybody I've ever used it on. Let's talk about that, he said. Do you suppose, Don, that the fellow that's handing out watchtowers down there had breakfast where he wanted to this morning? And I said, yeah. And he said, well, you didn't. He said, do you suppose that that poor guy who's humiliating himself asking strangers if they've been saved picked out the clothes he's wearing while he's doing that? And I says, yeah, and he said well, your wearing clothes the state gave you. and we walked through this process and he finally said to me do you suppose when he's all through doing that that he gets to go home I didn't with his care and his love for me that overshadowed his desire to not hurt my feelings he brought me to the state of mind where I am today anything at all that God has in mind for me is better than anything at all that I may have in mind and for me and that's what the third step prayer says I am now without ambition other than to seek and do the will of God what a thrill that is I've always wanted to be able to say that publicly and was always ashamed to so I love you for that too I can come to you and stand before you and say all I really want to do is serve God and love you. You say, good, because if you don't do that you're a dead cookie. I asked him how do I make it real and he sent me off to take an inventory of myself. He said, God will reveal himself to you as you reveal yourself to you. My first inventory was really funny. I'd finished it in two hours. I came back to my sponsor at Fifth Steppet and he said, that's garbage. You wrote that to impress me. Get away from me. I did what any good drunk could do. I found a fellow that would listen to it and came out of there with a spiritual awakening. I'd written down two hours worth of the bizarre stuff I'd done in my life. I thought that's what it was about. And I'd tell this guy I did this and he'd say, well, that isn't that bad. And after several times of him saying it wasn't that bad, I woke up because it was that bad I was not a nice person. I woke up to the fact that once again I had picked someone who would tell me what I wanted to hear so that I didn't have to change and if I didn' t stop doing that immediately I was going to die a very ugly death I'm not afraid of death and haven't been for a long time I've died three times that I can remember but in order to die an ugly death it means that for some period of time just before that I must live a very ugly life I can't do that whatever god has in mind for me is better than anything i have in mind for me so i ask him to help me with this inventory thing and i began to look at it for what it was not to learn about me learning about me won't keep me sober the book says its whole purpose is to help me find and be rid of the things in me that have been blocking me from god to be rid of is the promise of alcoholics anonymous there's no way I could face myself without dying unless I knew that I didn't have to do that again. I found out that resentment is a spiritual illness, not an emotional problem. It cuts me off from people and it cuts me off from God. It's a spiritual illness. So I've got to use spiritual means to deal with it. My therapist had me deal with resentment by putting my dad's face on a punching bag and hitting it so I could get rid of the anger. I loved it. Spent hours out there. Just really got into it. He said I had to let him go. I recognized in the midst of this inventory that the things my father had done to me that confused me and made me angry was because I couldn't understand how such a nice man could do that. I awakened to the fact that someone must have done some terrible things to him somewhere along the way or he wouldn't have been able to do that to me. So maybe he'd been doing the very best he could with what he had. If that were true of him, then that's true of me too. And the stuff he couldn't give me when I was a child, I'm never going to get. Ever. I can quit looking for it. He did the best he Could with what He had. At least He didn't go to the penitentiary. And I did. a federal agent broke into my house one day I've learned they seldom knock three of them came through the door knocked me down and hurt me a little bit my four year old son let out a shriek and this big cop swung around with a gun and almost shot him in the head and I hated him well he was on my list better believe it the list by the way was simple I was to make a list of all the people I was mad at God that's easy I'm supposed to put down why I'm mad at them that's all I ever thought about or talked about anyway 22 reasons I was mad at this cop one lousy arrest and he made me a criminal he'd broken the door he violated my civil liberties talked ugly about me nearly killed my son we went into some stuff he'd ruin my sex life my self-esteem wasn't all that great either I was very insecure where he took me my ambition had not been to go to the federal penitentiary I tried very hard to look at this guy like I would a sick friend and grant him the same pity and tolerance Hey, I had trouble with that. I never granted sick people pity and tolerance. They scared the hell out of me. I'm the kind of guy who had to have a pat answer for everything. What do you do when you walk into a sick room and say, how do you feel? You know what? I don't feel any good. You don't say, How are you? If you say, What can I do for you? They may ask you to do something. so that concept didn't fit into my mind it said I'm supposed to consider them like myself perhaps spiritually sick and I could go along with that and I still hated him but I went on and did what it said next without thinking said I was to set aside the wrongs others had done and resolutely look for my own mistakes or have I been selfish How did I set this deal up? And it burst on me that I'd invited this guy into my house. I'd been smuggling marijuana out of Mexico and not paying the tax on it. That made me his business. A clue, if you're tired of being arrested, quit going where there's cops. You'll find them in dark alleys at night. behind businesses that are closed. You'll find them in bars where they're fighting among themselves. I awaken to the fact that all of my troubles have been of my own making my entire life. Somewhere, somehow, my ego said, I want that and I set up a chain of circumstances that brought me difficulty. and yes there were people that genuinely hurt me in my life but i picked them i went out looking for them i learned about fear in this little process and you know when i think about this is a really sissy process for a bunch of tough folks like us what do we do with resentment we set them on paper there's no action in that I learned about fear by setting it on paper I had a whole lot of nameless fears so my sponsor said well let's put some names on them then dogs, cats, snakes the basic stuff being hurt being with people being alone started to get funny terrified of talking than afraid you wouldn't give me my chance. Afraid of succeeding? Far more afraid of succeeding than being afraid of failing. Failure is a marvelous thing because people really are very nice and when you fail, they'll help you. But if I succeeded at something, if I did it right, I knew it was dumb luck and I also knew that tomorrow you want me to do it over again. I didn't know how I'd done it the first time. A whole lot easier to fail. I thought fear lived down here in my tummy because that's where I felt it. And I discovered I have a manufacturing plant up here in My Head that makes high-grade stuff. I can take good morning and run it through the plant and come out with, what do they mean by that? And once again, I was demonstrated to me about God's mercy. Thank God there is no justice. I used to bitch about that, but I'm so happy about that today. I get mercy. We live on a planet that's filled with sick people, and they have all kinds of things that they have to go do to learn to cope with fear. We don't. first of all cope means to fight the good fight and I'm fought out my answer is simple I am to ask God please to remove this fear from me and direct my attention to what you would have me be and at once I commence to outgrow fear and I learned in that prayer one of the most important lessons of my life I'm not what I do I'm not the car I drive, I'm not the work that I do I'm not the clothes that I wear I'm not the money that's in my pocket what does God want me to be I don't have any problem with that it's told to me right in the big book scary stuff spearhead of his ever advancing creation my God that's heavy that's what he wants us to be loving tolerant kind how do you do that useful the most terrifying feeling of all is the sense of uselessness that we've all experienced he wants me to be useful he wants you and I to go out there and find the drunks the friendly ones the ones that throw up on your carpet or your car call you ugly names don't pay attention to what you want to do with them we're to find them each day parade our garbage in front of them and make them feel better. You and I have a unique talent, God-given. We can put our garbage into His hands and because of that I believed that you had an answer for me and that's what I'm to carry on. So I'm useful. People don't have to die if you and I go out there and talk to them. That's useful. I rejoined the human race in the eighth and ninth step. I took my fifth step with a fellow who'd been in the program the same length of time I had, and I had a marvelous experience. I walked away knowing I'd finished something, first of all. And I also walked away from there knowing that there were two people on the planet, me and a fellow named Jim. I wasn't alone anymore. By sharing my garbage with him, I had accomplished something I had always wanted to do. I experienced compassion for the first time. Jim was in that penitentiary for a crime he couldn't remember. He'd committed it in a blackout, so he didn't know why he was there. And somehow you'd gotten across to me that the only valuable thing I could do for Jim was to share my garbage with him. It would make him feel better. I did and he did. We became fast friends. When it came to making amends, there were some real problems. I'd committed some crimes that the statute of limitation wasn't up on yet. My sponsor said, you write them a letter anyway. You tell them where you are, but you write him. Because they told me that this whole process is based on a real simple premise. If I harmed you, I was wrong and I owe you. No more than that. If I did you wrong, I owe ya. And I was right. I was not wrong. But how do I clear that? because they wouldn't let me out. They wouldn't Let You In. Well, they wouldn' t let Bruce out ever, and he had learned how to do that. He said the secret is in the willingness to do so. He had me make a list and then go back to my cell, and he said, Now take each person on that list separately. Close your eyes and picture them in front of you and see if you can feel the willingness to say to them, I've been wrong. I harmed you. Will you please tell me what I have to do so that we can get the books to balance. He said, you know what you did to them but you're so insensitive you probably have no idea what it did to him. So you get to tell me what I have to do to get it straight. And I was lifted that night and set free. Physically lifted up off my chair and set freer. because I will look any human being on this planet in the eye and if I've harmed you just tell me what I have to do we'll get it square as good as you are and as bad as I am I'm as good as you are as bad as I am it made it possible for me to go back and make amends to my family I could spend hours telling you about making amends because it's the lifeblood of this deal. It makes me fit to be of service to God. If I can't look every human being on the planet in the eye, I'm not fit to do that. I'm fit to serve as a servant to God because just sure as hell with his sense of humor, that's the guy I've got to go see. And if I'm Not Able To Do That, I'm NOT Fit. my mother allowed me to come over one day what you do after you say that is shut up while I tell you by the way she had me come by one day and I didn't go by to please her or anything else and I found a way to ask her what do I have to do she said honey all I've ever wanted for you is for you to be happy so for the last 17 some years, I'd go by my mother's house on a regular basis, happy. And that's all it took. She told me it was six years before she really thought I was going to make it, but I wasn't going to prove anything anyway. I was just going so she could see me happy. As a result of your kindness and your trust, you created a monster for me. You've asked me to serve this fellowship in some pretty important ways. I'm not important, but the jobs you've given me have been. Area chairman, GSR, delegate, I'm currently serving you as a trustee on your general service board. And I heard my mother talking a while back and she has a terrible misconception of my importance to alcoholics. God. I thought I better straighten her out. You know? But I don't do things like that without praying anymore so i went to pray and the answer was simple after all the years of agony i've given that lady if she wants to think i'm important then by god she can think i'M IMPORTANT as long as you and i know that i'M NOT okay my father making amends to him was an experience i started to go down the litany of things that i'd done to him lied to you and stolen from me and blah blah blah he said stop that please i know all that all you can do by Jumping that up is making me hurt all over again. You and I are going to have to start from here. So he and I started from that day. We have a marvelous time together, my dad and I. He's a genius. He's never been measured. And we were standing in his driveway one day and he lives in a 48-room house that's filled with stuff. And he said, I've spent my whole life accumulating all this stuff and now I've got to get rid of it. And I heard what he was really saying because that place is a reflection of his mind and he was saying, I need somebody to talk to. So I go by my dad's place and listen and every now and then I even understand him. He gave me one the other day, I'm going to give you. Said I'm 75 years old, Don, and I finally figured there's really only two things a person needs to live a good life. Honor and wisdom. You must have enough honor to keep every promise you ever make no matter what the consequences. and enough wisdom not to make too many promises like that. He's grand. My dad's going to die someday soon, so is my mother, and I know that. Because of Alcoholics Anonymous, we have had a family for the last umpteen years. when they go I won't miss them but I'll miss them I won' t miss not having gotten it straight we've gotten to share with each other we just put my grandmother to sleep 96 years old she finally just got too tired to breathe anymore and grandma and I got to talk and I've been able to make a home for my children because I did grave damage to my kids. But by giving them a home, they're okay now. They have presented me with four marvelous grandchildren. One of whom is better than anybody else's grandchild ever has been. And the other three run a close second. I've been living in the same house for ten years. Married to the same lady for ten years. I never did that much time. we have a home I married a sane lady the reason our marriage works is because we never, never try to fix each other I tested that one day she has two stepdaughters and that's a new experience raising two little girls and sometimes they just get a little heavy on me so I send myself to my room and I sent myself off to my room and I just knew in about 20 minutes Jackie's going to come up and pat me on the head and say it's all straightened out you can come back now two hours later it struck me she isn't coming I'm going to starve to death up here before she comes and tells me it's okay now it's ok now when I walk out of the room and until then to hell with you we have learned a dimension of love that I don't know how to describe to you I loved it this morning when you said how long it's been since you've had an argument we've been 10 years without one I don't know why people need that I guess some do, I don'T we don't always agree either but we don' t have to argue about that that's nice her little girls are the joy of my life and I wasn't even sure that I wanted to raise them I'd already raised 7 kids and I lived at the base of a 14,000 foot peak I worked behind the walls of a penitentiary and did what I damn well pleased and my two loutish teenage boys lived with me we had a white cat and a black dog and we fished and fooled around and I'm supposed to give that up to move back to the city and raise some more kids well I tell you I loved her and I loved them and it hasn't been easy but my young one thinks Alcoholics Anonymous people are just the greatest people on earth she's grown up with you trooping in and out of my house all the time because the only way I know how to sponsor is that you show up at my house and we go through the big book and you see how we live and you come with me on these deals she loves the people of Alcoholics Anonymous she gets nervous when I leave but if I tell her I'm going to AA she relaxes because she knows because I told her that when I'm out here with you doing God's work he's watching over my home and I know that and he's watching over me the trouble with that airplane didn't develop until it was on the ground you notice we came home one day and we had been burglarized oh that pissed me off and it scared my kids my older daughter says my god dad what am I going to tell the kids at school I've told them God watches over our house and because I understand what that means I was able to say to her he does honey we weren't here we didn't get hurt we just got some of our stuff and we didn'y have any stuff when we started in fact if some of you aren't through burglarizing I'll give you my address I've got a clean house it's time my little one gave me a gift so precious I don't know if I can tell you about it about eight months ago she had to write a term paper at school on her dad and she has two of them and she picked me which was nice and then I got to read that thing and I got to tell you that was seven or eight pages of some of the niftiest stuff I was glad I knew me just oh what a beautiful picture but her last paragraph shook me to my soul she said if I'd have had a choice I would have picked Don for my dad but I didn't have any choice so God picked him and brought him to me that's how I feel about you that's why that hit me so hard if I'd had a choice I'd have picked you but I don't know I didn' t have a choice so God pick you and brought you to me so you own me I'm yours whatever you say the great joy of my life are the fellows who show up in my house and sit on my couch I've got two places I just discovered last week I'm somewhat of a I don't know what the word is when you first come you sit upstairs on the couch with me and the black lab puppy and after you get serious Listen, I know you're serious. We go down to my private place in the basement where it's really neat. But we sit and we go through the big book of Alcoholics Anonymous together and we share with each other. And I get to watch people who are desperately ill recover from this god-awful disease we have. And I'm always sponsoring three or four or five. I try not to go beyond that, but I like that number because that means every single day somebody walks into my house and I get to share this with them and I got to watch them share it back and I go out to save the world I promise you if I sponsor you and we hit the 8th or 9th step and you're not trying to save the world we start over the trip to Guatemala and the experiences of the last few years left me with something that I'll give you a short description of before I shut down because I'm once again in a process of changing I came back to my home into my little room and I didn't fit in it anymore I had to move the furniture back and my most prized possessions are going out the door I don't understand it the painting that was done for me by a convict I gave it away the other day and my walls are getting bare because all the stuff I really want to keep are going up the door and I started to sort through my piles of stuff papers that I'd had since 85 And it struck me that if you haven't looked at them since 84 or 85, you don't need to look at them. Just throw them out. And I did. If you've written me in 84 and 85 and haven't gotten an answer, better write again. That room is a reflection of my mind and my being. And there's room in it now for more stuff, for new things, new experiences and new people new pictures and new images i have all my meditations i had difficulty with at the beginning until i got an image because i think in images and the image that came to me was from that old baptist hymn i thank you in the garden i come to the garden alone when the dew is still on the roses and he walks with me and talks with meand tells me i'm his own well that's how i've entered the garden within me and i used to carry all my burdens into the garden and show them to him and say look at this and then somewhere along the way in this process of spiritual growth i learned to leave the burdens outside the garden and just go on in and i found that when i came out i either had the wisdom to leave them there or the strength to pick them up last month I was on a trip to Texas in the airplane and I use the airplane for quiet time and it was as if a small voice in my head said become the garden now that's interesting because I know I already am God dwells within but something about becoming the garden has got me excited I'm weeding my little garden and I'm moving this plant over here and pulling some weeds and fertilizing this and talking to this one. And it's kind of fun. I don't have the slightest idea what's going on. So you have to direct me. I go to a lot of meetings and I don' t believe meetings will keep me sober. The reason I don''t believe that is I see people going to meetings and they go out and drink. Without meetings, I don't have a chance. Don't misunderstand me. But I go to a lot of meetings because that's where my people are. I'm like anybody else. The minute I quit depending on you, he sent you to me. You can't keep me sober. Without you, I won't have the chance. but since you can't do it I don't count on you I count on him and that means all I have to do with you is love you and I do that I'm interested in whether you live or die that's love actively interested in whether you live or Die if you want to want to get sober I'll walk to the gates of hell with you if you want to drink you can go to hell on your own I'm not going let me wrap this up I want to tell you how I see Alcoholics Anonymous and then hope to God we get to sit around and talk some because I'm finally plugged in I'm ready to go I've gone over time already I'd become everyone I'd ever met read about seen in a movie heard about they were all talking at once and I thought I was going to have to spend the rest of my life sorting that out to find out who I was and you said we don't do that you helped me find out who I wasn't so I could get rid of that and who I Was just showed up it's like the fellow who had seen the statue of David by Michelangelo for the first time he was so awestruck that he went to Michelangeli and he said how in the world did you do that and Michelangela said well I took this block of stone and I just chipped away everything that didn't look like David and that's what I got. That's how I see Alcoholics Anonymous. With God as the sculptor and our steps and our traditions and our meetings and our books and our funny little things as the chisels. One day at a time we are chipping away everything that doesn't look like Don and so far this is what we've got. Thank you. Thank you.