Tom Tuesday: Tom I 2009

[Music] Hello and welcome to SilverCast where we provide AA speak meetings and workshops in podcast format. We are an ad free podcast and if you enjoy listening please help us be self-supporting by visiting silvercast.com Look for the donate link and drop a dollar to into our virtual basket. We hope you enjoyed the podcast. Have a great day. Tom, MalcoHolly. And remember the primary purpose, can I bend this mic? Okay. I remember the primary purpose group in southern Bines, North Carolina and delighted to be here. I really appreciate you guys putting this on and folks showing up for something that's pretty well content oriented. Sometimes if you mention anything with work in the title that will thin the crowd. You know, work scares people off. So I am really pleased to see this gathering this morning. I don't know what my topic is but I know what I'm going to talk about. I think it's connected to the title. It's about to depth the illness and I want to get into that ballpark. Sure, are there any brand new people here that within the first three months of sobriety? Okay, what's the first thing? Maybe some deeper water than you comfortably paddle in. But it's water that you're very definitely in. It's not irrelevant at all. I've been watching the parade in the alcoholics anonymous for a long, long time. I was second of 57 and you imagine how many folks I've watched go through here. And over the years I've become more and more concerned about the level of effectiveness in the program. Effectiveness in terms of people coming in and genuinely finding recovery and being able to hang onto it. But our effectiveness has declined over the years rather than improved. That practice has not seemed to have made a lot of difference with us. And it's very, very provokes a lot of concern with me. When I watch people come in with their lives broken and pretty bearing of hope. And then start to get the hope and then come to a point where you just sort of drift off for whatever reason. Also see a lot of people who stay in the program but sort of die in place. They just sort of lose the steam, lose the spirit. And so what I want to try to deal with a bit today, I've got one hour, is that right? Okay, well I got a three hour topic and I'll have to talk like a Yankee almost to get it in. But we get in much we can. When I would frame it a little bit, I don't usually read to folk. But I want to say, if you've got computers and you get email, you're probably just like me. You get just overloaded with stuff. A lot of it is just, God, you wish I hadn't even gotten it. You just need goofy stuff. But once in a while you get a real nugget. Somebody said me this, I don't even know who it was. I just got a name on it but I don't know the person. And it's called, we don't have to drink to die. And it sort of captures in a way I've never quite heard it phrase this way. Of what happens to people, when you come in, you got, in this case, we'll be talking about two different trajectories. You got people like me who've never looked back and who have really thrived in our college stomach. Who have genuinely found a new life and has gotten caught up in it and blessed you in a very real kind of way. You got other people that come in and they get off to a pretty good start and then they just kind of level off into some sort of a survival mode. And the thing about AA, we don't have a past, a past failed system. Our failures you use to find in a bar. You know, so we don't have any kind of way of grading people and all that kind of stuff. In this program, we've got a program to work. But we're free to stop at whatever point we're willing to settle for. And many people come to AA and they're willing to settle for just survival, for just not drinking. For my money, just not drinking is about as miserable as what happens when drinking. And being miserable sober is not a real pleasant thing. And so an awful lot of things happen. A lot of suicides occur. As a matter of fact, nobody's ever done real statistics on it. The common belief is that there are more suicides in early recovery or in after recovery than in active alcoholism. And when you think about the nature of the illness, you start to get acquainted with the nature of the illness, you can see why. And why, for my money, that's settling for something less than the very best is dangerous and not very satisfying. Here's the thing I've gotten. It's just an account of somebody who lost a dear friend. We don't have to drink today. We buried him yesterday. The county coroner had published the required notices for next of kin and nobody had claimed his body. It was just his sponsor and I, no preacher even, the county doesn't pay for those. Not much of a send-off. And not one David had asked for. A cheap coffin, a backhoe drug a whole, and that was it. And another old A-gon. He had been sober and I don't agree with everything in this, but I was really 99% of it. He had been sober over 20 years and in A-A, over 30, that's sort of a study and contradiction. Anyway, at this point, well made, I think, a stern and rigid man who tried to soften his edges and never could. He was a loner, a fringer, and an isolated man at the edge of life's good things. He hung in there and then the end hung himself. I don't know why. I can't know. I know there had been a, there's somebody got some glasses. Well everybody's got glasses, but I mean, you got to dime store glasses. David, you have to be an old person to have them. Thank you, buddy. You need a dog, David. The band is as they fit. Yeah, okay. I live mine in the car. Yeah, I'll start that over again because of the heavy trouble. See, it's been sober 20 years and in A-A, 30, rigid man tried to soften his edges and never could. I don't know why I can't know. I know there had been a diagnosis of senile dementia and I know that the doctor had added cancer to the list, but I've seen A-A's deal with such things before. I don't know why David decided he couldn't. It isn't the first time I've been through this in alcoholics anomalous. I've known several over the years who just up and walked out life's door one day. Sober, but we're not happy. Sober, but we're not at peace. Sober, but they died of alcoholism. Our disease doesn't need us to drink in order to kill us. I wish more folks knew that and appreciated it. Alcoholism's the only disease that is entirely capable of fighting back. Alcoholism can take care of itself and emerge in new places and new forms when it isn't properly treated. That's because of the spiritual malady. Most people think it has something to do with prayer with God. It doesn't. It has to do with our spirit, spirit, that force which animates, motivates and propels us. As an alcoholic, my spirit, my spirit, my spirit is ill. It is flawed. My character or basic nature doesn't work right. At its root, it is a fundamental and irreversible insecurity, a whole that can't ever be filled. It is an instinct run rampant, a desperate need for acceptance and love that cannot be met. It hurts. It feels one with fear. The selfishness and self-centeredness of the alcoholic lives here. We're totally preoccupied with what's going on with ourselves on the inside. The slings and arrows of experience warp by this need to drive us to the fringe. And the voices of the committee and our head keep us there. We're obsessed with ourselves. and from this condition of mind the insanity of feelings going haywire, we become self-medicators eventually. We discover alcohol or something else, and the stuff quite evocated provides relief we've never been able to find in any other way. It isn't any wonder that we drink the way we do. Some of us in attempting to meet these crying demands of our spirit become ill. We develop other malformations of behavior and suffering in a hundred different ways. God broke David's obsession to drink, but I don't think David ever truly understood his disease. I say that because I watched him struggle with those old, unresolved issues of his heart for years. His rigidity, coldness, aliveness, and isolation and difficulty with other people were a reflection of the pain and his heart. Of the disease of our alcoholism going deep inside and still active, alcoholism didn't need David to drink in order to continue to try to kill him. And in the end, it succeeded. In the end, instead of self-abandoned, David abandoned hope and discovered it better end. Our recovery from alcoholism through the steps must be a three-fold process. It is not one dimensional. When we say in AA that we have a triangle, recovery unity service, we mean it. In working the steps, I clear pathway for two purposes, first to come into a group of human people and away from the fringe of society where I've spent most of my emotional life. Secondly, I discover belonging through service to people, to people. Within the group, it is only this entire three-fold process that heals. It is especially true for those of us who suffer from the spiritual entomality as it to a great degree. Perhaps the 12 steps says it best, having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps that's recovery. We try to carry this message to other alcoholics that service and practice these principles in all our affairs such as unity. You see, I cannot hold back. I must not continue to suffer that shyness, loneliness, that overwhelming sense of guilt of self in my in my affairs. I must get involved in a group of people to practice these principles in all my affairs, only the total approach is healing. Anything less is a little more than driving my disease deep. If I do that, it will continue to eat a way trying to destroy me. On the other, on the other, on the plus side, it wasn't as fault. You seem to have been born that way. There were a lot of ideas about self that David could ever muster the willingness to let go of. He is at rest now, but he says somewhere that no matter how far down the scale we've gone, we'll see how our experience can help benefit others. David cannot speak to his experience any longer. I'm speaking to his memory. I think that if David could talk to us a day, he'd say work the complete program of recovery. I share that to the lengthy reading, and I don't normally read, but I think it's a real story in that. Let me make it a little bit more personal in terms of, now I've never experienced what David did neither did he before, but that was into the road for him. I was two or two days ago. I was at a memorial for a fellow that I had sponsored in for a number of years. He's one fellow that I rarely, I don't use the word firing in relations to sponsorship. Yes, how do you fire somebody from a spiritual relationship? I mean, that just never seemed to have congruent way of describing it. But he's one, I gave him a year's notice and told him that at the end of a year that I was just at nine years, I had seen no visible science of improvement. I mean, not. He was just as bummy as he was the day he walked in. And I said, you'll continue to do a sponsor. You is a delusion. I mean, my God, all I'm doing is able to enable you. So I said, I'm going to give you a year because I don't think you're going to find a sponsor real easy. And so you got a year, about 10 months later, he said, you really mean that about not sponsored me, don't you? I think, yeah, I sure do. And he still didn't. And so we parted company. We didn't part friendship. We parted company. I'm not going to pretend to sponsor somebody, you know, and then make a charade out of that. And he became sort of a neat frequent visitor today. He liked to come in and pick up a medallion once in a while. But anything but a member of Alcaliksanand, he was willing. He stopped at what he was willing to settle for. And what he was willing to settle for was not much. And so he lived the life of sort of a junk surrounded hermit. You know, and it wasn't a photo. You wouldn't want him as a poster boy for Alcaliksanand. But that's who he was. And he was like David. You know, he was somebody that got into his own world. And then he died. And at the memorial, we just had a little quick thing, headed out a halfway house, which was the last meaningful place in his life that was identifiable. So as you heard, the memorial was, it was in a halfway house. And we met in a little, little conference room. And it was more than adequate, because we only had 12 people at the memorial. And I was the only AA member at the memorial. And my wife sort of exclaimed, and this may have, she said, "My God, why did more people from AA come to the funeral, or to the memorial?" I said, "Well, the main reason is because they didn't know him. Who's you going to come to the memorial for? Somebody you don't even know, you know, start strange, but that's what happens, you know, when somebody drops off to raid our screen. And it was a sad thing, you know. And during the course of the memorial, they asked me to use two words to describe him. And in a words came very easily. That was, I said, he is charming and challenging. And that's exactly the description to him. He could absolutely con you out of your shoes. But he was a pure loser in the process and had a challenge to work with. Anyway, it just saved. I've seen it as I've closed. I had another good friend who was a fellow. I'm going to hold a bunch of detail about it, but he was a guy that I ate with quite a lot. He came into the program. And unfortunately, we'll sometimes make a bad mistake. And just because somebody has a lot of resources, that means we think to have a lot of ability. And we'll tend to overrate them and fast track them into stuff. They're not ready to handle that. Happened with him. This was a guy that had mega bucks and he came in. And in the zeal to sort of make him feel comfortable here, he started getting propelled into service beyond his capability. And you stay chair in no time. He was a delegate to a conference. And when he was 12 years, 12 years, so we got drunk. And I watch that man. I've watched many men and women lose their recovery and try to get it back. And I'll tell you that it's got to be one of the most one of the most taxing, trying, vexing experiences that a man can offer. I never understood for a long, long time. In fact, this guy that I'm talking about, the deep bogus guy, helped me to clarify my understanding of why people have so much trouble coming back day A who have left, who've gotten drunk and want to come back. And a guy, those of you who've been around recognized named William James, he was an author and a philosopher, Thelogen, that he was a guy that that bill read extensively. He wrote complex books. I started to read one, but he gave me a headache and decided to quit. And so I let Bill do that reading. But James said something one time that in one sentence, almost one sentence, put total clarity for me on why people have so much trouble coming back. And in the man I'm talking about was a good example. And what James said was, it was simply this, no state of mind once attained and lost can ever be regained and be the same. And I've seen so many people beat their brains out trying to come back to A and recapture what they had. And they never will. It's like trying to have another first honeymoon or another first kiss. I mean, that's one time per lifetime. You may have many of either, but you'll never have the first one again. And so people who lose their recovery come back to and always tell them to pronounce, I tell them, you're just be prepared. You're not going to capture what you had. You either got to go for better or settle for less. It won't be the same. And what this guy was, he got did, was come back. He was out for 22 years. Many of those years were, we were in the same home group. And he got into sort of, it was one of those real sort of evangelical business men's religious thing of the evangelical kind of thing. And he got caught up in the rapture of that for a while, but it ran his course. And he wound back in AA, but he was a lost man. You can just see him in a meeting. He was a lost man. And here's a guy with every resource in the world, and unlike David, he didn't get a rope. He drove a new cattle like out in woods and shot himself. So it's not an uncommon thing what's written here. And it all happens all too often. Tell you one other, one other just sort of a case photo of a way of what that looks like in life. And you've probably seen it. If you've been around very long, you've seen it. There's a, when people come in like before I see it most vividly, periodically I'll take a group of people through the book. You know, take them through doing the, doing the program out of the book. It's a long and tedious and demanding process, but it's also the most effective work I have ever done in our college anonymous. And so period I do that. And when people get through with that, they really are charged up and ready to go. They normally do very, very well. Now that's one way of getting launched into good, solid recovery. The first group I ever took through that was probably 15 years ago, and about that many people and every single one of them is still sober. So there's no magic bullet, but that comes as close to it as anything I know. And it's just getting people intensively involved in the program. And when they're intensively involved, there's a little room for goofing up. Now if you really are doing the practice, it was laid out. What I've noticed when I'm taking people through the steps is that if I lose them, you know, if they're going through the steps, if I lose them, it's almost always at step six and seven. It's just about where you lose them. It's his nowhere else. Steve and I, the guy that's going to be on later this afternoon. He and I have got a sponsorship group and we're getting periodically to get together. One day we spent a half a day on step six and seven. You wouldn't think that six brilliant alcoholists could spend that much time on something our book triggers about that much space in, but critically important, they went six and seven. And what happens with the guys that guys, the guys that I've worked with in the book, when they bomb out, it's at six and seven. And it's where they basically, you know, if you look at the first three steps, for my money, they're about a stablitional foundation for recovery. They're not really about recovery. They're about stopping the bleeding and getting hold of the lifeline, you know, so that you got a place to start recovery. And there's a powerful thing, a very important thing. I know people who have done that and nothing more and never drank again. You know, people stop what they're willing to settle for. And then four through seven are essentially about causes and conditions. It's about what is it that drives? What is this thing called alcoholism? What is it that causes my mind to turn irresistibly to the thought of a drink? What is it that makes it so difficult for me to have comfortable relationship with other people? You know, what is it about me that causes me to be restless and irritable, you know, on a fairly regular basis? Now, it's called alcoholism. And so causes and condition is getting down to those causes and trying to see what is it drives this canoe in such a strange pattern? And then having discovered that in the inventory, at least on introductory level, the question is posed in six and seven. Okay, you've seen what it is. You want to get well or don't you? I think it's just as simple as that. I think that's why Bill or whoever wrote that portion of it wrote so little about it because it's an action point. You know, you've taken a look, you've studied the surgery, you've seen what's happened to the patient, you know why you're here. Do you want to get better or don't you? To get better, most people can read ahead and when you get into doing six and seven, the next step is action. Where you quit studying your condition and you start trying to deal with how you straighten up the wreckage of the past. And so that's where I lose it. And the other case, I want to cite, I think it's probably an all-too-comic case. What happens to people that I've worked with that deviate and move out, they don't just necessarily go get drunk, but what they'll do is find an easier softer way. And an easier softer way is instead of being in a purposeful program in a strong home group, they'll get into just visiting meetings, just visiting meetings and talking about me and my problem and stuff like that. And that's an easier softer way. Unfortunately, it often leads you to drinking. Easier softer way use it does. But that's what'll happen. You'll get into that favor, there's almost no brainer. It's very seductive when you compare trying to write all the wrongs to just grab and hold of the lifeboat and let's see if we can't paddle together. That's what'll happen. And one night at my group, I saw a guy, now I watch the door at my group and what I'm looking for is fresh meat. That's what I'm looking for. If I see somebody come here, you can bet I'm gonna get hold of them if they're not literally. I mean I'm gonna, anyway, I'm gonna cost them, I'll put it that way. They call it a costume, I call it welcoming, but it's just a fairly aggressive welcome. But that's what I do. And one night I saw a guy come here and I'd known him for, at least casually, you know how you know people just around the campus. I was aware of him. And I was also aware that he'd never had really been a show enough member. Yeah, I mean he's just one of those kind of our tenants that wandered around from one meeting to another. A new everybody in town. And I knew he wasn't a happy camper. And he came in at night and I swear to God he was a dead man walking. He was a dead man walking. And I went over it. I mean even though I'm a little goofy, but I'm not totally insensitive. If you know I can recognize that the guy was nodding great shapes, I didn't mess with him hard, hard. I'm a little bit, but not much. And I just let him know he's welcome. And bought him a cup of coffee. They didn't cost anything. And he responded a little bit, not much now. I mean he didn't jump up and clap his hands, anything like that. But he followed me everywhere I'd go. I'd go sit on front row. He'd never sit on front row. His life, he'd come up and sit right beside me. He was just like a little kid and would say much. But I noticed that you could read the steps and he'd cry. Anything. I mean you could burp and he'd cry. Anything. And the guy was an emotional wreck. And so he started to keep following me around every time he could get rid of it. And finally he said, "Will you help me a little bit?" And I said, "What?" He said, "I don't know what to do other than I'm just coming." I said, "Well, go to prison with me." He said, "Really?" "Yeah, I have to go to prison with me." So we go to prison. And my god, he loved it. I think that his first place, he felt normal in his life, but what going into a prison, he was a pretty heavy roller too. He's the house only, he was a type of guy. And he would take me to the prison. He wouldn't ride at my little skateboard. He would bring a big, long Mercedes in there and slide up to my house and that thing. And I'd go out there like to potentate. You know, we'd ride out. So we out there at the prison of what night. And we were talking to the guys. And an officer came in and he came over to tap me. And he said, "Tom, you have a Mercedes?" And I said, "Yeah, but at home I did not hear why." And he said, "No, it's not that one." He said, "This one's out in the parking lot and it's asleep." And I said, "Well, that's certainly not mine." And he said, "Well, the lights are wrong." And so I said, "This is his. I've got to take care of it." So I told him, I said, "Your lights are on in the parking lot." Go turn them off." And he said, "I don't want to leave the meeting." Now, this is during the meeting. We'll get this going on. I said, "I don't care. I don't want to walk home." Go turn the lights off. And he said, "I got a good battery." I said, "Well, you better hope it's good because it's good." Well, anyway, here's the guy that day at my end walk and I, all the ones who's coming to life, you know, and couldn't get him out of the meeting to go rescue his car. And then just over time, you just got to know him a little bit. And he's exactly what we're talking about. You know, he was one of those guys. Got in the program, took a look and decided to just survive. And if that's all he wanted to do, survive, he was doing quite enough. But he was not a poster boy just like the other guy. You know, he was a miserable guy. And why did he cry so much? You know, it's funny when you get to know people. You get close and you'll get some confidence in that you don't have to ask him questions. That's start talking. And for a long he's told me he had had a son. that had committed suicide and it was a troubling thing. He had his ex-wife after a major war, major war had split and he hadn't seen his children for 25 years, including the one that killed himself. He's got another one that he sees heading the same way. He didn't have to have any. It was obvious that there was a concern and he had no communication, didn't know how to have any. He said, "Will you help me with that?" I said, "Yeah, will. I will." I said, "Let me give you some thought." The fellow lived out in a western state that was quite a waste of weight. I thought it out and I said, "Let me tell you what I want you to do." Now, he could afford to abort the plane, but I said, "My ticket to go out to that town and then back the next day. Call your son and tell him you want to meet with him for two hours. Don't do anything else. Don't cook anything. Don't pull the grandchildren together. Don't have a family reunion. You go out there for the purpose of the man's you make him and get back on that plane." I'd never got that fool loaded up. I swear to God he had more excuses for not going in. Finally, God he'd want to play. I got out there and called me. He said, "I'm coming back." I'd tell what that was right out of bed. I said, "Why is that?" He said, "Well, my son doesn't want to see me." I said, "How do you know?" He said, "Well, I just know." I said, "No, that's not going to work. You call it, boy." 42-year-old boy. You call him and tell him you want two hours. If you don't do that, you can leave that state, but don't come back to North Carolina. You better keep going if you don't come back here." He called son and he had the meeting and it did just what a man is doing. That was a beginning for United Family. That family, that little kids at that family have brought the whole tribe to vacation with him in North Carolina. That's simple to deal with. They just by taking the steps beyond survival and starting to get into restoration. This fellow is not ready for trustee yet, but he is a living, breathing member of Alcoholics Anonymous. He's a guy he served terms like GSR. He couldn't have expelled that before that. He got started to get into Alcoholics Anonymous. That's the thing that's so compelling to me to understand about recovery. That not drinking is not where we stop. That's where we start. My God, we stop drinking before we get here. This is how to live at peace with it. What I had to learn was that alcohol for me treated my alcoholism for a long time. It treated my alcoholism. It kept me from being suicidal when I was drinking because those forces that drove me, enough booze would quietly ride down and then almost go away. They would always come back. But at least it took care of the medication of what those conditions need. We call them defects of character. My firm belief is that in recovery we will never be free. Never be free until we go back and make right those wrongs where we have hurt people misused them, abused them, took advantage of them, all of that. We will drag that forever just like the case I just cited. He had deserted the family but he drugged that with him everywhere he went. That's why it is in recovery. If we don't move forward and get in what they are talking about, the full program, the rest of the program. We won't know peace. We may get by. If that's all we won't find, but you're not my kind of alcoholic. If you're somebody that can settle for just not getting, for not drinking. I'm not that simple. I'm going to say I've got a complicated mind and I can't live with that kind of stuff. That's what the rest of the program is. Those first few steps are about getting acquainted with it, getting it under control. Then from seven on it's about making those things right that he'd have lunch on a regular basis. Those things that we can't quite forget, which we could, but we can't forget. The recovery is being able to straighten that stuff out. I had the pleasure of hearing our founder Bill at one time in the way back in '65. We went on a small meeting and he was really going to talk about traditions. He was also talking about this. He said, "The thing that just stuck with me so much," he said, "If I take the actions that are laid out in the program, like the mere process," and that kind of thing, he says, "There will come a day when you'll be able to walk the face of the earth and meet any human being, every human being on earth and look them in the eye." My God, I was barely up to knees. I hear that. That sounded like an impossible dream to be able to do that, to not be dodging anybody, to not have to be uneasy about being around anybody. You know, the God told the truth. Today I don't know of a human being in any world or that I couldn't comfortably meet. I'm not going to like every human I meet and they're not going to like me. I thought you were bringing me something. You just sit down and eat and I thought you were bringing me something. I thought my God, an angel is coming up to me. Reality says it. But that tremendous thing is so vital to me. That thing of getting that wreckage out, that stuff that drives the engine that causes the bead art brains out against the wall over and over and over. And that's what people miss when they opt out and just start for survival. And there's no regulators on that. There's nobody that's going to tell you that you're doing that, but that's just something we have to gauge for ourselves. And we're either going to go for the whole deal and be free. All we can survive is our choice, totally, 100%. I've got many good friends who have never really done steps. I mean, they played with them and talked about them in meetings, but in terms of taking action, everybody. I know old timers who 35, 40 years sober who've never made an amende in their lives. They're not like me. I'm not somebody who can live with that kind of junk. I want to be free. I want to be free. And I am. I am as free as I've got sense enough to be. I've got some immense left that I'd like to do that I haven't been able to do yet because the other person has got to be willing to accept it. You can't find your peace if somebody else is expense. You know, so can't force it. But anyway, what our book says is to do it wherever it's possible to do it. It's a vitally important thing. And that's where that whole business just like this guy, you know, he got by in and out of A for a few years, but he had 20 years of sobriety. And he winds up hanging himself. I wonder why? And when you think about that and you think about what you carry around with those driving energies and emotions, you think about one day that makes an imminent sense. That's all that made sense to David was to put that rope on jump. And that's that unfortunately is not not an unusual event that it happens a lot of times as people start trying to find a new life and that sort of chasm in between is where we lose a lot of people like some that I've described here. And I think I such a vital part of the program. And just to get to the point of being able to be comfortably sober. And then the rest of it that he's he didn't talk about too much in there is by the way, I always offer the invitation to ask questions or comment anytime. But now I don't ever give time for it. I mean, you got to just stop me because I get going. I'm not going to stop teaching and say what about no, if you got something you just want to comment about or say what do you mean by that? Feel free. And all we'd ask you to do is go to that mic. So did Mike can capture the mic and get it on recording and not have answers to no questions. So so far so good. Your deadly illness. If I stopped drinking, that will stop the hangovers. Yeah. But it may not introduce real peace in the valley. And then into that process where we start to do to get rid of the stuff we drag around and we become free. And where does the joy come from? For my money, and if you're real new now, you may not know this, but just keep an eye out for it. You'll come to a place in the book, and it's right after this immense process, I've just been beaten out here. Right after that immense process, there's a little line that says in the book that says, if we are painstaking about this process, and it's talking about the process of immense, painstaking means nitpicking, that means that you're getting back and getting it all, you know, painstaking, you've been thoughtful, you've been insightful, you're being honest about where you were meant. That's what painstaking means to me. If you painstaking about that, you'll be amazed before you're halfway through. And I can testify that is absolutely true. Absolutely, it was true for me. When I started to make amends, I immediately started to feel better. And then that little line is introducing, it says, if we are painstaking, we'll be amazed, and then it lists, lists what, 10 promises, yeah, 10. 10 promises of what will happen. And I'm not gonna read those, then we can take a look at them, read, they're impossible dreams it sounds like, but they'll be, before we even halfway through with amends, those things will start to happen. And it's just a state's of mind that just seemed totally unrealistic when they're big, but I'm here to tell you that every promise will come true, absolutely, absolutely. And I don't have to do any magic tricks. All I gotta do is take the actions to clear up the record, you should have passed, and then that in itself will give that kind of relief. And then the other thing that I'm a great believer in, is after you get through the promises, if you look carefully, you may see the same thing I do, you may not, but what I see when you get through with promises is that working on me is done, it's done. Everything from promises on starts with me, but never ends with me. Everything from promises on starts with me and ends with others. Take ten steps, for example. I can't much out of it, but it's a short, it's one of the shortest little chapters in the book talking about step 10. And it basically, making you talk about, "Well, so what happens after all these wonderful things happen?" And it says in so many words that we have now entered the world of the Spirit, we've got a spiritual life no longer a theory, it's become a way of life. So we've entered the world of the Spirit. Our task now that we're in the world of the Spirit, we're not dragging dead stuff behind us. Our task now is to grow in understanding and effectiveness. Powerful words for me and understanding. What does it mean? I don't think that means insight and self-knowledge. I don't think that's what that means. I think it's in the world of the Spirit, what's that real purpose to be of maximum service to God knows around us, ain't? Not about studying me forever. It's about getting out of that and starting to have useful purpose. It's what I think it means is like that man who walked in dead man walking in my group. Now I wasn't thinking, I think I will be, I'll improve myself in understanding effectiveness. I thought, I thought, here's a guy in a crisis. I didn't want to worry to do what came natural. I tried to get him out of that death march and get him hopping along together. It's broke. But that's exactly what it was. I mentioned in the beginning that I was dismayed a good bit, still am, about the number of people who come into our college enormous and miss it. And I mean just flat miss it. They just travel through as if it's a tour. And I want to understand that. I want to understand what it is that causes somebody to come in here with a life that's shot. Take a look and walk out. You know, what are we doing? You have what kind of a job? I want to understand that behavior, the best I can. And then I want to see if we can do something better. That's how I started doing big book, the workshop for people where I started taking people through the book. I heard somebody describe it one time and I'd not done it. I mean I'd take people through the steps. There was this up in here. Everything from Marine Corps style, do it or die and feel from the 12, 14 weeks of crash course. I'd done it every way known to man. But I heard some description about ways to use that book and how to draw it out. And so I said, shoot, I'm going to try that. And that's what I did. I got a-- I won't go mad to hurry, but I had a decided to do. I'd never seen one. I thought, oh my god, I'm not the village idiot. I can figure that out. I just read the book and then try to make it work. And so I told some guys at our sponsor. I said, we won't do this if you want to get any-- come on. And you bring anybody you want to. Well, that's an open door policy. And I regretted that the first day of the first night we met. There was a-- I have a clue who was coming. There was one gal that came in. She's dear friend of mine today. But when she came in, I really didn't like it one moment. I didn't like her. And she'd dislike me more. And she was a brilliant woman. The Ivy League educated gal, entirely a teller of woman, stone atheist. And it probably still is. In a kind of a way, she probably more agnostic than anything else. But anyway, she was stone atheist and proud of it and just loved the debate you meet, particularly. And she came in, I said, oh my god, I'm going to be in the debate society for the next year. And so she comes in and it was funny now. I bet you all did it here this morning. You two look like Mormon missionaries. I just got back-- [LAUGHTER] I just got back Utah and every young guy saw it in this old lake with dress like that. And it's out of my shirt. I thought it was a flashback. [LAUGHTER] But anyway, it she came. [LAUGHTER] So we got going. I tried to ignore this funny about how people were grouped. You know, the missionaries sit together. And she sat down with two other aggravated cases that I knew very well. And I said, well, OK, we're off and running. So it got to work. And it's an amazing thing how the process works. You don't have to be sincere. It doesn't matter where you sincere, or not. If you'll take the actions, it'll happen. I don't care what your motives are. It'll happen. And so we got going along. And I noticed-- now, this is a pain-saking process. Read every word. And the operative term is always, do you identify or relate? Identify means you did it. Relate means you would have if you'd have thought about it. And so that's the only term. What do you think never hits the table? Don't care what you think. What you want to do is for you to identify. What you want to do is make that big book become your story of recovery. So we're going through that. And I'm noticing a little warmth over in that idiot row. And we got to the third step prayer. And we didn't just happen to get there. I'm somebody who-- I love spontaneity-- provided this well plant. And so we just spontaneously landed on the third step prayer at the end of the meeting. And I said, we're going to close different tonight. And I'm going to do that. Father, we're going to do the third step prayer. And I'm going to give you three options. One is to join hands and get on to it with us. Second is to hold our hands while we do it. The third, you step back. Watch us do it. She told me later-- and she graphically, she told me later-- what she said to herself when I said that. And it was not nice what she was saying about me. And it was really a true out, not that bad. But it's a dilemma for her, the moment of truth. And rather than boogie, and she stepped into the circle. No burning bush, but a changed person. From that point on, she just mellowed. But if anybody had told me this would happen, I would have swear I'd have sworn they would drink it. She became my backup. If I had to be gone, she would lead the group. If anybody told me that would happen, I'd have probably resigned from it. No, I wouldn't have done that, but I'd have been tempted, though. But it did. I mean, that thing really worked in today. I mean, I just got a note from her right before I left come up here that she is probably the warmest, most gracious person in that region state. If I have anything to do with a female alcoholic, that's my go to person. Tremendous thing. And to me, that's what's so important about this thing of effected to show that it's not enough to sit back in mourning, grown about the problem. It's not enough to talk about how treatment centers get people confused. They don't know how to come to A. That's no solution to anything. That's no contribution. That's just griping. It's all at ease. And so understanding effect is if there's something wrong, I've conditioned myself to the point that if I think of a problem, I don't have to prepare to think of a solution. I automatically start thinking of a solution. I waste no time on agonizing over problems. I don't want to understand problems. I only want to get rid of them. If I have to understand them enough to get rid of them, I've spent a little bit of time. But I think that's what it is. I want to make a contribution. So I want to understand the problems and try to do something about it if I can't. And it just goes on to say that what we're doing now, we're moving in actively working with others rather than ourselves. That's why it's so important to me about that from non-on, it never is ends with me. It always ends with others every bit of it. And he said, you know, a little further on down there, it says that we're going to goof. We're human beings. They're going to be time to goof. We'll be rude to somebody, unkind to somebody, or mistreat somebody. But we don't need to go into Freudian psychiatry to deal with that. It's just being-- we're restored to human. We don't transcend human condition. We're restored to being human beings. That's all normal average human beings. And we're going to goof. But it's not a big deal if it's a goof. And I just did some job. Hey, job, sorry about that. Hey, buddy, I'll try not to do it again. That's it. That's the end of it. And I'll need to do it in Victoria on that and analyze every nuance of feelings. Well, lonely. Yeah. I just goof, man. I'm sorry. And move on. And I'm not living it. And I think the spirit of it follows right behind that. You'll see this now. I'll know it to some new folk here. But you'll see this when you get to it. So you'll be warned now. This isn't going to get you going. It says right below that. When we goof, we take care of it right now. And then we immediately turn our attention to somebody we can help. We don't dwell on it. And agonize over. Why did I do that? Two cares. Move on. You don't think you know what the bit is a limit. And that's the whole spirit of them. You know, some people think, except tense about just studying your behavior every day. I did a workshop not this last time, but I know the time I was Utah. I did a workshop with a bunch of guys. I keep looking. Because me and the clock and I always agree it. I did a workshop with some guys. And at one point, what I was talking about inventory. And I pointed out, I think it was probably 50 years at that time when I was doing a workshop. And I pointed out that in 50 years, I had done three complete inventories. And then I thought that was right about just about what was right. And I'm talking about doing full thing and doing fifths after that. So I'd done three. And I started on with the next area. And a guy, nice young, he up, he sailed with me type of guy. I was sitting over there. And he said, can I ask you something? I said, yeah. He said, did you say you'd only done three inventories in 50 years? I said, yeah. And I said, what are you asking? And he said, my God, I've only been 17 or 18 years. I know I've done over 200. And he said, as a matter of fact, I do one every day. I would log everything I do during the day. And then I come in at night and I evaluate that. I looked at him, I said, you got any hobbies? [LAUGHTER] I mean, come on with God's sakes. What are you going to do to stare at how I'm doing now? You have to-- I'm all larky. I don't know what does about it. He's about check his air for you. You've got to whack fix it. Then get on with the business limit. And all that whole spirit of that thing, and then it goes on, you know, to some more stuff in there. But the whole tenor of the game, and everything in 10, 11, and 12, for my read, is that it's all about how to practice what it says, to be a maximum service to God and those around us. It's what it's about. You don't deal with a self-centered condition by focusing on self. That's not the way you do that. Now, that's the way you drive yourself. Nuts is by that. The more people work on problems, my observation has been the worse the problems get. They don't get fixed. What they do is get romance and they'll grow. You aren't till you they'll grow. And so that whole business about the difference between me and David, and many of you in David, and my buddy that did the memorial for it, the difference is doing the whole program. It's not about just stopping the bleeding and trying to survive at that level. It's about finding new life. It's to find a new purpose, finding things that make you feel good about yourself, glad that you came to the dance, you know. And so that's what it's about. And to me, this whole business of getting down to the real illness, is what the steps you're designed to do. The inventory will help us understand those things that we're out of quack on. And then these amends things will help us get that back. As we make amends, we don't have to understand all that behavior. All we have to do is take the actions to do the amends and we will take care of that defect. I read something one time, a guy, somebody wrote it, "Stevens" and maybe wrote it. He said, "Do the thing you fear to do and the death of fear is certain, absolutely true, absolutely true." And that's the way it is in the program. We got about two minutes, if anybody wants to ask quick question, comment, editorial, and protest movement. [LAUGHTER] [MUSIC PLAYING] Thanks for listening. I hope you enjoyed the podcast. Sobercast is at free and we'd like your help in order to keep it that way. So if you'd like to help us be self-supporting by pledging a dollar to a month, visit sobercast.com and look for the donate links. Thank you very much. [MUSIC PLAYING]