Steps 4, 5, 6 and 7 at the 25th Brazos Conference

I go bring my cheap books here

what about a man I'll call it my name is Mike way

and we were before we get into steps for five six and seven I know there's some serious sobriety here so it's gonna be like preaching to the choir

what I'm gonna do this thing anyway and I'm just delighted to be here

D. was talking this morning she said this conference is developing a theme she said and it's a

it's honesty well I'm here to laws that team up

but the wonderful things are spiritual things that this is a spiritual place I was here nine I'm forgetting the steps I want to share a few things I think with the theme of this thing really is is is love

and honesty is part of that unfortunately I didn't know that was crippled up I thought there was some you faked

this love thing

when I was here nine years ago as a speaker

and all the guys I met was a the head of the red shirts Paul a

and we just did it office over a little over a year and I was just a kid of twenty three or so and

we were in contact ever since and I I got to go out to is the Shawnee big book group and speak for one of their anniversary got to meet Tommy and and some and I got to meet to the beautiful land who later had the misfortune to merry Paul

and we stayed in contact with I met the

Charles and Betty before in Waterloo Iowa where we went to the boys and I got Charles his sponsor and I went to a used tool auction as a lot of fun

before I came here what that was nine years ago

and we've all stayed in touch

in a couple years ago I I moved up there was very Maryland to mount St Mary's I was going to become a holy man

and

still I got sick

Hey guess who came to visit me

Charles and Betty

all of a

nope skill based

if you don't find love here

go home

I mean in our view that we're talking yesterday you know we've we've gone to a lot of things we got a lot of things together and in course CC speaks every weekend somewhere I get introduced in tonight I haven't been able to do that since last Sunday

but you know we go to some places sometimes together and and try to stay we don't stay out of trouble very well but

the thing is in this particular conference here in presence river conference they levy coming in

not every was spoken

and that's the deal here if you don't want to give love don't come here

and if your new

that's the scary part of it is real like me I thought love was something that you had to earn

that's something you have to qualify for and I brought that into my alcoholism I thought you know if I if I'm okay then people will Love Me nobody told me that I made this up myself

what the deal is here is that you are lovable and you are loved this is hard for an alcoholic like me to to understand takes awhile for me to to to comprehend the fact that it's not something I earned it's a gift that you are willing to give five if I'm okay then people will Love Me nobody told me that I made this up myself

what the deal is here is that you are lovable and you are loved this is hard for an alcoholic like me to to understand takes awhile for me to to to comprehend the fact that my sponsors bill M. and I'm a active member of the Carolina Curie beach group of Alcoholics Anonymous the mobile for the last twelve years

my buddy kilos and I

event prayer partners about twenty eight years of is almost thirty years of sobriety we met in nineteen seventy four and somehow god has kept us together two lunatics in the

in co habitation and surprise hate he says there were so a lot of what I know about Alcoholics Anonymous I learned from Pete and his sponsors and the B. because I'm a big book guy

and they told me that there's this book and there's this book

and what happened to me is that I discovered over the years the big book will tell you how to do the steps

but when you get a six seven six and seven is going to be doing this morning is but I have a paragraph that covers both of

and I'm a soft longer than that on six and seven

they couldn't return it if I were around in those days it had to have a lot more pages in the big book and that's why we have the twelve and twelve the big book tells me

how do the step in the end the twelve and twelve written fifteen years or so later after the big book was who it was and Brent tells me what's involved for instance in the step four as we begin

metasearch fearless moral inventory of ourselves isn't it amazing if I got a big Booker that falls open step four I've used it with a few guys that I sponsor

amazing is the first of what's the first thing we do

we take a searching informal fearless moral inventory of everybody else

bill psychology there is kind of strange and we make a list of our resentments I didn't have any resentments

I was a walking resentment and I didn't know it

yeah I was able to live in this fantasy world of alcoholism for so long that I had no idea

how angry I had been and how many people who loved me and whose love I wasn't able to receive because I didn't think I deserved it

I was my own worst enemy when the big book says that the problem centers in the mind

that's exactly what it means the mine not the brain

that's where the phenomena of craving sets in which means my makes my mind unusable

my mind they tell me consists of three major powers or faculties

the memory the intellect and the will

now you see

until I was able to surrender my whole self including my will in the third step I don't have a chance to go any farther

because when I was drinking

one drink and what happens

my whole self is drought my memory I don't remember give me about a list of them to kill Mr is not gonna happen this time my memory is gone my will is gone because I think my brain the doctor so we're talking about the goal but the phenomena craving overrides my will

my memory and my intellect they tell us that for every drink you take your your I. Q. drops a little bit well I didn't have that much to start with

so by a bus in our drinking hours but you know have the intellect of a

of a ring tailed baboon

and

I I hate to see as many mediums and sell the baboons

the four seven about taking inventory and Leslie came up this morning as it and gave me out of range bag pick when I picked transformation

I said that's no small

that's no small

it's a dental happening because that's what this is about

see if I'm going to be changed

I have to be really changed not just change what transformed ray okay a lot of you know the grumpy old man who's not a member my home group the so I could save his life

because the first three steps the emergency room

of this of this program how many died I was gonna do this force of stuff I was happy to do the third street up also want a what steps you on doing one two three one two three one I had obviously read the book

and here this cockamamie stuff but also as you made the decision there's three crow said nana logs and like I say if you make a decision and then don't do anything you made a decision not to do anything that's the decision you made it says down here the third step

in which we

you know if you're in a meeting and they they read the portion of chapter five like they do they don't read the next lines as being convinced of a B. and C. stuff wanted to

we were at step three

then three pages later says now we're step three everyone else going on here

bill is trying to tell us twenty four times in those three pages that self selfishness self self ego self self centeredness and egotism twenty four times might be a problem

we get to that wonderful prayer

free throws is another another curve

god I offer myself to the to build with me and do with me as thou wilt relieve me of the bondage of self that I met it may better do that I will L.

take away my difficulties that victory over them may bear witness to those I would help all the sudden it's not about me anymore that I'm clear back in a second step

all of a sudden somebody else's important those I would help

of the high power the I love invite way of life may I do that I will always that's a heavy step and then built after we've done this is just we thought it desirable take this little step with an understanding person

but we thought well before taking this step I've already taken and our children to think well

the psychology of steps three and four just wonderful because we gotta step Forney sets us up again

it's me taking everybody else's inventory but says though our decision

decision

was a vital and crucial step to step three it could have little prominent affected less at once

what is that me

well later on

when I feel better

followed by a strenuous effort to face and be rid of the things in our souls look which had been blocking us is there any clear language in that and if you sit on the third step you gonna fry

I did nothing going to happen

so what we do is move on therefore we start upon a personal inventory course you've all read this but in that and then we see this list over here I'm resentful at the cause affects my

I thought that was all the things are were was those three columns bill lies to us again

resentment is the number one offender

no other things to talk about making me dead catch my attention

we're back in a self thing in the third step where to get rid of the self

okay big river or kills us that got my attention you know we must do it kills us all mine

the number one offender it did let you know right here in the big book that I too suffer from PMS

from it it destroys more alcoholics than anything else from its stem all forms of spiritual disease S.

for a better not only mentally am am physically E. il

we have been spiritually sick

and here's the key when the spiritual malady is overcome we straighten out mentally and physically

okay

so the spiritual thing has to come first for me well what spiritual about taking everybody else's inventory

there's a theme that comes up in step two lack of power way back in the jeopardy a gnostic which I believe is all about step two

lack of Barcelona we have find a power outside of ourselves greater themselves which would solve our problem the problem I discovered very late in the program is me self maybe will me me me me

your guide me me me me now now now now more more more more a man

it's going away my brother live with you know the

or if you'll do this I will do that again I lied every time

the bill calls it a grudge list I call it a hit list I'm more modern and bill was I've updated the program a little bit

was our self esteem our security

our ambitions are personal or sex relations which had been interfered with all of the above

hi everybody

but the thing I've noticed in this this underlying theme of lack of powers our dilemma is carried through into this

for instance the big book a lot of people stumbling step for because the listing the listing the listing the underlying thing is in step four three very grave problems are addressed in the solutions given if we're doing stuff for according to the big book the course in a twelve and twelve it says the thing is going to keep me from doing step for pride says we need not pass this way fears says we dare not look self self again manifested in pride and fear we're keeping from doing this because I I'm not I was growed raised Catholic I don't think I made a good confession after age thirteen

until I was able to step five

and talk to another human being about the act the exact nature of my wrongs and by the time I got the program there were one or two

okay

but what we do is we put on our resentments

the because the resemblance of affected me

and then bill slams a trap shut on us on the next page they conclude that others were wrong was as far as most of us ever got oooh ale

that's true that's where I was

displaying the life which includes deep resentment leads only to futility and unhappiness

this business of resentment is infinitely grave

grave jumps out at me

we found that is fatal that jumps out at me if I don't do the stuff I'm gonna be dead is there to pick up on that we talk about being dead a lot

for harboring such feelings we shut ourselves off from the sunlight of the spirit the insanity be alkyl returns and we drink again for us to drink is to die

now this book is made me seek other places you know other things ring a familiar bell like not my will but thine be done that's a steal you know that don't you

faith without works is dead that's a steal don't you you know that so I know you bet this notice of the Catholics know this to not

Chatterjee's father Peters in Latin this morning

with amazing thing that happens is when he's really slams the door shut on us the thing I discovered I was reading about a guy by the name of I got really interested in and the mystics as running back either the name of John of the cross who lived in in Spain around the same time of trees of Avalon he wrote a thing called a

it was a bigger

no that was Thomas Merton wrote the seven story mountain

without of annoying in this the dark night of the soul the ascent of Mount Carmel thank you because a lot of scripture in their news quoting one is at the

where says when the blind lead the blind

both show Paula fall into the pit he said what we're talking about here

his emotions

when I let my emotions

leave my intellect

I cut myself off from the sunlight is spirit and my soul is darkened

so I'm blind my intellect my memory

and my will are darkened by my emotions so we're here is to try to get the for the spiritual thing first then the emotions will come along and we'll get better physically

C. R. jibes causes often must say more so a lot of the spirit so when I let my anger my fear all these things run my life I'm no good to anybody because I am now being lead by something that is blind

blind rage member about that

that's exactly what it is that's where I lived a lot of my life anyway I thought I'd throw that in there

I'm not going to teach and I has given you some things to think about and gets a chance to read but later

we turned back to the list Ford held the key to the future

now here's the problem

as pointed out we saw that these resentments must be mastered but all we could not wish them away anymore than alcohol

what are we to do like a powers my dilemma

this was our course we realize that the people around us were perhaps spiritually sick though he did not like their symptoms and the way these disturbance they like ourselves we're sick to

here's a solution we ask god to help us show them the same dollars billion patients that we would cheerfully grant a sick friend

what a person of Venice we said to ourselves this is a sick man how can I be helpful to him god and listen to this talk about lack of power god help me know god save me from being angry

the lack of powers my dilemma

I go from sweet Mikey the Rajan forty seconds left to my own devices god save me from being angry

we avoid retaliation argument all hope this is hard

we wouldn't treat sick people that way if we do we do start chance of being helpful I will me the help that

yeah

love and tolerance that that was going to eleven dollars what a father a brother Dr Bob said we know love we know service

oh gosh

we cannot be helpful all people at least god will show us how to take if kindly intolerant view of each and everyone lack of power my dilemma the solution is this loving higher power that I found the second tradition about always anonymous if I tap into that sort of love I've got it

I've got it I can do this

referring to our list again

but it was it was happen now if we do this step without the fear of all this list making thing would do the list like we're supposed to we'll see that

we have to ask ourselves again something's referring to our list again here's where he slams the trap shut us

putting out of our minds the wrong others had done

we resolutely look for our own mistakes all this blame you jerk where have we been

selfish dishonest self seeking and frightened those situation not been entirely our fault we tried to disregard the other person involved in Charlie where were we to blame now he's meddling and

the inventory was ours not the other man's slam the trappers with slam shut on me it's my deal I'm the problem hello

and I know how many people have been to rehab where they force you to step five before you get out of Rio

and then they burn your four step

it's a hazard to burning your age that was done to

yeah

the

the inventory was ours not the other man's I have to point this out the guys I sponsor when we saw our faults we listed them our faults we listed them replace them before us in black and white

okay it makes a mistake he gives his guys lead pencils which are great and and yellow legal pads he doesn't wrong

it's black and white

what made you write it down

now it

it made it all wrong as honestly and there's the theme that the was talking about this morning the honesty thing you know how it works the first paragraph is honest or honestly three times I knew I was going to get this program I've been to see a psychiatrist in Saint Louis in nineteen sixty two because I knew I was a chronic liar I came out of there's a lot of psychiatry doesn't work I couldn't tell the poor man the truth about why I was there to see him

we have made it all wrong honestly we're willing to set these matters straight this eight eight steps of this is for steps up new guys I want to tell you is fearful as four and five are this is just practice

four eight nine so this

K. this us all as practice

no this is the word fear is bracketed alongside the difficulties with Mister brown Mrs Jones the blade and the wife you notice it to Mister brown is a real jerk

this short words somehow touches about every aspect of our lives fear it was an evil and corroding thread the fabric of our existence was shot through with it it's set in motion trains of circumstances which brought us misfortune we felt we didn't deserve but did what not we ourselves set the ball rolling how was I responsible for my fear

man

fear was a marvelous marvelous thing in my life I was so scared from the day of birth

until a long time it's Alcoholics Anonymous that I had no idea how fearful I was out terrorized I've been my entire life for a cause for me that was of a way of life with me

nobody could get through to me because of the fear our people saving the podium and I felt like I was an outsider it's like a kid in the candy store looking inside of my nose pressed against the window and everybody had all this information that I didn't have hello I was too proud to ask

I assumed I was supposed to know all these things so I never asked anybody

but even about the birds and the bees

and I never was I'll tell you story about that I went to parochial school in south Milwaukee Wisconsin nineteen forty three I was eight years old I heard the F. word for the first time

I don't know what it meant but I like it

so much so that I wrote a little song which I shared with the family at the dinner table

my dad was six foot four next marine normally was drop kicked me across the living room

but he looked at me in shock and he said we gotta talk now you know

you know some people say to you we got a dog that you have not been consulted on this matter about

so afterwards we went for a walk

the more you use it as a general word you ever use again I will drop kick you because the living room I believe him because he done it many times before

he said and when you're ready one of these days I'm gonna tell you about the birds and the bees

time goes by

it was nineteen ninety eight

I'm sixty three years old got

five grown kids and ten grandchildren

hello my father's bedside he's invited me out to wrinkle city Arizona to help them die

I'm sixty three so called me boy

and that was it dead we had a good times and then I really did it just was fun watch my dad died if that makes any sense to you

because I knew I was going

and he was thorough he did a great life help a lot of people including me when I let him finally after all those years

well I said that your member nineteen forty three when I said the F. word delusion yeah born member that

I said do you remember taking me for a walk afterwards tell me one show me about the burden BR member at

you said you don't know when I was ready I am I ready just know

I'm sixty seven years old I still don't know about the dam burst

and with the same but fear

as part of the whole deal get me from asking the questions about his life business so I was afraid of this business of being alive and I wasn't aware it was a like a good sponsorship right away three Harry's legal man who dragged me around when I came in the program I thought the first it was get in the car Yankee

we went to meetings of places I never heard of before since I think they just created for me to go there

and

but the spare thing is

perhaps there's a better way it says here we think so for now on a different basis the basis of trusting and relying upon god there's a god thing again we trust infinite god rather than our finite cells once again self is the problem

where in the world play the role he a science just the extent that we do as we think he would have us

at home really rely on him does he enable us to match calamity

with serenity

and that's the name of the game here

serenity we pray for it all the time

and then I goes a long way to go be sorry now

same way in the eleven step of Saint Francis prayer lord make me an instrument of the I. pace well I'm going to be in his mouth to speak now

I'm gonna bring light orders definition

we never apologized to anyone for depending upon our creator we can laugh at those who think spirituality the way weakness paradoxically is a way of strength

spirituality real men get spiritual

now the third step is let's get spiritual thirst up let's start relying on god the spirituality comes when I get out of the way

is

the verdict of the ages that faith means courage all men of faith have courage they trust their god we never apologize for god instead we let him demonstrate through us what he can do

no I heard I was I went to

it's amazing what M. J. as work for Pat Robertson for a couple years doing

television news for the seven hundred club is amazing how blasphemous person can end up working for the Christian broadcast network

end up

a funny thing happened there

my wife left me

second wife let me

first name was al I mean I've divorced couple times couldn't hold a job because after I got sober

but I was down there in the

the guy came up to many said Mike

you know it is collects evidence bodies and drives down are you working with a new questions I get saved on Tuesday start preaching on Wednesday

I'm walking down the hall I'm

this book on the measures brother Mike I said yes brother Billy

if you're not already had a dog I got a message for you from the Lawrence and I wait a minute

I said I'm an alcoholic and I got to talk to lord every morning and seek his will what is it you think

did he held back for me it is saving for you to tell me

or might I say what is it you want me to do and stop blaming god for

so I don't get these warder knowledges real quick about whatever else is doing it

but there's something here

yeah I want to share with you because I've heard it in the room sometimes fear is a lack of faith and I stated that B. S.

we don't have any favorite would break this runny part which **** for ask for courage

no where in his book too I see that fear is a lack of faith and I checked the big big book to just perfect love casts out all fear

there might be a like a lover not certainly not a lack of faith

or a lack of the ability to receive the love that's available in my case and that's what it was that was my fear and I was afraid of everything and now the solution

and I pondered this for years

we asked him to remove our fear and direct our attention to what he would have us do not be

that was B. I was pondering that I was working in the prison system down North Carolina two years ago in a tech had take a little time off for open heart surgery they were kind of give me two months off without pay so I playing time to sit around

or where my next meal was coming from and deal with the big book and solving twelve and although I'm Catholic I have a good strong Concorde and she'll be happy to know you Baptists

and I sit there pondering this I had for years and

what would you have me be

and three words popped into my head I look them up in the Concord socially words pop up thirty seven times in the old and New Testament so when something like this and I've I've everybody falls on the floor in the words coming from the entity there

it is be not afraid

that's what governor Abby is not afraid that's with this step is about being not afraid at once the proof is building as we commence to overcome walkthrough beat up no I would grow fear which means affairs that I brought into my alcoholism other fears I had when I was a kid I was a thirty five year old man reacting as a child

all the old fears are placed in anything that happened to me and I reacted with those fears of authority of anything of lack of love of being inconsistent of being incapable of being that were they all those fears I dragged it from my childhood and they were given to me the ones I developed by myself self is the problem the solution is this lovely guy that I found on the second version of Alcoholics Anonymous the solution is got

the problem is fear the solutions got the problem is anger resentment the solution is got it sent his book I'm not making this up

so let's move on to this

C.

so

Zacks

Georgia grew up not knowing anything about that so that was another blue talk about fear well man

we do not want to be the arbiter of anyone's sex conduct this well like about a not gonna make any judgments on me

for me

it's getting folks

we all have sex problems

oh oh god I wish I had a six problem today is

I've been married in nineteen years I got the steak and sponsors think that fornication adultery not part of my recovery

but I remember so I can do this

we'd hardly be human if we didn't

what can we do about them once again here's the problem what can we do about our sex problems

we reviewed our own conduct over the years passed and all we want to know is where had we been discovered with how many times would know

about the zebra the steely jawed **** no weapon all I just care about

we're good we've been selfish dishonest or inconsiderate every time it was all about me

it was a good for me to

we had we heard what I've never been accused of hurting anybody unfortunate

hard emotionally

physically or spiritually moment where her

did we justifiably arouse jealousy suspicion or bitterness

now women are better than men because they look better

if you are looking hot in

go somewhere and look over the table and you see it nine guys are looking at your check

rosin general job fears what affairs easily even

she's leaving tomorrow

in what I do I so many fears I made sure that they all left eventually to prove myself my inadequacy

I would drive them out so yeah I know you're never stay

where were we at fault

what should we have done instead here we got we got this down on paper you know what that means is like writing about a black and white we got it down on paper on paper I mean it's right it's a white with the fears we write him down so we got three list so far outweigh

but what we've got is three solutions as well

it I love I work with the

young guys

in this way we try to shape a sane and sound ideal for our future sex life

well I'm willing

but not ideal is not a person an ideal is my behavior

how am I going to be I have many many intimate relationships with women that do not include sex

it's kind of scary when your reputation is shot I did a big book study with seven women they asked me to lead a big book study they asked me to leave this

it does in the meetings when we each got it they would talk women things is all I was one of them and I heard that I didn't know women know about

but the blow to my ego was it that they had no fear of me as a sexual being

I call my support hose

god I'm glad I'm getting old

and here's the solution again it's god god what is it of course is a twelve twelve points out it will talk about briefly in six steps all my desires for sex security society our god given and therefore good

what I did with them what's not swell

but this is about whereas we're beginning the transformation begins if you notice

we have to be changed

and the change doesn't begin up in step six and step seven begins the second step

when we finally decided that there might be something outside of ourselves which could help us that's the beginning of the transformation process

god does not make to our terms of those who earnestly seek it my job is to do the sinking that's all my job is to the C.

and the thing is I learned about this let me got he is not going to force his will upon me

yes perfect all power and perfect humility

he's willing to wait for me until I ask for these things as to just quickly to respond

girl came up to says this morning for the piercing I've lost my Karki she says pray to St Anthony

what she walks up and she said all

C. thirty secs later she had a key to make sure who's that guy

but there is a big thing for us alcoholics it is no longer dear god maybe maybe it's not I will

what is that I will and god wants me to have a good time if you notice I'm having a good time I don't feel guilty about that

I can be a mist of loving people and accept it now

because I don't deserve it that's never been part of the deal

with a love thing and I have to earn it is left to learn how to receive it this is a good place that is I've learned to learn that it's right here in the Brazos River conference and the people here

well we ask god

to mold our ideals and help us to live up to them

remember always that are such powers were god given and therefore good needed to be as lightly or selfishly yours it's selfish again order a spliced in local

whatever I

I

I work with young guys

and I love to torture them

and

god alone can judge our sex situation I say these young guys in a great god alone can judge your sex situation that's good news all yeah yeah man yeah here's the bad news god will judge your sex

let's just say that it doesn't

but I just like to torture you

and there's nothing about meditation here people say

shows up several times in his book that

prayer is talking a guided meditation is listen

it says here we asked in meditation we ask god

what we should do about each specific matter the right answer would come if we wanted

only if we wanted

with this meditation thing I've found is kind of a silent non verbal communication with his loving higher power their final college anonymous and I can go in there with a bunch of questions and not ask them and have them answered if that makes any sense to

also and I think that goes like this is meditation thing goes starts with prayer

meditation

contemplation like contemplating

some of the words the big book

where's his protection care with complete abandon wears a gray area there lord

there isn't one but I can asset but that's followed occasionally by illumination all of a sudden we all

this is part of the transformation process will become those who rely on this loving a higher power this loving higher power including our sex thing

we realize that some people are as fanatical about sex as others are loose we avoid hysterical thinking or advice I love that it was so what we've done here in the four step we've we've built a little

a little thing that we've got to work on we've got solutions to three problems I've gone from my hater to a lover

okay that's a transformation

I've gone from a victim to a perpetrator that's a transformation

I've gone from a fearful person to a man of courage of a guy I know who to ask for help with my fearful times I've gone from a deviated pre verge

to someone who is willing to understand that there are two people involved in sex

selfishness is not part of the deal

health

and this is this is part of the transformation process is taking me out of this isolation I've been in all this time I've rambled on for a long time about the forced up with because I think it's kick **** step

then we come to the fifth at which I was never going to do like Dr Bob I was going to air my dirty laundry in public