The gay/lesbian "Living Sober" conference in San Fransisco, CA

beaker Grady

what everybody

I think you already know who I am my name is radio here and I am an alcoholic

for anybody that didn't do well here tonight a couple with three

I mean the energy is

you want to go to a meeting and I that's the meeting I usually go to is the one I don't want to go to I always like going to meetings you really have to go to and at the meeting that you want to go through in the meeting that you don't want to go through and so I went to a meeting I didn't want to go through last night and and I thought well I probably ought to you know go listen and of course I talked and

the

Hey guys the definition of property group someone who would

travel three thousand miles to talk when walking up the street to listen

right

when I'm amazingly not nervous tonight compared to I mean everything's relative but it's like not to claim in the hands are too cold and maybe that should make you nervous I don't know if you're going to

thank you might forget about the whole economic fourteen years ago and some months and two days before my birthday

and I think now looking back that has something to do with the fact that I believe that I was going to die before I was thirty years old and it just wasn't working out and

some people come today because they want to live and I came days resigned to the fact that I was going to live and I had better you know I'm just going to work it out

I thought I was going to die in a red Ferrari

is there any other

and

going out in the straight away hitting a brick wall with some open driving and that was symbolic of my life you know it would be someone else's fault everything with somebody the they did it I mean you don't

and I said after I came out everything your summer when I came out whatever that is and there are yeah

yeah

doesn't make me a better person but we thought you were trying to be a white

the windows

but I don't have to hit the ball

really newcomers identify with the feeling of resentment

it's like with the morning when you go and sit down in the bathroom and some **** less the lid up

when you hit the water and you don't think to yourself well it's the first time today that could happen

you think one more turn

is doing it

when you're down on the floor where I could have picked up around the toilet

you don't think yourself

it's a one day at a time line but I'm living in

I can do for one day what I thought you had to do this the rest of my life you think

June in the end you will go to

but you don't you just quit talking to

when they come home that night

it was the reading and it'll never be ready again

he resigned from the line he resigned from the married you resign from the relationship you resign but you never tell anybody why

and you know why you don't tell anybody why because you know one of the things that you're petty

I heard a guy he was on one of those talk shows I've learned almost everything I know about life from a talk show I love Oprah Winfrey or to keep losing weight I'm gonna quit watching

the way you dress you look like Oprah Winfrey I said now you know why she dresses like this flattering but

this guy was a Mary scale three book of course we're talking about can and he said that he had a client that came to him and he lives in a state where it was the law that you have to go to marriage counseling before they would give you a divorce and so the agenda with that of course with opening session is how many times where I'm from how much is the cost and when I get my divorce and down

he said to the man he says certainly the issues that you're getting a divorce over probably didn't just come up in the last letter you know are having some of these issues been going on for a while in Israel god yeah can fifteen years and they said well have you tried to talk to her about it I don't know I would want her feelings

with regard to getting the things you've got her by the arm and your dragon divorce court don't you think that hurts your feelings something that I've learned in Alcoholics Anonymous are on there up in divorce court anyway but we're all going to know why

before it gets to that point and there are maybe a little bit of rain maybe everybody will be so hurt and there's a chance that there's a line that often missed in our reading and I believe the twelve and twelve under the temp work inventory and it says between common which is someplace they often hide in the big book and the product

is this what have you left on third degree that should have been said and done no matter how small it is and no matter how

and then after

happy for me and so often I see people that I don't even know sometimes the safe way or or you know at work or whatever it looked really nice and I think everything is going right back okay hello you look really nice are you like that that looks good on you they look at me a lot but you know people are very nice to each other anymore and I found that if I'm nice to people people are nice to me that it might not be even the person I'm talking to but that energy always comes back and it's when I put out that returns to me it's a natural law the universe

I can I can make a real choice about my attitude today by making the kind of choices that I'm learning to make our interns over here awhile although when you get there you don't feel like you are I mean I used to think surely at some point you arrive here you got five years of it and I thought ten years of IT nine two for fifteen aren't that common in September I'll let you know if that's it but

sometimes quickly sometimes slowly

R. Allen on speakers that I just love it it brings tears to my eyes when they read the promises I think it just makes my heart sing

not yet not yet

I was gonna be my

but that's not true many of those things have happened for me sometimes quickly sometimes slowly and sometimes for a while and then they go when I come back in and many of them frankly many of them right into the program many of the blessing I don't believe that the only blemish healthy process over a a we're all god's children drunk or sober and we're all god's children are out of a

I remember

the program I yeah I was reading a book trying to the race ready

you do that thank you trying to go to meetings or talk about a book and read a book review and it says something or it's going to help you and whatever the current you know therapy is everybody that reading the book and everybody's talking about women who love too much okay maybe think they're women who love too much

you know

actually people with

you know all these things all these workshops are reminding people had that many problems you know I don't even know I could stay sober you know I mean the thank god there's a few of these rooms are there next year we don't trade places with problems but there are

in America about

not all sick on the same day

they

I was reading one of the books in the end I thought Justin roses but

interested in eighteen seventy

then I read an article

yeah you're right we have a corner on this thing you know I found out was that they were simple spiritual truths that have been alive in the universe for ever and their mail to anyone I heard a story one time I love the stories I don't know for sure but I always

by the third purpose but apparently

I wasn't there but I heard this story about from a guy who was there that there was a dinner in San Francisco and Marin area somebody rich had dinner for bill Wilson

there were a lot of

really getting you know it wasn't hot in the beginning but you got a couple and their

I thank you again for a minute I did a lot of people who over a long time and and also in the spiritual communities to meet their welcome one of five people at the center and Chris number with their

that bill Wilson he was very aware of the a message and the big books and and he said the bill Wilson apparently at the center

he said the difference between you and me is that I'm a spiritual seeker and you are spiritual seeker and I strive for the same protection in my life that you strive for but the places that I can stop doing it tomorrow and nothing in my life will dramatically change but if you don't keep doing this for the rest of your life you will

so I have to wait to do it or not to do it and you don't

and I think we need to remember that

one of the things I dislike about the right account down there down in the order they did this one

are usually people with any brains at all start early and end up with the low numbers because then there's all these people searching around you know I would have I would guess that two thirds of the room are under five years sobriety there's nothing wrong with that but

I don't know where the rest of the people are I don't know if they drink I don't know if they went home and I don't know if they were busy this weekend I have a feeling you're resting on their laurels which is probably not like sitting on your **** and

and I don't believe it trying to give you a reprieve from the maintenance of the spiritual condition on a daily basis

then I hope you have a suggestion

I have a sponsor in my program today who is active in Alcoholics Anonymous and

I just feel that it's real important for me to always remember where I came from and that's part of what I may or may not ever get around to talk about

I did mention I was dated nine because I mean I would still remain ten years before I came out and I would I would fly to mention that stuff

there are indicted and now I can to get conferences and talk and I forget to mention it and I think oh god do they think I'm straight you know I look at these long nail Polish makeup and **** I mean

let it go I can't even get the lingo right you know what can I say but I like girls yeah

latest

but I was explaining to a man that that I've known for many years

who I've known like on a sort of a semi business level is how I met him but you know how you're connected in New York when you talk to passers by doing what I am saying if we hadn't seen each other like maybe six or seven years of hotel you the conditions under which I found the last time and entertainment is to catch up on all right

so what they are going to know what is going on but I need to be made well how's it going with your sex life and I said well im Kay and on this and we talked and I knew I was like by whatever that is and somebody tell me that job like an alcoholic who has still has a drinking problem

a few people

I don't know but I know when I was buying I wanted to be strict really done because I didn't want to offend anyone and

and now I find that when I'm being true to myself it's different than that that's all and I don't speak for anybody else anyway this guy was talking to reply so I don't know

well you know I don't

whatever you say but anyhow he said to me well how did you know that finally know that and I said that the only thing I know to be the truth and that is that I love you man I'm not repulsed by man I never have been my best friend demand

so my favorite husbands women

there was for me that last level of the wall of emotional stress that I simply could not surrender to anyone but another woman and I don't know the reason for that my father would like me to explain it to him

I would be trying harder we were speaking our

it isn't easy for me and I'm not laughing about it but it's okay with me today because that's one of the freedoms I have today and one of one of the ways that the program has manifested itself in my life

and that is that I'm able to draw the people into me and hold them close to me that are willing to allow me to be me I don't expect Williams said to me I don't expect the straight community to understand me I only expect them to let me be and leave me alone and I thought that's All I Want that's already want from him this is just leave me alone I live two thousand miles away and I don't live with him and I'm not in this case and I'm not any of those things and I don't need to be told every Sunday that I'm ruining his life because I'm true to myself and that is one of the main reasons that I denied myself for so long with what they think and I have to accept the fact that many of my brothers and sisters in Alcoholics Anonymous condemns me forever coming out to my father

Brian Sionis living a lie

high incidence

I told him three years ago about me and he never mentioned it again until about two months ago when I three months ago when I became involved with my current lover and told him that there was someone moving in with me and it would like you couldn't pretend you know because I wasn't living alone that it wasn't true and then he chose to address it in a very vocal manner over and over and tell me that I was okay and he couldn't look at me and he couldn't see me and five o'clock and

and it was like I had to find a way to work that through and any of the people that I talked to an Alcoholics Anonymous said to me we just told you should never come out from in the first place

and that was not what I considered a lot of moral support I think is the real life issue that real people have to deal with

and I had to deal with it I don't suppose I thought I would attract over because Jesus Christ they

so over this issue and we may get to that

the general philosophy what if I don't get off the ship is but it's like what's happening in my life today is amazing what you gonna talk about identifying no

I wish I sometimes I don't really think so sometimes I wish I had a campus where it had a beginning a middle and an end and over the

I'll be listening

it it it it you know it was like I would have a beginning a middle and an end I know when I was finished you know it's like with me I just look at the clock it's been an hour and stopping now because there's no place to start because I don't start and is in the middle and I bounced around and and

one minute I'm talking about god the next when I'm throwing up in a toilet you know fifteen twenty years ago so I don't know

I only know one organised by the clock okay but

I always you know I'm wherever I am and and what that that has been going very recently in my life and it's been real painful and I don't come from a dysfunctional family they're just **** up

there are

you know they're going to die soon enough

no need to pretend

somebody said to me in a minute one of my sisters are calling me to check on what I'm doing because my father's army signs people to call me to check on the hello how are you he called on me and tried to put me about what was going on you know just the same old **** game game game there are just decorations at your father's burial the public really old and I think

forty four years by the time I'm willing to put in on is it just me

you know I told the people in the world around him the people in the world are gay I'm so

it's a crap shoot what can I say

worn out one signer are ready

we have a double team does love it I love it

so I came down call it's not a must never got to it was I brought them into any meeting because I thought she should quit drinking

how did you get a relationship at the time but I wasn't gay

I can only hear about unlocking

Hey guys so I never did it guys but I want the option to that guy because I don't want to label I used to go on radio programs as our servers you know the calling for the Baptist call you

women would show the alternate lifestyle and you know I do all that stuff you know when it's really easy to be gay when you're not gay

look like it's fun to pretend you're an alcoholic when you really secretly no you're not one

you can start to go along with everything but when their surrender here makes you want to vomit you know somewhere along between a year a year and a half a dozen you really are one and you are going to have to be here and it ate up all I think I might go down there on Monday and are you gonna have to you can your guts out eight for the rest your life by going through with this change with a table and a chair attachment coffee product cast your life for the rest of your life

you're gonna have to face over no matter what even if you're at fault I mean that's the pressing stop

prior to that you're just thinking you're making this intelligent choice based on information

recalling his second surrender but it has a lot more words than that

in a report to be able to stay sober to do that a lot of people go back out to drink and try and do that but unfortunately most of them don't get back they talk about the revolving door of Alcoholics Anonymous and unfortunately they feel lady that different people are coming in

the ones that go out

you know it doesn't is swings both ways but you always don't get to turn around come back you know

and I see it happen too many times it'll just ring for a week or two weeks now I go to render myself you know at the bar I heard a lady say one time you know you hear people who go back out and I don't chastise them for it they say you know I learned a lot when I was out there drinking

her latest a one time if you could learn anything from drinking it has been a smart son of a **** when you got here the first time

I have a message to the newcomers

it would be you do not have to go back out it does not take you have to take you ten years to get a year you can do it in in a year amazingly enough three hundred sixty five days of not taking nothing

you really want to do that

when you even if you really don't want to do that do that and and if you don't think you're an alcoholic and if you weren't an alcoholic it should be easier for you

in Alcoholics Anonymous was that I didn't want to be an alcoholic

replaced I love the people I mean it was just like the bars with no better and everybody is scurrying around there there's a whole host of people doing or do you finance and I am and they got they play cards that Gambhir the compulsive they go bankrupt they do everything it's all happening in a

life is over the moon drinking in the

thing goes

right but that is not the way it is if you will listen in meetings you will know who they are and you're welcome to spend time with them they will show you how to do anything in

things were I was too good to do drugs

in order to get past being judgmental about those people

it was a

I mean if you're trying to go to an origin you wish you brought your meeting you know it's not a way of life

I did debate here on the TV

but anyway it was a good shot at the girls

the only chance I got a time starting when

you know I'll run deep let me tell you

but anyway my refining out more than I wanted you to know tonight about

this is not an audition tape for the PPL

they're reading the little I know they're in trouble

I said it when I came up here tonight I was going to keep the podium to say if I ever got here I was going to hit the ground defy anything major but I had to go through that I don't

one of the things I found out is that a real alcoholics one out of a

are you going my mind I don't know about you but when no one's around and you talk to yourself

and you listen

it is similar to chewing gum and walking at the same time

especially when so many of them are talking at once

but we have a knack for listening to all of them

it's like taking your group conscience in a room alone

don't forget to call god to the meeting but

I would say to me well maybe I'm an alcoholic but I'm not a real alcohol because I used to hear people make a martyr

you know I think I wonder what that is

he looks like one she sounds like one she probably has one initiated by

and then I go home and I think in my real alcoholic and there are three lines in the in the in the big book that almost threw me out the door it's about college you might have heard them in a meeting or two if you're an alcoholic and quite frankly that is the president's chapter three that read the real alcohol I don't really ever recover control and they're not afraid to talk about alcoholics our type an alcoholic our

and I would think well maybe I'm a real alcoholic but I'm not a real alcoholic of their

well maybe are not everyone of their kind and I never asked anybody with an alcoholic of what they're trying to live but I was sure I probably wasn't an alcoholic compared to other times and

and certainly I didn't feel like a

all right and there are

frankly thought that their fate I had accidentally killed the A. ten years before I would have really had to quit drinking on genuine evidence

I mean did any of you raise your hands of anybody who thinks in the beginning when I got here that they had a mystical number of years left that they could drink with some degree of safety

well good I'm not alone again and does

and

a secret but I never talk about this topic meetings I was clever I was smart I picked up on what was going on here yeah I know if I walked into a meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous is said to me I don't think I'm a real alcoholic he Patty on the arms they keep coming back what would they say to me you're in the right place for me to come back and I don't want anybody to sell me on

I don't want anybody to convince me I was an alcoholic I wanted to believe it and believe me I wanted to believe I was an alcoholic I want to believe it was that simple

I want to believe it wasn't because I was immoral and a bad person and that there was a part of me that was missing and broken it would never ever

I did I couldn't recover they talk about recovery and they talk about being restored and I had all this emptiness that I felt from the day I could feel that hole in the valley that the wind blows through that I've heard described so many times in a day when I found out that I tried to shove everything into their home and the only thing the prisoners got it got it in there when I came down collecting on a mission I thought could it be that I'm really an alcoholic and they'll let you stay I mean I don't like that and I would think sometimes that I mean I think I maybe I shouldn't talk if I'm called on because there's probably a real alcoholic

and I'm just what

it's better

it was like you know I mean it was scary I had the good bad syndrome the Madonna **** syndrome you know I had I was like a converted Catholic I do the math and Latin I used to pray every morning with the nuns that they have put me in a private girls schools a lot you know kinda lock me up a little and they're very controlled by the leader and I was going to become a nun and and I was going to be a same thing like that you know and and then I discovered man who's on the same day

and I went to confession shortly thereafter and there's a part of the act of contrition which

real Catholics will understand

no

Catholic every

that's not proven

that is in the act of contrition I will avoid the occasion of

and I knew it wasn't true

there wasn't hurt I mean if he's been out there with that then the bird we do in the backseat outside church you know I mean I knew that there was a rush I mean I can get out quite what was it about but I was on my way to figure it out but the right insights about what it was about you know and

right I heard the lyrics to the song today and it says you know you're trying to find love instead of trying to learn how to love and I thought god that with me for so many years so many years trying to find love give it to me six me instead of trying to learn how to log in and that's certainly the last year's identical economic record to last year

I'm not learning now although it's a process but I have learned to live here

am I I'm sure that I my capacity for that deepens but I digress again anyway I knew that I would not would not and wasn't even particularly interested in I wanted absolution but not at the price of avoiding litigation expense and

not being a hypocrite I stopped going to church for the rest of my life and

and that that is true today and I I realized I could you know god asked me to live one day at a time but I don't think he can

you know he's gonna drag my path around forever and never quit reminding me of it that was my mother that did that I don't think it was god I think he's got bigger fish to fry than that you know I've been keeping a ledger on me

and in Alcoholics Anonymous of course to tell them that our past is our greatest asset becomes the golden tool that is available to us to help another human being I realized fairly early on in Alcoholics Anonymous and was told by my first sponsor that I did not come to Alcoholics Anonymous to rewrite the big book

we were told that were brought here you know god brings us to a millions of alcoholics die out there every year without ever hearing about them so why me why am I in it for you it

why did you get to sober up how come you

and my answer is precisely because of who you are not in spite of it

not in spite of it

they haven't been given a gift out of pity

he's been given a gift of love from a loving god

and it's your job to carry that torch of love forwarding your sobriety I believe I was brought to Alcoholics Anonymous to bring my story if you wanted someone else to store here brought someone else

and I never share in a general way ever

however

my G. SR in my home group when the first year and a half I was over I asked him what that meant and he went to New York and he asked them

what that meant

because I was being told frequently that I did not sure generally allow

and I certainly wasn't spiritual enough because I still sent fox and

he will tell me that anymore because they figured if telling me that would work it would hurt by now

but

he came back and he said that the that line in the book applied to the book

about global economic and the stories in the book were general for a specific reason they were trying to reach a large group of people professional people to impress them with the big book they even made the print big and made the paper cheapened six of the book would look impressive I mean we're not phony or anything right our spiritual leader day comes of age it's a miracle any of this matter wonder AA have been destroyed a long ago by out

but it was general because they wanted to appeal to the general public and I believe that if we continue to remain in many meetings I go to people are very general are very non specific you know the the meetings you go to where they say I had a problem last week

and I was really in a rough place but I called my sponsor and really got down one to one about it and I'm doing a lot better today

then I think to myself thank you for sharing

exactly what what do you shared

halitosis thank you must have had something to offer there give me a break

give me a break

it's like if you get any more general in some of these meetings I think out of his break out a deck of cards to play pinochle

I mean if you've got real problems taken to a real meeting an appeal to the group conscience because the people I'll tell you what phone number you have in your book may not be home the day you have that problem

you better learn to share with god and you better learn trust in the group and I don't mean the people in the group I mean at twelve tradition I mean the only description of god in all of these literature is a loving god he expresses himself in our group conscience that does not mean the business meeting

that means at this meeting right here right now that is called to order to that moment when we say that serenity prayer god is called to this meeting and we become more than we are

St Augustine said god is the more of me than I am

and true it is god is the more of me than I am and he is here and you are more than you are

one word for the healing it it comes from one to the other god's perfect love given to me distilled within and passed to you and that love for me and your love from god is still within you and pass it back to me and onto another it's the holy Trinity as a truly exist you me and god

and I can't do it without you in god's perfect love to me in a monastic cell from where is stagnant water in the dead sea and here were given the privilege of passing on and passing it on passing it on you have to get distilled in return to us in beauty and we see it happen around us every day and take it for granted

and take it for granted and that's good that we do

take it for granted because it is our blessed gift from god

I don't ever get complacent about the fact that it exists and I think that's different it has been granted to me I should take it as a grant and take it for granted it is my Jackson right do as a child of god to open myself to his love pass it to you and receive all the benefits of

and I think that each and every one of us can do that and if you're not feeling that in this room tonight you know you just need to open up I I have a little thing that I do I'm very sure when hell you know I'm like a real simplistic program I DO not chant and meditate twice a day do tai chi I'm just

give me a break I had a hard time getting through Chinatown today you know

but I don't put that down but I don't put me down because I don't do it and I don't think anybody else got a more spiritual program than I do because they do it you don't then I try to meditate I went schizophrenic

I mean all I could think of being quiet was everybody's talking to god right now the **** you're going to hear anything I got it

you know overlooking Waikiki beach and I could see every hotel room and I would think everybody in there as a person and they're all praying to god this one very moment and you'll never hear me that I'm over forget it seitel instantly

so I don't try to meditate by any formalized means or whatever but I can't sometimes they have to be quiet I don't do that at the normal exercise the P. five grown I mean I don't see it as a growth it's just like that's not who I am so what and

it's easy when you could try to be what it is you think it is it is it is it

you know when they've got it you run out do they do and it makes you crazy because it's what they do and it works for them it makes you not give it up

I mean if if you didn't come from a dysfunctional family okay

it really is okay not to go to ACA guys or where any of those things if you don't have a problem with it if you do have a problem with it you're ready to deal with it go then if you're smoking tonight and you wish you weren't do something about it if you don't smoke at anybody you know what I'm saying just if you don't smoke and smoke until you're done

I mean forget it white

when I went to a meeting the other night and I mean never got onto this like healthcare and I said look I've been since I reckon that's so raven I've I've loved server I've not smoked over I mean if there's ever a lot of people have done everything's over and not that it's over what I like as you know during anyway you know and I know what I mean it doesn't make me more wonderful it would probably be a lot healthier but then I'm still have a little definition

look around I mean you want to live ever give me a break

I watch the news two days in a row and I was suicidal again I went you know give me slow down but I mean you know I'll I'll take slow death which life is you know every day you have your step closer to the grave

how you run you can run you can jump you can quit smoking you can wear out you're going to die and die

you will cast off this mortal veil I promise you

rather it's Gucci or Mervyn's honey

everybody is going

but it's like when I get out is like if I can just allow myself to be exactly who I am today and be okay with that then I have a chance of being a better person tomorrow but as long as I hate myself for ma'am today whatever it is whatever it is I will never be okay have you ever thought of that if you're not okay with you you are right now you will never be okay with you you are ever

because it will always be something L. like trying to pass a final exam every single week and of course you can never pass

because it's like you will always have an ever shifting group of standards for yourself by which you cannot live

and nobody can do that here no one

can do that here without your permission

nobody

we only all of us knew how much of what we have in our own lives it would terrify us because alcoholics never wanted responsibility for anything

I remember standing committee one of my game and friends right after I came out I said

do you suppose that I married I hope not either here tonight all those ****

because when I finally came out I could blame it on them you'd be K. two if you've been married to men like I was married to

many said it wouldn't surprise me a bit you're real sick

you know what I thought about that that was always my pattern you know it's like I always want to be somebody's fault that I was doing what I was doing like I'll go out in the Ferrari but you will be driving it they will no I didn't do this myself I could never have an accident

I just never wanted to own who I was and it took me so many years to be able to do that and to be able to accept people into my life I can love me today and accept me the way I am purge me to change change is what I want and if I change my mind in mid stream of the change they well you know I love you

I'm in a relationship today with a person like that and it

it's like I look and I go why is she here

and it's just because she loves me and a third that really knows who I am I mean honest to god knows who I am for years