The Into Action group in Berkeley Heights, NJ

my name's Chris ram ram a recovered alcoholic

nice to have a man around the house

thanks

thank

that's good that's good

it's warm in here

I don't hear any more jokes about how hot it is in Texas

it's a lot harder here

I I am honored to be here folks idea we came in this weekend it'll conference over in queens and then I I was just so honored to get a chance to come over here and do this all talk and promise you don't take that but right at an hour to do it because it because it gives us time to eat this past my dinner time and we need to do that and I gotta say thanks Tom take it thanks to the home group that invited me over here there's a gazillion ID that I've talked to over the last six months that we've since we've been talking about this and and I just I need it thank you for for for asking me to do this it's it's you know what I speak a lot I get a chance to talk a lot out there in public and it's not necessary because I have anything really to say but I I I'm I'm pretty

ET entertaining if nothing else I mean I I'm pretty excited about recovery and you know the usual boss speaker that gets up and tells his drunk a log for two hours and that's just not me and so I got snagged a lot to go speak it places an anniversaries and some of these places that Colin Asman course and I I they said you know you don't ever say no and if I can help but I don't say no but some of these and I just grind my teeth when they asked me to speak because I know who I'm going to be speaking to I'm gonna be speaking to a bunch of middle road Buckaroos they have never worked the steps and never had a spiritual experience your stance over quote unquote drive one day at a time miserable people you follow me and I and I and the catalyst for for peace in the whole room off you know and it's like

and I'm gonna and I'm gonna hear it takes me all in here somebody all of our our lost you know you keep you came because you know you got some free food back here and and you know you and your and after this is all over you'll be back in your luggage you'll never guess what happened over in Berkeley heights last night I mean this guy came from Texas and he was so abusive you know and

I just like to say right off the bat screw you

I'll make it real clear about alcoholism is abusive alcoholism nearly killed me you know and when I finally met up when when L. was talking I was your name when when she was talking up here and I'm list my ears a pick it up because what she's telling isn't was my story I was around all parts not in this for seven years Diane in this fellowship you say because there's two things going on out there folks you know alcoholism and drug addiction this this

there's a fellowship called Alcoholics Anonymous go with this and there's a program called Alcoholics Anonymous the program is the book is the twelve steps and we got the fellowship over here now because everybody wants to get involved in the fellowship of Alcoholics Anonymous except you know nobody bothers to say that the fellowship won't keep you sober you know it's been my experience that if you're real alcoholic and and let's let's get straight you know I mean everybody in this room maybe call themselves an alcoholic but let's but that's that's crap is there some people in this room that are not even kind of alcoholic they're hard drinkers they got they got gotten a little trouble they made a decision to stop became a few meetings put the plug in the jug established a dry day and they're sober today your father was my books says

this is good

on page thirty four we talked about it this weekend on page thirty four it says whether this person can stop on a non spiritual basis depends upon the extent to which he has already lost the power to choose whether he's going to break or not

this is a baffling feature of alcoholism as we know it this utter inability to leave it alone no matter how great the necessity or the wish you see that's alcoholism folks if you can stop just because you made up your mind to stop comes a few meetings you're not an alcoholic anyway and I got a taste some folks that grinds the daylights out of some of the some of you cats in this room believe it but we're working on some kind of a commission program in here and we can get a bunch of people in our meetings were doing a great job Alcoholics Anonymous were people who were dying from a fatal illness called alcoholism and if you're not suffer from that you're not you're welcome come on down but but don't for a second think did you understand what it is to be an alcoholic

it's the most tragic disease I've ever watched I answered my messages this afternoon I've been away from work for a couple days and I work for a treatment center down in Texas and and I'm answering my messages and I left in this nice recording sales coming to Texas leave a message someplace else you follow me I twenty one messages and a couple of them was from the same lady this nice lady that I've known for years at West Texas and she was so drunk I can hardly understand what she was saying going on in this and the sadness and the loneliness and the fear in her voice because the husband was mad the kids are mad the town's mad everybody's mad now because she's loaded one more time you'll get with us she didn't understand what she's going to do she's she's absolutely

I don't understand this hopeless

it is coming across that phone line like you wouldn't believe and I my prayer tonight is that she ends up in a room like this with a bunch of people that understand what's in this book so that she can finally once and for all stop this relapse crap and start staying sober for good and for all way

Chris Paul you know Pat you know you just come across as angry you know it's like Jeez guys don't

I I ought to be angry a bunch of us ought to be angry people like I don't want to be angry

we nearly died comments come into these rooms listen to people talk about everything under the sun except the program except the twelve steps

it's a travesty

I I I travel a lot in Canada today with an iPhone this winter and we know we just I travel a lot doing these talks in doing workshops and speaking around up around the countryside about this business is not isolated stuff it's not like that in Texas they don't do it right and they do it right New Jersey they do it wrong over here this is the same everywhere you got pockets of people just like her in this room right here who understand that the solution to alcoholism is god

not therapy god

and in rooms that were people understand that there's a lot of people getting sober and having wonderful things called spiritual experiences and rooms whether or not there's a revolving door of people picking up desire chips walking back out trying it one more time just because that's what this crap keep coming back you know keep coming back you know it's one of these days it'll work you know I mean I I hear people in meetings all the time you know what it's god's will that'll boil he'll get sober I gotta tell ya how arrogant of us to say crap like that arrogant of us when it's god's will

excuse me I believe it's god's will right now for everyone of us to hold our heads up and understand our place in this in this earth

children of god sober kick in but

getting all the blessings that the world has to offer

we're gonna we're gonna blame the fact we can get sober on god gave us this wonderful program

I think we can blame it on a bunch of people who who believe

well let me tell you my story

I think it I think it'll explain things a little clearer I think it's putting things a little clearer

I yeah I got grew up down the hill country and in Texas and in high school somebody handed me a bottle of booze farm apple wine and and I I gotta tell you something I've heard a thousand speakers talk about this and I think goal understands I'm not gonna explain but it just I suffer from a thing called a spiritual malady and that's the group that's the bottom part of the spring called alcoholism and and the spiritual malady manifests itself in in in depression in boredom anxiety attention that this low self esteem you know this feeling of uselessness that's how the spirit that's what the book talks about that's how the spirituality manifests itself so I'm walking around looking down at the floor feeling uncomfortable all the time absolutely unhappy afraid of everything you're with us and somebody at seventeen years old somebody handed me a bottle of Boone's farm I don't know what Boone's farm apple wine is yeah tell me all

you have to be an alcoholic to drink that stuff I gotta take evidence if it tastes like absolute crap you know it's just a terrible stuff but again it's a loaded quick you don't it's the price is right it's the price we give it to you for the price of a sack you know it's just

so I'm thinking this boon farm apple wine and stuff doesn't work on me and it fixes what's wrong with me and that it sets me up I mean I'm I'm on the physical phenomena craving kicks in and I want some more that stuff in the middle of the session you know it's just full blowers like this is the solution let's go drink it you follow us and for the next

what twenty years I drank and then later on drugs and then later on drink and drugs yup the follow how it works and because it's the only thing that I know that's going to fix what's wrong with me and I'm in the food business on up in Afrin Houston and learn to be a professional chef and alcohol is that is that is accepted part of the industry we drank on the job we drink after the job we drink before the job you'll let us but you see the stuff is working for me at that time alcohol alcohol is good stuff you know what I mean a lot of people think well alcohol is that it is the right spirit you know I just I I that's not my experience alcohol alcohol saved my life if it hadn't been for alcohol I don't think I would have graduated from high school because the only thing that kept me from committing suicide was a drink can you get down with that budget nodding heads and some of your not nod your head and you let the atlas and the tension

all right

this program is about identification and I mean if if we talk about the did the stupid drama out here till the cows come home that's what we get into these these pissing contest in our meetings everybody wants to talk about the stupid drama and that's the stuff that ends up separating it let's talk about the internal condition because I don't care if you're nineteen years old and not any you understand what I just described if you're an alcoholic that absolute loneliness inside and once you take the drink it fixes that internal condition everybody understands that you when you got a lot of money or you don't have any money yeah I understand what I'm talking about

this is where it gets good

in nineteen I moved around a lot trying to trying to get away from me

you know what it is is one of those frustrating thank you to get get get out of the U. haul truck and you know guess would be there in Atlanta Georgia you know and you get it moved over in Texas and you moved to Dallas so you'd move the Houston you know and it's and it's like it's the same stuff I I've I've had a lot of relationships that I dated lots of different women because I believe it if I could just finally settle down with a woman that wasn't evil I could stay sober

I'm still not sure I found that woman but we're gonna

all right I know I know hi

I think I have some

but John understand we're coming from this and all of you all have done is I've tried to organize my life out here so I could be okay in here and that's what a lot of you guys have done for years she tried it you try to change things inside was back about the time I was in Houston when I first started cooking over there and and I was quite successful in the industry but the depression is killing me thank you buddy the depression is killing me and and that and I'm seeing a therapist for the depression I'm start to take antidepressants and you know the the pills are figured into a part of this is trying to I'm I know instinctively that something's not right because I'm just not a happy camper and I know instinctively that something could help me but I just don't know what it is your father was I mean it twenty one years old I picked up a phone book called Alcoholics Anonymous I knew I was in trouble my father was an alcoholic I knew this and I knew what it looked like and I was becoming that person but I didn't call him I picked up the phone book I look them up but I didn't column because I mean I just I just like Jesus I mean this is the lowest of the low when you pick up a phone book call Alcoholics Anonymous you know what I mean I'm not I'm out there and in Houston Texas lane and gutters you can straight up you follow me you know but I don't

I don't wanna look

I got an image to uphold I mean I don't want anybody to know that

we were laughing you know you go not going to date you know you you started drinking in the afternoon because you got a big date that afternoon that even if you want to get right you know in about seven o'clock you know your your prime you know you had a quart of beer and you're ready to go you don't answer the door but that's just a little crooked you know it's like a back over here and I'm I'm just I'm squashed I'm drunk I'm knocking on the door this girls looking like what what happened to you you know it's not the nineteen to get like that know what I intended to do was have a couple of drinks knocked the edge off and go be Don Juan your followers what happened was the phenomena craving kicked in and I'd like to much and I made an **** of myself again you follow me she didn't go out with me so I'm driving home give you which

I'll just show her

gun gun gun now I'm really good and drunk now because I've got every excuse in the world and that's what happened there were times of my life just exactly what somebody else earlier was talking about where everything in my life was absolutely good don't follow me good job making good money mass house good looking girlfriend nice little doggie nice everything good you know everything good and yet I'm dying inside and I and I'm I'm frustrated now because I don't have anything to drink over you know I need an excuse to drink or so I come home and pick a fight with her yeah let me kick the cat you know run out go get something to drink looking for an excuse unbelievable

and I'm seeing a therapist every week for ten years they think they're present here I want to thank you I wanna thank you for putting up with my bullshit for ten years as a as a as a as a profession alcoholics probably the most abusive people on earth with therapists you know when we're telling them we're talking nine times out of ten were not telling the truth anyway you with us the frustrating thing part with our relationship with therapy is is that what we're telling them is not having much effect because what they're telling us back can't fix what's wrong with us folks

alcoholism is a disease it's genetic

nothing out there causes it

and if you're sitting in a therapist's couch talking about something out there that's causing it

if you were wasting so much money

I I just bless your heart to send it to me I'll put it to good use I don't I need a new bicycle I mean I don't know what to tell you my bikes are expensive so it could come on I everybody I I would

I think it's probably some of the most controversial stuff I talk about from the podium Alcoholics Anonymous is not therapy

therapy is great folks therapy can help us deal with this external world but they don't help us with this internal world medicine is great you'll help us with lots of that but it won't fix this internal work we just read it in the A. B. C.'s folks what do we do this boat we should not be news we read about this every time we read how it works ABC's what what what we just read

the probably no human power could fill up a fact we could fix what was wrong with me and that god could would be were sought right so we put that on hold while we go back over to talk to somebody else about a crappy day so that maybe we don't have to drink today

this is where we're killing alcoholics this is where people like you were dying every day because they just get to a point of such frustration they don't understand what's wrong with them I'm trying to I'm going to meetings I'm doing the deal but the spiritual malady continues to percolate upward Patty talk about a thousand times if it hadn't been for people in this group you were standing for something

she'd been dead the day

and there are people like the Howards

in my home group when I finally got back to AA in nineteen eighty seven in nineteen eighty I entered Alcoholics Anonymous as as a result of some domestic disturbance at home and I am not in a therapist look at my chart for the first time look at all of my Jordan said Chris buddy you got some stuff going on and we need to talk about and I hope that you stay here with me to do that but I can't help you with this drinking you're an alcoholic you're just a garden variety drunk

but I gotta tell you something I staggered out of that office because the first time somebody finally told me the truth

just to get your skinny but the Alcoholics Anonymous they're the people that can help you

and the next night I went to an a a meeting

after all this from a million podiums folks it wasn't a meeting like this there was not a single big book in the place it was a therapy session and we walked into a deal I've we it was an overnight store in downtown Dayton Texas and I walked up these dark skaters you know when he was a pitch dark and I was a light in the one light in this big rig in this big room is a small room but there was one light back in and I can see it from the bottom of the steps and I'm looking at I'm looking at the address and and and I just feel like hell I've been drinking on the truck you know and I was like I gotta walk up here and I'm freaking out I don't know I see a little circle triangle there I know I'm in the right place and I start walking up the steps

I don't know there was twelve there or not you know and who knows I have it I walked up there and I walked in the room it was one of these pitch dark places and I walked in and squinting my eyes there's this old geezer old old geezer yeah

I don't care how you cut it it was a geezer anyway it was an easy chair and he's all right laid back on the teacher I don't know if he was alive or not he says and he did this one ball comes that look like something out of cycle you know when is it won't bode laying down in the coming out of the don't think I'm making this stuff up and I'm freaking out I'm I'm I'm in my late twenties I guess in them

I don't want to be there and got his start

do you have problems with alcohol

Hey you know hair stand up on yes

well welcome sit with us US

there's six other people in the room it's so damn dark in there you can't see who's in there yup I got is like

unbelievable and I asked if I pull up a chair there's this lady in there and she starts talking about her husband who's an alcoholic and her husband's drinking and she needs some help with her husband

makes good sense except this is not an Alan on meeting this is a meeting for alcoholics I think we're not gonna talk about me we're not gonna talk about the disease we're going to try to share some some cool things this old geezer learned in treatment to try to help this old man get in recovery

nice gesture check out what what we were there for folks Alcoholics Anonymous is there for one thing to help alcoholics get connected to god do we talk about god no did we talk about the steps knows if we can talk about any of that we talked about this lady's husband

for an hour then they freak me out of a dollar

I said keep coming back everything's gonna be okay and I went down the steps I sent my truck like a deer in the headlights this is like what the hell was that

what did I just experience

I look back at that meeting and think I what what bill Wilson and Dr Bob would have thought if they'd have been in that meeting with me that night

treatment centers up in North Texas were granted out drugs by the gigs at the time recovering alcoholics

I was looking for somebody that it recovered

but we were finding people that were recovering after all we're always gonna be recovering I just want to peak if you're one of those that are saying that stuff I'm gonna tell you right now before you get any food in your hand to throw at me I want to tell you buddy if you're recovering alcoholic finish the steps please

have a spiritual experience

what I hope is this to tell we we we we passed the lady up in the up in queens this weekend about that stuff well we're always going to be have alcoholism nobody said you're not

we're always gonna be recovering recovering from what

folks when the obsession to drink leisure yours recovered as you're going to get

I mean isn't that the truth what kind of hope are we giving to the newcomer if we if we invite him into fellowship where they're gonna have to remain sick for the rest of their life

unbelievable the book says twenty four places in the book it says that we're going to recover from alcoholism but what we know better right so we're gonna unbelievable you know what the treatment centers continue to talk about stuff that's exactly where it comes from and I work for one I'll take the remote or just like I think everybody else's inventory it's much easier than taking my inventory listen what you know what they say that because it's good business I don't want you to get well you introduce yourself as a recovered alcoholic you're gonna be out there Kickin but taking names if you're recovering maybe you can come back to treatment big all you want to hear that big yet it's great business folks it did not come out of this literature

seven years in Alcoholics Anonymous the wife leaves exit stage left to businesses leave act like it's just getting worse by the day follow us and the depression is returned the end of the presents are not working and I am not unhappy camper folks in November nineteen eighty seven I

it was

I was working for my brother up in North Texas and I

federal home and picked up a bunch of

returned checks and I'm thirty five years old in my counsel empty again and I'm not a happy camper and there's a woman in my life there's no furniture in my lap and there's not many clothes in my life Mike Mike Mike Mike clothes closet is that I mean I times made a lot of money but if the there's about three or four pairs of holy Levi's in a bunch of free wheeling T. shirts in there you'll follow I'm saying these beat up T. shirts and every time you wash in the pocket gets a little closer to the center of your chest you know it's like you got a look like idiots that's that's that's big my uniform of the day you know and notice I didn't mention it was any underwear in there you know I mean this is those are things that we just don't have quite have the money for today unbelievable sh I came home that night

picked up those checks sat down in my living room and made a conscious choice to off myself I was so sick and tired of living the life I was living with I I didn't want to die folks I had a great home in a great and a great family and and I

a lot of love in my family

I don't want to leave them

I just didn't want to be

who I was I didn't want to feel the way I was feeling anymore I was tired of people looking down their nose at me I was hard to look in the mirror feeling embarrassed about who I was and not not

and we see this all the time folks I don't know of an alcoholic that's the real McCoy that didn't one time think about often themselves

and unless that changes

we're gonna die

I took a bottle of pills and by the time skews me those things start to kick in and I I heard a voice it said Chris don't do it go back to a a a toll that voice whatever it was and I'm never gonna go back to a a a a doesn't work Hey is a fellowship of men and women who want to get in there and tell their stupid war stories until the cows come home and after they finish the war stories are going to sit there and piss and moan about wild about how screwed up their life is

talk about the little problem of the day and everybody's gonna shake hands get fleeced by another dollar and then we're gonna go our own way and I'm gonna sit there the same as I always did empty and scared to death

with me

this voice that go back to Alcoholics Anonymous

don't do this I boarded that suicide attempt folks it was the second attempt to try to take my life this was the the most progress I ever got in it I boarded it and went back to Alcoholics Anonymous the next day I got some doggy downers from a doctor to detox and that I made a commitment that I was gonna try this one more time and I I told this from a million podiums folks this is my story in a bit different from yours I'm sorry it's just that this is my nickel this is my story yeah I walked in this room full of people and it was a lot like the experience that a lot of y'all in this room have experienced here I walked in and they were all carrying this book right here and they were all talking about god and the steps and the twelve steps and twelve traditions around the wall and we read those you follow us and they're all laughing and joking and it was well lit and it was clean and it was a lot of happiness in that room I guys I've been I've been drinking for for years folks twenty years drinking and drugging and model mine wouldn't work in real well the body when I walk into a room full of people whether they're excited about life you can inspect the newcomer can see that there's something different going on in this train is like so we don't know what I'm talking about you walk in certain churches and I just feel like they're dead you know when you walk in certain churches and it's like you can feel the excitement in the church because of some people that are actually connected to a power they created this universe he talk about with that and that's exactly what I was feeling in that room it

we went around the room and everybody shared their hope with me there wasn't one stupid war stories shared with me these people understood that Chris was there he did need to get scared into the rooms he was here already they didn't need to make a twelve step call on me I was here what they needed to do now that they had me was real median

give me something to sink my teeth into so that I would want to come back tomorrow and they shared their blessings with me they set there and they smiled and they laughed and I cried and they told me that their life was better today they were told me about making the money and they told me about getting a credit cards back and they told me about having families in love and people that

they blew me away

then hundreds of a a meetings and all we ever did was sit around and talk this isn't listen please this is my store this is my deal this is if I say anything from the podium that grinds people this is it

because a lot of you sit in these rooms believe it you're right coming to a meeting and share anything you want and I'm here to tell you right now you can tell if you could tell anybody down there Denny's tonight that the one I got was off base but I'm telling you right now you might want to consider what you're doing before you do it next time I'm in a meeting because I gotta tell you something folks your words have a lot of power your actions have a lot of power that smile has a lot of power in your sink in that meeting using it as a freak and cheap therapy group you were doing more harm than you're doing good

how many in this room have done it I mean I doubt it are you going there you talk about your crappy day you leave feeling better thank you all for listening thank you for letting me share quote on quote with you but you know what about the poor schmuck alcoholic over the corner that's dying just like I was for seven years can we give him any hope he doesn't have a baby to worry about he doesn't have a family to worry about he doesn't even have a place to stay tonight to worry about but we're gonna talk about you what's your little chicken **** problem over here expecting every

I'm absolutely it's a bus to think that we can come to a meeting and do that crap I mean where's our discerning spirit

we walk into a meeting right with a nice business woman like you and we sit here and the first thing out of the back I'm looking right at you you look like a nice business woman hell I don't know you might be looking for all I know but it

you look like a nice business one okay and she comes in and she's just on the meeting and she's scared to death and she got a person to get a look I'm comfortable right and the for what's the first thing we wanna do we wanna go around we're all we got a new comer here we have a first meeting and everybody starts telling their stupid stupid there's

there should

fabric more stories

well this is my story

cares

who cares

she just wants to know if there's any hope can you wake up tomorrow and have the obsession to drink removed is there any hope for this woman that's all she's in here looking for the little hope but we're not gonna do that we're gonna scare with us from another stupid war story the sign for stories we've all heard a thousand times and rolled and rolled her eyes and he's going to tell the same stupid war story

deanne

your followers and I you know what I ate out of dumpsters and not and I know that everybody not so hidden feels the pain right she's going she's

that's pretty low I've ate out of dumpsters not well I got to drive yes and almost lost my family well I've never had a D. W. I. N. I've never lost my family you think that's bad I had three W. as needed up the penitentiary Manette Nina not not go with us we do it every time this lady over here instead of becoming comfortable and feeling some hope in our lives she scared **** less because she thinks he's in a room full cycle paths

because we're all too busy trying to outdo each other with our stupid war stories how sad can we make this how tragic can we make our lives what do you think for a second she's a real alcoholic do you think she's going to remember your crappy war story when it comes time to take a drink my book says she won't my experience shows me she won't she's not even going to remember war stories watch you can remember your war story guys one place for a war story that's a twelve step call you catch somebody out that there's never been an I. eight you want to get them to identify a little bit tell me a little bit about your story it's a powerful tool to help people get here but once they get here shut up with the war stories

that's why we can't keep the young adults in our rooms because we're too busy trying to scare them in here

the book says you won't remember the consequences of a week or a month ago that's what it says page twenty four you won't remember the consequences when the middle obsession hit you again you're just going to go drink again so why don't we start sharing the good stuff begin to come in here and get this get this work done and then they can recover and have the coolest lacked the magic double because it's been my experience that god's grace even on everybody and everybody does the work gets the message they get they get that they get the gold raining everybody

these people ask me that night if I was ready to get sober they explained to me quite clearly that our job in Alcoholics Anonymous was not to help you not take a drink today it was to help you get connected to god so that you didn't want to take a drink today this is where treatment centers have killed millions of us believing that we're going to be able to somehow some way orchestrate our lives so that we don't have to be around alcohol and then we don't have to drink absolute crap because about internal condition continues to percolate and that fear and that tension and that depression stays with you you will drink again you will drink again without without exception you may last a few months you may last a long stretch of time but you will end up in a place where you become so irritable restless and discontent you can't stand it you will pick up the drink what's the solution the solution folks is a spiritual experience a new attitude towards life the takes place as you work the steps rapidly

not over a period of years over a period of weeks finish the work

those guys in Alcoholics Anonymous that night they were men and women both set down the table with me there was young adults there to laugh and have a great time drinking coffee talking **** smoking cigarettes on the back enjoying the daylights out of this experience and they all got around this increased you want to stay sober for good and for all

after some discussion ya heard my story not the one day at a time staff after some discussion I said yes I said buddy we're gonna help you with this work and if you're willing to go to any length come on down to places in the book says that you got to be willing to pay a price if you want to get sober folks

are you willing to pay a price because you see if you're not you can't get sober

sobriety is not not this **** nilly little thing that could flood the area some of us finally get struck sober and some of us don't this is ridiculous the people that end up doing the work

get what we call permanent sobriety

it's it's the absolute cooked the depression lifts like this boom gone

the boredom goes away we get a new sense of direction a sense of ease and comfort in our lives and somebody else in this room and that hasn't happened yet and you're mad at me because it hasn't happened and I'm sorry

I want to motivate you to finally get a sponsor and get past your arrogance and get to get next to somebody that understands its work so that you can have the same experience I had your spiritual experience will be different in my spiritual experience but it will blow you out of the water none the less there's no such thing as a baby spiritual experience folks I hear people in meetings all the time talking about I had a spiritual experts of educational writing but he's the same as bill Wilson he's in the vision of god in the hospital

it's enough to overcome alcoholism and drug addiction can you get down with that

readers digest condensed ology out

I was back the next morning after the live meeting on a Saturday we did a third step per in the back room we was up there was three or four men in that room with us and we all held hands we got on my knees and then the third step prayer that we open this up with where I ask god to be my father where I also implored god to remove my difficulty so victory over those difficulties could bear witness to god's power pretty cool and they explain that to me they sat down and we really talked before we did this about that the physical allergy in the middle of the session they qualified me to make sure I needed to be in that room that I wasn't just taking up a seat you're with us they asked me some questions so they could find out so I could see my own truth didn't jam is down my throat they just ask me are you willing to do this does this apply to you thank god for those people that took time with me that afternoon they gave me some information on a four step

guys I'm detox him one day they gave me information on duo forced it those people understood with crystal clarity but the last thing I needed to do was get comfortable and sit on my **** because I've got a history of seventy years of showing yet the minute I get detox and I start feeling lousy again inside I'm going to go drink

the problem we're having enough autonomous today's we got too many people willing to sit on their **** and watch our newcomers die because nobody wants to take responsibility to try to help them get connected to god

that's why our success rate in the early days of age were so huge and they suck today

because everybody's too busy looking around again nobody wants to get involved

talking to Maggie before the meeting just talking about shared in a meeting somebody coming up to her and afterwards and and referring to her as a bleeding vegan you know I gotta tell you something folks we're also afraid that somebody's going to call us a bleep bleep bacon they've that we we just don't say anything at all I've been called worse Maggie I gotta tell you that

**** comes to mind I don't know

okay guys everybody's experience in this village is going to be a little bit different but you know we we owe it to the newcomer to at least give him a shot at the program we ought to and then if they don't want to do it that's their business we don't chase anybody down everybody just because you're hitting this god thing too hard I don't think I'm doing it hard enough

two weeks later I've done a complete of a completed four step sitting down with a sponsor in a spiral notebook in a big book and I've done this work I've got an appointment to do a fist step and I'm on a different footing now some people this doesn't happen to that quick but for me within two weeks of actually for the first time in seven years getting off my **** and doing some work I start to have this thing called a spiritual experience and I drive home at night and as a Friday night after this meeting two weeks after I tried to commit suicide and I sit on the back into my pick up truck up in North Texas and cry like a baby I mean I'm looking around me I'm surrounded by liquor stores and seven elevens in places there's four places five places that I can go get a drink right now and my W. lives in the apartment complex where I live I mean there's nobody living in my house you follow me nobody to tell me I can't I got some money in my pocket what what guys I don't want to drink