Step 4 through 9 at an AA and Al-Anon workshop titled

when you do that because I don't know what you're saying

trying to answer program only my name is Linda and I'm a member of Alana

but he

step four and five I'm going to dress them briefly just from the standpoint of Allen and and then bobbles take over from the eight point

when I first came to Alan and I had absolutely positively no intentions of ever taking steps four and five you didn't know that I didn't make that clear to you but that was the way it was going to be I was going to do that I didn't need them I was raised Catholic I had been many many many times to confession and that's what this seem like to me and therefore I wasn't doing it I didn't tell you that as time went on people started to assume that I had done steps form five because I never corrected them otherwise and I like the fact that they assumed I had done them because it's sort of let me off the hook

in a very funny way it did but in a very tremendous way it didn't because now I not only had that taken steps four and five but I knew what a phony I was that I was lying to all of you and so my dishonesty was even worse than not having even taken steps four and five so finally I decided I got into much pain and I thought I've got a work program the way it's supposed to be worked and I

did four and then three weeks later date five in

the thing that I don't know if it's

for sure harder for Allen and because I'm I'm not on both sides of that but

I think most of the time the Allen as I talk to it's very difficult and it's very easy for them to find other defects of character

but it's very difficult for them to find any assets

and I think that's part of what our eldest looks like we lose ourselves in the alcoholic you loot we lose who we are

and we don't even know what we like and what we don't like and as far as do we have any assets I remember going to Bob and asking him because the woman who I went and did my first step was insistent that I write down assets and I remember going to many asking him if I had any

that's sad

in all

but that's what I that's what our illness looks like so I guess the main thing I want to stand for is I I believe it's very important that you include the things that you've done that you're not so proud of

and the things that you've done

that are your good points so include you know your defects and your assets I don't know if it's going on an offer I'll just talk loud

so I think for Allen as we have to include both because it's very difficult we we tend to get put ourselves down a whole lot more

and then for step five my first job was pretty much what Bob talked about you know getting rid of sort of those big boulders the big issues and over the years I've been able to do other force into steps and they become more become more refined I've taken a first step forth into steps on our marriage why really looked at that the aspects of our marriage my party's pardon what I could do to improve I took a fourth in a step by anger issues that I had around my mother

where I just focus on that and I even took a fourth and a fifth step on aging I don't like getting older there were some issues that I was looking at that I didn't like about it and so I went back to what I've been taught this is how

you get rid of things that don't work for you and this is how you come to acceptance and how you come to see that in this situation so I am now of the opinion that

you know there was a woman in our group we used to say to drive me crazy too should I say well if you haven't taken the first step why don't you try it before you say you don't need one

and here attended me but now I really give you that same advice if you haven't tried one try it it really does set you free four and five of the steps that we really would come nose to nose with who we are good and bad we look at it I honestly it's knowing from my experience I was in the program seven years before I took a four step it's a lot scarier in that place that was after I took one

now turn it over to Bob

hi I am Barbara holic

the question is if you're married you have to do an inventory

or do you have one done for you

I have done

probably eight inventory since I've done a lot of activity

in the first inventory that I I've I've done wasn't very insightful it was important but it wasn't very insightful and got rid of

I look back on it an accomplished quite a bit the what I have I have a lot of girls around the behavior and and conduct that I. have prior to getting so

and I relieve myself of much of that

killed in the process of doing a full the the early fourth insist up even though by the big book standards about whether it covered all the bases into the columns correctly and have the right you know words I didn't but I felt a great relief not only did I feel a sense of forgiveness which I didn't expect

I really had a sense of the reason I went through that was because I was going to change

and it was kind of reminded myself why I was going about this precious and we know that goes good on that we get all that if I was going to change I really had to know what I was going to change

and

my second first up was when I was about

five years over in my third forced up when I was seven years old and I'm not exactly sure what I'm gonna talk about my big change which is I think during section seven only go into sections of the stuff

but when I but as far as getting into the causes and conditions of of the aspects of my sobriety I didn't really understand the causes and conditions of life and manageability of my sobriety until I was five and six and seven and eight years old I didn't understand it at three you can't understand at all three years or three years

the book says that the you know the during the first four stopper something about a start in a lifetime process of doing an inventory

if this is a spiritual walk this is a process this is a spiritual awakening we're going to be inventorying we have to be anal about it we're going to be a perfectionist about it but we're going to be doing some sense of inventory in our whole life

me one of the greatest assets and I think we have an recovery is just we have a healthy questioning of ourselves not only around a question not a you know people say you're putting yourself down you're you're gonna demeaning yourself you're not you know there are some of the times the woman will not look at a a and said you know this powerlessness just a tool to keep women down the different organ in all other organizations look at us and say you're too religious you know

I don't know how to answer other people's views of us but from from my point of view of of of recovery

having a balance question we are people who look at what we are flawed people we have in our many of us are behaviors were weighed

baptismal had bad consequences for us in a bad consequences for everybody around us we're capable of rationalizing a very broad spectrum of behavior

yeah and so we are people who should rightly question are thinking because we can rationalize a lot of things

plus how healthy it is to be able to run some of these things by

our advisors it's just I mean if you can do that not only do you have a more open life but you're going to get input and you're gonna be less likely to get isolated in a way out there so I I think the process of inventory is enormously important we have over the last number of years

it has become much more formal in how it approaches a lot of things you know there are there kind of movement within organizations

within all organizations there tend to be a movement towards orthodoxy

okay you can ship in churches you can still get in lots of different places

and I just I I think I see the tension all college shoulder there M. and R's of actually there gets to be kind of a right way to do it in a wrong way to go

and while our book is instructive is our is our basic tax I want to say that you can sometimes get too formal it's sometimes good to region about how you do these things

as important as the form of what you do is the spirit of Washington the heart that you bring to the matter my sponsor was really big on attitudes you know he'd say give me a person with a good attitude and they can make mistakes they don't have to do everybody makes mistakes doctors have a good attitude her manager you are going to do this thing perfectly this is bigger than any of us this is you can't contain this so I'm gonna give you my my

five minute lecture on

a north of actually

you are having a lot of people come to you and talk to you about the steps you know you've had

Carl and you had

who

sure in case you know sure in case and you know lots of them your current orders in my age group at home and

yeah and and so I I don't know all these people are are good friends of mine and I know that

but you know over the next five or six or seven years you're going to have fifteen or twenty people come to talk to you about the steps

and if you want to a big convention in the United States for anyone back to the table where they sell tapes you'd have all these different people to teaching on the steps when I came in we didn't have any of that

and yet we had a good recovery

things were not as structured as they are today and we have the recovery

there's a technician

sure some people would give the impression that all you need to know when life is a hundred and sixty four page

and your life will be complete that's not my view I I think this is the menu

you can starve the gasket in the menu

you need the full

the food

is of god the food is spiritual spiritual

you might never find the food if you don't have the directions so don't you know I don't hear me I don't want to make it sound like I don't want the directions I want the direction but it's a description

as a holy man said when the master points of the moon all the issues of the finger

in all the finger is not the object the moon is after

so we get the impression that all you need is the right instructions and it will all be okay

well if the steps for mechanical

every time we had a problem all you have to do is say the surge stripper and click your heels and you'll be back in Kansas

there'd be no problems

well sometimes when you say the surge that per no one's home

it's not mechanical god doesn't answer just when you ring the bell

I mean that's childish to think that you can somehow reduce the use

profound spiritual principles to mechanics

now

it's better doing the mechanically the not doing them should all listen to me save don't do the mechanically I've done the mechanically when you're driving you're having a tough time and you're down to mechanically

because that's all you can do you bring what you have you have to you know

but

there's something you have to bring to the process of doing the steps beyond the form

and it's something to do with your heart it's something to do with your integrity or something to do with your Highness to get something to do with your openness is something to do with humility or something do it teach ability

but it's more a matter of the heart the prices of the steps in the process of recovery

is it is a process of being not doing

most of us want to know what to do

the door we will come when you alter your beef

you're being gets altered when you are touched by god

when you were touched by love when your touch for the program who you be changes

time and time again

last

time and time again in the program

the the book talks about you know I'm page twenty five degree tracks Russian nothing less that we have had a deep and effective spiritual experiences which has revolutionized our whole attitude toward life perjure fellows in towards god universe rebel you know what I mean this is transformational this is just about a linear change one two three is one two eight thousand meters

it is you know it is a very big deal one short course talks about

early on the deal was very early in the province's offered talks about inches on the he's talking about a list of entire second change can take place there's little hope of many cells on the other hand strange as it may seem to those who don't understand once a psychic change has occurred the very same person who seem doomed to have so many problems you despaired of ever solving them suddenly

find themselves able to control the desire for alcohol the only effort be necessary to follow a few simple rules suddenly it is when when when these things happen of god it is like

we're different we're we're not the same people and one of

and what has changed you can ship you can see in the eyes of the people you come in all we used to joke in treatment you know your tire guy up and you put it in the trunk of the car and drive them out each from the two first to explain how to kill his wife if you ever got out

but in the third week something happens and all of a sudden

he's talking to the new person

he's helping them

his volunteering stuff that it was highly

you know

very different

that's a shame yeah you know just in a week in on a very very different so

the impact of the program

comes out comes from the spirituality cultural power grid in ourselves

not from the form the form is in the system the former lead you to the place to do the work but the work is not the form now you know Joe is saying that the best way is to is to engage yourself with the four K. but have some freedom have some play in that process so you know our first show for us to

you know if we're going to get our allies in the kind of shape and find happiness and balance and wholeness in our lives

we need to know what's wrong in order for us to find out where our flaws or defects of character where our shortcomings are what doesn't work inventorying is a process

the most conservative members of Alcoholics Anonymous thank god wrote the big book and Bill rode Wilson wrote the twelve and twelve in his office

that's the big book is the real thing and the twelve and twelve

okay

I don't believe that I believe that what we have is bill Wilson with four years of sobriety writing the book

I believe that he was guided you know one smart another four years of sobriety

to write with the death

I am a student of of eastern philosophy and I read a lot of different spiritual and religious material it just comes back and back and back how wonderfully written and how profound and how

why is this what bill Wilson wrote and I believe for every fiber of my body and from my experience he was guy I also believe that when he wrote the the twelve and twelve seven years later even though it was published in nineteen fifty three he wrote it in nineteen forty six with the grapevine started as a series of articles and didn't come out of the book until afterwards

that he was talking about just trying to deepen the instructions that we had in the book and you can see different influences on this show the same man who wrote the first up in the big book wrote a very different for Stephan curry in the twelve and twelve so obviously he didn't think there was only one way to do it

with that said most of those today follow the instructions in the big book of the columns the columns on

here's a look at our emergency account insurers in the columns of sexually to the fourth column the talk about what was our part which is the most what we're trying to do when you go through if I have a criticism of being too formal

what I find the some of these young people when they come to me today I feel like it's an artificial processing time I feel like when they've done going to give me their system

it's too rigid I don't feel like I get to know them I don't feel like

they've dumped a whole load they're using only the words that are described in the in the in the book and I'm saying that if you were telling me your story could use more words don't restrict yourself to

only the words in the book you know use the words in the book because your own words so that you can you know so that you can tell me what hurts what's wrong what doesn't work what what are you afraid of I I want to know both of those those things do you do if you don't restrict yourself

gonna go through that so

the first in first out ours

I think it's a great rights of passage in the in the program I think all of us feel more of a member when we have done the fourth interest if we feel like more

growing up you know we feel like we really belong we have now have our spot when we've done the fourth interested that's a big piece of work that's kind of the

one of the real initiation the first of being maybe the key initiation but the force of the staff are like that in in in rice passage

in our country the first up

and then I want to talk just talk briefly about one other thing I'm going to send up a pamphlet that is on

one of the one of the things that we now see going around or called step workshops

and

people will tell you that they started in different ways my understanding of some of the started is that there's a whole time member the name as usual coracle and and

his sponsor the kind of confronted each other going or they both had about fifty three years on or just died from prince Albert Saskatchewan Canada

in order to do some of the present work Elmer and rolled out these meal prep sheets that referred to the big book you know read chap read the doctor's opinion then I would ask you a series of questions on the back of different

those got passed around through Denver insertion active young people all over the country and then about ten years ago Dr Paul who's you know those stories in the big book Dr alcoholic adding

doctor Paul published them in a little

in a little pants

and he refers to his friends in Texas who sent him a lot of this material

and

what it is is a sixteen week workshop on the steps

using the big

the way we use it I don't know if everybody does it the way we do it but the way we do it is we got ten to twenty people have all the right now one of the group to seventy

and we say look we're going to go through the steps we're not gonna read about him we're gonna take a

they were going to do the work the gym this fancy

and once you're in this group you're in I don't want you to say that you're coming here and then don't come you say you're in this group here and once we start to group no one can get in the groove

so after the first meeting maybe between the first and second but after the second meeting

if you attend this group you promise you will do it one more time to help someone else

now you want some old timers in the group you want some people who've got eight years and ten years and twelve and then they want not just everybody knows but it works no matter you know because the instructions are in the book is pretty good

and then we go through

and we were the boxes the nail in the all of the books as the primary prey when the boxes we admitted we were powerless we admit that we're professional we actually use the words and do all the work as we go through the book

when we get to the first up was about four weeks or five weeks in the book to do the first step the first up we do not do the first up with a job you make an appointment with your sponsor or whoever you're gonna take the system so there isn't that sort of violation but what happens is you buy you get closer during that process and it's a great process for people who are kind of having a flat spot it just

it just shop it just gives you like a steroid shot or something like that just kinda

kind of does that I'm gonna stand

a couple of those passes up here and and then that'll give you another option so the first step are

I love what the book says this is up until this time you have some ideas of god now you start to have an experience of god

when you are done with your first step the barriers when I talk about I turned on my wall the completed the turn down on my wall I no longer had a very between me and you

when I was starting to restore my life I was starting to restore my relationship with my god

my relationship with myself my relationship with you it is an enormous

passage it is it is the opening of the door I think for the whole second half of the program is you know it is the first African of powerlessness and sh and surrender hold on a second step and then turning or well over the the care of god and and frankly though the program rests on how well those three stops

and I just wanna say one other thing sometimes there's a tendency in the modern program I think to keep going back to stop foreign five

when things are bad

and what I find is is most of us have the information with some foreign five we know what's wrong we don't need necessarily more inventory more more information we have the information we need to change

what we often don't have a step one two and three

and the reason that nothing moves when you go back to an inventory when I just go back to stop for it because one two and three are not alive

at that moment

if you really want things to move you should go back and find out

what a one two and three are alive when you go to do four five six seven

because if you're not if you want to ensure you're not alive when you do a foreign five you're not going to get any result options you're not probably going to get the whole result that you would might hope to have

inspections of

I'm in a rush I have intersections along the canal to

what I want to add to this is just kind of fun and usually when we do this when I do this weekend I give my talk Friday night and people know the details more details of my life today we don't have that

format so it's kind of awkward because I'm gonna give my talk tonight and

but

I had a second spiritual experience at eight years of sobriety I had I was a very active member of the I have always been a very active member of Alcoholics Anonymous of always going to four five six meetings we always had a sponsor tried to do the strap sponsor people active in service

but my first search for seven years and I ate my life was horribly unmanageable I have problems at work with finance I had a gambling problem kind of a hobby

for five hours a day for five days a week one of our

but I was making about ten thousand dollars a year plan back and I was kind of a semi professional backgammon player

and then I had issues with marriage with you know we were arguing about how life was going and I have issues with my children as they should do that I was angry and sometimes violent physical with my children

I have those problems throughout my entire first structure seven years of sobriety I worked on pretty hard I can't I want to be a good man and it was frustrating as heck for me to keep doing

these things as poorly as I continue to do

and I'll tell you I have eight and seven or eight years of sobriety I was in trouble

I was thinking about suicide

you know that's not a joke not sort of you know I was tired

the good old

you know I felt like I could write the book

and what to do I just couldn't do it

it gets frustrating

knowing the answer

Joe physician earlier I was shocked

in

in that place where I thought I haven't changed before I can ask I'm so glad I got which if I want to ask on top is a change

it's a try that I can't do it you know help is on the way sure I can help you first I don't have to do the change first

yeah I'm not

so I did another four out of desperation I went back to step one and find out what went on to meet your shoulder I was powerless again I was a manager

I have rediscovered step to

I came to believe that I was going to restore Bob not you'll not hot spot the Senate I started to see people with bigger problems with smiles on their faces with great dignity walking through walls and I was trying to avoid

and I came to believe god was going to restore it by

I took a third step on my knees with my sponsors office we didn't do that much in those days so you know that was different but I thought I'm going to do it

the whole

I did a forced up and I did my third system

in the previous two I don't want purging in this when I do it much much yeah I said when you're done be careful because I'm gonna do whatever the heck you too I said I feel like I'm dying of thirst lying next to a lake

I said I feel like a plastic shield between me and the water

yeah and

when I was done

he sent me to a psychologist

and I did want to go to college I have but I have a lot of issues around money

and failure and work and success I had a very successful father and I thought I'll never be as good as my father journalist mixed up stuff

and I didn't want to go but I said I do whatever he recommended I do and I went to a psychologist so my most like college just wanted to get my parents involved they should all do that you want to get lenders all of them are crap

just gets confusing yeah maybe more honest than I wanted to get to

when you're right Sir it's pretty hard in the language of the manage ability

when you're going alone you can manage it a little bit

and that

what I mean I don't have enough time to get into one of my

which was just up to fifteen from

to

okay given the coffee

when I got into it with the psychiatrist psychologist is a

but I made a discovery was how afraid of much

now at this point I am a thirty two years old

I'm married with two children I'm a psychologist office with my wife in those two kids

about to go bankrupt in a job I don't know why I busted my **** an hour or two a day

on the

and it's not working

and I mean as much data there's a sobriety as I was when I came in the program

and I'm in trouble

and

I'm an active guy okay I'm I'm trying to do the deal I just thought I just don't look to

and

I got in I I made a discovery is how afraid of which

now if you think having done three inventories and streets here of the project you know a couple of term duration but I that was dogs and high buildings inspection I have no insight into

and and this guy got me in touch with our free to failure I wish and I tell you something if you can't fail you can't play

you can't play

I was the guy that we're going to run a marathon at a greater issues in greater shortage I look and talk and act like a runner when the race took off you think I was going to be in the top ten I tell you that I won some races in Minnesota

for the first third of the race I'd be open trunk button somewhere between a third halfway through the race I'd fall and hurt myself and I've stopped

when the regional resolution would have negative for Minnesota

so I don't know I pulled a hamstring or some hell of a runner got it was up in the fictional one summation Minnesota but if you want to follow me around in a helicopter in my life three shooting ten years

you could have guessed within fifty feet when I would've fallen down because I don't finish anything

I'm a great starter but I don't finish anything

and I'll tell you something that gets old

it gets old for your wife to control for your parents are controlled for you and if it's just catch all

they have a lot of talent and not be able to put it on the street and use that over an extended period of time good souls to not be able to use your gesture controlled

and I realize at the moment I was in that office that I was afraid of being a father

I was afraid of being a husband

only for the responsible I was afraid of success

earlier

I was swimming in fear of you know what

I don't three inventories and didn't all fall for eight hours

when I went home to my

after I did that for the first nine months of college I went home and I had a horrible day

and I realize that I have tried as hard as I knew how to try to change

and I failed

for some reason

the thought occurred to me that was okay

maybe that was where I was supposed to be and I was allowed to take the section a seven step of the program okay the six steps that

we're entirely ready to have god not god

remover defects of character the censorship we humbly asking remove our shortcomings I spent eight years trying to get rid of

I don't have the power to get rid of it happens truly not by me I am the pipe not the well

I am not the shortage

I am the vehicle through which the power comes true

is it right there's an acting all farmer doesn't grow a plant to soil creates a fertile environment to reach a place of growth can take place to guide growth the doctor doesn't heal encouraging the staff to give Armitage Allison was healing can take place of guiding

we don't change we create an atmosphere would change can take place and god changes us when you're ready for changes like it falls off

it just disappeared it just goes away

suddenly it goes away when you can see through it when your consciousness is raised in the process of doing these steps you look at the strange Ameritrade shoes anymore

their dog **** wrapped in golden foil they are not treasures anymore

you see through them

and they just go away

and that's what the pro to me the process of change

pretend for a moment just a jewel I don't know what I'm gonna do my talk we're going to do here but I want you to know something about change

if I ask most of us to raise your hands and I'm not asking you to raise your hands and say how many people would like to get rid of the things in their life the doctor doesn't work

and that hurts people

most of us would raise our hands

well I want to tell you something that's not as true

as you think it is okay

pretend for a moment that I'm working with a thirty eight forty year old guy married with children

and he's doing the for Stephanie is having trouble with all the columns

and I say bill don't worry about

I said that's a complicated

don't worry about it your wife your kids your mom and dad

your mother in law your boss

a couple of guys you're a group

when your brothers and sisters are bringing over the house

here's what I want you to say

we have a stop in a which helps us get in touch with our defects of character and I'm having trouble identifying mine

and I'm wondering if you would help

and then hand out tablets

and leave

you have a pretty good start

what engine

okay

but most of us were not called I mean

you know why

we don't want to change

but it's worse than that baby

worse we don't want to know

we train each other about what you can tell us what you can't if you're married

you train your wife because they were not talking about interest we're not having that we are not having that conversation you want to have that conversation going to be a very expensive conversations

mad mad your head up and down as you understand we're not having that conversation

okay your children know what they can say what the cancer

the people who work with knowing your ball should know what they can say what they can't say

okay your friends know what they can say what they can say their stuff they know what's okay to talk about what's on the table and their stuff is not on the table

okay

so we are not as open to change as we change when I was first in the program I could try and fail and try and fail and try and fail and try and fail and still grow

but there comes a time

where you got it changed if you're going to grow

there comes a time when you get to a spot where you're at the fork in the road were each time you don't need the inventory you don't need any more information you don't need to do any more stop work you need to change

if you don't change you then go out and build an addition on your house to accommodate the problem

the chasers hang out with the chasers a gambler's hang out with the gamblers and they make a deal I will call you on your craft you know call me on my deal

bad deal

I got just the opposite deal with my friends if I'm not online call me

call me and tell me that

if I've done something

that really kind of stinky call me and tell me I want to I really that's the kind of deal I've got I've got guys if they knew

if they heard something they'd be on the phone calling me

check it out okay

we are afraid we saw identify with some of our defects of character we think say who we are they are who we are just behavior they're not skin and bones just behavior you can change your behavior without changing who you are you can change your your political party without changing who you are you can change your car you can change your behavior

it is an O. U. B. that's what you do

the reason that a lot of us do not have the results in the in the in the process of changing growth that we want

it is worth three

we're afraid to stand in front of