Steps 10, 11 and 12 at the Carry This Message group in West Orange, NJ

My name is Jean, and I am a grateful alcoholic. That'll come out really well. Now, again, I you know, every time I get up here, I get those butterflies, and I feel like I'm gonna throw up one more time. Yeah. And you're ready.

But, you know, I keep reminding myself, missus d says, there's nothing more than God shaking the truth out of us, and, I think that's probably very, very true. Again, I wanna thank the group for the honor and for asking me to do this. It has been a wonderful experience for me, and it's probably been one of the hardest things I've done in my sobriety. I find it difficult to speak on to stay in a specific getting like you, George, I can't talk. A specific a specific, like, a a box.

You know what I'm saying? Can you picture that where, for instance, 1, 2 your story in 1 and 2 and don't go outside the box? And then 3, 4 5 and don't go out the box. 6, 7, 8, 9, stay in the box. And now we're up to 10, 11 and 12.

And that's difficult for me because I have been privileged to speak at a lot of state conventions and big conferences and whatever. And it doesn't mean I don't get as nervous here as I do when I'm doing that, but I almost have free reign. And, and this has been very good for my discipline. If you wanna be disciplined, try and do it. It seriously, it's it's, but I do the very best that I can.

Every night before I've gotten up here, I just say a little prayer to God. And I ask God to allow me to get out of myself long enough to tell the truth because sometimes I still want to embellish and I still want you to think it was maybe a little bit more glamorous or exciting or whatever than it truly was. You've heard me say it a couple of times that the first three steps for me are the, giving up steps, and the next three steps are the owning up steps, and the next 3 are the paying up. Those are tough. And, now we get into the growing up steps.

And if the growing up steps mean, growing up, then I was, 15 when I had my first drink drunk and blackout, and I was 45 when I had my last. And I'm 20 years sober, so you know how old I am. And if you can't add, that's okay. I'll take whatever years you want to give me. That's fine.

And so really, when I got sober at the age of 45, mentally and emotionally, I was probably about 15 years old, maybe, if you're lucky. Today, I think I'm really lucky if I'm somewhere around 20 5 or 30. And that's okay too. That's okay too. I was reminded again this week, and you all know I ramble sometimes and I get off the track, and that's okay.

I'll get back there eventually. I was reminded again this week how precious life is. I was reminded again how important my sobriety is. I was reminded one more time for all the times that I say, I think I'll do this or I think I'll do that, and that's about all I do is I think about it. And I don't, move and do it and take the action.

I got Billy Noonan called me. Broke your anonymity again, babe. Sorry. Billy called me, Monday. I had to stop and think what day it was, And he had received a call from a mutual friend from mutual friends of ours in South Carolina on Sunday that the wife of a very dear friend of ours had passed away.

She had a brain aneurysm, and she died, and she was 58 years old. Now to some of you in this room, that's, you know, okay. But to a lot of us in this room, that's very young. Donna was a dear, dear friend, loved her dearly. She taught me a lot.

She set a wonderful example in the program of Alcoholics Anonymous. She was the epitome and the example for me of carrying this message. She truly was. She set a beautiful example. Alcoholics Anonymous was her life.

And she was happily married to a wonderful man who's a big man on the circuit. And Donna spoke on the circuit too, and she had 2 beautiful grandchildren and very active and had a sponsor a lot of people and had a wonderful sponsor and did all of those things that set an example for all of us. And 58 is too young, folks. 58 is too young. And one more time, I was reminded how precious life is.

And one more time, I was reminded that if I wanna do something, I better do it. You know, if I can possibly do it, I better do it. I'm going on this sober cruise. I left some, flyers back there the 1st week in November. Some really cool people are gonna be on the cruise too.

And I was starting to beat myself up about it. And you've heard me speak for 3 weeks now, and you know I do pretty good job of beating myself up. I mean, I'm constantly taking the blame for something or saying I shouldn't when I should and, you know, whatever. I don't deserve it. I'm not worthy.

Anyway, and I was starting to do that to myself about going on this cruise. Well, financially, you know, you really should spend the money someplace else, and you're gonna have to save for it, but but but but but so on and so forth. And you know what? After Billy called me on Monday, I had no more guilt. You know?

I wanna go on a cruise. All my life, I have wanted to go on a cruise. I have the opportunity to go on a cruise. I have an opportunity to be with sober people. I have an opportunity to go and see places that I won't get to see any other way, and it's reasonable, and it's not gonna cost me an arm and a leg.

And I no longer feel guilty about that because, I call those incidents like that. I call them, my wake up calls from God. That's what I call them, my wake up calls from God. God sometimes just gives me a nudge to bring me back to where I'm supposed to be and make me aware of what's going around me. I always think it's wonderful that after the 8th 9th steps, we have the promises.

And most of the promises have come true in my life, and I'm grateful for that. And then we get into the 10th step. It was interesting this week, I didn't do very much reading or research or whatever. I I don't know why. I just didn't do it.

That's all. This is all from my gut tonight, folks. And I went to my step book for whatever reason to not to particularly look at the 10th step but see what notes I've written in the margin because they're important to me. I write my big book is marked up something awful. I keep thinking sometime I ought to start a big book study and start with a new big book, but just wouldn't be like the same old friend, you know?

It just it just wouldn't be the same. And, but, anyway, I went to the 10th step, and, and it says, whatever it is it says here, it says continue to take personal inventory. And when we were wrong, promptly admitted it. Anybody ever notice it does not say moral? Step 4 says we made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.

I'm saying about personal inventory. Says moral. You know, the things that I did wrong. You know, the things that I have to make right. The things that were so blatant in my life that I need to change through the 6th and the 7th steps.

When I get to the 10th step for me, and Mary Anne read it, it's my opinion, for me, 10 Step is a is exactly what it is. It's a daily inventory. You know? When I, retire in the evening, I don't always hit my knees. I'm honest about that.

But I do do a personal inventory, and I try to look and see where have I been dishonest, where have I been selfish. I have a big mouth on me, and sometimes I open foot in certain mouth. How many times did I do that today? Did I hurt someone? Where was I fearful?

And I've shared all these, 4 weeks now that most of the things most of the things in my life are fear based. I'm afraid I'm not going to get something I want or I'm going to lose something that I have and it's completely fear based. So what went through my mind today? What did I do today that was fear based? Well, let's see.

This morning, when I first got to work, there was an angry message from an angry client accusing me of doing something that I didn't do. And for about 30 seconds, I took the guilt. You know? For about 30 seconds, I took the guilt. I admit that I did it.

And then it dawned on me that it had nothing to do with me. I know for a fact this guy is a drunk. I mean, when you have a 2 hour conference with your attorney at 9 o'clock in the morning and you have to excuse yourself every half hour and disappear, And you got a bright red nose and bloodshot eyes, and you don't quite remember what transpired, seems to me, and you reek of alcohol. Hello. Hello.

You know? So he called, and he said he specifically told me not to send a specific letter to his soon to be ex wife's attorney. Well, no, he didn't. First of all, he never spoke to me. He spoke to another girl in my office who's only there on Thursdays, and she was right there and remembered the conversation.

And no, he never said not to do that. So but I had to look at it and I had to think it through. And I had to look at, you know, my part. You know, what did I do? Did I do anything?

No. I didn't, so I let it go. And, honestly, for the rest of this day, I think I've had a pretty good day. I don't make anybody angry to my knowledge. I didn't, open my mouth when I shouldn't have.

I I can't think of anything that was fear based today, and I honestly can't think of any time today that I was selfish overly selfish and self centered. So therefore, I've had a pretty good day. And what I find is when I put my head down on that pillow at night, I sleep really good. And it's been a long, long time since I haven't been able to get a good night sleep, and I firmly believe it's because I try to practice step 10 in in my life on a daily basis. And when I do make the mistakes, and I do, step 10 is a wonderful tool for me to be able to just say I'm sorry and how do I fix it.

I'm a paralegal and I work in a busy law office, and I'm one person. So somebody said to me, Well, what do you do? I said, Well, I'm a paralegal. I'm a legal secretary. I'm a receptionist.

I wash coffee cups. I make the coffee. I shop for the soda when Peter needs soda. God forbid he should go to the store. You know, money there's money in the petty cash, Jean.

Just go, would you go get me the soda? You know? So, I have a I have a busy day every day. I'm bound to tick somebody off. But what I have to do is and what this program has taught me is I really have to be very, very careful.

I work in a people business. These people pay my salary no matter how angry I get with them and no matter how stupid I happen to think that they are and how ridiculous their requests are and how much I don't want to do this and why don't they get it, I still have to do my pleases and my thank yous and my yes, sirs and my no, sirs and yes, ma'am and no, ma'am. And so the incidence of me having to say I'm sorry on a daily basis seem to be farther and farther apart. I've talked about my children a lot, trying to make amends to my children, you know, in my 9th step. And staying sober one day at a time is about the only way I can I can do that?

I got to practice that 10th step with my oldest daughter a lot lately, but that is as you've heard me share because I'm living under the same roof with her. And, you put a 65 year old mother with a 41 year old daughter, neither of whom are married, both of whom are independent, and you got a problem. And we're trying really, really hard, but the word is she's leaving for Brussels tomorrow. And nobody is well, she's happy too. I know.

You know, she hates my cat. My cat has chosen to sleep on her bed. She had this weekend, she put a hook and eye on her door so he couldn't open it. I mean, that's a horrible way for my child to have to live when you get right down to it. And I really am getting tired of saying I'm sorry.

But I am. I'm doing the best I can and that's all that I can do. So for me, that's basically what the 10th step is. It's doing it on a daily basis and taking my daily inventory and looking at where I am today and who did I offend. And if so, did I make my amends when I should?

Sometimes, I can't make them right away. As you get older, some of you not everybody's old, but when you get older, at least this is the way it works for me, I wake up in the middle of the night, and I have this brainstorm about something I did or didn't do. And then the next day, I have to go and I have to do a I call it my belated tense step. You know? You know?

I would have told you yesterday or the day before, but I didn't remember. You know? But today, see, I remember, so, you know, please accept my apologies. And and that's just the way it works. You know?

I like to call it old timers disease. I think it's very true. So it's amazing, though. Sometimes, I I remember everything, and that's really scary. So I haven't figured it out yet.

So for me, this had that the 10th step has been a growing up step. It has taught me how to make those amends on a regular basis when I have to, but it's also taught me to be aware because I know I have to take my daily inventory. It's It's taught me to be aware of my character defects and those that raise their ugly head on a regular basis. Not all of my defects are as bad as they used to be. They're not all gone, I can tell.

I guarantee you that. And periodically, I lose it. I don't lose it so much in traffic anymore, though. I'm getting better about that. I'm getting better about the guy that doesn't know where his gas pedal is.

I used to scream, and I don't do that anymore. So, I guess that's okay. So that's for me, that is step You know? That's that's how I I try to practice it in my daily life. Step 11 says, having had a no.

It does not either. It says continue. Let us not prepare meditation to improve our conscious contact with God as we understood him, praying only for knowledge of his will for us and the power to carry that out. I love the as we understood him. I don't know about anybody else in this room, but I can tell you that my understanding of my higher power is a lot better today than it was a year ago, 2 years ago, 10 years ago, 15 years ago, 20 years ago.

My sponsor, Marge, used to say to me, Jean, what you see at 6 months, you won't see at a year, And I didn't understand that. I did not know what she was talking about. I understand it today because even tonight as I stand here and if I think 6 months ago, there are some things in my life that were in my life 6 months ago that I see completely differently than I do tonight. So, my you know, I never lost a god. I think that's the best way that I can put it is I never lost a god.

I was not fortunately, for me, I was not one of those people who thought that God had forgotten me, and God had left me and dumped me and whatever. I I grew up in the Episcopal church. I went to services. I went to Sunday school and whatever. But as I have come to learn, that's religion.

And what I have today, I hope, is some spirituality. I really do pray that I have some spirituality today. I used to do all the foxhole prayers as most of us did. And I would find myself in a horrible situation and I would say, God, if you will get me out of this, I promise I will never do this again. And somewhere around, I one of my enablers would come through, and one of my enablers would get me out of trouble.

And I would go right back and do what I what I had said I wasn't gonna do. Because I had no sense of honesty in my life as an active alcoholic. I had no sense of fairness. There was nothing in it for me. I didn't want any part of it, and that's just the way it was.

You know, I would be the kindest person in the world, and you would think that I was the kindest person in the world. But if, but I always did it because I was gonna get something out of it, and that's not necessary for me today at all. It really isn't. It's a threefold disease. We talk about the physical, the mental and the spiritual.

And the spiritual is the first to go and then the mental and then the physical. And it comes back the opposite way. Our physical comes back and then well, mental depends upon who you talk to. And our spiritual back. And mine is not a Billy and I were talking on the way up.

He said I love those white lightning stories. Do you have a white lightning story? I don't know why I don't have white lightning story. I mean, I didn't wake up one morning and all of a sudden, I had this wonderful relationship with the God of my understanding. It took a lot of seeking, it did.

It took a lot of prayer. It took a lot of meditation. And I don't do meditation well, but what I like the best is what Bob B. Says from St. Paul, Minnesota.

And Bob says that what's there when you're not there is God. And I love that. What's there when you're not there is God. So it just means for me, if I'm sitting quietly and I'm it's like an example he gave, which is the one that I can most identify with is if you for whatever reason, you're walking along a country road and you come to a beautiful field with the gorgeous wildflowers, You know, in that instant before you realize you are there, you know, god is there. In that instant, god is there.

And, and I find it, for me, very difficult to to get quiet, you know, to get quiet and meditate. But I told the story last week, I I believe, when I was talking about my former husband and being at a conference in South Carolina and saying the Lord's Prayer and this whatever thought came through my head that I had to go and I had to talk to him. Now trust me when I tell you that that was not a thought of my own volition. You know, I firmly believe that that was the God of my understanding putting, you know, that thought in my head because of my own volition, I would never have gone and done that. But because it came to me, I really believe that God spoke to me.

So meditating, I really need to work on that. I was getting my haircut last night and there's this little girl, she's relatively new in sobriety who cuts my hair now. And she stands about this high and I kid you not when I tell you that. She's about this big around and about this high. And she has been suggesting very strongly that I should take yoga, that that would improve my meditation.

And so I was talking to her last night when she was cutting my hair, telling her how I was coming up here tonight, and she's been doing my secretary job for me at my home group while I've been here too. And she said, well, certainly, I'm going to talk about the yoga I've told you. So now I can go back and tell her, yes, I did. And it's suggestions. It's even the newcomers that come in and give me suggestions.

And I need to listen to them because there's probably something there. And maybe it would help me slow down in my own life, and may and it probably will help me with my conscious contact with god. When I first got when I first got sober, I didn't hit my knees. I don't know why I didn't hit my knees. I just didn't hit my knees.

I would lie and wake up. I can remember in a waking up, looking at the ceiling and, saying a few words to God and whatever and then moving on. And somewhere along the line, and I can't tell you where, I don't know how come, when, where, why. I have no idea. Yes.

I do. Thank you, god. That was just a shot right through my head. It was. I do remember.

I have a wonderful friend who was my, very first counselor at Carrier Clinic, and her name is Jane Albers. And Jane got sober here in New Jersey. I believe in August, she celebrates 31 or 32 years. I've lost track. Anyway, she moved to Wilmington, North Carolina, and I discovered that she was there.

And every August on her anniversary or on the weekend around her anniversary, she has this thing on Sunday at her house. She calls it the wonderful women of Wilmington. Try saying that one 3 times fast. Okay? And she does.

She invites all these different women from all around to come for a day of sharing. Language of the heart is spoken there. And, and I when I lived in South Carolina, I would make the trip up. And the first time that I went, I took a weekend, and I went up. And, I went with a friend of mine from Myrtle Beach, and we were staying at a mutual friend of Jane's Jane of Jane's at this lady's house.

And I woke up the first morning, and Nancy had rolled out of bed and hit her knees. And for whatever reason, you can call it because I wanted to. You can say it's because I didn't wanna be different. You can say the it was because I had it was guilt ridden because I hadn't been hitting my knees. Doesn't make any difference what label you put on it.

For whatever reason, I rolled out of bed and I hit my knees. And I've been rolling out of bed every morning and hitting my knees except when I have been physically incapable of doing so. Those times have been few and far between. But, last year, I spent a week in the hospital, and it was a little difficult to roll out of bed and hit my knees since I had a perforated appendix. And I had a lot of stitches, and, you know, I I just couldn't do it.

But I do that today, and for whatever reason, I feel better. It just doesn't make any difference about what's going on around me. But every morning when I wake up, I roll and I hit my knees. And the reason I do that is because I know, as sure as I know my name, if I get up, I'm not gonna hit my knees. Now I know me, and I know what I'll do.

It's habit. And now we have a fellow at the shore, who says you make a habit of drinking and drugging, so you have to make a habit of praying and going to meetings. Got it right. And and it's very true. So I have to make a habit of praying, and I have to make a habit of meditating.

So for me, that's exactly what I do. I roll out of bed and I have a specific prayer, it lasts about 5 minutes. I no longer one thing I stopped doing was I stopped asking God to let me win the lottery. I stopped asking God to get me out of this problem. I stopped asking God for things.

God, I would like a new car. God, I would like a new place to live. God, how about some new furniture, God? That would be nice. You know?

But I know today that that is not the purpose, at least for me, of praying. You know, the purpose for me in praying is to ask for God's will. Whatever God's will is in my life. But then I like to take it one step further, and I like to ask God not only for I pray for God's will in my life, but my ability to carry it out because, you know, this is a partnership thing. You know?

This is that God doesn't row thing that I talked about that I stole from Billy Ann. You know? But it's my favorite story because it just it does. It just puts it right where it is. You know?

I row and God steers, and that's the way it is. So if I'm asking God for his will in my life and he's steering, I got a row. I got a row. I remember years ago, the other analogy, and and you all have been here for the last 4 weeks know I love these analogies. It's the only way I can remember anything.

And, I remember years ago at the lighthouse meeting in Sievert at some he was a newcomer. I I I don't remember who he was. Don't remember if I ever saw him again. But he said for him, recovery was like riding a tandem bike. God pedals and he steers.

And I like that one too because it's very true, tandem bike takes The one thing that I've learned in this program, if I haven't learned too much, is I can't do it by myself. It's impossible. Alone, I fall down and I fail. But when I'm in partnership with the god of my understanding, I have a chance to succeed. The god of my understanding has never, in all my years of sobriety, never said no, never.

The god of my understanding has said not yet. The god of my understanding has said, maybe, but never know. No. Because I don't know what's good for me. If you do, you're a better person than I am, but I don't know what's good for me.

I believe that that, I was at a Friday night oh, I loved this one too. I have to share it. I was at a Friday night meeting in Red Bank, this past Friday night because now that I'm dispossessed, you know, homeless. Let's see. Billy shakes his head.

Homeless. I'm living in Fairhaven. Yeah. Yeah. Exactly.

But, you know, it makes a good story, folks. But, anyway and I went to this meeting. Yeah. I went to this meeting in in, in Red Bank, and there was a fellow he's been around a while. I've heard him before.

He lives down in Orchid River or someplace down there. And, anyway, he says he prays to Gus, the guy upstairs. How cool is that? He prays to Gus, the guy upstairs. See, and I know for me that my higher power has the best interest his best interest in me.

I know for a fact that God did not bring me this far to dump me. I know that. There have been times in my sobriety when I really I had to go and read footprints a 1000 times, literally. I had to read it and read it and read it because there were times in my sobriety when I really believed I was dumped and came to find out that I didn't even know what was good for me, and I didn't even know what I was supposed to have. And if I just wait patiently, the God of my understanding provides it.

And I believe also for me anyhow that, God speaks to me through people. I believe God puts people in my life. I never know why they come in my life, and I never know why they leave my life. But I know that while they are in my life, they leave a great impression and teach me a lot of lessons. And for me, that's really important.

I have been so blessed to have so many wonderful people, in my life, who have guided me and led me, and I know that they're heaven sent. They're sent from somebody greater than I am, who was just there at the time that I needed them. I think about last year when I had this perforated appendix. I got probably one of the best surgeons there was. He just happened to be on duty in the emergency room that morning.

No coincidence. There are no coincidences in Alcoholics Anonymous. The only thing that there is in Alcoholics Anonymous, in my opinion, are God incidents. And every one of them is a God incident for me. So praying is very, very important to me and, and I can use all of the prayers that are in the big book and I can say the serenity prayer 102 times at least.

And I don't know if you all noticed, but whenever we say the Serenity Prayer, we say amen. Down south, we say amen. I can't get out of the habit. And it is a prayer. To me, it's a prayer.

So when it's all over, I'm usually the only one that's saying amen. But that's okay because it's important to me and it's what helps me to stay sober one day at a time. And now now for our last growing up step, which, you know, allows me to talk a little bit about where I am today, which I haven't done. The 12th step, having had a spiritual awakening as a result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to other alcoholics and to practice these principles in all our affairs. It doesn't say in Alcoholics Anonymous.

It doesn't say in my family. Doesn't say just in my workplace with the people I need to be nice to. It says in all my affairs. And I don't know about you, but I know about me, and that's really hard sometimes. It really is.

I have a new way of living today. I have a new way of living. I have I've done a 180. In my opinion, I look back and I see where I was and where I've come and where I am today. And I have done a 180.

I have crossed that line. For me, it's that second line, and I think I talked about it the 1st week. I don't remember. But then I have Alzheimer's disease. I somewhere in my sobriety, I have crossed a second line for me.

And when I talk about the person that was, that drunk, that 24 hour a day drunk who crawled on her hands and knees, whose morals went out the window, who really didn't care one way or the other, what happened as long as I got some more boos. And it didn't matter to me how I got it, where I got it, when I got it, just so long as I got it. That's all that was important. And when I talk about that woman, for me, it's like I'm talking about somebody that just doesn't exist. I mean, not in my lifetime anyway, because I'm not like that today.

And it's today, it's very hard for and the farther I get away, the harder it is for me to really go back and identify with her. I don't like her. She's really nasty. I wouldn't, you know, I wouldn't have liked me then. No.

I would have moved out. I would have kicked me out. You know? I I won't I won't worth the time of day. I was not a a worthy person, And I am a worthy person today and I know that.

And it's only through the 12 steps of Alcoholics Anonymous. It's only through practicing these principles in all my affairs on a daily basis. You know, when I first came into the rooms of Alcoholics Anonymous, I was told, don't drink. Go to meetings. Get a sponsor.

Get a home group, and get active. You know? And I sometimes hear people leave off the get active part. Even people who have just walked in the doors of Alcoholics Anonymous can do some type of service work. You can take a coffee commitment.

You can stand at the door. You can used to be you set up chairs and cleaned up ashtrays. That's the one I remember from years ago. But there's always some type of service work to give back what's really given to us. And moving on into service work, there are all sorts of things you can do in your home group.

I like to just talk for a minute or 2 about, for me, service work involves being very active in my district. It's not for everybody, and I know that. But I found my niche. That's where that was my niche. And so I was very active in South Carolina, and I'm very active here.

And I enjoy it. That's where I get some of this balance in my life. I get some of this balance in my life. When I, when I first got sober, the only thing I was capable of doing was not drinking and going to meetings. That is all I was capable of.

I couldn't do anything else. That was the balance in my life. But if you look at your individual lives as I look at mine, the longer I stay sober, the more I can add to my life, which which adds to my balance. My I have an aunt who's 51 I think she's 51 years sober. I'm really not sure.

She doesn't know, and I don't remember. But anyway, Mary, I know she's 50 or 51, maybe she's more, I don't know. And Mary has always said to me, she 12 stepped me a year before I got sober, planted that seed, and then I finally eventually landed here. And she's always said to me, I spend 25% maybe of my life in alcohol in the rooms of Alcoholics Anonymous, in the rooms, so that I can spend 75% of my life carrying the message. Now isn't that true?

Isn't that true? You know, how many times have you heard it said, you may be the only big book anybody ever sees. You may be. I find for me that carrying the message is never saying no to Alcoholics Anonymous. Never saying no to Alcoholics Anonymous.

If I can possibly do something, I will, whether I really want to or not. As long as I don't have something another commitment or something that stands in the way, I will do it. I find for me carrying the message in Alcoholics Anonymous involves sponsorship. I'm privileged to sponsor a few not a lot of people because I don't like to sponsor a lot of people. I can't give all of my time if I if I sponsor too many people.

Then somebody's getting shortchanged, and I'm getting frustrated. And as soon as I'm frustrated, I'm no good to you at all. But I tell all the people that I sponsor the same thing. I tell them my phone is open 24 hours a day. Anybody that wants my card can have my card.

And you can call me 24 hours a day, but don't call me after you picked up that drink. Because if you I can't talk to you after you've picked up that drink. Because once you've picked up that drink, I can't reason with you, you're unreasonable. I can't talk to you about the program of Alcoholics Anonymous and the steps of Alcoholics Anonymous and something that you might do not to pick up that drink. I tell everybody that I sponsor the same thing.

You call me anytime you need me. My phone is always open. I am not one of these sponsors that picks up the phone and calls everybody that they sponsor to find out how they're doing. You know what? For me, in the very beginning, the one thing that was more important than anything else was learning to pick up that telephone.

Now picking up that telephone was one of the hardest things that I ever did. I didn't want to be a bother. I didn't want to disturb you, whatever. And March, God bless her, you know. Or she'd meet me in a meeting and say you didn't call me.

But she would never pick up the phone and call me until we had gotten into our relationship a lot longer. And for the new people in program of Alcoholics Anonymous that I sponsor, this is my opinion. I tell them to call me any time. I don't tell them they have to call me every day. I don't tell them they have to do whatever.

No. This is my phone number. You want what I have. You do what I do. It's that simple.

It's just that simple. And I tell them to carry 10 daytime numbers and 10 nighttime numbers, and I still have them in my wallet. And I have ten numbers that I can call anytime of the night, and nobody's gonna shoot me for doing it if I have a real problem. Yeah. And I know if I have a deep deep problem, I can call Billy in the middle of the night.

He wouldn't care. I know a lot of people that I could call in the middle of the night. Now it's really, really important. I don't know about you, but sometimes for me in those dark hours of the night, that's when my problems seem to be the worst. For whatever reason, they just seem to dwell on me and be the worst.

Now if I you've heard me say this before, but I'll repeat it because I think it's worth repeating that. I tell my girl because I do this myself. I mean, I want you all to know that I do practice what I preach. And then when I have a problem, I sit down and I write about it. I truly do.

I get pen and paper, and I write it down. And I take that piece of paper, and I fold it up, and I put it away. And the next day, I get up, and I take it out. And I read it because I wanna see how important this problem really was. It might still be bothering me, and it might really be something that I need to continue on and look at.

But most of the time, for me, anyway, it's a you know, it's this this is a real dangerous place. You know, my my head is a dangerous neighborhood, and I should never go there alone, ever. And then sometimes the committee up here just gets going. And it's it is. It's very dangerous.

So I have to write about it for me. That's what works for me. I think I shared the 1st week when I was telling my store, I'm not sure, but I and I love this girl to this day. In fact, I think she's gonna celebrate 9 years of sobriety. God bless her.

She was I sponsored her from the very beginning, from the minute she walked through the doors of Alcoholics Anonymous. I remember one night she called me 2 o'clock in the morning. She's obsessing over her boyfriend. And I said to her, Fran, tell you what I'd like you to do. So I want you to go sit down.

I want you to get a piece of paper and a pencil, and I want you to write 100 words on why this is so important. I said, I don't want 98 words. I don't want a 102. I want 100 words. And then you put it away.

I said, call me at noon tomorrow. You know, well, when she called me at noon tomorrow, she had to admit that it wasn't as drastic as she had thought it was at 2 o'clock in the morning. I asked her to please remember that from now on because I find sometimes writing about it saves waking somebody up in the middle of the night. And so I find that, that is another way that I believe service work is most important. I will, I pontificate it, as I said, at the somebody didn't know what that word meant the other night at the district meeting, and I really felt badly.

Anyway, find one where you do feel it is the best and where you really want to give all your time. Now this is a smaller group, but my home group, we have probably 100, 150 people maybe on a Thursday night. It's an open speaker meeting. And when the chairperson says, will all the members of the group raise their hand? Can't begin to tell you how many hands go up.

But when we say we're going to have a business meeting and all those who are members, would they please stay afterwards and attend? We have maybe 5 or 6. Now this is my opinion because people get angry at me when I say this. Some people do, not everybody. So this is my opinion and my opinion only.

Saying you are a member of a group does not make you a member of a group. That is my opinion. If you are a member of a group, then you are active in that group and you give your heart and soul to that group. And you do all that is necessary to help that group to survive and to grow and to become the best group it can. My home group just did a group inventory.

It was a fabulous experience for all of us. It really was. And we discovered we went through the pamphlet, and we went through the questions, and we discovered where we were not reaching out to the community as best we could, where we were being a little lax with the newcomers. And we're trying to take measures to correct that. But without group inventory, we would not have known where we were falling back.

I don't want to say we failed because we never fail, and we still get newcomers. It's amazing. I'm the secretary of my home group and I can't begin to tell you how many people have come up and asked to join the group since we started to get ourselves together. And I think that's really, really important. That's part of carrying this message, folks.