Big Book Workshop Weekend in Altamore Springs, FL

The effort hasn't been involved in booze. It hasn't been involved in chasing your attitude. We haven't been focused on the problem of booze because that's we we put no effort on that. Our effort has been toward, I was saying earlier, taking out the trash, which is part of the spiritual awakening process. That's where we've been focused on.

We don't focus on the problem. We focus on the solution. If the solution were contained in the problem, we would've found it already because we've been focused on the problem for decades. Yeah. So it's a change of focus.

Next paragraph. It's easy to let up on the spiritual program of action and rest on our laurels. We're headed for trouble if we do, for alcohol is a subtle foe. We are not cured of alcoholism. What we really have is a daily reprieve, a reprieve if you look it up as a state of execution, a daily reprieve contingent, that means based on, the maintenance of our spiritual condition.

I spotted that when I was about 6 months sober, and I said, alright. There it is. What I'm gonna do is to find out what that spiritual condition is. I'm gonna attain that, and then I'll be able to get what I've always wanted, and that's to take the rest of my life off with pay. I thought, like, I'm gonna get that, and I won't do anything else.

And I searched for over a year before I found the definition of that spiritual condition. It is, by the way, the next sentence. I didn't think to look there. Every day is a day when we must. There are no musts in the program.

You'll hear that. This is one of them. Every day is a day when we must carry the vision, that's the best I can see, of God's will into all of our activities. Well, there aren't any holes in that, are they? I don't get any days off.

I don't get any activities off. That simple. And it's not something I can detain. It's it's it's continuous. Page 164 for just a second.

Four lines from the bottom. We shall be with you in the fellowship of the spirit, and you will surely meet some of us as you trudge the road of happy destiny. Doesn't say to. It says of. The road is the destiny.

It's today. This is the happy destiny. Don't look for it out there. We're not on the way to it. We're living in it.

Back to back to 85. And then here's the second prayer. How can I best serve thee? Thy will not mine be done. These are thoughts, so that must be a silent prayer, which must go with us constantly.

We can exercise our will power along this line all we wish. It is the proper use of the will. Much has already been said about receiving strength, inspiration, and direction from him who has all knowledge and power. If we have carefully followed directions Bill did get directions in here, didn't he? Yeah.

We've begun to sense the flow of his spirit into us. To some extent, we've become God conscious. How's that for a promise? We've begun to develop this vital, right, there it is again, vital 6th sense. I heard a fellow with 6 months say, if I'm still using my other 5 senses trying to get my will, I won't develop this vital 6th sense.

That's a pretty good piece of information, but we must go further. And I'll go ahead and start just a little bit on step 11 before we before we take the break. Turning the page, top of 88, the evening inventory to retire at night, constructively review our day. I don't have permission to bash myself here. Constructively review our day.

Where were we? Presentful, selfish, dishonest, afraid. There's that whole there's that list again. Do we owe an apology? Kept anything to ourselves we should discuss with someone?

What could the question is what could I have done better? Have I done harm I need to repair, and what could I have done better? And and it's really that simple, and it needs to be the last thing I do. And I I'd like to note too, do y'all use the term around here, next right thing? Do y'all say that?

You need to do the next right thing? I discovered a last right thing. Each day, there's a last right thing. For me, it is to go to bed at an hour so that I can get a full night sleep and be able to get up in the morning in time to start my day on a spiritual basis. I need to read my 2 pages in the big book I read from nonconference proof spiritual literature.

I do prayer and meditation. I need to have time to do all those things. And if I don't do the last right thing tonight, I won't be able to start tomorrow morning with the first right thing. Yeah. Next paragraph, on awakening.

Collect observance does not say. It does not say after a shower and shave, a half a pot of coffee, too over easy with Hammond reading the front page. It says on awakening. That's right now. I got a friend that says his disease gets up 20 minutes before he does, everyone Does some push ups, some jumping jacks, wakes up on the headboard of the bed.

As soon as his eyes open, he goes and jumps on. And he wakes up with untreated alcoholism, and I have to start on awakening. I got a good friend. 1 of my mentors says that, it's on awakening because I'm capable of making life devastating decisions between the bed and the bathroom. So I gotta treat it right now.

I gotta treat it right now. I think that's important. I have, I bought this exceptionally ugly watch. I have better taste than this, and I want you to know that. But I bought this watch because it has a function I can't find anywhere else.

It has multiple alarms. This morning, I had them set 10 minutes apart, and usually I'll set them anywhere between 10 20 minutes apart. When the second one goes off, it's the get up time. When the first one goes off, miss Linda and I cuddle, and we do our morning prayers in each other's arms. Uh-huh.

Let me tell you something. I think if the whole world started the their day that way, it'd be a better planet. Amen. It really would. That's and I'll I'll grant you that there are mornings when that second alarm wakes us both up.

I'll give you that. That happens. It says sought through prayer and meditation. It does not say achieved through prayer and meditation. I'm responsible only for trying to take the action.

That's my only responsibility. And I'd I'm telling you, I'd sincerely believe that those mornings when the alarm goes off the 2nd time and wakes us both up and we slept through our prayers are every bit as good as the mornings when they don't because we saw it. And it's all we were responsible for doing. We saw it. Typically, we get up on the second alarm.

I get a shower and shave. She starts to coffee. We meet on the sofa. She does her reading. I do mine, and we do morning meditation together.

And we close our days in a similar fashion. A lot of times on the close of the day, we name individuals. We'll lie on the bed and pray, and we'll name individuals that we know that seem to be in need of some prayer. I sponsor a fella whose, brother's name is William, who's missing in action. 1 of us.

1 of us missing in alcoholism action. If you get the chance to pray for William and me somewhere in London, we think, we'd appreciate that. This those kinds of things. People around us that are in need of in need of prayer energy, and and we don't instruct god on how to fix them. I don't do that.

I just I just hold them up in love. And part of what I do too, and I learned this also from miss Linda, if y'all have not heard my wife, you need to do yourself a big favor. She is something. As I learned that I can send love, love is a commodity that can be transmitted. And I sent love this morning to the room I was in.

I sent it to the restaurant. I sent it to this room. I filled this room flat full of love. Light on my bed this morning between the alarms. My My trip to the airport, at the airport, on the plane, and home the trip home and at home.

And I sent love to the places I'm gonna be today. I also sent it to the places my wife's gonna be. And I send it there so there'll be some there when I get there. And if you haven't tried that, you might do yourself a favor. And I'm gonna tell you a story.

I I had an assistant for a number of years, and she was a very, very, very spiritual Christian woman. And, she and I found ourselves talking bad about a particular person we had to deal with on a regular basis, had a lot of power in our lives. I'm a manufacturers rep. I'm a multiline rep. And I was a power broker at our biggest factory.

It represented a third of my income. And I guarantee you that woman was something. If there wasn't a broom parked in their parking lot, I swear there had to have been. And and she she and I finally caught ourselves talking bad about this woman and said, wait. We don't believe in that.

And we decided, and we started the next morning, and we opened our office with 5 minutes of prayer, sending love to this woman. And the way I do that is I get a mental image of her suspended in space. God's love is flowing down through me and out my chest and swirling around her this wonderful white stuff. Now that's just what I do. What you do, I think, is perfect.

And we started doing that, and 3 days later, this woman is calling our office to chat, to find out how we're doing, and, gee, aren't you guys fun? 3 months later at the National Trade Show, I walked into the meeting. There were 200 people in the room. She was knocking people down to get to me, to tell me I was her favorite rep and how great it was to do business with me and Sheila. Yeah.

Yeah. Don't doubt the power of love, and don't doubt the ability to send it. I'm gonna share I'm gonna share another gift from my wife, and, she tells us better than I do. But, this this is her 3rd marriage, my second. And we have a problem, and and we have had a problem with ghosts in the bedroom.

Yeah. Alright? You understand what I mean? Yes. K.

And, she prayed about that, and she was given a gift. And the gift is before we're gonna have a she calls a physical exchange, she prays this prayer. And she says, god, help me stay in the moment. That's all. Just help me stay here right now.

And it takes care of all of her history and mine, and it takes care of wondering about tomorrow morning as, you know, was it really okay and, you know, has she noticed I've gained weight, all that kind of stuff? It just takes all that away. It takes all that away, and I I share it just just in case somebody can use it. I tell one more story, and we'll take a break. When I was, I guess, about 5 years ago, a young fellow that I sponsored came into my beloved home group, the back room in Nashville.

They meet on Saturday Sunday mornings to be there. And, he'd come back he'd just come back from his grandfather's funeral. And he told his grandmother at the funeral, he said it occurred to him, and he told her. He said, I think you were a fabulous wife to my grandfather. And she said, I should have been.

I prayed to be that every day. And, well, that hit me hard. And so so I start I I thought about that, and I started the next morning. I don't think I've missed a morning since then. And and the prayer that I use is I ask god to help me treasure Linda today.

The the word treasure is mostly used in the English language as a noun. You You understand it as a verb, but we don't use it that way too often. And I started that within 2 weeks. I was walking through the den one day, and she was talking on the phone, and I heard her telling someone, Scott treasures me. When I ask God for what he wants me to have, I get awful lot of help.

It's always about me getting to the right question. He's got the right answer. It's always about me getting to the right question. We're gonna come back at quarter after. Still Bob?

Still alcoholic? Someone had made I was talking to someone during the break and, we're talking about a men's. Just briefly before I get into 10, 11. How do you know who should be on your 8 step list? Well, the book says it's the people from our 4th step.

But I'll give you a good rule of thumb that's if we're talking about mending separation between me and god's kids. Then a good rule of thumb is if you look back over the people in your life and you run it and anyone that you can't picture sitting in a car with driving cross country for 8 hours, if the idea of of any individual spending that kind of time alone with them makes you crazy, they should be on your 8 step list. Right? Because there's some separation between you and that person. Now, sometimes the answer is isn't sometimes it's paying them money.

You owe them something. Maybe you owe them some you have a debt to them. You have unresolved business. Maybe it's just to forgive them for exact for being who they are, allowing them to be what they are. Maybe it start maybe it's just simply saying some things to them that you've never said to them.

You're somehow you're not even with them. Right? So there's a state of your separation. Do you ever take those 2 do you ever take 2 magnets and turn the one around and try to put them together and they just right? That's what's going on.

That's what's going on. Right? You could feel it. Do you ever you ever go into a you ever go into a meeting or a family event or something and there's a person there that you're not even with? You know what we you know what I do?

I I I caught myself. I had this blank spot right about here, and I will always keep them right there. I sat I sat in a meeting when I I I sat. I stood at a podium in a meeting telling my story one time, and there was a girl in that in that meeting that I owed an amends to. And I had to go like this the whole time because I couldn't I had it it made me crazy.

And then after the meeting, I had to go up and clear I had to go up and make the amends to her. And I didn't realize I owed the amends until I caught myself halfway through my story and realized I'm not even. I'm chattering to myself in my head about this situation right as I'm trying to share my story. Because we there was separation between her and and I. It was just and it was all involved is is me being vulnerable and telling her some things I didn't wanna tell her that I felt embarrassed about and just clearing the air and expressing honestly my regret about something that had happened, and, you know, owning it.

Step 10, I really liked, Scott's comments of, about when rather than if. You know, you can this road of happy destiny, you could be on the right road, but if you just sit there, you're gonna get run over. You know what I'm saying? Right? You so this is an action.

This this chapter is into action. It's not into hanging out or into thinking. It's into action. And it one of the things that should happen, and and I think does happen in all most of us, by the time we get to step 10, inventory is taking on a new light. Now it's not looking to see how we're bad or wrong or any of that stuff.

Really, it's just an honest recognition of who and what I am. I know that I'm a guy with an inclination towards selfishness and self centeredness. I am a guy that gets afraid often. I'm a guy who gets judgmental and builds cases against people. I'm a guy who's driven sometimes by self pity when god or you don't do things my way.

I'm a guy who does all of that. I'm a guy who who alters reality and blows it up and is creative with the truth. I'm I'm that guy. And because I get it that I'm that guy, I'm the self centered, fear driven guy, and I will always have that propensity. Then step 10 and 11 is not about beating myself up for not being perfect.

It's about an honest recognition of these are my tendencies. Let's correct the course so I don't get so far out that I destroy myself, so that I can keep to my purpose here, that I can keep close to the decision I made in step 3. Not perfectly. The books reminds us in chapter 5, no one among us has been able to maintain anything like that means you're not even gonna come close. Anything like perfect adherence to these principles.

We're not saints. But the point we have here is that we're trying to grow along spiritual lines. I must try to grow along spiritual lines. I I'm an avid scuba diver. And over the years, I've I've had to learn a little bit about sharks, which is naturally for scuba divers.

And and, there's types of sharks that the way god designed them is that they they bring oxygen into their systems by keeping a flow of current over their gills that oxygenate. Then the the gills are able to get the oxygen out of the water, and that that's how they they sustain an oxygen level in their blood. But in order to do that, they they can never stop. They must constantly be moving forward. They can't stop because then the flow stops.

And when the flow stops, they start to suffocate. And I think I'm that way. I think if I stop growing along spiritual lines, then the flow of god's spirit, which must flow through me, will stop and I will become stagnant, and I will start to suffer, and and my spirit will start to wither and die. And we all know what that's like. And, you know, when your when your spirit gets withering and dying enough and the and the pain of the in the heart is enough, we always remember somewhere in the back of our mind like times we've been like that years years ago and how 5 shots of Jack Daniels could fix that.

So I must keep my spirit healthy here, and this is how we do it in step 10 and 11. Couple I do this because I leak. I I'm not this is the weakest area in my personal program is step 10 and 11. And I I'm I'm here to tell you that I've really, in the last just in the last few years, I've gotten a little more disciplined about this, but I'm still nowhere near where I'd like to be. On the bottom of page 85, in italics.

Oh, one more thing about step 10. Step 10 is a lot like a tea bag. It seems to work better in hot water. Yeah. Right?

When when I'm in hot water, step 10, I'm I'm a serious step 10 guy. When I bought hot water, You know, I'm a I'm a kind of a sluff off the guy. You know? Where have I been selfish? Not today.

Let's go to sleep. Now that's, you know, that's you know, truthfully, let's face it. There's never been a day I've been alive where I haven't been selfish to some degree, self concerned, self obsessed, worried about me, my feelings, my life. There's never been a day I've been alive that I haven't been like that. To some degree, there's never I don't think there's been a day I've been alive that I haven't been dishonest to some degree about something.

The little kind of petty dishonesties, like, like, I buy a new car. I pay, say, $36,748 for it. And you see the car and you say, Bob, that's a nice car. What'd you pay for it? Well, depending upon what I think of you and how I think you'll be impressed, I I might tell you, I paid 40 grand for that car.

Because you'll think, oh, Bob's a big shot. He paid 40 grand for that car. I might if I think you're more, you'd be more impressed with a guy and get a good deal, I'd say, oh, I I spend about $30 for that car. And you'd think, boy, Bob, Bob's smart. He got that car for $30.

But to say $36,784, there's no edge to that. You don't get any there's no leverage on that. You you don't get no torque in your life with the truth. Am I right? Right?

And when you come from a place of vacancy and not enoughness, you need torque. You need leverage. And I tell you I tell you this is a little sidebar. I think one of the worst things we do in Alcoholics Anonymous is try to act as if our own inadequacies and vacancies are something we should grow away from. I think it's the greatest thing I have going for me.

It's what brings me to the table with God. Because, you know, and you you hear you'll hear stuff in meetings that implies that this is something I should grow above, that I should not feel inadequate, that I should I should become whole. No. That hole is inside the vacancy is my god vacancy. And if I lose that and I ever get secure unto myself to not have that vacancy, then I've just pulled myself out of the ballgame.

Right? I just put myself on the bench. It's what brings me here. It's what brings me to my sponsor. It's what brings me to my knees in the morning and at night to pray.

It it's, what brings me to step 10 and 11. The greatest blessing I have is my vacancy. Is that my my not enoughness, my inadequacy, my incompleteness. In the in Genesis, it talks about the creation of the of the world, and it it talks about god on the 1st day created this this this. And in the Hebrew, it says and it was and it was tov.

And tov it translated in English is good, and it was good. But it's not really. Tov really means and it was complete and it was complete. And then he created a second, he created this, this, this, this, and it was complete. This this this this, and it was complete.

And it gets to man. It doesn't say complete. Man's not tov. Man was never created to be tov. Man was created to struggle towards his towards enlightenment, towards God.

Man was created with a God hole and a vacancy that no other creation has. See, you'll, you'll you'll never deers, dogs, cats, rabbits, birds, they are told. They are complete. They cannot misinterpret their vacancy because they have none. You'll never see a a deer in the woods with a brown paper bag and a cigarette coming out of its life.

Look at it look at it pornos. Right? You'll never see a deer doing that because a deer is tov. A deer has no illusions of filling holes that it it the deer is tov. Deer is complete.

You'll see people like us doing that stuff. Right? You're you're trying to misinterpret this god hole. Trying to fill up something with, what's that old country song? Looked at love for love in all the wrong places.

Right. The god hole. Real quick. I don't wanna I'm running out of time. Step 11 in italics suggest prayer meditation.

We shouldn't be shy in the matter of prayer. Better men than we are using it constantly. It works if we have the proper attitude and work at it. It would be easy to be vague about this matter, yet we believe we can make some definite and valuable suggestions. K.

The book says step 11, they're about to make some definite and valuable suggestions, and then they go right into what I love what Scott called it, the 11 step inventory. This confused me for a long time because it I couldn't I didn't get it till I found this passage in the 12 by 12. And Bill, in the 12 by 12, explains why they're connected, why when he's talking about step 11, he's talking about inventory process as an integral part of step 11 because he says in the 12 by 12 that self ex self examination, prayer, and meditation, when taken separately, can can bring much relief and benefit. But when they're logically related and interwoven, they create an unshakable foundation for life. And you see 1011 are meant to be logically related and interwoven.

You can't separate them. If taken separately as I tried to do for years, I got much benefit relief, but there's a big difference between relief and freedom. And I'm here from for freedom. I'm here because I have to have freedom, and there's only one thing I need freedom from. The bondage of self.

I need to carry out the decision I made in step 3 or I'll die. We must be rid of this selfishness. We must or it kills us. And that's when when we interlock when we interlock step 1011, it is unshakable. And what it's very similar to when you when you combine the two exercises that are on 86 and 87, it's very similar to what a a sailor would experience.

Let's say you were good at to go down here to, the harp one of the harbors on the East Coast of Florida, and you were to rent or buy the most expensive, best equipped sailboat you could find. Money is no object. And you were to go to a nautical library and you had the goal. The the goal is that you made a decision. The decision is I'm gonna sail to the island of Bermuda.

And you went to the nautical library, and you went through a a 9 step course on setting a perfect course for the island of Bermuda. What would occur is no matter how perfect your boat is and no matter how perfect the course you've set from the East Coast of Florida to the island of Bermuda, it's just gonna come to pass every single day that the winds and the tides and the currents are gonna blow you and move you off course. It's not because you have a bad boat. It's not because you played with your tiller too much. It's none of that.

It's just it's just the way it is. You're just it's not because you've done anything wrong. It is the natural condition of the realm of the spirit. Because what we bring to the realm of the spirit is a person with a propensity to self involvement, a person who's had an inclination to play god. And that's what we're bringing to the table here.

So every single day, a sailor must get out his compass and section and all those all those tools and take an honest, honest inventory, and he cannot fool himself about values, an honest inventory of where he is, and then compare it to a vision of step 3, a vision of self abandonment service, a vision of Bermuda, and readjust his course back to where he was going so he can go there once and for all? No. Because the next day is gonna have to do the same thing again. Right? And if you don't do that, I'll tell you what happens is all of a sudden you're sailing along, and it's and you're wondering why you're running into these chunks of ice with penguins on them and on the way to Bermuda.

And if you're really a truly self delusional alcoholic, you'll start saying, well, you know, they must have populated Bermuda with penguins. It's just and what happens to us is we get so far out we can't get back. And if you've been around if you've been around the fellowship of Alcoholics Anonymous for any sustained period of time, you've seen those guys. And you'll see them once in a while that they build this tremendous house of cards out of all kinds of gratification stuff and material stuff, and then it'll collapse on them. And they have not done step 10 to 11.

They do not they're not current and connected to no power source in their life. They're not connected to their sponsor or anything else. And they will run into a discussion meeting frantic, and the chairman will say, does anybody have a problem? And they'll go like this, and they'll dump this mess of their life that is unmanageable out on the table for help. And they'll unfortunately, if you've ever tried to get help or advice in a discussion meeting of alcohol eximes, it's like trying to take a drink of water from a fire hose.

I mean, it's just and they'll sit there. And after about 10 people have shared at them, they bolt out of the meeting. They bolt. And then the rest of the meeting will just be spinning about a problem that's left. Right?

And you can get so far out. You can't get back. You can't back because now you're too entrenched in being right. You're too entrenched in how they screwed with you. You're too entrenched in your judgments.

You're too entrenched in your will. You are the center. You're running the show. You are right. You're not the guy who can be wrong.

And I tell you, if you can't be wrong, sobriety's gonna be hard. Because from step 4 all the way through, it's about how how I'm wrong in my perceptions, how I'm wrong in my judgments. If you can't be wrong here, you're gonna have a hard time. So that's really what this whole thing is about. And I want, actually, it's time for me to turn it over to Scott, and I'll I'll talk a little bit more about 11 when I get back.

A couple of more quotations that have meant a lot to me. This is a gift from a good friend of mine. It really changed my perspective. He says, I worked this program to the best of my willingness. I don't believe I've ever worked it to the best of my ability.

Oh, boy. This is a gift from my wife. Anxiety is really just low grade atheism. Yes. It is.

Another one from miss Linda. Now this one has nothing to do with recovery. I'm just gonna try to make you laugh. That's all this is. Miss Linda is slightly dyslexic, and and she's not embarrassed by it, but we do get some funny things out of it.

And she we were I was watching the US Open golf tournament on TV. She was being with her husband. And you got it? Yeah. It's anonymous giving is what that is.

Alright. It really is. And, this oriental fellow, I think he was Japanese, was in contention. He may have been in the lead at that time. He hit a particularly bad shot, and the camera comes on close.

And, I mean, you just see he's in anguish. And miss Linda says, oh, I hope he doesn't commit karaoke. I hope so too. I've been there when people have committed karaoke. It can be a terrible thing.

It can last a long time too. One of the things you may have noticed is that Bob and I give our last names here. We do that in keeping with our tradition of anonymity. If that didn't make sense to you, I'd like to recommend the pamphlet understanding anonymity in the book, doctor Bob and the good old timers. Really, really would.

And I wanna tell a story about anonymity isn't just about press, radio, and films, and and we do that so that the newcomers can come in. Anonymity is also has another level, and that is the level of doing something good for someone and not being caught. Now that's not my style. I'm just a little bit into the applause myself. But and I had an experience a number of years ago where I had the chance to do something good for someone and not get caught, and I did it.

And what happened was I don't mean to sound poetic, but I can't describe this any better. People are gonna nod and grin when I say this, but it was like there was a piece of sunshine about the size of a golf ball that lodged itself in my chest. And I could think about what I had done anytime of the day or night, and this thing would glow and send light through my whole body. See I'm nodding? K.

And and it just didn't matter. Whatever was going on, I could just think about that, and it would just light me up. And, boy, I never told anybody about it for about 6 months. And when I told, that thing got out. Yeah.

It's gone now. And because there's another lesson in this story, I'm gonna tell you what it was. I'm a I'm a salesman by trade, and it was one of those days where I got a full day's work done in a half a day. I had my fishing tackle on the back. I was near a city park.

I'm fishing the stream, and there was a family having a picnic, and they had about an 8 year old boy. And, boy, he locked on my leg and wanted to fish. And so I'm showing this thing and got to talk to the family. None of them fish. And eventually, I took him on a couple of short trips and, got to another family.

And the Buffalo River in Tennessee is a National Scenic River, and it's full of fish. And, with his parents' permission, one day I put him in the front of the canoe. We floated 5 miles of river. And and he never we floated 10 hours, and he didn't get enough, and I didn't either. And we caught over a 100 fish that day.

Oh, wow. Yeah. The little guy caught a 4 pound smallmouth bass, man. He got my fish, but I'm okay. And about a mile from the takeout, the the banks are steep, and there's room and no place to get out of this river.

And suddenly, the sky darkened, and we're fixing to get it. I'm hearing the thunder. We come down kind of a shoot, and we did what canoe has called eddy out. There's a little backwater. You can count a parallel park in one of those up under the trees just before the bottom drops out of this, baby.

It's gonna be raindrops the size of my thumb. Right? Just before the bottom drops out. I'm sitting in the back of this canoe, and I'm just about to give God a little piece of my mind. Have you not noticed saint Scott down here with the little boy, and he caught my fish just about there?

And this beautiful little boy looks over his shoulder at me and says, is it okay to fish here? I forget. I prayed that third step prayer, and I meant it, and I forget that. And when the skies of my life darken and the thunder's coming and and I'm fixing to catch it, It's the only thing I'm supposed to say, father. Is it okay to fish here?

Because that's my job. That's what I signed on to do. A friend of mine getting a 24 year chip a couple of days, she called me. He said, he said, I gotta remember I don't own this business. I just work behind the counter.

Yeah. I just work behind the counter. And that's the question I'm supposed to be taking. My god. Is it okay to fish here?

It's a great question. Step 11 on the short form on page 59 has an implied promise, I think, and a beautiful one. Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact. If I'm gonna improve it, I must already have it. So I believe we're promising you if you'll do the first ten steps with a sponsor who's already done them and do them right out of this book, that by this time, you will have a conscious contact with god, as I say, of my limited understanding.

Isn't that wonderful? Yeah. And then I get out of the business of coaching God, of telling him what to do, and ask just what would you have me do. Is it okay to fish here? That's the question.

60. 12. Having had a spiritual awakening as the result, doesn't say a, says the. We promise a single thing, spiritual awakening. And spiritually awakened people don't drink beverage alcohol, and they don't get thirsty.

I'd like to report that my wife, an 18 year member of Al Anon, does not drink alcohol. She chooses not to. I can't choose not to. Page 25 tells me that very clearly. She chooses not to so that her husband, who she loves dearly, doesn't have to come home and kiss burgundy wine or a martini or something on the lips coming home from a day at work.

Y'all might think about that. It means an awful lot to me that she does that. And to me, the the 12 step breaks into 3 parts. Promise of a spiritual awakening, and then I'm not sure the rest of that is telling me what to do so much as describing who I'm going to become. Tried to carry this message to alcoholics and to practice these principles in all my affairs.

It was my experience in step 5 that when I told all those things about myself, they became lighter. I've got some pretty ugly stuff in my past. I've shared it with some of you. When you hear me say that I don't have the power to make a mistake, God can't turn into something magnificent. I want you to know that the master has used these worst things I've ever done as tools to help people in this room this weekend, a lot of them.

I'm not taking any credit for that. I'm saying we have a powerful God. Gave us a powerful program, more powerful than this than the worst things I've ever done. Yeah. The and I think the so I still carry those things.

I think of in step 5, I think I became god's caddy. I'm still carrying those things, but they've lost their weight and stench. And part of what keeps them clean and light is my willingness for him to use them. I think if that ever goes away, then I'm in trouble. I think the weight and stench will come back.

I don't know that, but I think that. The, the other thing is I'm an apprentice messenger. It says we tried to carry this message. Doesn't say we carried it. I think if I was a messenger, I'd say I carried it.

Says I'm trying to carry it. I think that makes me an apprentice. And if I can hold that attitude, I'm god's caddy, and I'm an apprentice messenger. When I hold that in my heart, I do a really good job. I can be I can be a really good, channel.

I'm I'm not the living water. I'm the pipe. You know, on a good day, I'm a plumbing fixture. That's that's that's what it amounts to. And so it describes me, and I I now I try to carry this message to alcoholics and to practice these principles in all my affairs, to live a principled life.

Irrespective of outcome. I'm responsible simply for my actions. I think it's important. I wanna talk a little bit about this, chapter working with others and hit just a couple of points, and then we'll take another break. Page 93, this is for me really important.

I wanna describe something to you first. I sponsored for a while, you've and this is no offense to any religion or anything. I'm simply gonna talk about something that's been in the news and my experience personally with it. One of the major churches that had a problem with clergy and pedophiles, I sponsored 1 of the boys that was a victim of that. And if someone had been using specific religious terms in his first meeting, he would hit the door, and alcohol would not have driven him back, and he would have died on the street.

I, today, still and I have permission to tell these, by the way. I still sponsor a fella who was sexually abused by a deacon of a church in the church from the time he was 6 until he was about 11. And if someone had mentioned some specific religious terms in his first meeting, he would have hit the door and would not have come back. Page 93. First full paragraph.

When dealing with such a person, you had better use everyday language to describe spiritual principles. There is no use arousing any prejudice he may have against certain, that means very specific, certain theological terms and conceptions about which he may already be confused. I think they were. Don't raise such issues no matter what your own convictions are. Alcoholics Anonymous is no place to try to sell us your religion.

I don't wanna talk to you about mine. If you ask me 1 on 1, I'll answer any question you have. I'm not hiding it. This is not the right venue for that. And no offense to anyone who who, who has a child or know someone who's needed this, but I have a friend that calls AA, spiritual special ed.

It really is. I mean, this is spiritual kindergarten for guys like me that weren't getting it anywhere else. I have a learning disability known as alcoholism. There's gotta be a learning disability. I mean, how could it have taken me 41 years?

So I gotta be careful that that my own beliefs don't take away somebody else's chance to get this thing. That's why I said that thing about voting. I I vote by secret ballot. We gotta keep that away from here. Outside issues and specific religious terms are outside issues also.

Let's be careful with that. When I was sober about, 5 years, I was sponsored by probably the most spiritual man I'll ever know. I I must assume so. And they called him one day and I said, Mike, I got this question about this guy I'm trying to sponsor. What what should I do?

And he says, drop him. And I said, Mike, come on. I'm serious. He couldn't have meant that. He said, no.