Sky Camp Men's Spiritual Retreat in Eugene, OR

Step 2 looks a little bit like this, I think. If I am the the step is came to believe that a power greater than myself could restore me to sanity, and so I'm still whining about the implication that I'm insane. And so we went through that drill about the crazy things I did, including the decision to drink. And I began to get a little closer to it, but they said that doesn't even matter really. It isn't about whether you're insane.

All you gotta get is that sanity is not part of your life. And the question is, what would sanity look like? What would it look like if a power greater than yourself restored you to sanity? What would that look like? And it sketches out over here.

I'm here, and I'm kind of basically at step 1, but I'm circling the drain. I'm in the middle of the ocean, and I wanna go over here to Sanity. I wanna go here. I wanna move from this point over here. I wanna go from where I'm circling the drain, with everything that implies, to some state of sanity.

Some state of mental health. Some state of happy living. Some state of being at peace with myself. Can I get there from here? Is not a bad place to start.

And the answer is, I've only been trying since I was about 5 years old, and I'm still circling the drain. That gives you a little clue right there as how it's gonna go. No. I can't do that. I cannot take myself to sanity.

So there's gotta be a power greater than me that'll take me beyond this point. That's, the whole deal. And the and the entire concept is caught up in a chapter called We Agnostics, which I never read because I'm not an agnostic. And why bother? Might as well have been we Ethiopians or some crap like that, you know.

Next. Next. Step 2 is chapter 4. And it has some remarkable, remarkable exercises in it that are designed to take a guy like me and move me. Move me.

It's just priceless. Incidentally, I wanna go back just a little bit to Bill's story because why would I even get here and wanna go someplace else? There's an itch going on. And I remember thinking, that if the if the task is for me to find myself in this book, I better start looking. And I'm looking at Bill's story one day.

And that story always annoyed me, to tell you the truth. And I know you won't repeat that to anybody. Because here's the guy that's talking about, like, he had this white light experience. And I'm thinking, how nice for you, Bill. We're so glad you had that.

If I could have a white light experience maybe. Maybe. Here's a guy that says things like, God comes to most men gradually, but his impact on me was sudden and profound. I'm going, oh, give it a rest, Wilson. And one day, because of God's grace, I'm thinking about the 14th August.

From on the 14th August, I was a drunk in 1966. On 15th August, I was not a drunk and have not been a drunk since that time. And I did not do that. And it finally came home to me that God's impact on me was sudden and profound. I mean, that is moving right along, you know.

He like he did not mull it over, baby. He just said, you got it. You got it. From failure, from humility of knowing you are toast, you're asking. You got it.

You got it. And I never drank again. And this room is full of exactly that. 64, 65 guys that one day from their deep failure, they never drank again. And we didn't know it was our last drink and we didn't quit.

Quit? Are you kidding? I can't quit. No. It's removed.

Well, then what is it that's contingent upon my maintenance of a spiritual condition? The contact, the relationship with God. The relationship. Because and the other thing that was interesting to me about Bill's story is that he had this cathedral experience. Deeply moved, I wandered outside in Winchester Cathedral.

And then you get the little thing about the, doggerel on the tombstone. A guy named Bill Thatcher was buried there and he was a beer drinker. And he died. And they did a little thing for him. But the most significant piece in the page is, Deeply moved.

I wandered outside. And the reason that we know that is because Wilson comes back to it on page 12 and on page 13 page 10 and 12. He says in town's hospital, with a couple of days of sobriety, that day in Winchester Cathedral came back to me. This was such a remarkable event in his memory that it survived all of his crazy drinking. He must have been in Winchester Cathedral, what, in the late, maybe, 18/19?

18/18? Before World War 1. And now he's in Winchay. And now he's in Towns Hospital in 1935. About drank himself to death in the meantime.

And this event came back to him. My time in Winchester Cathedral returned to me. He says. He says, the meaning of that moment returned to him. And he describes it this way in the book.

He says, For a brief moment, I had needed and wanted God and was humbly willing to have him with me. And he came. And he came. But soon the sense of his presence was blotted about out by the clamor of worldly things, mostly those within myself. And I went through the same drill, you know.

He had a cathedral experience. And then I realized, I've had cathedral experiences. Where is my cathedral? It's right here. It's in these meetings.

How many times have we sat in these meetings? And maybe every 6 months, every 3 months, a feeling comes to me. I'm there and I see a guy take a cake. I see some molt that can't stay sober a year ago. It's sober now.

I see, I see miracles in my life. I watch this transformation in life of another human being. And I'm sitting in my cathedral, my meeting, my men stag, the big top on Wednesday night, my little speaker meeting Monday night. I'm sitting 1 on 1 with some guy in my office on a Saturday morning. I listen to a 5th step.

I'm praying. Whatever I'm doing, I'm in a meeting. I'm in connection with another AA, and for a brief moment, he came. And I was humbly willing to have him with me. And he came.

And he came. And soon the sense of his presence blotted out by the clamor, worldly things. The meeting's over. I get up. I go out and get my car.

And I'm on the road and somebody comes into My Elaine. And, the sense of his presence is blotted out by the clamor of worldly things, mostly those within myself. I've gone at about Wilson in his cathedral experience. I've had it. I've had it a couple times a year, maybe.

Profoundly touched, deeply moved, humbly willing to have him with me. And he came every time. And so that leaves me with this, I've tasted the honey. I've tasted the honey. I'm a seeker.

I'm a seeker. And a seeker is somebody that's been touched by God in such a way that nothing less will ever do. And every seeker needs a master. And you're my masters because a master is someone whose life bears living witness to the seeker, that what the seeker seeks is real. And we have AA.

We have this. Designed by a remarkably, kind God to bring us home. To meet every need we have. And I didn't even know it. But I couldn't leave you.

No matter how much I brought into my life or how bad it was, I couldn't leave. I am brought here. I'm called here. And we all are. We are called to this place.

And so, is there a power greater than I am that will restore me to sanity? I must believe that. And it's all that's required. There's another thing that's required and that is that I'd be willing to go to any lengths. And I could say, yes.

Yes. I'm willing. Gladly ready. Gladly ready to go to any links. And there's another thing that's a part of this too and that is God does not make too hard terms with those who seek him.

Is this hard? This is not hard. This is not hard. And this is as hard as it gets. God does not make too hard turns.

He honors the slightest move in his direction. He does that. Yeah. Yeah. He does that.

And so we're blessed. We're blessed. So am I willing to believe that some power greater than myself will take me to sanity? Yeah. Yeah.

You know what? I am. And he says this, an interesting thing. Bottom of page 44. If we're in we agnostics, the chapter that need not be read, if you're like me.

If a mere code of morals or a better philosophy of life were sufficient to overcome alcoholism, many of us would have recovered long ago. And they said, shift it just a little bit. What if it said, if the mere awareness of the AA principles, or a better recovery program, were sufficient to overcome alcoholism, many of us would have recovered long ago. Oh, I'd been aware of those AA principles. You bet.

I've talked about them. Like the guy said, do you believe in complete immersion in baptism? He said, believe in it? Hell, I've seen it done. No extra charge for that.

I was in the best recovery program I knew about. In the middle of the Pacific group, in Southern California. Big top. Lots of people. If that had been enough, if these principles had been enough, of being in the we're going to meetings all the time.

We're in service all the time. We're in unity all the time. Commitments and calling our sponsors every day and sponsoring other people and going down to whatever, never say no never say no to an AA request. And we didn't. We didn't.

If a better recovery program would have gotten the job done, I would have recovered long ago. It's important to get that. Because what's missing out of that is a relationship is a relationship with God. Because when he tells us, there is a chapter that has a really elusive title to it called There is a Solution. Which is a promise in itself, isn't it?

A title. And what does he say the solution is? Wilson is not easy to read, because he doesn't label what the solution is. But at the end of the chapter, he kinda lays it on you. Because he says here on page 28, if what we have learned and felt and seen means anything at all, it means that all of us, whatever our race, creed, or color, are the children of a living creator with whom we may form a relationship upon simple and understandable terms, as soon as we are willing and honest enough to try.

It's the relationship. On the other page, he says, each individual in the personal story is described in his own language and from his own point of view the way he established his relationship with God. That is the solution. A relationship with God is not enough for the to have the principles. It's not A better recovery program isn't gonna take us home.

We must get in relationship. I had a guy in my office the other day, on Saturday. He describes himself as a Jewish atheist. Whatever that may mean. And this guy has been around a while, 14 and a half years, 14 years 9 months.

He keeps correcting me when I say that. And he's, a very powerful figure in the entertainment industry. He, managed U2 a few years ago. I mean, he has been around and done the deal. He knows where all the bones are buried in Hollywood, and he's quite an interesting character.

Except that he can't manage his life. He can manage you too, but he can't manage his life. And he's desperate. But he's an atheist. And he can't and when the word God comes up, he bristles.

He's okay with spirit of the universe. But if you go to God and it gets personal I said, I got the worst possible news for you. It doesn't matter whether you call it spirit of the universe with which you agree or God that makes you wanna throw up. It doesn't matter. But what matters is that you can't you can't go where you wanna go unless you're willing to be in relationship with some power greater than you.

Relationship is different than knowing about. It's different than believing in. How would you like to ever see a girl that you just wanted to be in relationship with her so so much? Would it satisfy you to know about her? Not really.

Would you like to say, you know, I think I'm in relationship with her because I I believe in Jane. Oh, really? Is that what you really want? That takes you home, does it? Believing in her?

Well, no. I'd like to date her. Oh, it's not enough. It's not enough. Nor is it enough to have a God that's way out there, the one we were taught about when we were kids.

It is not enough. And we get that finally in this chapter, where he is. See, when I thought he was way out there, I it's a little comforting in a sense. Isn't it? Because maybe he won't bother me a lot.

But I'm practicing the absence of God when I'm doing that. And even when I think he's inside me, willing to look at that. Although, I don't know why he would be because I'm not a fit host for God. I think he's in me like a pebble is in a glass of water. Or maybe he's in me on my better days like a raisin is in a bun.

And when you told me that he's inside me like the ocean is in a wave, it made me weep. It made me weep. Because it really describes something much different than I ever imagined. But we start with this in chapter 4, step 2. He says, don't let, on page 47, the first assignment they asked me to read, do not let any prejudice you may have against spiritual terms deter you from honestly asking yourself what they mean to you.

And I didn't ask them why they wanted me to do this, but what they wanted me to do is to take the spiritual terms in chapter 4. Ask God to reset aside my prejudice, which is just prejudging the term, and asked myself what it meant to me. And I said, okay. What are the spiritual terms? They said, use the capitalized terms in the chapter as spiritual terms.

Just assume those are spiritual terms. There's only 18 or 19 of them. Make a list of them. Set aside your prejudice. Just set it aside.

Just let it go. So much is available to us by letting stuff go. Let it go. And ask yourself, under your mind, way down deep in your heart where you really live, in your gut someplace, does this term have any meaning for you? And I found that each of these terms had meaning for me.

As I went farther into the list, I discovered that it was getting more heartfelt and less heady. And I came back to him with my list. And we got a little deeper on some of the stuff that I was heady about. I mean, what does a supreme being mean to me? That's the ultimate in power.

But it's a discrete entity, a being. What is the realm of spirit? Today, I think, is the right side of the page. But that's it. The place, the realm means reality.

I mean, realty. It's this place where God is. Where God is. Power, we know what that is. All powerful guiding creative intelligence.

What is that? Well, it's a power it's an extraordinary supreme being that is not just powerful, but guiding. That suggests that he's in touch with me, if I'm fine with that. Creative intelligence. The most imagine most incredible intelligence that creates all things.

I mean, to go down that list and to get in touch with that, what I really think underneath the crap from the Church of the Air in Billings, Montana, underneath what my mother told me, underneath all the prayers, underneath everything, is a deep awareness in me that I have a sense of what this power is. And when I got that done, they came took me back to the book and they said, at the start, this was all we needed to commence spiritual growth, to affect our first conscious relation with God. And I had a first conscious relation with God as I understood him. And afterward, I found myself accepting many things which seemed entirely out of reach before I started that process. That's just the first exercise in we agnostics.

And I'm on my way. They asked me to assume a reasonable starting point. Make a reasonable assumption on page 48. The reason we believe in electricity is because we have a reasonable assumption as a starting point. And that is there's some connection between that switch and these lights.

What's my reasonable assumption? That a power exists that'll take me beyond this point. That's all I need. That's the next step in the thing. What am I gonna do then?

I'm gonna ask myself, what would sanity look like if it were in my life? And they took me to, the bedevilments on page 52. To this little paragraph that said, we were having trouble with personal relations. We couldn't control our emotional nature. We were prey to misery.

What would each of the and they when they that that was first used as a test for chronic untreated alcoholism. I'm 23 years sober and they said, here's the test. We don't know if you qualify for this program or not, but we're gonna give you a shot. We were having trouble with personal relationships. Is that true for you?

I said, well, you mean just because my girlfriend left me and my partner won't do business with me anymore? Yeah. I guess that's right. We couldn't control our emotional natures. Yeah.

That applied. We were prey to misery. Yeah. Pray to depression. Yeah.

Couldn't make a living. Yeah. Had a feeling of uselessness. Full of fear. Unhappy.

Couldn't seem to be a real help to other people. And they told me, they said, add a 10th category. You're gonna have to get to it sooner or later. Add sane sex life. You got anything like sane sex life going on for you?

I said, no. No. No. I just knew it. Because when there's sexual tension, I just don't really act well.

And so I had to look and see. What would sanity look like in this little area? We were having trouble with personal relationships. What would that look like if God removed the problem? Well, I guess, those relationships would be loving, wouldn't they?

I guess there would be fidelity involved. I guess there would be real respect. I guess I would, if I said, what would what would sanity look like in this area where I can't control my emotional nature? What would that look like? I'd be safe to be around.

See, it's my expression of anger that shames me because it's so inappropriate. Is it about not ever being angry again? No. Is it about expressing it cleanly and appropriately? Yes.

Yes. It's that. It's that. Is it what about we were a prey to misery, a victim to misery. What would sanity look like?

I'd have an ongoing sense of well-being. What about depression? I think the opposite of depression is expression. I would say it. I wouldn't just jam it down.

I would say it. I wouldn't just jam it down. That's what sanity would look like. Just in that area. This is not rocket science.

We couldn't make a living. What would that look like, that area in my life with sanity in it? Well, I guess, number 1, I would have abundance in my life. I would share it with others. It would come in easily.

My creditors would be real happy with me. That. That. Had a feeling of useless. And I would be useful, and I would be aware of it.

Full of fear. I would be full of love. We were unhappy, I would be happy. Couldn't seem to be a real help to other people, I would be useful to other people. Same sex life, I would have relationships that really were respectful and mutually satisfying.

And have fidelity and commitment. And keep my agreements. I mean, it's not a mystery. When, if you write down the 20 craziest things you ever did, just look at how it really you wanted it to go. And it gives you another shot at it.

It's one of the craziest things I ever did. I slapped a child. Oh, god. I could tell you that the the terrible sense of failure and insanity that I had as I looked on the face of that child, how that look on that child's face is insane. And what would sanity look like?

That kid would be loving me, and I'd be loving him. That's sanity. No strings attached. Just loving. And we know that.

And we wanna go there. And we have to define it. And they made me a remarkable promise. And it's a promise that turned out to be a good one. Because they said, if at step 2, you can see what we're looking for is a vision of sanity.

At step 10, it says it's every day we carry the vision of god's will into all of our activities. Now that's our vision of God's will. We're never gonna know God's will for us, but we can have a vision of that, and we need a vision of that. And they said if you can form a vision of sanity at step 2 and do the rest of the steps very thoroughly, by the time you get to step 10, you'll have no more and no less in your life than the vision that you formed at step 2. And I signed on.

I like the promise. I said, that's the way that it is. We're going someplace. We're going someplace. This is a journey.

You know what a journey is in the dictionary? A day's trip. And it is a trip. Yeah. Broad highway.

We're moving. We're on our way. Alright. So that's it. And I formed a vision of sanity.

And then, I had something else that they wanted me to do. They asked me the most the weirdest question. They said, and we're going through the book line by line, but the exercises are what I'm describing. Now, is God everything or nothing? Is that a rude question?

Well, I know he's not nothing. But everything, I don't think he's everything that he's cracked up to be. You know, I'm always into the middle road. I know that my choices are pretty clear. I can either, as it says on page 25, go on to the bitter end blotting out the consciousness of my intolerable situation as best I could.

And I was doing that at 23 years of sobriety. Going on to the bitter end blotting out the consciousness of our intolerable situation as best we could. And my other choice, to accept spiritual help. Why am I looking for the middle ground? Because I don't have control on the other 2 that are available to me.

If I accept spiritual help, I'm out of control. If I'm going on to the bitter end, blotting out the tolerable condition I'm in, I'm out of control. It's like when we're new. I could crawl around on the floor of the garage barking like a fox, or I can I'm afraid if I do anything else, God will send me to China. Either way, I don't have any control.

My ego is not happy with that. And so I'm looking for middle ground. I'm looking for middle ground. I knew I should accept spiritual help, but I what's my middle ground? Go to lots of meetings.

Are they important? Yes. Am I glad I went to lots of meetings? Yes. Do I still go to lots of meetings?

Yes. Does it take me to a point where I'm willing to accept spiritual help? No. Not automatically. What will I do?

Where's my middle ground? You know what? It gets pretty subtle. My middle ground goes like this. I don't want to actually accept middle accept spiritual help, but I will ask for it.

Is that cute? I'm in there praying, asking for spiritual help. Oh, God. Help me get over my self obsession. The phone rings.

Somebody says, can you help me? No. Not now. I'm busy praying for Take the middle ground. Take the middle ground.

It's perfect. So the middle ground is God everything or nothing. And they said and I said, you know, I'm just stuck. I just can't get past that question. And these guys were kind and they knew I'd had a college education, so they took special care of me.

Here's how it goes. Here's the question. What five things will you not give up for a better relationship with God? Is that rude? Well, I've got 5 things.

Let's say, let's start here with sex. Let's start here with, control. Let's start here with greed. That old greed and groin combination, always a favorite of mine. Sounds like a restaurant, doesn't it?

Let's go down to the greed and groin and have a steak. Here's one I like. One of my favorites is anger. Here's another one I'm happy with, rage. Why?

Keeps them away. Keeps them it gives me the illusion of control. Here's another one I like, it's career. And my all time personal favorite is image. In those days, each of those those were 2, 4, 6, 7.

I think I had about 7 on my list. Each of these things was more important to me than a better relationship with God. Isn't that great? Isn't that wonderful? Down here, I'll put b r w g, better relationship with God, was at the bottom of this list.

And if you go home and you take a look at this, you come up with your own list, whatever it is. But now at least we know the answer to the question, is God everything or nothing? Neither one. This is everything, And God's at the bottom of the list of everything. Number 8 on the list of 8.

You gotta know where you're playing with this. And yet we're finding the the wisdom of the ages. Remember when he said, thou shalt have no other gods before me? There they are. He came down from the mountaintop with those tablets and he said, I got good news and I got bad news.

Moses said that. And he said, well, what's the good news? He said, well, I got him down to 10. What's the bad news? Adultery is still on the list.

There's no extra charge for this. Or said another way, where am I going for power? I'm going here. This is my power. My attempt to get power comes from sex or control or greed or anger or rage, my career, my image.

So now I'm getting a little whack at the answer. This is how I've been playing it. I I won't go here until I've tried every one of these things. And then I don't really want a relationship. I just want a line of credit on the power.

I'll write I'll write the check. Thanks. I'll spend it the way I wanna spend it. That's the way I play the game. And that's the answer to the question, it's got everything or nothing.

And the solution to the question is not anything less than having a better relationship with God, the most important thing in my life. More important than any of these things. Does it mean it's time for all these things to leave my life? No. No.

No. No. No. No. I don't want my career to go out of my life.

I don't want sex to go out of my life. Sometimes anger can be useful. I don't want those things out of my life, any of them. They don't have to go out of my life. But they better be less important in a better relationship with God or I don't dare take that third step prayer because when I say, relieve me of the bondage of self, that's the bondage of self.

That's it. That's it. And so the technique they gave me was very easy. You look at this list at night. You ask God to take you to a place where you're gladly ready to have these items less important to you than a better relationship And I looked.

And the first thing I was willing And I looked, and the first thing I was willing to say is less important was rage. I don't remember what order they came in, but it was within 2 weeks, everything was down below the line or said another way. A better relationship with God was at the top. And we're still in step 2. We're still in this remarkable chapter I never read because the title's bad.

And then we'll take a break, and when we come back, I wanna talk to you about the last piece. This is very critical here. In fact, I was going through this with another guy, as, I do. And Jim, was writing his list and I decided I would write my list again. And I've I discovered the damnedest thing, and this was about 4 months ago.

I discovered there is something that's more important to me than a better relationship with God. That day I was right in that list, and that is my re reputation as being really good with taking people through the steps. Once I put a virtue on it, I'm just dead meat. You know? And I had to go through this process again.

It just sneaks in there. But once you kinda wake up a little bit once you kinda wake up a little bit, things begin to shift. And so when we come back, we're gonna talk about that last piece and we're gonna talk about waking up. Okay. Here we go for the last session this morning.

Shall we do it together or am I gonna do a solo flight? I there may not be any real point in finishing it alone. Anybody here ever, hear about a guy or listen to any tapes by Anthony de Mello? He's, he talks about waking up. Says we have to wake up.

We don't wanna wake up. Or we think we're awake and don't need to wake up. And he told an interesting story one day about a guy that was, under a bridge in London on the River Thames. And he was, just settling in for the night, getting, his newspaper around him and foggy, cold, rainy night. He had his newspaper and an old blanket, and he was settling in for the night, and he fell asleep there by the river, under the bridge.

Began to dream. And in his dream, a big limousine pulled up. Beautiful woman got out of the limousine, marched over to where he lay there on the concrete, and said, what are you doing here? My good man, what are you doing here? And he said, I live here.

This is where I stay. She said, you mean you're gonna stay here all night? He said, I always do. She said, you mean you're you don't have any place you can go? He said, no.

I haven't had for some time. She said, well, tonight, for once in your life, I'm gonna have my man take you out to my my estate at the edge of London. You're gonna get clean clothing. You're gonna get a bed. You're gonna get warm food.

You're gonna get new, shave and a shower. And you're gonna have, at least once in your life, a comfortable night. And tomorrow, when you wake up, we're gonna feed you some more and give you the clothes you really need and send you on your way. But at least one night, you'll have a wonderful, wonderful experience. And she did exactly that.

She had her man take him out to the state at the edge of London, and this guy could not believe his good fortune. And they gave him exactly what she had promised that they would give him. And put him into a clean bed in a nice little room, not like this room that Gary and I have with the Jacuzzi and everything in it. But still, it was a nice room. About midnight, she couldn't sleep.

Beautiful woman. And she got up and put on a little wrap, a little silk wrap, and started walking around this large estate of hers, and ultimately walked down the servant's wing, and saw a light coming under the door. And she knew he was in that room. And she knocked on the door. And he said, come in.

And she opened the door and he's laying in bed. And she said, how are you doing? And he said, oh my God. I'm doing wonderful. I'm just really doing beautifully.

And she said, did you get some food? He said, yes. They gave me marvelous food. I see you got a shave and a shower. He said, yes, I did.

You got some clean clothes for tomorrow? Yeah. They fixed me up. They did exactly what, And now, I have this wonderful, warm bed. And she said, well, I was a little restless and I woke up and I wondered, would you like some company tonight?

And she said, he said, yes. Yeah. She stepped into the room and closed the door behind her, this gorgeous lady, and started to take a few steps over to the bed that he was in. And he moved over to make room for her on the bed. And when he moved over, he fell into the River Thames.

I mean, we hate to wake up. Right? We really don't want to wake up. We would rather use our little substitutes for a sense of being alive. And we don't want to really get this business about whether God is everything or nothing.

We don't really believe we have other things first or that we can possibly rearrange that, that it's really safe. The question that comes to every one of us, every one of us, is what'll happen to me if I leap into the abyss? And right underneath that question is what will happen to me if I don't leap into the abyss? We think that leap is so unsafe. We were, laughing the other day because somebody had reported some testing they did during the Vietnam War about airborne troops, green troops that were, in combat zones and airborne troops.

And seasoned troops were tested. And they were tested by putting electrodes on them as they were on their way to the drop zone. These guys would be operating autonomically at a certain level with their heartbeat and their respiration and their pulse and their temperature. Blood pressure, all that stuff. And, they'd be sitting there with their rifle between their knees, and, then the jump master gets everybody on their feet, and everybody's autonomic nervous system responses increase.

Blood pressure goes up, pulse goes up. Boom boom. Mama. Then they turn toward the door. And then they begin to shuffle toward the door.

And they hook that static line to the overhead line and they begin to boom boom boom boom. And everything is going up. And by the time they get to the door and the jump master master pops them on the headgear and they go out the door, they are amped up really good. And all the way down. The seasoned troops had a completely different reaction to it.

The new troops felt that it was dangerous to go out that door. The seasoned troops didn't change much at all. You know, when their, autonomic nervous system impulses began to speed up was when they were very close to the ground because they knew the jump is safe. It's that stop that'll get you into trouble if anything does. But the green troops didn't know that.

The new guys didn't know that. And we're in the same position. People that have made the leap know the leap is safe. That it's a groundless leap. We're that our fears are groundless.

But the interesting thing about this program is that it never asks us for blind faith. Never asks us for blind faith. If, it asks us for belief, and it asks us for faith, but we know those. We have that inside us. Look that word belief up in the dictionary, it means an expectancy.

That's all. And we had belief in booze. Didn't we? 2nd, 3rd, 4th time out, we have a belief in it. We expect it to do something for us.

And it does until it doesn't. But we also have faith. Faith is a confident trust born of experience. A confident trust born of experience. Did you ever buy a bottle and you couldn't drink it right then?

And you locked it in the glove compartment and you felt better? That's faith. I remember going into the University of Oregon, student, health center. They gave you a prescription of dexamil. Didn't ask any question.

Boom. Here you are. And it's just a piece of paper and I put it in my pocket and I that's better. That's better. Hi.

Let me open that door for you. Hello. You're so gracious. That's faith. That's faith.

We have that. But we've always had faith in what? Our mind? Our stuff? Our anger.

I have faith in my rage. I have faith in sex, control, greed. Why? Because I get an illusion of power out of all these things. I believe in this stuff.

I have an expectancy about it. It isn't mysterious. But we come equipped with these things. And so the leap we've made the leap many times in many arenas. This is not new.

I think drinking is a good I think alcoholic, knee walking, snot flying drunk is such good training for AA. You gotta get totally involved in it. It's a day at a time. It takes you places you cannot go any other way. It's perfect training.

And yet, we kinda back away from this one. Because we wanna explore all these other things first. And we can do that. We can do that. Doesn't take us where we wanna go, but there it is.

So the question is, is God everything or nothing? And we wanna get to a point where we can say there is nothing in my life that's more important to me than a better relationship with God. We want to get to our a point where we can say, that's where I'll go first for my power. Now do I go there first for my power? Not every time.

Not every time. No. Do I get lustful thoughts and fantasies? Sure. Do I try to go there for power?

Sure. Do I go there do I get angry and try to go there for power? Not so much. You know what my Achilles tendon? My Achilles heel is lust.

I don't know what yours is. Some guys have greed. Some guys have control. Some guys but we all have one. We all have one.

But on balance, I start out my day, as I told you last night, in wanting to come down a completely different path. For a lot of reasons. 1, I'm happier that way. Number 2, I love the way my wife smiles at me when she feels secure and served. Did you know that the women we are with have psychic knowledge about us?

We wonder how they know what they know. You come home exactly when you say you're going to come home, but you've been at the wrong place before you got there, and they say they got a little neuron that fires. We see the color green. The green neuron fires. We go, oh, that's green.

We see her, oh, that's Linda. Oh, this neuron. They got a neuron that fires that says, I don't know what's up, but something's up neuron. That neuron drives us crazy. Or normal, depending on where we are.

Now, the last thing and this is not like you can't sit here and go here. This is, these exercises in chapter 4, the chapter I never read because of the bad title, are exercises that take you can spend a month, 1 on 1, with another guy getting through there. Is it worth the cab fare? You bet it is. You bet it is.

And if you're taking somebody through the steps and going through these exercises, it takes a little bit. Is it worth it? Yeah. Yeah. That's the deal.

That's the deal. And the last question that we want to ask is, and and will vintage Wilson on page 45, he says, but the point is to find a power that we can use, that we can tap into. And then he says, but where and how are we gonna find this power? And then he answers those questions on page 55, as you know. And how are we gonna find the power?

What does he say about that on page 55? Sometimes we had to search fearlessly. That's how. That's how we find it. It.

Where are we going to find it? The great reality is deep down within us. Deep within us. That's the great reality. In other words, it is inside me, like the ocean is in a wave.

Which means that we are not separate from each other or from God. He's inside me. Where is the center of God? Right there and right there and right there and right here. It's spirit.

And it's who we are. And there is a place in me where my divinity meets the divinity of the universe. It's just who we are. And I can't tell you how hard I fought that simple idea because, for one thing, I did not think I'm a worthy host. Why would God take up residence in me?

And another thing is, I don't really want this relationship with God. I'd just as soon he'd not even notice me. My mother used to say, what will you do when you meet your maker? I don't know. Apologize, I guess?

I don't know. Hey, sorry. Look. If she were here today and asked me, what will you do when you meet your maker? I could tell her, we already met.