The 26th annual Tumbleweed Conference in Hobbs, NM

Now the girl at the desk was surprised when I asked for the thong. My name's Jay and I'm an alcoholic. God's doing for me tonight what I couldn't do for myself because it's, you know, quarter to 8 on a Friday evening, and I haven't had anything to drink all day long, which for an alcoholic of my variety is quite amazing. Could I see the hands of all the people that have been at all 26 of these tumbleweed things? Yeah, baby.

Thank you. Thank you. And, how many folks here in their first, couple years of sobriety? Outstanding. Now, I bring you greetings from the left coast of the United States of America.

Your brothers and sisters out there that are working this thing just the same way that you are. And I've had the privilege to be in a lot of meetings in a lot of different places and be with a lot of folks. And tonight, you know, there are literally millions of men and women in places like West Africa and places like, Chile that are getting together in twos and threes and fives, and they're not drinking just the same way as we are here tonight. But we get to be heir to this tradition of coming together in these large groups, and it's a wonderful thing and they you know, you bring some lame trick in to tell a little story, and I'm here with you today because I'm I'm just an alcoholic that, that's found a a release from that terrible affliction with which I was cursed. Tomorrow, I'm not gonna go into any of the history stuff tonight.

I I have the privilege of of you know, not I'm gonna tell you my story, but tomorrow, I'm gonna have the opportunity I like to call it about telling our story, a little bit about the history of Alcoholics Anonymous and where it is that we come from. See, I bring you greetings from my fabulous wife, Adele. Adele's got 17 years sober. I bring you you don't have to worry about clapping because alcoholism gallops in my family. It don't run.

I bring you, I bring you greetings from my my brother-in-law, Gregory, who's got 20 2 years of sobriety, and his wife, Regina, who's gonna have 20 years in another couple of months. They live in Las Vegas, Nevada, and they're part of the double digit group that meets the Salvation Army. So if you're ever in Las Vegas, go by and see my sister Regina. My home group's the, Hermosa Beach men's stag. We meet on Monday nights in Hermosa Beach, California.

And if you're there on Thursday night, I'd like to, invite you to the 11 step meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous in Manhattan Beach, and, it's a mixed meeting, and it's the greatest meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous in the world. And if you don't believe your meeting's the greatest meeting in the world, don't come and mess mine up. Let's see. I bring you, I bring you greetings from my mother, who's been a member of the Al Anon family groups for 22 years. Anybody here, a member of the Al Anon Family Groups?

Alright. I bring you greetings. Yeah. I bring you greetings from the steps of recovery meeting. We meet on Tuesdays at noon in Manhattan Beach, Let's see.

So that's, that's the sobriety side. All those folks have been sober, including myself, and I came to you on the on the second day of May in 1979. And although I found it necessary on a lot of occasions, I haven't taken the front drink, sniffed any glue, or done any of those other things that I found to be so consoling. And all of us have been sober from our first meeting in Alcoholics Anonymous. So if you're here for your first pass, just realize that relapse does not have to be part of recovery.

Now now now we all have our own stories and, you know, we all have our own stories and no story is better than another because it's all about our own personal sobriety. But, you know, just if you're sitting out there wondering when your slip's gonna come, don't worry. There are other people who'll take it for you. So I also, in my family, I'm kinda big on this not drinking thing. My brother-in-law Douglas died of cirrhosis of the liver 4 years ago.

My stepmother Marsha died of cirrhosis of the liver 3 years ago. My father died of complications of alcohol, is in about two and a half years ago. And then I've got one other sibling, my, my sister Maria. She's one of those girls that dates poorly and marries worse. And she's currently up in the mountains around Crested Butte, Colorado.

She's not a street person because there aren't any streets where she's at. Country living at its best. So, anyway, that's kinda why I'm here. It's the the Stinnett family, we have alcoholism in it, and it kills. Now, I was born in El Segundo, California, which if you need a reason to drink, is as good as any.

It's kind of like El Paso on the Pacific. On one side of the on one side of the the town is the Los Angeles International Airport, and then on the east side of the town is the Northrop Defense Contractor. And on the south side of the town is the, 2nd Chevron Oil Refinery, once the town got its name, El Segundo. And then on the little patch of beach in between the town and the Pacific Ocean is the waste treatment plant for the entire county of Los Angeles. So toxicity is just a way of life, you know.

You wanna get right with your environment. And, and so I was I was born there and, you know, for all my family's weirdness, my, my folks, they fed me, they clothed me, they taught me to read when I was really, really young, they taught me good table manners. They introduced me to God as they understood God. And I will be forever grateful for those gifts that they gave me because no matter how far down I went, I had some tools to climb back up. I'm I'm deeply, deeply grateful for that.

I was the short kid in school. You remember the short kid? I can't throw the ball as far. I can't run as fast. But I found something when I was 12 years old that I could do better than guys that are bigger and tougher and stronger than me, and that's metabolize beverage alcohol.

Obviously, this is a gift from God. And, you know, when you find that you have an innate talent, you do what you can to bring it along. Now, you know, when you're a short alcoholic, it's kinda difficult to get everything you need to drink, but fortunately, there's a lot of things available, and so you augment, you do whatever is necessary. And But I didn't realize that what I had was I had alcoholism. I didn't realize it.

That what I have is I'm part of a a of a very interesting set of people. It's about 10% of the population that when I put alcohol into me, it does stuff to me that it doesn't do to 90% of the population. Example, by the time I'm 15 years old, my idea of a good time is to eat a rack of reds, which was a second all, a high powered sedative hypnotics, and to wash it down with a quart of spinata wine. Now in 90% of the population, when they do this behavior, what happens is that physiologically, it's called synergistic effects. The drugs and the alcohol mix together, the brain starts to shut down, people actually forget how to breathe and they die.

Okay? With me, I'm looking for car keys and to make short term romantic commitments. So I have an allergy of the body. When when I put alcohol into me, it does things that it doesn't do to most people. Another manifestation of this disease that I have, this alcoholism, is that I'm able to operate my body with no knowledge of what's going on.

This is called a blackout. If you've woken up with a life form with which you were unfamiliar when you left the house this morning and you've been drinking that day, you might wanna take a look at how physically or logically alcohol is working in your life. Now some of my Al Anon friends say that they've gotten there without any booze whatsoever, but, you know, that is a special subset. So I don't know that that, that what I've got is I've got alcoholism, which is a fatal, progressive, physical malady. And then it manifests itself in a couple different ways.

First, there's a physical allergy. When I start to drink, I get this what what's called the phenomenon of craving. And this problem has been with men, you know, from the beginning of time. In fact, the Chinese have a great proverb of it. And it's the man takes a drink, and then the drink takes a drink, and then the drink takes a man.

And I don't know that that's what's going on with me. The other part of this disease that I have, this alcoholism, is I have an obsession of the mind. Now I think that what I am is an enthusiastic young man that's really looking for a good time in this life. But what happens is is that my mind starts, and I've got this I've got a mind. I've got a brain where I actually believe that if I think it, I'm supposed to do it.

That's rather odd. Example. This is the way the obsession would work with me. That'd be. We're not drinking.

We're not having any fun. Look at all these lambs here. They're not having any fun either. We should just get the heck out of here and go have some fun. We should be drinking.

We should be drinking. Now we're not drinking. We should be drinking now. And it's like the middle of second period, and I'm in 11th grade. I mean, in Alcoholics Anonymous, there's a couple different kinds of stories you hear.

There's the has beens. These are men and women who've had wonderful careers, fabulous marriages, incredible opportunities, and they start to drink and the drink takes them and it gradually grinds them down and they start to drink at noon, and then they end up drinking wine in the alley in the morning. And then there are the never was's. We start out drinking wine in the alley in the morning, and we never go anywhere. And, any morning drinkers here?

Yeah, baby. Yeah, baby. So I've got this wine, so what do I do? I bolt. I go have it.

And the minute I have that drink, that shuts up because I'm obviously doing what it is that I've been created to do, which is to have a good time. Now what starts to happen is that I've got this I've got this physical allergy. I got this phenomenon of craving going. I got this obsession of the mind and it starts to get in the way of human relationships. This is, the soul sickness.

And the soul sickness manifests itself in this way for me, is that no matter what our relationship is, be you my lover, be you my friend, be you my employer, be you a family member. Be you anybody that I care about. At some point, you and I are gonna agree on something it is that we're gonna do together, And I'm going to not show up. And you're gonna be disappointed in me. And I'm gonna I'm gonna compromise everything that it is that I believe in, and I don't know why that is.

See, I think what I am is I'm a bad guy getting what I deserve. I don't know that what I am is I'm alcoholic. Did you ever have this happen to you? You come home and they've changed the locks. You know, you try the key for about 20 minutes, and they've got the alcoholic luggage waiting for you, 2 hefty bags with all your worldly possessions in it.

And, and so what do you do? You knock on the door. Right? They ain't opening, so you knock some more. Neighbors start to get up a little bit, so they finally open the door.

And they're standing there and they're crying. Go on, where have you been? And I don't know about you, but when I drink, I get very literal. I said, I said I'd be home at 4:30. They said, that was Tuesday afternoon.

This is Thursday morning. Where have you been? Well, I've been busy. Doing what? And I don't know how to explain it.

I don't know. Because I don't know about the disease of alcoholism. All I know is is that Tuesday I got off work, I went and had a few pops with the boys, we started drinking through the evening, The bar closed. We went to an after hours joint. We drank port wine until 6 o'clock in the morning at a bar.

Then we went and opened a bar so we could get a real drink. Right? Pushed a little food around on a plate, got some of that Peruvian marching powder, drank all through the night and into the morning, and I'm home. She says, you don't love me. Get the hell out of here.

And I stand there and I go, no. I do love you. If you loved me, you would have been home. You knew that my mother was coming over this evening, and you couldn't even show up for her. Get the hell out of here.

We don't want you around here anymore. What is that? I thought it was a moral weakness. I didn't know that it was alcoholism. Physiological reaction.

The man took a drink, the drink takes a drink, and then the drink takes the man. Now does this happen every time? No. But it happens just often enough that I can't keep anything going. I can pull it together for about a 3, 5 month period, and then it all runs out between my fingers again.

Did you ever have this happen to you? They look at you and they say, no drinking at work. And no drinking before you come into work either. Now I don't know about you guys, but I hate to pay retail. So my idea of an ideal career path is to tend barre preferably during the day so I'm available for the evening's activities.

And, the the the guy looks at me and says no drink okay. No drinking. No drinking. No problem. So I go out and I have a few pops.

Right? And I get home early. Now everybody here knows what early is, don't you? 1:45 AM. If I'm in before last call, I'm home early, right?

And so I get home early, and then I I I lay down for a little while because I'm a little weary from the evening's activities. And I'd pop up about 4 o'clock in the morning. Fortunately, in those days, I had good sponsorship. I had men who cared about me that told me what you do is you keep a a beer next to the bed iced so that when you pop up because some of the alcohols the depressant alcohols wash through you and you come up, drink the beer down, and you can go back down for another couple hours. Excellent.

Excellent advice. And then I get up at 6 o'clock in the morning and start to get ready for work. And I have a few beers because I have to have a few beers before I get on the bus and you guys all know why it is that I'm taking public transportation, you know, because I can't afford another lawyer. I can't afford another ticket. I can't afford the, the, the driving under the influence, the insurance, all that stuff.

I had a judge one time look at me and he said, mister Stenant, you blew a 0.28. Don't you think that's a little excessive? And I looked him dead in the eye and I said, your honor, I'm a bartender. There should be some kind of sliding professional scale. You can't judge me about these lanes, you know.

I mean, come on. You didn't find that funny. Thank God it was 19, 76 and not 2,006. But, so okay. I I I so I get on the bus and I go downtown and you guys all know why I'm going downtown because the only kind of saloon that's gonna hire a guy like me is downtown.

And, and then I start and have another couple beers on the way in and I come into work and my tongue's just a little thick. And they look at me and they go, what the hell is wrong with you? Didn't we just talk about this yesterday? You said you weren't going to have anything to drink. And I look him dead in the eye and I say, I have not been drinking because I know, like you know, that beer is not drinking.

Right? It's a food. Right? At the very least, it's a beverage. It is not drinking.

See, my alcoholic life was the only one that made sense to me. And I don't understand You know, it's like people would say that drinking beer is drinking. Those are the same people that will try and tell you that smoking marijuana is doing drugs. No. It's what you do in between.

You know, it's green. It's from God. You know? And and so they here's your paycheck. Get the hell out of here.

We don't want anything to do with you. You'd rather drink than than work for us. Every relationship in my life, that's what had happened. And I reached the point that I was, I was living in my pinto. I wasn't homeless.

It was my outdoorsman phase. And, I got arrested one more time for driving under the influence, and, and, the guy was really nice to me. He gave me the geography quiz. Do you know what town you're in? And it was like 10:30 in the morning and I didn't know.

And it was San Jose, California, which is a fairly large metropolitan area. You should know if you're in San Jose and I didn't. And, so one more time anyway, I over at Vodka Rocks that afternoon, with my father, he said to me, do you think you have the disease? And I said and then the still small voice inside me said, pay really close attention. Maybe you'll get the lawyer paid for.

So it appeared to be in my best interest to follow the still small voice. So I said, well, I don't know. And he said, well, I tell you what, you can stay at my my mom's house, my grandmother Marie who's 96 years old who sends you her greetings and love. And, she she said you can stay with me and he said I want you to call this buddy of mine. So I called this guy up and he says meet me at the Howard Johnson's in Culver City, 7:30 tomorrow morning.

Don't have anything to drink. How did he know? So I go go over there and I sit down with this guy and he starts talking about himself and talking about himself and talking about himself. He had these problems in life. And he met Alcoholics Anonymous and everything got better and he's talking about himself and he's talking about himself.

But 45 minutes into this, I realized that this guy is gonna talk forever. And he's not even close to closing me, so I figure I'll prompt him. Do I need psychiatric treatment? Do I need religion? Do I require hospitalization?

And he looked at me and he said, well, Trick, he said, a hospital program will cost about $3. He said if you can get your hands on $3,000, go out and drink that money up. And when you're done, call Alcoholics Anonymous. They do it for fun and for free. Well, I don't know about you guys but I've been surrounded by caring nurturers of late and nobody had ever said what it is you do if you can get your hands on $3, of course, you go out and drink the money up.

And then you plan your next move. Right? Well, this guy said it out loud. And he said, if you wanna find AA, it's in the white pages of the phone book, I suggest you call him up. And I, I went home to my grandmother's house and I've poured myself a water glass full of Davies County old fashioned Kentucky bourbon with 3 ice cubes and I drank it down and I called Alcoholics Anonymous.

And, you know, this is Alcoholics Anonymous, and and we know each other far too well here. This is Alcoholics Anonymous. We don't shoot our wounded. But, you know, this man, he he saved my life, this man. And I wondered later why it was that he didn't take me to a meeting.

But see, he'd had 10 years sober in Alcoholics Anonymous and he'd had 15 years sober in Alcoholics Anonymous. And that was on the 2nd day of May in 1979 and he was not an AA member at that day nor was he for the rest of his life. But he took the time. It's the message. It's not the messenger.

It's the message. It's not the messenger. Because we all will have our times. We will all have our troubles. And this is Alcoholics Anonymous and we need to hang with each other.

Just a little opinion. So I went to I I I I called up and I went down to a noon meeting at the old Manhattan Beach Club in Manhattan Beach, California. And one of the things that we learned there on the left coast is that we're supposed to do the whole program of Alcoholics Anonymous and that the 11th step is not extra credit. And it's not prayer occasionally, but it's prayer and medication in order to get relief from this disease, this thing that I have, this alcoholism. And I walked up these 12 steps into my first meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous, and everybody started talking at me.

And I couldn't understand why they were talking at me. But when I, when I'm drinking, my hair gets long, and I kinda look like the sphinx. And, and my hands were shaking really bad. I hadn't had enough to drink it. I was starting to get the zeps ups.

And, and the 3rd guy that talked to me was a guy by the name of Butcher Joe. You can always tell Butcher Joe. Right? And Butcher Joe talked about when the family left, how he was crying the big crocodile tears and inside he was going, yes. Now we can drink and there won't be anybody to bother us.

I understood that. And he talked about knowing just how deeply to cut himself at work that they'd have to take him to the hospital. They couldn't just do a little stitch there so that he could get a little drink on the way. And I understand that. See, I'm a geek.

I'm not talking about some computer techie. I eat glass on a bet in order to get the money that I need to drink when I don't have money to drink. That's what booze means to me. And this man looked me dead in the eye, and he said, you don't ever have to feel the way that you feel about yourself this moment ever again. And I bought the package.

I bought the package right there and then. I believed that he had felt how I felt and he told me that he didn't feel that way anymore. So what I'd like to do right now is I'd like for just one minute to ask you guys to close your eyes, and I want you to just think about that room that you came into. We'll do a little guided meditation. Think about the first meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous that you came into.

Go around the room. See where they're sitting. Remember how kindly they greeted you. There was Butcher Joe and there was China Joe and there was Smilin' Pete and there was Joyce who'd just gotten out of the nuthouse, and she hadn't had anything to drink on the way. There was Gordon Ballinger who was wearing a powder blue leisure suit, and that in my first day as I tried to make conversation and I asked him, what do you do?

You know, like, as a job. And he said I, you know, I said, what do you do? And he looked at me and he said, I don't drink, and I go to meetings. And these people went around the room, and what they did is they invited me into their lives. They told me about the pain.

They told me about the powerlessness that they felt and that they were not that way anymore. After that meeting, some guys took me down to the beach to explain the program Alcoholics Anonymous to me. They said, this is a AI kid. We don't use no dope here. I was horrified.

But see, at that meeting, what had happened is I'd identified myself as an alcoholic by the way these people talked about themselves. And they said that it was that you had to stay away from the front drink. It was the first drink that got you. And that they knew lots of people back in the back in the sixties and the early seventies that had gone to what they called primary purpose meetings. And these people were more spiritual and tougher and smarter, and they were able to do other substances and and and not drink.

But nobody could stay sober for more than 2 or 3 years. Nobody could stay away from the front drink for more than 2 or 3 years. And they told me that if I smoke some of that non habit forming marijuana, that sooner or later I'd wanna cut the cotton mouth. Right? And you guys all know how you do that.

Right? You have a few beers. And, they said if I did any of that Peruvian marching powder, the double Bombay on the rocks with a twist, just to take the edge off, you know, they'd be taking the edge off. It wouldn't be drinking. And if I was being spiritual and doing a little of that LSD, you need about a gallon of wine in order to look at the sun that long.

To settle through the experience, they told me that that was drinking. They told me that I couldn't use NyQuil. How did they know? I don't know about you down here in Hobbs, but I've been stuck in places like Idaho on a Sunday back in the day when they weren't selling no booze. Oh, thank heaven for 711.

Come on, honey. We'll just pretend it's creme de menthe on the rocks. But it'll get you through. It'll get you and they they said that I had to stay away from alcohol in any form, what so ever. They said that the drug bone was connected to the drink bone.

And if you're one of those addicts, it goes the other way too. And they said that I couldn't use alcohol in any form whatsoever. You know why they call it nonalcoholic beer? Because it's not for alcoholics. If you're drinking that crap, knock it off.

You might kill somebody. In our book, Silkworth says the only thing that we've got is complete abstinence from alcohol in any form whatsoever. Is there any question about something that has alcohol in the label and whether or not we as members of Alcoholics Anonymous can drink it. You know, you may think that I'm a I'm not this lame that's come in from Los Angeles to spoil your fun. What it is that I'm here to do is share my experience, strength, and hope.

And my experience is being at the funeral when the wife or the mother looks at you and they say, he was with you. We thought he was okay. And you can't say to him, he was doing it his way. He started out having a couple of those and then he was drinking a case of it a day, trying to tell us that he was sober. Just an opinion.

So I came in on a Wednesday noon and, went to a couple meetings on Wednesday and a couple on Thursday and a couple on Friday and and Friday night, I I almost drank. I walked into the Alcoholics Anonymous dance. I realized I was 24 years old. I was never gonna get laid again in my life. I went back out to the car I was living and started driving towards the Stickenstein.

Now I wasn't going to the Stickenstein to drink. I was just going to find a woman who understands. And on the way, the miracle of Alcoholics Anonymous happened to me, I'd only been to 5 meetings, and the the the still small voice inside of me said, this is not a good idea. Turn the car around. Now I've heard that still small voice all of my life.

All of my life. And every time I heard it, it always sounded like somebody with, like, thin blue lips that was trying to limit the amount of fun that I could have in a day. And so I always turned around and did exactly what I wanted to do. And what that does is it ends you up in Alcoholics Anonymous at a young age. But this time, what I did is I turned the car around and I went back to the, to the Alano Club to Larry and Larry Guerrero was working the hinge and he got me a copy of the book, Alcoholics Anonymous, because I'd been too busy to get one those first few days.

And he I didn't wanna look like an obvious rookie, right, walking around with oh, Nick, it's Bible. And I, and he got me a copy of the book and he sent me home and I started reading it. And I got hooked in the book in the doctor's opinion where Silkworth talks about the sense of ease and comfort that comes after having a few drinks. Now that's not the way that I describe it. But, you know, all this Alcoholics the instead of the sense of ease and comfort, I'd say, remember when the third one stays down and you can light your own cigarette, and you can use your whole lung capacity.

They knew. And I kept reading and and I got into Bill's story and I was not interested in World War 1 or the stock market crash. I wanted I wanted something contemporary, something that spoke to me, something disco. Can you imagine how horrible it was getting sober wearing that gear? There were meetings on the west side of Los Angeles where you needed 3 gold chains just to get in the door.

Thank God we don't do what the newcomer wants. And and but I kept reading, And I got into we agnostics, which if you're in day these people at the meeting, they told me that this was the last time I ever had to withdraw from alcohol. It was too outlandish. Because I couldn't stay out of jail, and I'm not talking about jail. I'm talking about jail.

Drunk driving, drunk in auto, drunk in public, public napping, you know, all those high flying crimes. And and they told me it was you know, and and you can't get enough to drink, and it gets real messy. And they told me that I never had to withdraw from alcohol, and I bet my life on it. I bet my life on it, and it's here. It's with you.

I've never had to withdraw from I haven't been to jail in 27 and a half years. Not a big deal to you. I couldn't stay out every 3 months, 4 months, no matter what. It was pitiful. And in we agnostics, there's a story of the preacher's son.

And in it, there's a line and it says, who are you to say that there is no God? And in the classic language, I was convicted. And I did the same thing that that guy did. I got down on my knees, and I said my prayer. And my prayer was, I don't know if from Jesus or Buddha.

I don't know from the Talmud, the Torah, the Upanishads. Just get me the top. I said, I'll do whatever these dried up old geeks say to do. Just please help me not to drink. And I believe at that moment, I'd done the first three steps.

The prayer worked perfectly. I'm with you. I went to a noon meeting the next day. I got there at 10 o'clock except it was when the club opened. And I was stuck on the Naugahyde couch, sweating, trying to smoke, and there was a woman there, Marie Sharp.

She She had a black dress on and a bun in her hair. She looked like she'd been to mass 87,000 times. And she said, oh, young man. You're new, aren't you? How can you tell?

She said, I'll tell you the secret of Alcoholics Anonymous in 4 words. What are they? Find God or die. Oh, no. Not that.

Not that. 27 and a half years later, I can tell you the secret to Alcoholics Anonymous in 4 words. Find God or die. But the wonderful thing is is that we're an Alcoholics Anonymous, and no one will ever presume to tell you what kind of God you have to find. We don't tell you that you have to believe in anything, but we beg of you to make an experiment.

And what it is that we have to offer for this fatal malady, this progressive fatal illness, is a set of spiritual exercises, which when done, not agreed with, will liberate the sufferer from the need to drink and put them on a life beyond anything they could possibly imagine. That's Alcoholics Anonymous. Can atheists stay in alcohol? Of course. Can agnostic?

Of course. But you need to do the stuff, all of it, and pay attention to what happens when you do. You need to pay attention. You know, I could miss the fact that I haven't been to jail in 27 years. I really could.

I could take it for granted, but I happen to cherish it. So what do you do with that information? Well, I got a sponsor at that meeting. And, I started reading the big book, you know, and and, and I saw where if I didn't do a 4 step, I'd drink. And so when I was 22 days sober, I was at my sponsor's house and I said, I'm gonna drink if I don't really need this.

And we said, okay. Great, kid. And he told me a few stories and he he gave me the 4 step prayer. He said, God, I don't know what I'm doing. Help me, please.

Said, what I want you to do is go home, get really jacked up up on coffee, look at the kitchen door. He said, think of where you lived. And at every place you lived through your life, think of where you worked, think of where you went to school, think of family members, Think of your friends. And if they walk through the door and your stomach could go like that, write their name down and then you get three sentences on why no one's life is that interesting. And I did it.

Said, write down the life forms you woke up with. It was the seventies. I'm not really gay. It just happened. Platform shoes, it just kinda I don't know.

It's And he said, write down who you hate. He said, you can put entire political parties. It'll work. And, he says, you don't and and, and he said, who have you stolen from and the money that you owe? And, so I went and did it.

It took me about 3 and a half hours. Was it a fearless and thorough moral inventory using all 4 columns? No. It was the greatest hits. It was the stuff that when my head hit the pillow went on and on and on and on.

And he came over and I read it to him the next day. We said the stupid prayers, and we burned it, and then he sent me out to start making amends. So I'm less I'm I'm 24 days sober and I'm a fully vested member of Alcoholics Anonymous. Have you done other inventories? Of course.

But what happened is is I got into the amends and and and I've got the obsession to drink alcohol every third thought. And I'm going, no. We're in AA. We should be drinking. No.

We're in AA. You know, you go to the meeting and it debates for a little bit, and then it starts up again. And at about a 100 days sober, I'm sitting down on the beach, and I wanted an iced tea to I'd never wanted an iced tea in my life. I never wanted anything that didn't have a punch to it, and it's never returned. The obsession to drink alcohol has never returned to me.

Have you thought about drinking? Oh, sure. I've thought about drinking, but it's not the obsession. There's a difference. And I never thought you know, when people told me that the obsession of leave, I'd look at them and say, oh, yeah.

Yeah. Sure. Right. You don't really know what they were right, and I was wrong. So what can I tell you about life in Alcoholics Anonymous?

Freed from this incredible curse with which I was afflicted? Well, you know, I'll tell you a few stories. When I was about 6 months sober, I went up to my grandmother, Alice. Alice had taught me how to attend bar. I owed her just a little money.

And I said, grandmother, I I'm sober in AA. God and Alcoholics Anonymous are keeping me sober. Here's some money and I'll be paying you back the rest. And she said, what did you say? And I said, God and Alcoholics Anonymous are helping me to stay sober.

She said, great kid. And she got her purse and she starts moving for the door. Where are you going? She said about 4 years ago, you and I had a conversation where you told me that you didn't believe in God anymore. And I went down to the church and I put your name on a list.

And me and the girls have been praying for you, And I need to go down and report that my grandson has been restored. Spiritual terrorism. It's really effective. It's really effective. This is not an opinion.

This is my experience. 1985, my then wife, Jacqueline, got sober. A wonderful, wonderful blessing in my life. And we picked 3 people. Her best childhood friend, my buddy, Jeannie, who was cocktail waisted waitressing at a, saloon that I, that I was tending bar at and, my sister Regina, who was missing in action with her self employed Colombian entrepreneur boyfriend.

And every meeting we went to, we said their names silently before the prayer. Within a year and a half, all 3 of them got sober. All 3 of them picked up 1 year cakes. And the 2 that got sober in Alcoholics Anonymous, Jeannie and my sister, are still sober. And the other woman decided after a year that she didn't have this thing in the way that we did.

She chose to pick up. It was a conscious choice. It was not compulsive drinking, which is what it is that we come in here with or at least that I came in here with. So I'm gonna give you spiritual terrorism 101 for those of you who are not big about running down to the church and putting people's names on lists and stuff. When you go into a meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous and you see an empty chair because each of you know somebody who's really bad, walk in and tap the empty chair and say their name.

Invite a friend or 2 to join you, and then keep it up and watch what happens. Pay attention. My belief is, and my experience is, that they'll show up. And that just might be the guy that I work the steps with that saves my life. So this is a way to pray without ceasing.

Just tap the chair. Just tap the chair. Just tap the chair. When I was 20 years sober, I, you know, big deal I've the best sponsors in the world, by the way, are about between 3 8 years sober, and I think that everybody should sponsor. Everybody?

Yes. Everybody. I believe that every man and woman in this room, there is one person that you are here to say. And if you aren't here and you aren't armed with the facts and you aren't you aren't available, what's gonna happen to that person when they're what about the AA success rate? You know, I started sponsoring people when I was, like, 30 days sober.

Right? I went to my sponsor. I said, what do I do? He said, if God sends them to you, you can't hurt them. Let me repeat this.

If God sends them to you, you can't hurt them. It's important you know, little philosophy. You hear people say, I tried Alcoholics Anonymous, and it didn't work for me. Don't ever, ever, ever let anybody get by with that line unless they tell you that they have paid back the money and they've looked the people in the eye whose trust they've violated, and they've asked them what they what you can do to make that better. The night step, it's not about the promises.

It's about changing the world that we live in and the shackles that we have placed upon the men and women who we inflicted upon with our disease, and that's our responsibility to go and to do that. And that's where liberation starts. But the true freedom of the spirit comes when we sit down with another man or another woman and we do kitchen table AA, 1 on 1, 1 on 1, turning pages, working steps. That's Alcoholics Anonymous. Not, oh, I'm not drinking, I've got mine.

You know, it was between, like, 3 8 years sober. That's when that's when my best work in AA was done, you know, because I was I was sober man. You know? Armed with concepts, traditions, and steps, I can transcend anything. Give them to me.

I'll save their lives. You know? It's great, man. If you have been an evangelical in AA, you know, just wait because it is a wonderful, wonderful ride. And, and anyway, so I I've been active and involved in all of this stuff and I I had the privilege of when I was 20 years sober, I've been involved in the retreat movement since the very beginning and and, I went off on a on a retreat, a silent retreat for a few days with and I turned my will and my life over to God as I understood God in a very special poignant way for me and, you know, but then I gotta pay attention.

Right? And so I'm I'm hanging out and I I got this church I hang out at it, and, this guy gets up and he goes, I'm gonna go down to Belize and I'm gonna build a church. Met this guy. Who wants to go? And I'm sitting there and I'm going, well, I don't have the time and I don't have the money.

But fortunately, I've been meditating long enough and my my my heart gets to overrule my mind at all times. And so I stand up and, and then I, go home to the nice Jewish girl I'm married to and I'm gonna say, I'm gonna build a house for David down in Central America. Now now everybody knows here that the reason that you don't do a 3rd step you don't wanna do a 3rd step because you're gonna end up being a missionary in a 3rd world country. Right? And it's not hip.