Sandy B. from Tampa, FL & Jerry J. from Dallas, TX answering questions at the Usual Suspects Men's Retreat in Camp Garner Creek in Dickson, TN

Thank you,

I lost it.

I want to to explain your exact concept of God.

That's what the question was. Trust me,

Jerry says. The question was explain my concept of God exact concept exactly specific and exactly specific and exact concept of God

detail.

Wow. I

myself, I, I feel an affinity

for every,

umm, deity that I've heard about and read about,

whether it's Jesus or Buddha or Muhammad. I feel an affinity. I mean, I really feel

how wonderfully spiritual teachers they all were,

and

I just can't get specific beyond that. It is clear that the universe has a very clear spiritual message and it has been transmitted by some wonderful teachers, including Bill Wilson,

to our benefit.

And so to me, the

cheering in on, you know, who is God, whatever the source of those principles that have are common to all religions and all spiritual paths, that that whatever that center is, which no one will ever know is what I think it is. And you know, we can't,

no, we have to just talk about this.

And that's why stories come in so handy to tell parables and stories and all of that. So that's my best shot at that

with your turn figure question. That was a specific question. Oh, that was a leftover question. So now what he's doing that I want to I want Todd showed me a portion of the big book. What y'all? He advanced the thought that I hadn't had or hadn't heard. And it was that when we get people from treatment centers and we get people from the jails or the

the probationary people with the little pieces of paper from the judge,

we don't tell them our stories. And the book says that the first thing we do with a new Comer is tell him our stories. And that allows us to establish a trust with those newcomers. And we wonder, he wonders, and I think it's a good wonder, is that a reason why we're not making better contact with those newcomers. We don't take that initial step to establish ourselves as Alcoholics specifically with them so that they

can have some trust with us. I think it's a great idea. I'm going to spend some more time thinking about that.

Sandy and Jerry. I grew up in a family of Jehovah's Witnesses. They constantly tried to draw me into this religion and insist that it's the only right spiritual way of life to live. How can I tell them I want no part of that and have a good relationship with them?

Um, one of my sons got involved not in that, but he, he just got so fanatical and so excited about it that every time I talked to him, he was. So my dad, you got to get this and you got to get that. And, you know, I was so excited that he had found something that I just asked him to tell me more about it.

And finally, he told me everything that there was to tell and that seemed to satisfy him. And,

and I learned, I learned, oh, that's a good point that you're making there. And that's a good point. So it's almost by embracing it, I didn't have to fight it.

Good.

I

I don't know sometimes whether you can. The first part of that question is easy.

What do you tell them? And that is you tell them is a kind of fashion as you can that

I don't believe as you believe. I don't disbelieve. I just am not in a position to endorse the same things that you're able to endorse. I envy you your belief. I really do. And I, and I honestly do envy people who have got that really rock solid, no questions asked, know exactly how it's happening and how it's going to happen.

That's wonderful. I just never had that and I couldn't develop it. So I have to tell people, you know, with due respect to you, I wouldn't try to talk you out of your belief in any way in the world, but I simply am unable at this point in my life to make that kind of a commitment. Now what that does to that relationship

is not my deal. I'm willing to be open to that relationship and they may not want me in their circle. And if they don't, there's just not a help lot I can do about that. I simply have to go my way and be as honest with them as I can.

Your turn.

It's estimated 1/4 of a million people in this country have addiction problems and only 10% can afford treatment.

How can more people receive treatment?

Well, there's a difference between treatment and recovery.

Treatment is a, is a way that that people learn a little bit about what's wrong with them or what's suspected as being wrong with them. Recovery is to get over and recover from that that condition. The way we can help the people that can't afford treatment is to provide them with opportunities in the program of Alcoholics Anonymous

to work the steps, form step groups,

form newcomers groups, form ways to allow them to find and learn what they would learn in a treatment center. If you talk to people to go to treatment center, they talk about some scientific Babble about what's new, you know what's going on in your head and what the thought processes are, all of which doesn't make a damn bit of difference to the drunk. The drunk is just

flat. He's an, he needs to know what, what's, what, what, what all this means to me

means to him that he, the question is, can you, when you drink, can you guarantee how you're going to act? If you drink one drink, are you going to be, are you going to take another one? Do you have an addiction? You only you can tell us and sit with him and let him figure this thing out or send him out to the bar like the, the book tells us to let him try to take a couple of drinks, see if we can stop. If he can't stop, come back. We'll help you with it. And then we, we get to the part where we can help. And that's we, we just provide the the

Today support and education and sharing of our spiritual lives with that person and they that that's the way we do it. I don't know of a better way.

I just agree totally. And but I also recall when I came in, there were just in most AA areas, somehow somebody knew somebody with an old farmhouse. You, I mean, we've all heard these stories and the farmhouse got converted into a place for new guys to stay and then there was volunteers go out. And so it was the predecessor of treatment centers

that practically didn't cost anything. And we may be going back to those as the insurance

coverage drops off. I hope so. And yeah, I mean, they were really fun to participate in.

I forgot. I want to make an amend without breaking any anonymity to a young man. I was very abrupt with them my way to the bathroom in answering a question that he had. And I'm very sorry. OK,

Where did we get the name Alcoholics?

Well, I don't know,

maybe from drinking alcohol.

What they used to call us, they used to

maniacs. Sounds better than dip. So maniac to me. I like it better than Dipsomaniac, I really do.

That's right. They've had all kinds of other names,

you know, but I think it obviously came

from the disease itself. And

but we were drug addict, came from drugs.

I've never heard it put that clearly from sex.

Probably there's a different meaning that was intended by that question, and so I will reserve judgment.

If you're talking about the name Alcoholics Anonymous, oh, that's a different thing. Yeah, I heard

by a legend that the in New York, they picked up a guy who's from a jitter joint insane asylum who had a wet brain and that he had been a former editor of one of the major magazines in New York City and The New Yorker, I believe. And they were all discussing what they were going to call this thing. And someone posed the rhetorical question, What do you call a nameless bunch of drunks?

And he said

Alcoholics, an anonymous Alcoholics and they just turned it around and called it that. What we have today, that's what I heard. I don't know what that's right or not.

I'm a large proponent

of singleness and purpose, but I find myself at meetings in my district with people just introducing themselves as addicts. The only problem is that in my

district, NA is non-existent. How can I turn these people away if a A is there only dying hope?

Well, this won't please a lot of people, but I don't.

I I talked to them and asked him, have you used alcohol? Have you used alcohol excessively? Has it been an integral part of your addiction? And I try to help them find a, a real honest way that they can say that they have an alcohol problem along with perhaps another kind of problem. But I don't feel comfortable.

I just don't running people off from Alcoholics Anonymous who have an addictive problem

was a drug or alcohol I.

I recognize that I'm in a minority probably on that point, but that's just the way I feel. Live in a small community most of the time.

NA comes and goes almost twice a year.

It never lasts very long. And there's some people who really need some help and we find ways to help them.

But I recognize in other places that would not be a satisfactory solution. And that's, that's just the way I the way I see the world.

When you think about the

only requirement for membership is the desire to stop drinking.

And no matter what your problem is, you certainly don't want to drink because that's going to

trigger it.

So we're down to why are you having such a hard time out of saying you're an alcoholic?

Your whole life is hanging in the balance.

We're willing to help if you'll do that one little compromise. Otherwise, you're going to constantly call attention to yourself and get the turmoil that goes with it.

So there's a compromise on both sides

and win, win.

And that's just me. So it's different everywhere.

Most people have a component of alcohol. In this society, it's almost impossible to imagine that no drinking was done at all, and that the drinking that was done was successful.

You know what I mean?

And so it, it, it's very, I mean, it's, it's one of those questions where here's the man

and we asked the question they asked years ago and it's in our traditions. What would the master do?

And then we just think about it in those terms and it's hard to imagine that the master would have said, push him out the door.

Maybe you I'll just take them home and work with them and try to help them. And but we, it I just find it impossible that just say I'm not going to extend any help whatsoever to you. Bye. It's just too hard for me to do that.

You and I kind of agree on that. Very amazing.

I'm not a lawyer and a fighter pilot though.

Yeah, boy.

Oh, God,

how did Mary Alice Bush get in the

OK, so

the rest of now, why does Mary Alice Bush get in the equation?

It's it's an episode that happened to me when I was drinking and I was at Yale and there was the junior prom. And I had met this woman from Vassar and somehow had gone up there on about three dates and stayed halfway sober so that it appeared like I would be a good date for the to say yes to to go to the junior prom.

And her name was Mary Alice Bush from Saint Louis.

And when the my roommates found out, they've said, Oh my God, you ought to marry her. You'll have free beer for the rest of your life.

So it was the Anheuser Busch Fortune is my date for the weekend.

And

I remember telling myself, now you got to really stay sober because this is important.

And I, well, she came down the train and then we put him up at the

hotel, Taft Hotel.

And while we're I'm waiting to go to the dinner party, I decide to have just a few gyms

in the afternoon to kill a little time. And a friend of mine was holding the dinner party out in Brantford and I was pretty buzzed when I picked her up to go out to the dinner party. But I made it out in the car and drove out and there was probably about 6-4 couples sitting around the table. And as we got to

coffee and dessert, I realized I was going to pass out.

You remember when you got the warnings and

you remember that when the electricity would show. Oh shit,

so I said maybe I could drink some coffee and and delay it. I mean I just knew I was smashed and what this was. So I picked up the coffee and was just getting ready to take a sip and I went and then I walked back up again and the cup had spun around on my finger

and no one saw it. I it just went and the cup was there just like I was still drinking my coffee, except all the coffee was in my lap.

And I remember going

and I passed out.

So my friends dragged me and put me in the closet.

And as they turn me over and I'm in my tuxedo, you know the whole thing. And as they're dragging me down, everybody goes. Look at that. He wet his pants. And that was the

So they went off to the prom without me, and I'm in the closet. But you know that Alcoholics have more lives than that.

So a couple hours later I come up from the dead out of the closet

and I'm I'm ever getting a hair dryer.

I got that wet spot to dissolve and went outside and just fixed up a little bit and had another drink and went out and hitchhiked and I was back. Then they picked you up. You remember hitchhiking you could just the first car that would come, you'd get a ride. So it was cold earlier and I got freshened up a little bit and I came into the

gymnasium where the ball is going on. Peggy Lee with singing there was really a big deal

and I'm looking around, looking around, there she is. So I come up and I just tap on the guy on the shoulder and I said, May I cut in? And she goes, oh, I'm so sorry. I had a food attack. And I feel kind of I'm so sorry, but I'm here and I'd really like a second chance of so she gives me a second chance. And so I'm hanging on pretty good and we're dancing around and I'm getting a drink. We're dancing around getting another drink and I think I'm doing really good. And as we came around.

I look over

and there's another prom going on

in the next gym and I go,

what the hell is that? The senior? I thought there's just one prom. And then I went around and came around and I looked over there and I saw this prom. I didn't say a word. Then the third time around I just said I'll be right back. And she stood there and I took off running into the other prom. And when I hit the mirror,

it's just

a Now I'm in the coat room

with my friends and they

and they got ice on my nose and I got blood all over the front. And I said, Jesus, So what the hell happen?

And he says, what are you doing? And I said I was going over to check that thing out.

And as I got closer there was another guy running out.

I tried to dodge them

and we and we hit

and they thought you asked. Oh, that's a mirror. Jesus Christ.

So I'm lying there and I look up and here's a buddy of mine that I went to high school with. He, he went up to Dartmouth and he was down. I said, Marty, God damn, how are you and I? So I got up and we went and had a drink. I said, have you seen this gym? Let me give you a tour. This is a this freaking thing.

So we're this thing is amazing built in the 20s, you know, it's just very gothic and enormous. So I'm showing all the room. Here's our fencing room

up the next level, next level. And we got up to where the single skull crew practiced and they had the little seat one or No2 ORS and you could row inside. I never row. I didn't know anything. And I said watch Marty, I'll show you how. And I got in the seat and I had the oars in the water and I said, see that valve? Turn the valve on. It makes the water go fine.

I mean, as soon as he turned the water, it comes roaring out and the oars are in the water

and it just knocked me right in the water. I just boom

and I

now the water sobers me up and I go,

oh, Jesus, Mary Alice Bush, I got to go down there.

So I ran and I got towels and try to dry off the tuxedo, you know,

drip drip, drip, drip, drip. Here comes dripping across the dance floor one more time. I tapped the guy. May I cut in and all I can remember her going never.

And so

we're trying to get a hold of Mary Alice Bush and hear her version someday.

OK, Scott,

I

I find that rather disgusting though too.

Says here Bill W suggests other

inspirational readings.

What, besides the Bible, as you do, you find has helped you as a adjunct as suggested in the 10th step? Oh my goodness,

I can't tell you the names of all the things I read a lot. I read everything that Emmett Fox wrote. That was one of the he was a he was a spiritual speaker in New York. His mother and all his yes, his mother was the first secretary to the editor of the Grapevine and the early a as went over to hear him talk on a regular basis. He has one that was a was a very famous one with early, as I understand it's called the Sermon on the Mount.

I unquestionably recommend any of to any of you those books because they are not offensive. They're not contrary to what we read in the big book of Alcoholics Anonymous, and I think they're very good. I can't tell you all of them that I read. I've I've got a shelf

full of books that I've read on of a spiritual nature. Some I like, some I don't like. But for a beginner beginning, that's that's the one author that I would unquestionably recommend to you

on the same as Jerry. I'm I have a tremendous collection books

probably I bet I have 70 spiritual books that I've read. And Emmett Fox, of course, CS Lewis and William James,

who Bill read The varieties of Religious Experience and

Eckhart Tolle for modern writers. And there's just the whole world. Yeah, there's a whole world, but it's not to replace a A, It is to enhance our vision of what

this is said in Chapter 5 or the chapter of the agnostics. It's to bring it alive and flesh it out. So you go, wow, that's what Bill was talking about. We never are leaving.

The confines of the Big Book were just allowing it to take us up as high as it can. And in both the Big Book and the 12 and 12 and the 11th step, Bill says our libraries are filled with spiritual books. Check with your rabbis, priests, ministers, spiritual advisors. There's all kinds of wonderful guidance. So somebody will give me a book and I'll take it home and I'll go,

Man is very Wiz, but I don't throw it away because I'll put it on the shelf and eight years later I'll go out at this and I pull it down. It's like, huh, that's the greatest book I ever saw

because that was the time for me to connect with that. But

it's an essential part of my life is using the help in broadening the big book.

Me. I'm going to dig around in here.

When a person stays sober, we give God the credit. When a person begins to drink again, we blame the drinker. God gets all of the credit and none of the blame.

Please

talk about this paradox.

OK,

let's say that spirituality

is, for example purposes, achieved by getting a suntan.

And the guy that stands outside The Cave gets the suntan, and the guy that stays in The Cave doesn't.

And it's the damn son's fault

that it didn't somehow get in The Cave. In other words,

when I cut myself off from God,

there's nothing God can do about it.

That's what free will is

it. I am perfectly free to reject help. That's what makes it so interesting. That's what makes it a choice.

And because we have to make the choice to choose God,

that's what makes us whole. And so God loves me whether I'm drunk on the floor or sober,

Equally, absolutely equally, there's no withholding of love under any circumstance. It is that I won't let it in. And so it's, it's really not a paradox. It is a, just a different way of looking at it. I mean, it's just you, you, you just can't blame pure love in any fashion. But we can and. And it's not

my fault that I reject it. It's there really is. Blame is just not a good word

to even use in our vernaculars. It doesn't accomplish much of anything. That's my thoughts.

You know, you have to think about what God does in the universe.

I, I was in a meeting one time, a young woman was talking about her problem and her problem was she had two job offers

and the she didn't know what God's will was for her. And there was no boy that in our group that talked a little bit like a Damon Runyon character. And he said, sugar, he said, God don't give a damn which job you take. God cares how you do the job you take.

We have a lot of free will. God does not direct us. God doesn't decide who gets a flat tire and who doesn't get a flat tire. And the football teams play boy, everybody prays. I guess they're praying for victory, but God does not decide which one of them he's going to he's going to allow to win the game. I that's my belief. I think we have an opportunity. Equally,

there's a line in our big book that says

it says something along the lines that

with what we see and understand means anything at all. It's what that every man, no matter what his race, color or creed, has an opportunity to form a meaningful relationship with his creator if he has the honesty and willingness to try. But we have to form the relationship God standing there or the power is present all the time. If you can't think of God as

a standing there, you can think of the power being present all the time.

You have to reach out. And if we steep, we quit reaching out, we lose the power. And it's not the power's fault. It's what we do is fault. And and like you say, I think God loves us drunk or sober, it's there all the time. Thank you.

You're the man, Chair. Thank you.

Could you please

give the group your interpretation of

fitting

ourselves to be of maximum service to God and our fellow man? God and our fellows?

Well, I think that the way I fit myself to be of maximum service to God and my fellow man

is to remove from myself as much of the garbage that I'm carrying along as I can. To reconcile myself with the wrongs that I've committed in the past and to make the amends that I can make. To do all the things that the staff asked me to do, the steps asked me to do, to bring myself into alignment with that power. And when I do that,

I think I have done all that I can

to bring myself into a state where I can be of maximum service to God and my fellow man.

I agree. I agree with that in in the very beginning. We obviously haven't opened up the channel yet.

And so our sponsor can show us mechanically, okay, go over and make this amend. OK, go over and ask that new person if they'd like a cup of coffee. Go over and they'll sort of program us for what these are. But the point of it is that, as Jerry said, once we get the blockages out of the way, we're going to intuitively know

precisely how to be of maximum service. It is simply going to

services automatic

the and when I was with Tom Ivester, we were talking about this and he was talking about service in general. And I said, well, I'll tell you what I think The Big Bang of service was. You know what, where's the origin of reaching out in the hand of a A and all of that. And my contention was that it came from Bill Wilson's profound

spiritual experience, after which

he could not prevent himself from extending the hand of AA.

Part of a spiritual awakening is the absolute necessity to pass it on. You can't contain it inside. You're just going. You just let me tell you. Let me tell you, let me tell you. It is just part and parcel of it. And if you don't believe it, just look at his life broke. I mean, everything is going wrong. We're being evicted out in the streets. And. And what's he doing? Well, we're getting started over here. We're getting started over here. He never

could stop

passing this thing on. Nobody had to teach him. Nobody had to go. Let me show you the service manual. He it couldn't be stopped and you will find when you have this you just God. Well, give me somebody to talk to. I mean it is just there and then we have the whole organizational part of it. But the the raw energy comes in the awakening. That's

one dimension.

One more you're up.

If God can relieve us from our fatal disease of alcoholism, why doesn't He relieve others suffering from physical and mental

maladies? OK,

God believes us of our

fatal disease because we become entirely willing to have God remove

the the problem.

It doesn't get removed until we do that. And so unless someone is seeking

a spiritual experience, it can't get in.

You follow what I'm saying. It can't

come inside in order to happen,

and so this could the 12 steps could very well work on other maladies. I'm not saying they guaranteed or anything like that because a lot of other illnesses are not composed of mental obsessions, but I would say anything that is composed of a mental obsession could certainly be relieved. Spiritually,

yes. No,

there's a book

written by a man named Weatherhead. It's called The Will of God. It's a little book

and it was written during World War Two, and he was an English minister

and women and children and a lot of innocent folks were being killed in bombings on a daily basis.

And the question was raised to him, how can this be the will of God?

And he answered that question. In this little book, he talks about different types of the will of God, circumstantial will, the will of God and his circumstance. What is it here? And then there's the ultimate will of God.

To my way of thinking, God does not think that death is a big deal

because we all do it.

So God must accept death as just another thing that goes on in life.

He does not necessarily create the things that cause death, not intentional at least. He allows us to have that free will we just talked about and the exercise of that free will. We error and we do things that cause disease and, and all sorts of things, but God's interest is, and to be with those no matter what,

whether we're drunk or sober, sick or whatever, he, the, the power is present for us to help us and sustain us in whatever we encounter. And that includes death, I believe. So I, I don't know why, I don't know why I was allowed to recover from alcoholism and somebody else out here didn't recover from alcoholism. I don't know whether they chose not to. I don't know whether they didn't have enough willpower left

from the abuse of alcohol to make that decision. I have no earthly idea. I only know, I believe that this power,

no matter where they went or how they went, was available to them, and I hope that they could avail themselves to it

wherever they were having to be.

Some of these questions I don't think you can ever come up with a concrete answer for.

Well, I think we may have done this when it's. Please comment on dual identification at meetings.

Yeah, I think we covered it. Wouldn't you all agree that, Yeah, draw another one, chair?

Whoops, it's all right. We worn those out.

What is your opinion on men's meetings, women's meetings, young people's meetings, gay and lesbian meetings? OK,

OK.

My favorite type of meeting is one of everything.

That's my favorite type of meeting, one of every type of God's characters that there is,

because all mixed in one big bunch. That's my favorite. Why? Because I'm hearing from as many different vantage points as possible, and not from other people who see it the same way I do. What the hell did I learn from that?

Now on the other hand, when I first arrived in a a I, I never thought special interest groups were a good idea. So. And I was going over to a military group at Andrews Air Force Base. Hey, it's all military guys. That's the worst damn thing I ever went to, because there was some new Colonel who had about 3 months and everybody in the room was afraid to disagree with him.

You know, there was a Sergeant with eight years. Well, you know, Colonel. Yes, Sir. And we needed a little old housewife to tell him to shut up.

But. But on the other hand, when you first arrive,

I could see where lawyers would talk and you have no lawyers were here and then boom into the one of everything meeting. You know what I mean? So, OK, that's 'cause we got pilots and lawyers and doctors and days and

old people, they're putting out pamphlets for old people

where

I gotta go read it and find out how the hell you stay sober when you're old. But I

now I'm just teasing, but I I'm, I'm, I'm coming back to

the my favorite that you can't beat the dynamics of

a steady diet of meetings that have one of everything. Boy, that is what it's all about.

An occasional all men's this or all women's is fun, but a steady diet. I'll take one of everything any day of the week.

Couldn't agree more. I had opportunity to form an organization in in Texas to help alcoholic lawyers and one of the things that I hope I contributed to that was that when we would not be considered an A A group. I did not want to be a part of forming a special a, A group because lawyers did not need to go to 3 button suits

a law meetings, you know, and and try to be separate in a dent from

the general population. One of the great benefits when you go to those a little bit of everything meeting is you become a part of the general population. You're not special. You're just there with everybody else. And we all got a problem. And that's a great leveler and it does a lot for ego. And so I agree totally. Oh yeah. And there's no Lenny's at a pilot's meeting.

What should I do if my sponsor comes on to me?

I honestly, I honestly don't know. I don't know what,

I can't even imagine that situation. But Jerry, on the other hand,

yes, that happened all the time.

Well, what they generally do slap hell out of me. That's what they do, right?

Well, I think this

as a straight answer to a kind of a tough question.

If you and your sponsor are not on the same page, sex doesn't have any part of sponsorship.

Sexual relationship should not be involved between sponsor and sponsee. I don't don't think there's any way that that could ever work. That's one of the reasons that in our area at least, they talk in terms of you should not sponsor. I should not sponsor a woman and by the same token, I should not sponsor a man if he, if I, if I'm physically attracted to him. And the purpose of my sponsorship is to get close enough to him to have make a spiritual,

a sexual overture to him. So I don't think that you can you can inject into that relationship

spiritual interest and have any degree of success. And my question, my answer that would be fire your sponsor and get to get another one.

Thanks

your turn.

What should a

new A look for in a sponsor?

We can talk a long time about that.

I did some talking about it in the course of my talk this weekend, I think. I think you need to look for a person who is walking the walk. You need to find a person who attends meetings who is you. You heard the drill has got a sponsor himself that goes to meetings. It's worked the steps

that's willing to give you the time that you need to

to communicate with him that you have some feeling of trust and confidence in or that you feel like you can develop some with him. You've heard all of those things. But that's that's what I think you should look for. I think you should go into that relationship with the understanding for both of you that if a little ways down the road, we don't mesh and it's not working. No hard feelings,

we'll just realign and and go again with somebody else.

My pitch, my view,

yeah, I agree with that. I but I also know the danger of expectations

that this is what I expect to happen

as a result of

my sponsor

and it may not happen in the sequence that I expect it to. I mean, in other words, once I've made this decision,

my job is to evaluate the results

And so

if I'm just making up some me. But if for whatever reason,

he decides to

focus on the 12:00 and 12:00 for a while and then come back to the big book, the

and 20 years later, you have wonderful sobriety. I don't think you're going to look back and go, boy, did he screw my life up.

You follow what I'm saying

because results are really the bottom line of Alcoholics Anonymous where you end up with a spiritual awakening.

The purpose of a sponsor, from my perspective, is to guide the person through the steps so that they have an awakening. I'm, I'm a guide. I'm just going to show you, because you're lost, how to go through this maze and come out the other end and all you have to do is

what I tell you.

I'll take all responsibility for everything that you're supposed to do.

You just do it

and then you can tell me that you didn't get any results and then not so well, I guess you better find somebody else. But it it never happens that way, you get results from

this. That's that's the deal.

One thing you should not do

is select a sponsor

who is not going to be around you at meetings. Oh yeah, you need to find someone in your group or where you're going to be so you both of you can interact with one another. You should not. You should not

select a sponsor just because he gets asked to talk around the community around the country from time to time because that's not a good reason. That's an ego builder. You should select a person because they they have

expressed or do express to you that they have the same kind of interest in the kind of life you want to have, and that's what you're going to go for. You may may make a mistake on that, but the fact is that's that should be the criteria. You like their sobriety, you like the sober life they're living. That's

Europe. I'm a little yellow.

Have you read Varieties of Religious Experience by William James, and if so, how important do you feel that book is to each individual zone? Concept of a higher power.

Yes, I have read it. I tried to read it when I had about a year.

Don't think about it. That is in very difficult book to read because he's quoting in different languages. The guy is really brilliant and it's very detailed. But I have read it three or four times, and I just finished a biography of William James

and

I.

This is what I think, what he was trying to share with us. He gave a series of lectures at Edinburgh University, never having studied religion before. You understand what I'm saying. He was just a famous Harvard teacher and was interested in psychology and medicine and science,

and he was just recognized as a very brilliant man. And so they would ask brilliant men to come and talk to other brilliant scholars.

And he gave 20 weeks of lectures over there, and he just started from scratch thinking about religion and studying religions throughout

the history of man. And he was also very interested in the current philosophies, which Darwin was having a great impact on. And we were coming into the humanism and existentialism, and God is kind of being pushed off to the side. And so he's studying religion from that perspective. And he basically concluded

that the

structural organizations, the bureaucracies of religions had really contributed very little.

And so it almost sounded like a complete put down. They've contributed very little themselves to the world,