Workshop on "Questions and Answers on Sponsorship" for Area 36, District 23 in St. Peter, MN

Dustin Barnes, alcoholic

real quick. Just going to do some quick introduction stuff before we start getting into this real quick. My sobriety date is 3/20 of O 6 and I went to treatment in this town. So I don't know if you can call it treatment really, but I was subjected to the tortures of the state system at the time. So

and it was good. Trust me.

We are going to be sharing our experience today.

It's just our experience. You know,

the deal is, is I, I used to have this idea that if you weren't sponsoring a certain way and if you weren't out doing this and if you weren't out doing that, then you probably weren't going to make it. Probably because if I didn't do that stuff, I wasn't going to make it. And a couple of months ago, I got an opportunity to sit in a, in a small town in northern Minnesota. And I walked in and the meeting happened to be on the 12th step. And I had one of those experiences that I think are necessary

to continue to grow in this program. And what that was, was that I listened to a guy talk about how they do 12 step work out in the middle of nowhere in northern Minnesota. And I realized how richly blessed I was because they literally don't have the facilities and they don't have the the big influx of drunks, both local and and from different states coming into their area. What they have is people that come into the meeting

and they just, they find out, they, they look in the phone booth and they walk in. And what I realized from that was,

you know, my experiences may be different from someone else's. I'm so richly blessed to be in the Twin Cities

and to have such an opportunity for sponsorship and such an opportunity for 12 step work and and to be able to come in contact with a lot of Alcoholics that are newly sober and looking for sobriety. So I preface that because I just want you to know that I'm just going to share my experience and, and Kelly, my wife filled in, luckily for Juliet, who went into surgery emergency

this this last week. And I'm so blessed to have her with me.

And we're going to share our experience. It may be different from your experience. You may agree, you may disagree, but the way I was brought up in sponsorship is I'm not responsible for the outcome. I'm responsible for the effort. I'm responsible when when the phone rings, I'm responsible to say, you know, if I can, if I can do it, absolutely, absolutely. I'll be down. I'll be down to Saint Peter. I don't care if the cops are blocking the street. You know,

I don't care. It's funny, came out to me and said, is this OK? You know, you're all right. You know that the cops blocked it off. And it's like,

buddy, a few years ago I was strapped down in medical restraints. Like I'm golden, you know, I'm cool. The other deal is that I would like to thank anybody that had anything to do with us being here today. I, I used to think I have to do this stuff to stay sober. And what I realized today is I get to do this stuff.

I'm alive today as a result of the program and the fellowship and being of service in Alcoholics Anonymous. And I, I don't have to do anything. I get to be of service. I get to share my experience and what a cool deal. So we're just doing some quick introduction stuff real quick. I want you to know that that I, I'm not a person that that's an original winner in Alcoholics Anonymous. You know, I, I didn't come in and, and just get a wonderful experience and, and, and to just, you know, become real

spiritual. That wasn't my story. You know, my story is I tried, I stayed sober for a year and changed. The first time I got loaded, I came back, I went for 30 days. I got loaded and I said I'm never going back to Alcoholics Anonymous. So you got to understand, if I'm going to share my experience, I'm going to share some of the stuff that didn't work as well as the stuff that did work. And I'm not trying to be adversarial when I do that. I don't know what

you're doing down here. It's nothing personal. It's just my experience.

The other deal is, is I came back to Alcoholics Anonymous drug back. You know, I didn't just walk in and go here I am, you know, I was drugged back by a way of a state commitment. You know, you'll hear people all the time say, you know, you can't, you can lead a horse to water, but you can't make them drink. You know, you, you can't force an alcoholic to get sober. And I want you to know that the state of Minnesota is not familiar with that policy. You know,

they are not aware in order they care, they they'll bring us here. You know, it's the greatest outpatient program that they have to offer because it doesn't cost them anything, you know. So that's how I come in.

That's how I come in. The other deal is that what I did find is I'd been doing a lot of things that I thought

were going to keep me sober and they didn't. And so I had a lot of hurt and a lot of anger to work through this process through.

I love Alcoholics Anonymous, and I want you to know that I'm not a spokesman. I'm not an expert on sponsorship. How silly would that be for me to be some sort of expert? I'm none of those things. I'm just an example

that Alcoholics Anonymous and sponsorship, you know, strong sponsorship works. I'm an example one way or another. I'm sober today and that was something I could not do for one day. At the end of my drinking, I could not not drink one day at a time. I, I just couldn't pull it off. I would make the decision not to drink and then later on my mind would say little bit of a serious decision, don't you think? I mean, you could probably have a drink to knock the edge off. And I would say,

yes, yes, that's a phenomenal idea. I would have a drink setting off this cycle and I would be drunk and then I'd be coming home the next morning And it was just, it was it was hell on earth. So my experience may not be your experience, but I'm just here to share mine. That's it. And

with all that said, I'm going to ask my wife to come on up here and do a little introductions and then we're going to get rolling.

Hi everybody, I'm Kelly. I'm an alcoholic.

It's so funny because, you know, Dustin's like, oh, you know, I get to do this today and all this stuff, you know, and when he first got asked to do this and he wanted a woman's perspective, he of course comes to me and I say no way. No, I'm terrified. I'm like, Nope, not going to do it. Find somebody else. I don't want to do this.

And, you know, God always has different plans. And so, you know, he struck Juliet with, you know, an illness. And here I am. So I'm grateful to be here, though, you know, we came in and you guys were so welcoming and you made us comfortable, and you were so friendly. And I'm so, so, so grateful to be here. Makes me a lot less nervous

but my sobriety date is July 22nd 2006.

I did not.

I did not come in here because I wanted to. I did not come in here because my life was perfect and everything was going great.

I came in here because I was homeless. I was had knew not a soul in Minnesota. I did not have a job, I did not have any money and I did not have any way to do anything but go to treatment. And I came into treatment. Not saying I'm going to go to treatment and get better. I came into treatment so I could find a job,

get an apartment, you know, have a place to stay for 30 days to get my life back together.

And it was funny because the first night I was there, they brought me to an, a, a meeting. And in this a, a meeting, there's all these people and, you know, they're just, they're happy, they're laughing, you know it, It wasn't the best a, a meeting in the world, but I tell you what, I was so glad to be there. It was the weirdest thing in the world that I had ever seen.

I knew about Alcoholics Anonymous because my dad was in it, but I had never gone,

you know, and I'm not a relapser. I, I came in, I stayed, I stuck and I, I honestly was very, very, very excited about a A after that meeting.

Now as I got down the road a little bit, I got very discouraged.

As I went to more meetings, I started to not like a so much,

you know, 'cause you'll hear a lot of opinions out there and you'll hear a lot of,

a lot of things that were not working for me. You know, I, I was told to get a sponsor, so I did. My sponsor said call me every day. So I did. She said go to meetings every day. So I did. She said go to the sober house. So I did,

but that was about it. That was about all she told me about. I'm like, Oh well, can we do the step? She said yeah, yeah, you can do those.

And that was it.

So I'm sitting in this sober house who does not believe in A8, by the way, and I'm reading the Big Book. I'm going to these meetings that aren't talking about the Big Book or anything. In the Big Book, I have the sponsor who's not telling me anything about anything. And I'm absolutely miserable.

Umm. But the thing that was so cool is I didn't need any of that. All I needed was the big book. And I did what the big book told me to do. Now, it wasn't to the best of my ability, but I did it, you know, And I was just reading an article over there in the archives. And it was so funny because it was from it was a letter to Pat Cronin, who said and Bill said,

you know, in in areas where there is no way A here's the book. We hope this helps. We've heard that this helps

for where there's areas where there's no way a Now there was tons of a everywhere around me

and the only thing that helped me was the book.

How sad is that?

You know, and, and like Dustin said, we have no right way. We have no wrong way. You know, I sponsor almost every girl that comes to me in a different way because there's different things that they need. But the one thing I always do is I take them through the book because that's what's that's what is important. And I have a sponsor today who as well did not take me through the book because I had already been through it,

but I did that on my own. And she said, Kelly, you know enough about the book. I don't need to take you through that.

You know how to work the steps. I don't need to teach you how to do that, she said. You had the book to teach you how to do that

and I thought, how cool is that? But we are so excited to be here. We're excited to get into the sponsorship stuff. I think what we're going to do is take the questions and answers pamphlets and there's all those questions in there. And we're just going to share our experience on on those questions and and what we do and what has been done for us. So we are very glad to be here. Thanks for letting us.

Now

we're coming out of the, the questions and answers on sponsorship, but what we're what we're going to do here is we're going to take the questions that are in there and just kind of share our experience with them. Or the other thing that, well, the first one here that we're going to look at is what is sponsorship? You know, there's a guy in my lineage of sponsorship that that used to say stuff like the word sponsorship means so much nowadays that it doesn't mean anything.

It has so many definitions that it doesn't

mean anything. And in also said that any, any problem we have in Alcoholics Anonymous can be solved by one-on-one sponsorship.

That's that's the way that we can really carry the message is one-on-one,

you know, So what is sponsorship to me?

Well, what I can tell you is exactly what Kelly was saying until I got someone in front of me who was saying, you know what the answers come out of the big book. The directions for how to recover from the mental obsession and the physical allergy driven by the spiritual malady, the directions for how to do that in the big book. That's that's why it uses such terms like directions, you know, clear cut, specific. We shall tell you what we have done.

And and so I'm going to continue to go back into the book today just because that's how I was taught.

And I believe we're a product of how we were brought up in Alcoholics Anonymous. There's a lot of things that I'm going to share today that are not original ideas.

You can believe that or not. It was stuff that I was sponsored into. It was something that I was shown through a living example of what the program, the fellowship and being of service could do. A living example who pointed me in the direction. So sponsorship to me. You know, page 18 of the Big Book, the bottom paragraph says that the man who is making the approaches had the same difficulty, That he obviously knows what he is talking about, That his whole deportment shouts at the new prospect that he is

with a real answer. That he has no attitude of holier than thou, nothing whatever except the sincere desire to be helpful. That there are no fees to pay, no access to grind, no people to please, no lectures to be endured. These are the conditions we have found most effective.

I think that the the

the phrase strong sponsorship brings up an idea of someone screaming in my face to tell me what to do. And when I say that, that's not what I mean. Sponsorship for me was always someone sharing with me what they had done. It's always been someone sharing with me in context of their experience with the program of Alcoholics Anonymous, which I was taught as laid out from the cover to page 164 of the Big Book.

But what about the meetings? Well, that's something else. That's unity. That's a different side of the triangle that that's where we go to

bring it together as a fellowship. You know, I,

I have some goofy ideas about this stuff because I'd been to meetings before. I think sponsorship is someone that I hang out with and I drink coffee and we sit there and Zing each other back and forth. And I got a buddy and we, we just do a lot of fun stuff together, you know, and that's a part of the deal. What I can tell you is that some of the guys that I sponsor and I, I have become real good friends. We have become the best buds. And we'll sit there and Zing each other and we'll have a good time. And you know, we'll itch and scratch and drink coffee and carry on and. And

the deal.

But before that could happen, I have to have a base, I have to have a foundation in my life. And I was taught that that's that's recovery. That's recovery. We're going to be buds. Maybe I don't know, but we're going to work the 12 steps and the sponsorship I've had. We work and rework the 12 steps because I've experienced in my own life that,

believe it or not, my character defects hung out after the first time through the steps. I didn't become like some holy roller, you know, a big time believer.

Sponsorship did something for me that a psychiatrist couldn't do. You know, sponsorship did something for me that the men of religion couldn't do. And, and what that was, was show me how to go from a militant atheist. I mean, I was, I was just, I wanted to argue. You want to talk about God? You want to talk about a higher power. Oh, I know what you're really talking about. And we would just, and I go back and forth all day long on that stuff.

A sponsor sat me down and said, yeah, I know. Are you willing to believe? Well, sure, I have no choice

and took me through a process. And what happened was it's through the process of the 12 steps

as they're outlined in the big book. Actually, yes, actually paying back the money, yes, actually knocking on the doors and saying, hey, you know, I wronged you in this way. I would like to, you know, write all matters to the utmost of my ability. Not in that language because that sounds goofy, but to to have that intention when I show up to to start and pray and meditate and to start to keep track of how I'm doing on a daily basis. By doing that.

What happened was I had a direct experience with God. It, it, it wasn't about theories or opinions or ideas.

I went from a militant atheist, didn't believe, but willing to because I was backed into a corner with a gun barrel called alcoholism pointed at my face and going, what other option do you got? So work the 12 steps and have an experience with power in my life. All of a sudden I start to wake up. That's it. Spiritual awakening. Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message. What message? The message that I've had a spiritual awakening as the result of the steps

I did, my life changed. All of a sudden I started to have a personality change sufficient to recover from Alcoholics.

I'm no longer obsessing about a drink. I don't wake up in the morning and just choose not to drink. You know why?

Because I choose wrong some days and I drink. The power in this universe, regardless of what you want to call it, placed me in a position in neutrality and allowed me to start living life on a different basis. You know that the 12 and 12 talks about the, the, the steps are spiritual in their nature, a set of principles, spiritual in their nature that if practiced as a way of life can expel the obsession to drink and enable the sufferer to live happily and usefully. Whole.

What a good deal, you know, I mean really, if you come from where I come from, like I could be whole, I can, I can wake up in the morning and not want to drink. See, because I thought a A and I thought having a sponsor was we sat and we gripped on to the tables in our meetings. It's just as hard as we could and we just tried to not drink. One minute, one second at a time. Not my experience. My current experience is, is if I get taken through the steps by a man who has a real answer

because he's done it. He's done the work prior to me. And he can show me how to get from a sniveling, whining, hopeless drunk to a man who has an experience with a loving creator who can start to grow up, you know, start to grow up a little bit and, and start to be responsible and do all that.

What a cool deal. There's so much power and sponsorship. You know, the history stuff was great. I believe we have a responsibility.

You know, we read the responsibility statement and then the guy walks up and says, will you sponsor me? And we go, you know, I kind of got a lot going on. Just read the book and call me in a week.

I don't know how responsible that is, you know, so, so sponsorship to me is nothing more than a person who's engaged in the process of recovery. Hopefully know something about the 12 traditions which are in theory supposed to govern our fellowship and has a working knowledge of, of how the circle and the triangle comes together. And we can live happily and usefully whole when we start to address the mind, the body and the spirit

by working the 12 steps, bringing our body to the meeting. Being of service,

you know, and so a sponsor that is involved and engaged and bought the whole package,

the whole package of Alcoholics Anonymous, the circle and the triangle to do the deal. You know, that's what it means to me is someone who, who well, and you know, has the light on in their eyes. That's what I see sponsorship as when I see a person who's got the light in their eyes and they're carrying this book and, and talking about the solution, what a cool deal. This is a person that that knows how to get out of the ditch. And that's, that's all I really need. I don't need a therapist. If I need a therapist, you know what?

I should go get one.

You know, drunks are want, we're wonderful people. I love Alcoholics. I don't know if we're the only people that do it, but I know that we like to give our opinions on things we know nothing about on a regular basis. You know is because one's been married 8-9 times doesn't make them an expert on marriage. You know what I'm saying? If I need a marriage counselor, I should go get one. You know, if I need therapy, I should go get it. If I need a psychiatrist, I should go get it. I think we put a lot more on sponsorship than it was ever intended to be.

It's a person that can show me a way out of the ditch, show me a way out of alcoholism

and

that's it.

OK, So what is sponsorship on the women's side

now? I, I was talking to Don earlier when we first got here and we were talking about how it can be in some areas really, really hard to find strong women's sponsorship. There's just not as many women in a A as there are men and sometimes women.

My opinion,

what I've seen is women that come to me for sponsorship seem to always have something better that comes along. So it's very, very, it was very difficult for me in the beginning 'cause I got sober in a really small town in northern Minnesota and I think there was like 3 women in the meeting that I went to, you know? And so it was, it was very difficult for me to find a woman to sponsor me,

you know, and so it was funny. So Dustin and I, we drive down to the cities almost every single day

for meetings. And there was this lady that we were at this meeting at the, oh, what was that place called where Rick does this four step workshop, the CRC. And this woman just comes bouncing along like I've never met anybody like this before. She was just so excited and so happy. And I'm just like, it's noon lady, what is your deal? You know, And she was just, I mean, hugging everybody and oh, who are,

are you new? Oh my goodness, how great to meet you. This is so wonderful. Let's talk. Are you coming out to lunch? Blah, blah, blah. And I'm just like, whoa, you're nuts,

you know, and here's my number. But, I mean, she was just crazy. And you know, after the three months of, you know, going to meetings, having the sponsor who was not telling me to do anything and sitting in a parking lot of a bar in a small town nearby,

I'm going, should I go in? Should I not go in? What's going to happen? You know, what should I do? But I literally sat there for like 3 hours debating in my head what I should do.

So I called this lady, you know, because I'm like obviously she is very excited to be here. You know, I wonder what that's all about. And maybe I should call her and see what that's all about.

And so I called her and she said, why don't you come over to my house? I said, OK, where do you live? I will. I live in Minneapolis or I live in Saint Paul. I'm like, Oh my God, I have to drive all the way down there. You know, you know how we are. We just really don't want to let anything inconvenience us. But, you know, I did. I was, I was miserable. I didn't know what to do. And I drove down there and

basically what she did was, you know, she got me writing another four step. Now this is I'm 90 day sober and this is the second four step I'm doing

and thank God she did that because this one actually had a fourth column on it. So I got see my mistakes and stuff. So it was very, very good that she did that and it should. We went through a fifth step and this woman was just, she was loving, she was compassionate, she knew the book inside. And now what? She was willing to help me any way she could,

you know, and she was just, she was very wonderful and I was very, very blessed to have her come in my life.

You know what there,

it's funny, we hear a lot in in Minneapolis that

a sponsor is somebody who takes you through the steps and that's it.

And I'm not sure I believe that. I believe that that's the first thing a sponsor should do is take you through the steps. That's what I do with the women that I sponsor. I say, OK, we're going to go through the steps. I lay it out for them. We're going to go through them in the big book. This is what we're going to do. Yes, you have to pay the money back. I know that's horrible, but yes, you're going to have to yes, you're going to have to work with others. Yes, I know.

Busy. Busy. Yeah, I get it, you know, But it I lay it out to him and that's what we do,

you know. But

if they, if

we always say as well in this in Minneapolis, is that you don't take your problems to a meeting,

you take the solution to the meeting.

But so if a sponsor is only there to take you through the steps and you can't take your problems to the meeting, then who are you supposed to take your problems to? And that's a question I always ask. Now, Kathleen, when she was taking me through the steps, I was calling her all the time because I was a newly sober in a relationship with somebody newly sober and we're nuts. And I was calling her on a regular basis, like, I don't know what I should do.

We're breaking up again, you know, on and on and on. And she was always there to love me and to say lovingly say, Kelly, you know, 22 eighteens,

you know, half an hour away. Why don't you go there and see if there's someone you can help, you know, or hey, I'm speaking at so and so tonight. Why don't you come along or whatever? You know, she was always very good at,

you know, getting me out of what I was in

and in, showing me a way out. And, you know, and that's what I do for my women.

You know, they call me, they've got a problem. I might not have the answer, but I may know somebody who does. Like right now I have a lady who's going through a custody battle. I don't have kids. I have no clue what that's all about. But I sponsored another woman that does. And so I said, you know what? I know the perfect person for you to call

and she did. You know, when she got that experience, Because that's all we have to share is our experience.

And

thank goodness I've been crazy enough in sobriety to have a lot of experience with certain things. So you know, it it it's helped out a lot and I'm so blessed with that.

I just want to kind of finish up where there's a story Dustin was talking about how, you know, we this guy could pull me out of the ditch. He knew the way out of the ditch. And there's a parable that I heard. I don't remember from who, but they say that, you know, there's this guy stuck in a wet

and he's down on the wall and he's yelling help me, help me. And a doctor comes by and he's like, oh, you're stuck in the wall. He's like, yeah, help me. And the guy writes something on a little pad of paper, throws it down there, you know, walks away. And so the guy's like, oh, Jeepers, you know, help me, help me. And a preacher comes up and looks down. He's like, oh, you're down in a while. Yeah, help me. And the guy says, OK, I'll pray for you and walks away.

And, you know, so he's still stuck down on the wall and he's yelling help me, help me.

And another guy comes along. He's like, oh, you're down in a well. And he jumps in and I was like, what did you do?

For now? We're both stuck in the well, he said. But I know the way out,

and that's our job in sponsorship. We know the way out because we're sitting here today and there's somebody that's not sitting in here today

and we can show them the way out. And that's our only job. And it's our primary purpose. And you know, we come in here and all we want is a purpose in life. And then God gives it to us and we say, well, not at, you know, I have a life. Hello, you know, but

but it's it's far, far, far beyond what I ever could have imagined my life to be and and working with others and you know, and liked us and said seeing the light come on in their eyes,

you know, seeing them actually get better, seeing them get excited, seeing them want it like calling me, having me like you wouldn't believe the amends I made to my probation officer today. It's like, you know, I mean, how cool, How cool is that? So

yeah, that's all I got. Thanks.

Tough act to follow.

Question out of the pamphlets seeking a sponsor. How does it help?

You know, I,

I went through a very militant phase where if it wasn't in the big book, it wasn't plain and simple. If it's not in the book, it's not, it's not a program. Thank you for your opinion. And I would just walk away. And luckily, through sponsorship, I learn that there's a, there's a program of, of recovery, which is in the book and there's, there's a fellowship and there's, there's a lot of things that, that

I could use help with

Besides the obsession to drink and to learn how to not only get sober, which I think is, is the most important thing. It's real hard to work on being a better person if you're drunk. It's my experience. It's real hard to care about how your character defects are affecting other people if you're drunk. I mean, I just didn't care when I was drinking. I just, you know, I, you better get out of the way. That's just the way I drank. That's the way I lived was you better get out

way 'cause you're gonna probably get hurt and I'll take what I can from you and then when there's nothing left, get out.

Having a sponsor initially work in the 12 steps.

I personally do my fist up with my sponsor. I've gotten turned on to the idea of multiple fist steps and as well as taking it to a sponsor, I've taken it to friends. I mean, I've done that whole deal, but my sponsor knows what's going on because I share my inventory with them.

That's a not necessary. I suppose. I've done it with chaplains, I've done it with whatever, but but I share my fist step with my sponsor because as we get down the road and I start doing 10 and 11 and I start getting out living life, I'm going to bump into people still because I'm selfish, self-centered by nature. I, it's not that I'm going to do it on purpose. I'm just, I'm so selfish. I just can't, I can't see you. I don't see how I'm affecting you when I want what I want and having a sponsor to do that 10 step with

and to to call up and go, you know, I was doing this and I went off on this guy in a meeting. I had a lot of that because I was so hurt that I was told to do something in a A and it would keep me sober. And it didn't keep me sober. Just, you know, just going to meetings didn't work for me. It worked for a time, but eventually the internal condition got so bad that I would just sit in meetings and want to die. I would just sit in meetings and want to drink. And so when I come back and I have the experience out of the book, I got like most drunks, you know, when they get on something, I got real righteous,

real self-righteous and real. I would bash people over the head with the big book and I went through that phase and to have a sponsor to like kind of guide me towards, you know that. Well, you know, it also says in the book, Dustin, love and tolerance of others is our code. You know, like there's a theory. Didn't didn't see that part. You ever notice that we like the things that justify our belief systems that are in the big book, but the things that go against

what we want to do or what we think is right to do, We like to just kind of pretend that doesn't exist.

You know, to have a sponsor to start getting me involved with this whole idea that if it's not in the big book, it's not was flawed if I was looking at it so militantly. But if I look at the big book and I see that they tell me to go seek out other spiritual teachers. When I see that it tells me to go see a psychiatrist if I need one. When I start to see that it's it's it's not about being rigid. It's about

becoming a whole person and whole people I believe are flexible

and allow God to give them intuitive thoughts and to move down the road. And I've the chances of me offending you on purpose today are slim to none.

You may be offended by something Kelly or I says today, but it was through sponsorship that the edges started to get rounded off. And I'm not going to intentionally offend anybody. See the difference To start working with motives and intentions and. And what am I trying to get? Where am I self seeking? Where am I driven by fear? Where am I driven by self pity? Where is it still selfishness, Self centeredness? I need a sponsor to help me do that. You know, it was a sponsor who taught me

about the 12 steps,

not because of what the book said, you know, it says and practice these principles in all your affairs. A sponsor who said, you know, Dustin, Yeah, I know you needed to get sober. A a had to be the most important thing in your life for a while. But you know what, bud? Practicing these principles work in a program includes paying child support and showing up for your kids when you said you were going to show up. It includes being a part of their lives. Or why did God get you sober?

I know guys right now that work with sponsors 7 to 10 guys at a time every week and they run them through the mill. Just take them through the book, take them through the book, take them through the book and their kids haven't seen them since they got sober. I don't think that's what the deal was here. The deal was I was supposed to re enter the mainstream of life and start living up to my other responsibilities, start being a better husband, got remarried, nightmare to be in a relationship with. I am

to start being a husband worth having to start being a friend that you would like to call your friend to start, you know, being

a human being

instead of an animal that just runs through life scratching and itching and taking what it wants. And it was through that that it really is helped. The other thing is, is to have a person to bounce all my great ideas off of because I get a lot of them. I could sit in a meeting and have 500 great ideas, you know, phenomenal ideas. And when I bounce them off a sponsor, he goes, you do know you're insane, right? Like that's probably, you know, I went through a phase a couple months ago. I had stopped smoking and

it was like 2 1/2 months off of it and I determined that it was best that I go get healthy, right.

I put on some weight since I got sober and I'm going to pretty much leave a, a except for maybe a couple meetings a week. And, and I'm not going to, you know, I'm not really going to like raise my hand too high for sponsorship and we're going to go get healthy. And we went and bought mountain bikes and we went and did all this and we were just going to go become health nuts, you know, which I have no interest to be, but it seemed like a good idea at the time. And you know, as a sponsor that was like, don't you think that's a little extreme? You know, I go from one day like smoking cigarettes and eating Donuts and the next day

I'm out, you know, buying bikes and, you know, getting ready to hike the Himalayas. You know, I, I've just, I'm enthusiastic. I'm driven like that. So sponsorship is also turned into an accountability thing for me. You know, it's it, there's a lot of people that got sponsors, but not a lot of people that are sponsored. You know, to have someone that I actually will let into my life to give me ideas contrary to my own belief system because my mind tells me it's a great idea. And prior to Alcoholics Anonymous, I see no reason to check it with you because I'm smarter than all of you,

you know, I know and I never, I just run with every idea that comes into my head. Sponsorship has allowed me to have someone in my life who knows what it's like to be in a fantasy land most of your life. And to kind of, you know, point out reality and say, like, you know, we may want to scale her back a bit. You know, don't go taking out a loan for the Trek bikes, All right, Like just just you want to get a bike. That's cool. But to talk about these things, to get my good ideas out,

you know, sponsoring others has been great because I get to watch my great ideas play out in other people. It's kind of a cold way to look at it, but I get to watch people that go, well, I'm doing it anyway. And I go, well, have fun. And I watch him go do it. And I watch the pain and I watch the misery. And sometimes if I'm having a good week, I may actually pay attention to it, you know, and go, I don't really want to do that. I get to watch the fresh wave of insanity that washes up on our beach every single day and I get to get to partake in that deal.

Having a sponsor, you know, the deal is, is I'm not afraid when I sit down with a Newman. I'm not terrified. I'm not nervous about if I can do the job because I got a sponsor that I stay in regular contact with. I don't have a sponsor that tells me to call them every day at a certain time and show up. And obviously I'm not wearing a tie today.

I have a sponsor who shows me by way of his actions how to live. So I'm more comfortable

showing a newcomer by way of my actions how we do this deal, you know, and that's it. It's helped. I'm not worried because this is coming straight down the chain how I was taught to do AAI, try to show the guys that asked me for help how to do AA. And I've had a lot of great teachers and I have a lot of spiritual advisors. And I got people from from New Jersey to California, from northern Minnesota to the tip of Texas that are spiritual advisors in my life. And these men also know my stuff.

I've allowed them into my life. But I got 1 sponsor, 1 sponsor that kind of hears my good ideas before I go out and do them,

you know? So pass it on to Kelly,

OK? How does it help?