Steps 1-12 at the 10th Annual AACYPAA Conference in San Diego, CA

And now, ladies and gentlemen, would you all please join me in giving a huge Acupoll welcome to tonight's main speaker, John Doe from Anytown USA

's.

I always wanted to do this. Yaki, yaki, yaki.

All right, I blew my name. Is John Dome recovered alcoholic?

And I'm from anytime USA and I'm grateful to be alive and sober and at a meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous and like Lindsey did a terrific job. I consider it a privilege and an honor to be asked to do anything, whether it's picking cigarettes out of urinals

or speaking in front of you lovely people. And as my friend Joe likes to say, I never saw such a nice looking bunch of sick people in my whole life.

And the list, the list of diseases you can get in this place? Just terrified. I don't know what the hell you guys are doing after curfew.

I, I got to tell you, I was walking around the campus here lost. Thank you, Kansas for those wonderful directions. And I hit just about every convention in this place and you guys are just about the best behaved bunch of people out of here. So I don't know what they're drinking in those other convention halls, but

yeah, wow, what a long, strange trip it's been for me, boys and girls. I'm looking around you and I see these young faces. And I got to tell you, I don't know what to say, really. My story has gotten so big. I don't believe it. That's the truth.

I want to qualify myself first by saying that, you know, I was up at 1:00 AM. You know, I teach and I like course get my doctorate right now out of university in Cambridge. So they make me teach undergraduates at 1:00 AM. I had to wake up. It's 9:00 AM in London and then it's 4:00 and I'm all juiced up because I love to sound like my own voice. So I go for the gym and I'm training. I, I, I do adventure cycling, you know, like my next big trip is I'm getting AirDrop into the Outback and I got to claw my way out 2000 miles, my bicycle, a tranquil,

an SOS radio. So I got, yeah, as if, you know, as if I have my bedroom enough, you know. So anyway, so I, you know, Thursday is my big spend day. So I spend for three hours and, and then like I'm all hopped up and I go to work and I wanted to get my head in the right space today because I knew I'd be tired. It was a tough week at work and I've taken a day off tomorrow, so I wanted to relax. I had the whole day planned. I was going to listen to, I don't want to say the names here, but there's a, there's

teacher I've been working with who is just, he's amazing. The things I've done in meditation are just beyond description. And so it's just so blessed, blessed beyond my capacity to receive anymore. This program, just when you think that it's the best it can get, God decides to drop you with another billion dollar gift. And I'm working with a guy who works with thousands of people and I wanted to listen to him to calm down. And I was leaving my, my health club,

you know, and I don't, I'm not from the, from the West Coast. I don't know if you can talk to my accent, but I ain't local and you know,

and spirit anonymity. I, you know, my sponsors at gunpoint is making me use the pseudonym John Doe. And from anytime you would say. But I live near a place that rhymes with Ricardo Beach, which pretty much accurately describes a couple of my neighbors, by the way, but that's another story. So I'm going to the on ramp to work this morning. I work, I work about 20 miles away and there's two kids about 20 years old with backpacks with the a a circle and triangle. Now that circle and triangle is sacred to me. I hauled everything I own from the

to the West Coast cross country. I broke down side of the road 3 hours nothing 911 nobody wanted to come help me. I took a two tuba toothpaste out of the truck and I put the AA circling triangle in the back windows. Both sides help need meaning. I had somebody stop every 5 minutes. They took my number. They irritated me all the way to California would leave me alone. This program never lets you dance. Why I see these two kids

with the backpack circles and triangles help me to lift to San Diego. They got to be going to hacky Aki.

You like the way I set that one up? So so will you guys go to the convention? What dude? And so I'm in. I'm in. I'm on the line here for this favor. All right, all right, guys, tell you what it's it's 9:00. If you're at my office at 5:00, I'll get you a ride to San Diego. You know, do the right thing and the right thing happens. You know, one of the greatest lessons I learned in a A is that life isn't a search for happiness. If you're searching for happiness, you're already off the path.

Search for right living. Do the right thing. Search for that. Look for the right thing to do in every situation, no matter how much it hurts. And then watch how the universe catches up and pat you on the back.

I don't know where the hell I came from, but that's the way my life is today. So sure enough, at 5:00, dude, Remember Me? I forgot all about you, actually, but OK. So I go downstairs and here they are. You know, like Jethro and the Beverly Hillbillies. This guy's got backpacks and their hairs all at Kimbo. And all right, San Diego, we're about to look here. I get in the car

so and again, now I have to get my head in the right place because I'm speaking in front of you nice clean people. So I have a, a, a busy job. We'll get into that later. I mean, I have a lot, I have, I have a lot of weight on my shoulders and I'm flying to Tokyo tomorrow. So I, I'm getting my bags ready in my head. I'm grading exams. I got my dissertation. I mean, I got a pack of crazy people and these two psychos went around with me in the car. So all right,

we have a responsibility, son. I used to. I did some service at the Do you guys mind if I take my jacket off?

They're going to drag me off the stage on the grass, right? I showed you Iota jacket. I did my job.

We're worried. Oh yeah, psychopaths in the car, right? So, so these guys want to come to San Diego now. I've been up since 1:00. I I I sweated 3 gallons of water to gym my and I wanted to listen to my spiritual teacher, but no, these two cycles wanted to ride to San Diego.

AA taught me you never break your word. You never break your word right. And that responsibility pleasure and anyone anywhere reaches out for help. Not when any alcoholic when anyone anywhere with yourself for help. I want the hand of a A to be there for that I'm responsible. My sponsor screaming at me in the back of my head. I can't say no get in the car. All right, so we get out to the I don't know what the heck it is. I'm in California year and I still get confused right. One of the highways, what numbers? And we're heading South

and kids says, you mind if I smoke? I don't care if you're burned. Do what you want.

And then I hear this noise in the back and that smell, that plastic smell. And I said, I know this smell. This is a familiar smell. It's it has an ambiance and a long finish and an almond bittery taste and kind of like what's sort of like a Union carbide, you know, after afterglow. Oh, and that is that is not a substance that's legal. I turn around. What are you doing, dude? You said it was OK

I go. Would you mind that? Throwing a stem out the window, please? And he actually had to think about that. I think about that for a minute. Here's a kid. He's got nothing in his pocket. And it's a choice between getting someplace else. And I know that feel, you know, And my mission was to talk to these two kids. Now, I doubt I made any difference in their lives, but I made sure they got some food in their stomachs. And I told them my story. And one of those kids asked me for my phone number in that parking lot. And he said he wants to call me later. I doubt he will. For every 100 times I hand out my phone number, maybe I got

3000 phone calls I get. Maybe one guy will follow up For every hundred guys that follows up, maybe one will show up to my house. For every hundred guys that shows up to my house, want to bring a book for every you know, and it keeps going and I still sponsored 3000 people, right? So the moral of the story is keep chopping woods. You never know when your spunters are going to ignite

Where the hell that comes from. I got to start writing the spot. That's good stuff. So it's I better get sober here before we'll fall asleep. I have a boring story. I I can tell you this last one San Diego right, love San Diego is here one and I didn't think I was allowed back. I want to tell you why

I ran for political office not that long ago. It was very close until they realized, you know, my personality and then nobody wanted to vote for me at the end. But but I did pretty good there for a while. And they had me put my story together real quick because I had to sanitize if we got the my recovery out first rule of damage controls, get the story out first. If you get it out first, we control the story and we we got it out first. And they had me put my own biography together to write my life and think about it. I mean, a moral inventory is one thing. It's not your life story. By the way, if you sponsor telling, it's your life story

with the book, it's not your life story. Nobody cares about your life story. It's what's screwing up. Your life is what we care about now,

but chapter one, it's called the sandbox. This I actually had to write this and it described my personality and pretty much the rest of my life now. I grew up on the Brooklyn waterfront between the Marine barracks, the Brooklyn Navy Yard, the Brooklyn Army Terminal 4 J the Kiwanis Expressway. Anybody see last night is the Brooklyn

boy that was over like a lead balloon. Anyway, that's about my grandma. Have you ever seen that? So that's my neighborhood. So it's like, how's your sister screw your mother? You know, that kind of thing. It was just constant, constant bickering and fighting. So when I was 10 years old, I, I, I knew it a curse like a Marine Corps drill Sergeant. I thought that was normal. You know, it was a sarcasm. A sarcasm is the language of the Irish and apriculum waterfront, you know. So when I was about 10, my mother, you know, got sick and they sent me out to San Diego to stay with my my step grandmother, I guess she's called and she was the chief nurse of some San Diego

Naval Hospital something I don't know what. It was some big place and everyone wants to kiss her butt. So they set up the biggest play date in history for my first day. So they put me right from Brooklyn in a sandbox with 30 little blonde haired angels from California. The toughest kid lasted 3 minutes. They all ran out of there screaming and crying. And that's pretty much the story of my life. I didn't go over the way I was hoping to go over, but

all right,

let's start over again. My name is John Doll. I'm an alcoholic.

My sobriety date is May 25th, 1994. And I never say that meetings of Alcoholics Anonymous because time don't mean shit. In case anybody told you it doesn't mean a thing. What matters is what you did today. How did you act today? How did I treat my admin? How did I treat my students? Did I call my mother? Did I call my sponsor? Did I help a stranger? That's what matters today. Anybody could put coins in a key chain.

A lot of things happen to me this year. I've survived a lot this by any stretch of the imagination, the most difficult year of my life. And I am so grateful to God, in a program of our faults anonymous, for carrying me on to such greater and higher heights that at a meeting this year, I took my key chain off the A, a Medina off my chain. I just threw it into the street. They're absolutely meaningless to me now. I'm just so grateful. Each day is a gift.

My sponsor is David Joyce and sobriety dates July 4th, 1951. His sponsor was Bill Wilson.

My sponsor was with with Bill when he died. His last Bill died of emphysema on his knees. My sponsors right next to him. I don't say that's impressing anybody, but you have the right to know who you're listening to and who I listen to on a daily basis. He's one of the surviving. I think there's two, two of the first 100 that are surviving. He's one of them. His stories in the second book, my stories in the Japanese big book right now. We'll get to that in a little while. True story. And it's really freaky what happened.

I I don't know what I don't know. I don't even know how to explain that when I need free years to explain how that trip to Japan took off. Anyway, So, you know, I was born and raised in Brooklyn, NY. And like Lindsey, you know, I can't blame Michael as my family. I had some horrible things happen to me as a kid. I mean, my father did things to me that they put people in jail for. My mother was really just a sick woman trying to keep up with the world. And I was a very angry just, I was always, I was always, I was always the weird kid.

Some of my my childhood real quick, I got kicked out of the best high school in the country,

5000 students a year graduate from there. I had the second lowest average in history, right? They've graduated 400,000 kids. I had the second lowest average in history and the second highest IQ in history. All right, me and another kid tested off the scale. All right, they tested they were so certain that I was a retard. They tested me twice and you know, so you know, I had like, I think I had like a 32 average or something. And I finally kicked me out and I graduated from some local,

which was a drag.

The real problem was I had a hole inside of me that was so big I couldn't fill it up right. And you know, when I was Lindsay talked about softball. My first attempt to fill a hole as I look back was comic books. You know, when I discovered Archie and Jughead, I read 100 comic books a day. See, I got some watching Jughead fans back here, but I discovered Twinkies shot up to about £350. I look like, I look, I look like, like a basketball when I was nine years old,

right Then I discovered dirty pictures. And you know

all I'm going to say, in the next three years, my right arm is going to sling.

And that didn't kill the whole, no pun intended.

Now you know what? Now you know why I got to go by. I never come up here with my real name.

Forget about it. So

so after the after the cast came off, I discovered that that were real girls. I'd be happy to give you hands if you knew how to park.

And that didn't work either. Or kidding. All kidding aside, at what really happened was I tore my way through hundreds of relations and I wouldn't even call them relationships. I just taught through hundreds of lives like a tornado, like it says in our book. And I did it for a variety of reasons. I did it to get back at my mommy. I did it because whatever the reasons, where they're in my inventory, you have yours, I have mom. What's the difference? We're all driven by the same basic, basic parts of self

and four basic flaws, right? So, you know, I just did it to pride, ego, you know, self esteem. I mean, I was just an animal and I got into college. I mean, I was dating 5 girls at a time. I mean, how much can you eat, you know, and I was smoking, I was smoking 4 packs of cigarettes a day. And you know, I was drinking, you know, but I was just drinking, drinking, drinking. And you know, I got to my second, my second year, my 40th college before I realized that I might have a problem. So

I saw, I don't forget this, I saw officer and a gentleman. That's it. I'm going to be a Navy, a naval aviator. That's it. OK, this is the way to go. I never, I never looked at the fact that I had like a 0.0 GPA and I got kicked out every school everyone went to. And you know, I had a four pack a day habit and you know, and the list just goes on forever. Nothing on the good side, everything on the bad side, but an amazing thing happened. Now Alcoholics are amazing people. I, I, I knuckled down, I buckled up or whatever it is you call it. I hunkered down

and I just concentrate it and I got straight A's. I got A after A after A. However, this is the thing to remember. This is how you know if you got what I got right. The more I love this when people say, you know you're an alcoholic if your life gets better the moment you stop drinking. Bullshit. When I stop drinking, my hair gets too tight. When I stop drinking, I get pissed. And I mean, I hate everybody

for lengths of time. And no matter how you look at me, I plot revenge for the rest of my life.

Kind of like how I felt when those two psychopaths left my car, right?

So, you know, I managed to go two or three years without drinking, but a but a funny thing happens, you know, I had to fill out God's sized holes. So I turned to everything and anything, whether it was sex, whether it was cigarettes, whether it was food, whether it was God.

You know, I, I, I got into a science fiction kick. I was reading three or four science fiction books a day. I mean, I was escaping. It was just on so many different levels. I was trying to run away from me

and that's really all this thing is boys and girls running away from what since I love page 55, you know, there's a buyout at a Las Vegas. I hate Vegas, but I love this guy and you know, he always talks about sleeping and you know, I wish I had more time. I had I had been a couple of years ago. I had been clawing and scratching and itching to say something, you know, and I have a sober blog, you know that I run. It's it's really it's not an A A blog. It's just my experience isn't.

I've done a lot of things in sobriety. I've studied a keto, I've become a samurai. I've taken, I've studied Dakota Bushido, you know, I've learned Chinese, I've studied the Daisy. I've done a lot of things as a result of Alcohols Anonymous. But I've been scratching and itching and clawing to get at it. I thought that it's just been just just driving me for years and I couldn't quite put it into words. And then one day it hit me

that inside all of us is the power, right? The power to recover from alcoholism. Inside all of us. We're born with it and all of us have it. There is God in everybody. My job is to look for the God deep down inside everybody, 'cause it's there. I don't care who it is. If it's a lady in a supermarket, a newcomer comes to the door

says on page 55, right deep down inside of every man, woman and child is a fundamental idea of God. It may be obscured by pomp, calamity, or worship of other things, right? But deep that inside it is there. It is only there that it can be found In a final analysis, there he is, right? In other words, God is always there, but he's always in the last place we look right here, right? The Taojing says if you want to discover the universe, don't leave your backyard. Big Book says it like this. You know the a a really

amazing except it's the first time anybody ever thought to write all this stuff down. This is really an amalgamation of every spiritual principle that has ever saved anybody's ass over the last 5000 years. That's all it is,

Big Book of Alcoholics Anonymous. In my opinion, it's a book about God, the solution to alcoholism. Which is why I introduced myself as a recovered alcoholic. Not because I'm better than anybody, but because I have achieved, through the 12 steps of alcohol synonymous, a loving sponsor with God of my understanding, the highest rank and badge of grade. Anybody could make an Alcoholic Anonymous. I am a child of God, first class,

just like you and you and you no better, no worse.

What time am I supposed to stop is I'm just lost man. I'm on Tokyo time now. How much time I got 5/10/15

All right, so let me let me run through the numbers here and tell you, you know why I'm here. You even know if I'm an alcoholic yet. All right, so I drank like a bottle of Scotch today. That counts, right? And then I stopped and I ate a lot of Twinkies and and read books through college, right? And then one day I was about to go on climb up a bell tower with shotgun. So I just want to wondering just one take the edge off, right? And I took the edge off for the next seven years.

Dropped out of college and left the Navy at the altar.

Take me but elect the Navy at the altar and I just start attending bar. And I love Scotch. I love Scott so much and his day. I would suck it out of a mop. I love Scotch that much. I love Johnny Walker Black, all the boys at Doers, Highlander. I love Highland Scotch, Lowland Scotch, Campbell's Islands. I mean, I know I'm forever about Scotch. It's a good thing we're not talking about alcohol tonight.

And, you know, I got a job as a bartender. You know, the reason why I started tending bar was, you know, all the Navy movies I watched, you know, they all drank Scotch and they all hit him in torpedo tubes. And I figured if I'm going to be in the Navy, I got along like drinks notch. And I drank it. I drank it and I loved it. And it got worse and worse. And it got to the point where I couldn't hold the job. You know, I was a great bartender. I worked with some of the glitziest joints in New York with the line on on me was, you know, great guy, good with customers, knows his business, which can't pay him.

You never see him again. I lost 52 jobs in seven years, hand to God, 52 jobs in seven years. And I don't even remember. I remember when I had 90 days like I got hit by by the IRS. I think they hang out in beginners meetings and they think about it. It's perfect. Place them in like the warrant squad, like those bail bonds people you see on TV, those psychos with the with the pink guards. But I got a notice when I had 90 days and this is when I knew I had a shot. When I had 90 days. I worked for

a gangster back in New York. Very powerful guy give you a hints, his thank you his

his mother, his father-in-law and throat cutting a barbershop in the 50s. That's how powerful his family was. And he showed me a letter and I was washing dishes at the time. I had 90 days. And he says the IRS says you're never going to make any money ever. You're 100% for the rest of your life. You know, $117,000. You want to Social Security number? Do you want to resource just like a gangster movie? Do you want a new Social Security number? We'll give you a driver's license. Yeah, no problem.

Only in New York could this happen.

I looked at the guy and I heard this small squeaky voice come out of me and say no,

I'm not going to run anymore.

It's hard to sound like Towley a little bit from hanging out with you. It sees two guys from San Diego. He want to get home,

Sony backtrack a little bit. So, you know, I spent seven years bouncing in and out of a a drinking and I wound up in a cardboard box drinking Listerine in Brooklyn.

And I lived on top of a hill right next to a pollution plant that burned methane. And in Brooklyn they call that the perpetual fart because the lights, the lights are always on there. So I had a viewer perpetual fart in a box, you know, and I had, and I really thought I had it going on. This is why you don't trust me. I don't think it. I really thought I had it going on because I had a cord that ran from the from the lamp to the box. And when I had visitors, right, you had a choice. You could have the heater or you could have the radio, but you couldn't have both because you blow out the lamp bulb, you know, so.

OK, I didn't have many visitors, you know, Needless to say, but seriously, you know, the last six months and I was drinking mouthwash because it was all I can afford. And I was doing other things that we really shouldn't talk about in a A because it's destroying our primary purpose. And you know, I was just, I was 117 lbs. It's half my current body weight. I'm in pretty good shape now for an old man. And I had scurvy, by the way, which is a lack of vitamins and rickets. And I had lice and a whole bunch of other stuff

and I was bleeding out of places you don't want to see. Blood came out of heart attacks. Wow, that's God's second right there. I had 7 heart attacks on May 25th, 1994 and I consider that to be a divine tap and shoulder.

I, you know, I'm not going to say that God spoke to me, but I had a white light experience and what I heard was not yet and I was resuscitated three times. I was pronounced dead at the scene, again in the ambulance and dead at the hospital. And the last time they resuscitated me I heard not yet. And I don't know if that was a surgeon screaming or what, but I woke up the next day handcuffed to a wall at Lutheran Medical Center in Brooklyn.

My mother had hired a leg breaker. My my stepfather used to work for the longshoreman's union, so he had lots of friends in the neighborhood, if you know what I mean. And this guy name was Vinnie. And Vinnie's job is keeping that hotel room for two weeks and break my legs if I tried to get a drink. That's a true story. And Vinnie would have broke my legs. And thank God for Vinnie. So I woke up with handcuffed to a wall and I was bleeding from a place you don't want to bleed from. And

the man who's become my A A sponsor walked in and goes. So David,

do you believe you're powerless now?

What's next? That's it, that's it. Who here is as 90 days or less? Raise your hands,

my people, right here.

What's next? That's the question that makes all the difference between winning and losing, between living and dying. What's next

Next is God, that's it. Everything else is bullshit. There is nothing after what's next. He did no ranting. He did no preaching like I'm doing right now. Actually how to think about it in a matter of fact way. He said listen, kid, I haven't listened. I haven't listened to the last three years and you're full of shit. I know it. You know what you're going to die. Look at you, you're dying right now. You know you want to run out and drink. I'm sober 30 years. I actually have people that care about me. I actually have a home and a place to sleep and children and you know, like real stuff. And I just found that I

throat cancer and I'm going to die in six months, kid. And I want to drink so bad I can taste it. Do you mind if I tell you my story?

I mean, sure. I mean, my, my calendar was wide open that day. So

I was on my 4th step the next day. And it was an envelope. It wasn't the Great American Novel, but it was a list of my bile, my filth, all the things that have been eating my lunch. At the end of 14 days, when I released me from that hospital,

I was on my 9th step. I had $2.00 in my pocket. He drove me to the first stop her own shark was into for 25 large and made me give this guy a dollar. I found out later that he was dead. As anonymous sponsor, he knew this guy wasn't going to hurt me. He had the whole thing set up, but I had $2.00 in my pocket. I handed one guy a dollar and I bought a bagel and put me into a homeless shelter in Brooklyn to say that the Atlantic Ave. men's shelter for one year.

It's important for you to hear this because when you hear the end of the story, I want to show you the heights that Alcohol Is Anonymous can take you

if you're willing to do the work because you got to you got to you got to you got to play like everything depends on God, but you got to work like everything depends on you. That's really all I have to say about that. So I spent the year at the at the at at at the shelter and Joe lasted the whole year and Joe passed away with lump with a throat cancer tended a year. And I was so angry at God. But you know, how could he do this to me? I'm on my 9th step and you're back in my life and I'm starting and the only man I ever loved dies of cancer. Well, that night, my first anniversary,

I hopped up a loogie that was black and they took me to slow Kettering and I had cancer. I've been carrying that. Never forget this. I remember looking at my new sponsors, my sponsor today. Well, how could God do this to me? I mean, you know, all through, through the boxes and the Listerine and and, and, and, and to take the, how could he do this to me? And, and he said the most beautiful thing, he goes, you know, maybe God knew this was coming. Maybe Joe was here to show you that you can die with grace and dignity because now I'm in charge.

You asked me to be your sponsor. I'm going to sponsor you. I don't want to hear about your cancer anymore. I don't give a shit because I want to hear about what you're going to do for the next sick and suffering alcoholic. And we're going to take you to the hospital. We're going to check you in. You're going to get what they give you, but you're going to go to detox every day and you're going to take this book and you're going to get them sober and you're going to shut up about your chicken shit problems. I'm worried about the guy doesn't know if he's going to lift her tonight because that's the guy that's got a real problem. At least you got you got a solution for yours. So I had chemo and radiation for 42 days. When I left that hospital, I looked like Alpha Fester. I put about 100

I had ringed into my eyes. I don't know if anybody said chemo radiation at the same time. They said it was going to be painful. It was far more hideous than they described, but apparently closer to God.

And I said then what I say now when I have things happen in my life, God, if it brings me closer to you, bring more suffering because it's worth it. If anybody's in real pain right now, I'm happy for you because we have a solution for you and you'll be that much closer to God and your other side. I promise you, this too shall pass. I got out of the hospital and I was broke, and I spent another year in a shelter. So I spent my first two years in a shelter and I was crazy.

So I would say I still AM.

I wash dishes

for four years and when I was about four years sober, I got fired from my only job as I brought every fired from and a lady said, David, you're too smart to be washing dishes. You owe it yourself. You owe it to yourself to get out and get a real job. And I found out lady, she had 25 years sobering. She but listen, we talked about computers in a A and that's how I talked about those computers. I was computer crazy. I was building like computers in my sleep. I was just out of my mind with computers. I had nothing else to do. I mean, I was sober and then you got another 16 hours of the day. What are you doing?

I go computer. Don't know what else to do. Give me a dollar. It's up here.

And so I went to my sponsor. I'm like, what do I do? He goes get a computer job. I know, but I don't know. Anything goes. Listen, you've been lying your whole life. Just make up a resume and get a shot.

I'm not, I'm not counseling anybody to do this, but it worked out well for me. I, I went in that line line why didn't give me a job and I got promoted 11 times in one year. And here's the thing. The book says that fear is evil and corroding threat. It seems to steal more from our lives than anything else.

I never thought I was smart enough to work in an office. I'm taking over the planet. I thought I was an idiot. I'm a genius. Go figure. I got promoted 11 times there, 11 times there. By the time I was seven years sober, I was a global chief information officer, which means I I ran lots of big stuff all over the world and lots of people jumping out of my way where at the work I was black.

I come in it was like 48 hours. So good morning. So and so I'm happy briefcase you got ours or it's beautiful and my sponsor was getting worried about me and at this point I was being asked to speak quite a bit. I'm using my real name and a danger there. You know, first edition right before it and they talked about this earlier when writing or speaking publicly about alcoholism, right. We urge each of our fellowship to admit his personal name designate himself instead as a member of alcohol synonymous and I'm John Doe from anytime USA

mentoring good standing of Alcoholics Anonymous. My Home group doesn't matter. I'm a member of AAI travel the world. I've been to a in 146 countries. It's all one big smear dot density of love.

I've noticed is a lot of people think that the home groups are gangs. We're not gangs. We're a fellowship of men and women who share our spare strength and hope and etc. That's all. That's not for that. So

I spoke at like 1000 meetings over the next couple of years and I was so proud of that. And I had my sponsees ripping my discs and putting them up on a web and I was just I was just being a real, you know, I was being I was being an idiot is what I was being. And I had I got the the car always wanted and I noticed I was driving by the a a coffee shops. I wouldn't hang out with these people anyway, but I wanted them to see me in a new car, you know? And

I remember when I was nine years sober, I got up in front of a convention and there were a lot of people there. And I was bragging about how many times I've been through the steps, you know, doing a lot of institutional work. And I was working with a lot of convicts, still do. And I guess I told the staff, my sponsor got up, and at that time it was about 80. And he goes, excuse me,

Dangle Barry. He goes. Have you actually finished your night step?

Well, you know,

hand to God after the meeting, we had a very serious talk and he said, listen, kid, you're about as close to a drink as anybody ever met. I want you to put the gag on you're done speaking in a a it's not about you. It's about God and a newcomer. You need to learn that lesson. And I want you to liquidate everything you have because you're still a FIFA cheating, a liar, because you still owe people for money from years back. You still owe this government money. It's time for you to get square with God. Get Squarey Cafe Fellows, hit yourself up and be a member of a a who's that nine years sober?

Greatest thing I ever did. I sold out.

The applause is for God. I sold the car, sold the house, liquidated by 401K. Within two years I had everything back 10 times over. But more importantly, I got to stay sober. All right, Money is easy. Doesn't seem like it is in the beginning. Money is at least your problems. You do the right thing, you'll have money. Do the right thing. That's the important thing. So my sponsor let me speak for a number of years. Thank God.

And you know, luckily for me, you know, I went to work, I got my dream job, I went back to college, I got my masters degree, I started working my doctorate and I got hired by the largest insurance company in the world.

It rhymes with aid big company. And it was like the dream shot. And I had like 6000 people working under me. And as a condition of employment, this is how God works in your lives as AC level executive, you have to be anonymized on the web in my Facebook before I don't exist on the web. I'm an anomaly. So when I got a call from Kansas who tracked me down over web and then actually found my phone number, I was shocked because there are vendors. I have a big budget. I mean, I have I write a lot of big checks. Thank God it's not my money. I'd be very nervous.

So get you have a better chance of getting the president United States on a phone and get me And he had my cell phone number. I took him like three years, but he got me. And the day, the day my sponsor took the gag off was the day Kansas called me to come down here. So I consider myself privileged beyond beyond my ability to express to be here. But I told him it had to be under my sponsor's condition is now. He's 91 now and I don't know how much longer I have before I'm going to go home and see him.

I'm going to go home and see him in a couple of weeks, but kind of love him so much.

But he said as long as as I remember member of Apple's Anonymous is standing order to me is never forget that you know that that you're the pipe. You know you're not the water. The farmer doesn't grow to crops like somebody says he plants the seeds. He kills the soil. God does the growing. You know, the surgeon doesn't cure the patient, not a surgeon. You know, make creates an antiseptic environment, removes the disease and you know allows God to come in and do his work and that's what we are Alcoholics Anonymous. I am not the message. I am not the solution. I don't want anybody looking for me. I'm a knucklehead,

you know, I could be having a very bad day. When you find me on the phone. I have them. Typically, I want you looking for Alcoholics Anonymous in anytime, USA. Alcoholics Anonymous is far and away the greatest thing that's ever happened to me. And you know, I don't know what to say. Ajit. My God, I used to be a bum in a box in Brooklyn with a perpetual fart. I teach in London in the morning. I'm flying to Tokyo tomorrow. Every time I try to quit my job, they keep giving me more money. I don't need anything and I just keep coming. And it's all because I drive knuckleheads and I smoke.

So I don't know if I've made any sense at all tonight because I don't even know what times are I'm in, but I love Alcoholics Anonymous. I swear to God I wish I could take my heart out and pass around to you just how good you people have been to me. Nobody has ever hurt me in Alcoholics Anonymous. And I'll leave you with this. Not everybody that smiles at you is your friends and not everybody that's meets use your enemy. I love each and everyone here. God bless you and thank you for having me.