Pollock Pines, CA

All right. Good morning. How are you?

I want to encourage you to buy those raffles. I bought you some really good stuff watching some old stuff that I that I do 1947 Jack Brennan,

Ramona Belford long time from Oklahoma girl. I wrote three grapes on it said you must have think of it. Linda Smith gets 3 greats. Nell Wing, secretary to Bill Wilson eye view of a a history here. Very good. Bill Mathis. Bishop Mathis name is 19th. They have survived July 4th, 1947. That's getting back a little bit. Isn't that fun? There's Doctor Mark, one of my running buddies. You love this guy

Ruby. Morale Workshop on how to work with wet drums.

Just don't trust them.

They'll lie to you. Ever tell fasting disease of perception? You don't own that thing. You ought to get it. That's a great one. Louise Aldridge,

1962. And this is the great one here. Four step on sex. How's that? I know you'd be fighting over that one. Well, that's pretty old crowd here. Good morning. How are you? You look. You look good. We made it up here again.

So today we're going to talk about the 5th step, the dreaded fist. Not so bad writing something in private

or even with some help. We talked a little bit about how you might do these things with your sponsor ease. You can work with them, you can have them telling your life story and then you can have them do the written part of the work. You can have them write it and just to get them through it is is the important part.

So let's go to the fifth step on page 72, I think of this book. If you don't have something, how do you get it? In this program?

See how well you've been listening. If you don't have something, how do you get it?

Thank you. Exactly anything you want. So I like my little prayer in the back that I use that I call the six conditions of sobriety. And I asked God this morning that He let us be open to all spiritual concepts, not to be an intolerable Blizzard tonight, and grant us the ability to be open, honest and willing.

Amen. If I am granted those things and I take these steps, things happen.

Personality change takes place over time.

Page 72

it says into action. Nice. Chapter 6 it says. Now I'm going to give you some words

and Bill's story he's going to call it in his fourth step. He's going to call it sin SINS,

which is actually a Greek term. It's an archery term that means to miss the mark.

The bullseye being the mark, the outside rings, or the amount of sins that you missed the marked by. Does that make sense? That's an arc return. Now we in Christianity, people in Christianity convert that into meaning something else. But what it really means is to miss the mark. All human beings miss the mark. There aren't any perfect human beings

all fall through the glory of God, period.

If you had an opportunity to talk to spiritual leaders of this country like the Pope,

and you would ask him, do you struggle with God's will and do you miss the mark, you'd be the first guy in the world say yes, I do. It's it's only us who think we know that don't know it makes sense to you. He also in his inventory calls him problems and deficiencies,

and he said that he took those problems, sins, problems, deficiencies with the sponsor Evie while in the hospital. He took the steps in the hospital.

Gee, I'm glad they didn't wait a year.

He might. He might have had trouble. Or two. Or five,

When you get into step four, he calls them flaws and shortcomings. No, just flaws in full

in five. He calls them defects, and he calls them weak items.

In six, he'll call them things that are objectionable.

In Seven, he'll call them defects of character.

We're going too fast for you. I'll go a little slower backing me up to wherever you are, and we'll start

four OK, flaws.

And now we have been five. He calls some defects

and he calls them weak items.

If I get running too hard like this, sometimes just stop me. It's not hard. I just, I'll stop back up.

I'd like to say sometimes them what page you're on. I'll just come where you are.

Six. He calls them things that are objectionable.

This will all be on the tape. You know the CD

seven, you'll call it defective character

on page 72 uses the word weak item. Again,

in the 12 of 12, you call them a most real deformities

as page 43 of the collaborator we're calling emotional performances.

In the 1212 on page 59, she'll call them shortcomings.

I've heard people fight, almost get into fights over shortcomings. In other words, you know, they mean different things.

And the big book. I'm 75 years old and twisted character

in the 12 of 12 on page 59 he'll call them

No. On page 61 you call them liabilities.

In the 12:12 on 3048 he would call a moral principles.

You also call them an index of non adjustments. I like that one.

I just got a lot of words and I got an index of maladjustment.

Now

amazingly, when Bill was asked about words one time,

he said they all mean the same thing.

He said when he was going to college that they taught him if you use the same words over and over, it was an indication if you had a limited vocabulary, which meant you were probably not very smart.

So if I measure myself by that, I'm in trouble

because I'm not very smart.

All mean the same thing.

Did you hear people debate it?

He's also trying to reach a very large audience. He's not. He's a pretty smart guy. He's not a professional writer,

but he but he understands he's trying to write something through God. I believe he's trying to write something that that going to mean something to somebody in Chicago and it will mean something to somebody in Southern California, maybe Florida. They use a little different word down there.

So we start in with having made our personal inventory. What should we do about it? We've written the inventory. However you got it written, we got it written.

You have to remember in these days we don't have when the book came out, there's only two meetings in the world

off in New York.

So the book is the sponsor. The book carries the message.

They wrote their experience in this book about what they did and how they did it.

It has been held in such reverence that they have. It'll take a 2/3 vote worldwide membership vote to change anything that has anything to do with spiritual principles there.

I just don't think that's ever gonna happen. They will not change the book because it produced a lot of success.

So he said. Having made our personal inventory, what should we do about it? We've been trying to get a new attitude, a new relationship with our Creator, and discover the obstacles in our path.

That's it.

That's the purpose of the program of Alcoholics Anonymous,

as the purpose of the steps

to get a new attitude, a new relationship to our Creator, and discover the obstacles on our path, that which blocked us from doing that.

In this case, we said it was resentment,

fears and harm we said is what did that. And so that's what we inventory.

And even though it says sex farms, the books doesn't treat sex like with any other problem. So harm is, the harms aren't.

So let's go to page 25 for a minute just to fool with you a little bit.

So we have brilliant, we are

look right in the middle of the page and

3 vines down it says there is a solution

and as a result of this solution

in the middle of the page. This is what's supposed to happen as a result of the solution. The great fact is just this and nothing less, that we've had deep and effective spiritual experiences.

Deep and effective?

You betcha. Not the same people anymore. You're not the same person that walked in the doors whenever you got here,

which has revolutionized our whole attitude towards life, towards our fellows and towards God's universe.

And I've seen God stand up here, look at things completely different.

The central fact of our lives today is that the absolute certainty that our creators entered into our hearts and listened away with this indeed miraculous

promise.

He asked. He asked, commence to accomplish those things for us we could never do by ourselves. A promise.

So now we'll go back to 72.

We have admitted certain defects

4 lines down. We have ascertained in a rough way. But the trouble is we put our finger on the weak items of our personal inventory and we always got to talk. When we talk about all these things, we talk about all that list of stuff we just did between me and who

he and God.

Get me and God straightened out. You and I will straighten out automatically. If I can get me and God straightened out you and I'll straighten, it won't be a problem. We have admitted certain defects that have ascertained roughly what the trouble is. We put our fingers on the weak items and our personal inventory. Now these are about to be cast out.

Wow. Wait a minute, cast out.

Hmm, somebody might call this 5-6 and seven.

That's in 7th. When you you become one in 6th and 7th is when you ask God to take away that which stands between you and them

so you can have power. Uses the word think that it could have used the word power. It's easy. This requires action on our part. Which one completed will mean we've admitted to God, to ourselves and another human being, the exact nature of our defects.

Understand it really makes no difference. What you tell the other human being

doesn't make any difference. Shut off.

That's what you're telling to God.

The other human being is just there to walk along with you. But a little bit of experience, we hope, as you take this inventory and work towards your guys.

It's all about you and God. It's not about me. I'm not nobody's God, you know, Take my advice. I'm not using it. You know,

think about it. You get to it a minute. Yeah, a lot of people get a lot of advice on a A, but they don't live their advice. But they got good advice. This brings us to the fifth step in the program of recovery mentioned in the preceding chapter. This is perhaps difficult, especially discussing our defects with another person.

We think we've done well enough to admit these things to ourselves.

There is doubt about that.

In actual practice we usually find a solitary self appraisal insufficient.

Now a lot of people like to do written appraisals, Journaling they call it.

I. Nothing wrong with any of it.

Try to remember, the insanity of the mind goes to the insanity of the paper,

and there's nobody there to challenge it, you know,

So I don't know. So you gotta be careful of that kind of stuff. But there's nothing wrong with it. A lot of people do it.

Many of us thought it necessary to go much further. We would be more reconciled to discussion ourselves with another person when we see good reason why we should do so.

The best reason first. If we skip this vital step, we may not overcome drinking and what this vital mean. Life sustaining. When they take my vital signs, if they're not all in good shape, that's how they find out I'm in trouble. Life sustain is what vital means.

I happen to believe a personal belief that we are spiritual beings in the human body.

I am a believer that

because it makes some sense as we go through here,

you cannot

force an autonomous spirit. We call our meetings autonomous meetings, self governed by God.

Well, what makes up autonomous meetings or autonomous spirits? That's how I come to that. There's no big church for you. Let's just how I come to that understanding.

You cannot force an autonomous spirit to do anything

that makes sense.

If you could, prisons would work.

Got drunk, did you? You'll send you over the drunk patent saying Clinton for six months, you ought to be fine. No, don't work that way.

Oh, denture treatment once? Well, we'll do this and you ought to be OK. Don't work that way either.

What I'm getting to here

is

I'm self humbled. You can't humble me.

Did you scare me and run me around? You can control me while you got me close to you, but you can't humble me. Does that make sense? I have to be self humble. God gave me will. I have to be willing to surrender the will. God will not take your will. You have to be willing to get it.

So what happens here is I'm going to become self humbled through taking these steps. I'm going to humble me

and at the end of the fifth step, he's going to send me home to meet my God because for the first time in the program, I am probably humble enough by the admission to another human being and God. I'm humble enough to let God in. We'll talk about that when we get there. So I said trying to avoid this humbling experience.

You see, that's what it is. This step is a humbling experience. Maybe they ever did A fifth step.

Hamilton.

Embarrassing.

Y'all want to tell him this? Well, am I going to be absolutely honest

trying to avoid this now? I'm a farm kid. Let's don't tell him about that.

Trying to avoid this something experience, they turn to easier methods.

Almost invariably they got drunk.

Half measures of they'll mean nothing.

Told you the other way the other day. It's all the way in or all the way out. There's not very much middle ground here. We're talking about it coming up in the car. And I said, you know, when a guy works these steps and has some sort of a change, even when he tries to go back to drinking, he's not the same human being. And so we tell people, you come around us, we'll spoil you drinking. Not intentionally, but we do, you know, one because there's a way out of it. Having persevered the rest of the program, well, you keep telling me

I did 1234.

OK. They wonder why they fell. I also did 56789 here. He persevered the entire program. We did it all at 11 and 12. Why did they fall? We see this sometimes with old timers sometimes lots of times go down. He said. We think the reason is they never completed their house cleaning. So people come to me from time to time and I seem to get I go speak somewhere and I, you know, I'm just this dumb guy and I say something and here comes these guys with 18 and 19 years

happy George and free and you appear to be and can you help us? And you know, I don't have much time to talk to a nervous to call me up and we'll talk about it. And I'll say to him. Did you ever write a four step? Well, no. Well, good. Come over. You've never applied the solution. So yeah. Did you do 9? You did four and five, 6-7 and eight. Did you do 9? Did you complete it? No, didn't complete it. No, no, quit, quit. Put a few people and quit.

Well how about 12? You doing 12 step work?

Well, no, don't do that either. Well, there's great hope for you. Come over. You know we can do that. And guess what? Something will happen for you. You know, it's amazing. Last time I spoke in the city, there was

three guys came 1819 and 19 and they're all last five for today. Supposedly doing their work is between them and God not, that's not my job to see further, you know?

So he said we took inventory, all right, Been hung on to some of the worst items in stock. He's warning me here. He's telling me something.

They only thought they'd lost their egotism and fear, the only thought that humbled themselves.

But they had not learned enough of humility,

fearlessness and honesty.

Hence we find it necessary until they told someone else all their life story. All

a life story sounds like this.

My name is Donald Dean Brown,

my mother was Bonnie Louise, maiden name was Ward. And you go into your family history as far as you can remember,

and I talk about where I was raised, how I was raised, and I never met my real father until I was 40 some years old. That's what life stories sound like.

And a resentment is a resentment is a resentment no matter if it was at four years old or it's at 44 years old.

Resentments of principles,

not the good ones, but they are principles.

And so I want to be able to write that life story. So when you wrote that inventory, we said start with the earliest memory and write your life inventory by memory on the resentment part so that it unfolds like this is your life. Makes it a lot easier on the guy that's trying to listen to it

when people tell their life story and they get that done with.

I will then pick up the sheets of paper that I've given you that we fill out and we'll go through each name and we'll go through and I mark with errors to see what I'm going towards God or away from God

because that's what I want to know. That's what the inventories about. I'm trying to get closer to the power. I stay sober on the power. Does that make sense? Excuse me. Total freedom. I love meetings. I go to more meetings accidentally and most people do on purpose,

but I don't say so immediately. That's not freedom.

I can go anywhere today.

More than most people, the alcoholic leads a double life. Oh boy,

when you're a liar cheating us ease, you've got to lead yourself alive. He is very much the actor. Remember the actor he talked about to the outer world? He presents his stage character. This is the one he likes his fellows to see. Must enjoy a certain reputation. But nose in his heart, he doesn't deserve it. He has a double standard.

If you have a double standard, you're a hypocrite.

If you're a hypocrite, you're a liar. If you're a liar, you can't have a relationship with God demands rigorous honest to page 58

so

this is the one he likes his fellows to see. He wants to join a certain reputation but knows in his heart he doesn't deserve it and have a cause of guilt.

That easy to figure out. It'd be a big time for factors to figure that out.

The inconsistencies made worse by the things he does on his Freeze and the Jekyll and a Hyde. I will do things while drinking. I would never do so.

This is

remorse, the book calls it coming to his senses. He's revolted at certain episodes, he vaguely remembered.

I have people tell me, well, I had a lot of blackouts and I'm not, you know? How do you know UW some of that stuff then you know

these memories are a nightmare. He trembles to think someone might have observed him. As fast as he can, he pushes his memories far inside himself. He hopes that will never see the light of day. He's under constant fear and tension. Don't even know it's there. Been packing it around for you. Take a few drinks. That's what happens to clear intention. It goes away.

Psychologists are inclined to agree with us. They spent thousands of dollars for examinations. We know but few instances where we've given these doctors a fair break who seldom told them the whole truth.

It's not a that's boy, that's just that's really, that's really realistic. Go to the doctor, fam, a couple $100.00 an hour and lie to them.

I'm not getting very far, George, with this patient of mine. I mean we followed their advice.

Same thing with sponsorship under you. Try giving a lot of advice out and see what happens. Unwilling to be honest with these sympathetic men, we were honest with no one else.

No honesty, no recovery.

OK,

Small wonder many in the medical profession have a low opinion of Alpha Oxygen Kansas for recovery.

No known cure to this disease.

We must be entirely honest. There you go. He's going to repeat himself with somebody

here we expected to live longer happily in this world.

Well, now I think that's a great statement.

Let's see. Stay in dishonesty and BS and be miserable and drink yourself to death or live long and happily in this world. Well, that's a big choice. Yeah. Right. And natural. We think. Well, before they choose a person or persons whom to take this intimate and confidential step, it tells me what kind of a step it is.

Remember 1939?

Two meetings in the world? What comes off the press?

You were saying to get the book $3.50, which is quite a bit of money. There's a seven day money back guarantee and I've just try to remember who's ordering the book. Maybe a family friend, probably drunk, gets it in a blackout. 7 days is going by, I can't send it back,

hasn't got a clue what it's about. You know,

so he's brought us to the point he's telling us we've got to choose someone to hear this thing. But there's no fellowship. There isn't anybody do well, you know, I like, I like George. George been so over 32 years and you know, I've been talking to him like sponsor and, and it's I've written this inventory. I think I'll take it to George, you know, or Jack or Joe girls, maybe Jill or maybe maybe the in the old days, men sponsored women, women sponsored men. I sponsored women. That's I know everybody says that's wrong.

First of all, don't know the difference

through the law that governs the Spirit does not know the difference between female and male.

It says here. So what they're doing is they're going to give you some suggestions in the time in which you couldn't get a spot out of the fellowship and they're going to tell you where. And he would misplace that today. They read it in a different way and they think that's what they ought to do.

It still would work all right. Sometimes those of us belong to a religious denomination which requires confession, must. And of course, we want to go to the property of foreigners, authorities whose duty is to receive it.

At the time this book was being written, Bill did not want to embarrass nor create a problem between him and religion at all, of any kind.

He's really suggesting maybe if you're a Catholic, you might go down and see your Creek.

If you're a Catholic, I'm not one, but I have to know a little bit about them. And you're going to see the priest is called an examination of conscience that you take before you walk into the confessional. And many Catholic people I sponsor tell me that this is a real or much more in depth examination of context of what they usually do. And it has benefited them greatly. And so a lot of times after I've listened to their inventories and we've got an 8 step list made, I'll say maybe you ought to take it on down to your priest.

Because if you're going to be a Catholic B1, I don't care what you're going to be, just be whatever you're going to be, you're going to be an A Never be one. Don't don't be half and around, you know? So he says

he goes on to say who's probably foreign authorities who duty is to receive it. Though we have no religious connection, we may still do well to talk with some of their Dang by an established religion. We often find such a person quick to see and understand our problem apart from God. They're going to see that. Religious people might be a little quicker to see that

wino down in the park I've been drinking with for 20 years. Of course, is sometimes encounter people who do not understand Alcoholics and I wrote in my book Stay away,

Stay awake. One of the great blessings we have in this fellowship today is our ability to have other Alcoholics who successfully walk this path and who can help us to walk it.

Two, the second set of circumstances he's looking at. If he cannot or would not rather do this, research out an acquaintance for And here are the conditions for someone listening to your inventory.

OK, he says he needs to be closed mouth

and understanding friend.

Not an examination of your conscience, not a judgment person, but an understanding friend. Someone who's been there is is better.

There's no way for me to judge your inventory. I have taken my own inventory.

If your inventory is anything like mine, there's no waiting to judge you.

Not remain army. Not without being a hypocrite. Can't. I don't care what you say.

Heard guys a little inventory the other day. One of the little boys arrived motorcycles, and it was a dandy. I'd like to say that for it. He never got me to Flint and he looked up at him and he said when he got done, he said I thought you'd be blown away.

I said my oldest father, he did 27 years in the joint. You ain't got nothing on him, you know

he steals over too. Perhaps our doctor of Sakazu will be that person. Thought maybe you could go there. They have a oath to maintain the privacy. It may be one of the wrong family who cannot disclose anything to our wiser parents. Will hurt them and make them unhappy to be done, but very dangerous

because you will hurt them and make them unhappy. You told the whole food

we have no right to say wrong skin and other person's expense. Such parts of our story we tell to someone who will understand yet be unaffected. So here's the other part of of the what you need to listen to it one it's got to be closed mouth got to be an understanding friend. He will be, he will understand it. Be unaffected by what you have to say.

Those are the conditions that you have a right to ask people about or if you don't know them well enough, but those are the conditions. We're listening to someone debenture.

The rule is we must be hard on ourselves but always consider it of others.

I want to go to 125 for a second

and look through the first paragraph where it says we families

of Alcoholics keep few skeletons in the closet.

Let us not be hypocrites here. On top of everything else,

we talk about people all the time.

Isn't that true?

We talked about these all the time.

It's according to how you're talking about,

it says this is a condition which in ordinary life everyone knows about the other alcoholic. So we got a great Vine and Alcoholics Anonymous and so fast. I'm telling you, I have people that go out to drink. Call me four days later and said I went out and drank and I said I know.

How do I know? Somebody called me on the phone and said, you know, George is drinking. I'm just waiting for him to get done, OK?

Everyone knows about the alcoholic troubles. This is a condition which an ordinary life would reduce untold grief.

There might be standless gossip, laughter, expense of other people and a tendency to take advantage of intimate information. Do not ever take your first step in the fellowship of Alcoholics Anonymous. Do not do that

because people do exactly what this book says. Everybody in The Fellowship of Alcoholics is not, is not on the spiritual path. We're coming and going.

We've got new ones coming in. Every once in a while somebody won't do a fist step in the program. Not a good idea.

So in the old days when the groups were very small, twos and threes, they used to do their inventories with each other as a group. It was very simple then. Everybody knew everything about everybody, right? Today, though, we have such a the membership is coming in sometimes at an alarming rate and they don't know, you know,

among us. These are rare occurrences. We do talk about each other a great deal, but we almost and barely 10 for such thought by the spirit of love and talent. Love and tolerance is our code. In case you don't know, we've got one. It is the code. We will talk about it in step 10 more.

I do talk about you in love and tolerance. Next line is very important. Another principle we observed carefully is that we do not relate intimate experiences of another person unless we're sure he would approve. So when I start my inventory with you,

when you asked me to sponsor you, I request two things of you. One, that you're going what 12 step calls with me if I ever call you or if the center around where I live solved it. Sign up on the 12 step and go out with people. Two that you'll sponsor when you know how,

When you know how, when he worked the steps, that's when you know how.

I also asked them as this thing provide, can I use your experience to share with another alcoholic? As long as I don't put your name on and they always say yes. If they said no, I wouldn't. But they always say yes.

And then someday I'll tell the story somewhere, and maybe you might hear this person speak and they tell it on themselves.

Does that make any sense to you? I didn't tell it. They'll tell it on themselves. But I also depend upon the experience of the fellowship. A lot of times I do not believe that I am so spiritually enlightened and so great that I couldn't turn to Mike if I've got a problem

and say to Mike, I got a problem with this sponsor, EI don't know what I'm going to do with it. And here's how exactly. What's your experience like? That's what love and column. Does that make sense?

Not that that no good SOB going to ruin my record,

which is God's record to start with. I'm just taking claim. OK, let's go back to page 74. Now we've got all that cleared up

in the beginning and to this day we have what are called loners

and Learners International was started by Captain Jackson as part of a history and he ran an oil tanker for the Standard Oil Company. And he had done that drunk and sober. And he started writing to loners, meaning they had no meeting, no place to go. No, maybe they worked out on merchant Marines, maybe they worked in different places. Believe me, at one time, Captain Jack, if he was going to a port of call that he didn't have never been there before,

he would call ahead like Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and he would say, do we have any AA members in Cuba, the country Cuba? And they say, yeah, we got two. And he would get in whatever he had to do and he'd go find it. He's not amazing.

And so he formed a bunch of loners and what he would do he was write letters to these loners and they would write back and they would talk about the inspections were taking the steps and they do all these things that people do.

It got so big that he had about 300 letters. He was writing a month. He couldn't hardly run his ship and do the letters. So he called Wilson very small in those days communication to to the New York officers. You can still call the New York anybody ever call the New York office? You can call the New York office and they will talk to you about anything and if they're right, they'll say and of course your group may do is it feels it's guided by God to do

so.

He calls Wilson the will and said, send them to us. We'll take care of. And that's how the loners desk got started and Alcoholics Anonymous and we still have people who write to loans. Does that make sense?

Pretty nice. Notwithstanding the great necessity of discussion ourselves with someone, it made the one is so situated there is no suitable person available.

If that is so, this step may be postponed only, however, if we hold ourselves in complete readiness to go through with it the first opportunity. That's called a timetable anyway. You cut it and people will tell you there are no timetables here, and I'm here to tell you the books full of them.

This book will tell you how to take a step, when to take a step, and what to do with the step after you're done with the step,

it says. We say this because we are very anxious that we talk to the right person.

That's real true. It is important. He's going to repeat it again for you. He's got to be able to keep a confidence that he will fully understand and prove what we're driving at. Well, the only way you're going to fully understand and prove what you're driving at is to have done the process yourself is that you understand

that he will not try to change our plan. Well,

you sometimes would go to ministers and preachers. God love them. Great people have all the interest in the world in you,

but they, they, they don't know much about this plan recovery, and so they'll tell you that you ought to get dipped. Nothing wrong with being dipped.

I've been dipped. I've been sprinkled also,

so

spoken with, talked to anyway,

but we must not use this as a mere excuse to postpone. It's another timetable.

When we decide who's to hear our story, we waste no time. I don't have more direct it can get. We have a written inventory to prepare for a long talk.

We explained to our partner what we're about to do and why we have to do it, and it's amazing. I asked people to this day when we get to this, tell me what we're doing here and why we have to do this.

And sometimes they need some help because they a little confused about what they've gotten there all right, but they don't know exactly why they've missed the point. We explained to our partner what we're about to do and why we have to do it. He should realize we're engaged upon a life and death air.

Ah, it is the only step that Wilson uses the words life and death.

It is the turning place in your entire program. It's the build up that you've come to. All this other work you've done brings you to this moment,

and it's going to be the moment of truth here.

So he says

most people are posting this way will be glad to help. They will be honored by our confidence. You betcha. I'm going to tell you why right now.

5012 or 12.

Let's go to page into the fifth step.

Page 57

AJR the humble servant of God.

Oh, how kind of you.

When we reach a, see the last paragraph on the page.

See the last paragraph on the page

when we reach a end for the first time. This is some promises here and for the first time in our lives, study among people who seem to understand because they do

what it's like to be an alcoholic.

The sense of belonging was tremendously exciting. I have found my own time.

I didn't even know you existed.

See you. I knew Alcoholics. Is this because I lived with them all my life?

But I and I knew this behavior of alcohols from drinking

trilat home that's a threatened kill my stepdad

either move the wood up and so I came to you people, but you have a solution. My folks didn't have any solution. I didn't have any solution. I didn't know there was a solution. And I come among you people and your happy Joyce and free and I can see happy Joyce and free.

We thought the isolation problem had been solved,

but we soon discovered that wow, we weren't alone anymore. On the social sense, we still suffered many of the old kangs of anxious apartments. And I'm going to stay apart in a a

I can come in here. No one will make you do anything here. We're not an orthodoxy. You can claim your chair. The right of your alcoholism brought you here. It is your right to sit in that chair. And I'm going to add something else you may not like, drunk or sober.

You could sit in that chair drunk or stove.

If you interfere with the other people hearing the message,

we will ask you to leave

part of the 1st edition. But we always say, as we escort you to the door, sometimes with a small struggle,

we often say to you, but please come back.

We're all inclusive, never exclusive.

We protect the solution of the fellowship of alcohol astronomers through the tradition. We talked a little bit about that and I'll talk a little more later. So we still suffer many of the old banks of anxious apartments. Here's the line. Until we talk with complete candor, which means honesty of our conflicts. It means take a fifth step.

Until we've done that

and have listened to someone else do the same thing, we still didn't belong

along to Flot.

Belong to the fellowship of the fellowship. The minute I say I belong, I take my chair,

I put up my hand. Maybe I don't even do that for a while, but eventually, just by sitting there, no, nobody comes and sits an aid. It's straight

the only people that will sit there and or they wouldn't they all go Oh my God, did you hear that? You can always tell when they're not alcoholic them

and have listened to someone else do the same thing. We still didn't belong belong to the fellowship of the Spirit.

This is how I joined the fellowship of the Spirit.

This is how I become one of the first of the real members of AA.

Remember when I said I sit in that chair for the rest of my life

and do exactly as I please, drunk or sober?

But if I want to join the fellowship of the Spirit, So we have two fellowships in the same room, don't we?

We have had those who've had spiritual experiences normally through the steps, not the only way to have one.

So it says didn't belong. Step five was the answer. It was the beginning of a true kinship with man and God.