The topic of "Disciplines" at the Sea Isle Big Book workshop in Sea Isle, NJ

OK. OK. Now from Ventnor, we have Robbie S on the disciplines of 10 and 11.

I don't get an introduction like like the others.

I was thinking a little bit of time while you're introductible.

Hi guys, I'm Robbie. I'm recovered alcoholic.

Can you guys hear me? Because I hate this. Can you hear me now? Yeah. I don't need it.

I was just saying, let me just say this, I got nothing right. And, and everybody so far has been so amazing. And it's, it's just humbling to be a part of this and be here and and and and and the guys are just going on and on. And I leaned over to Chris and I said I got nothing. Now I'm not sure I can talk for an hour on 10/11. I just feel like I a mental blank spot

and Chris told me that's that's good, keep it that way so my head is empty. That's a good thing. So who knows what's going to come out today?

I,

I have a sponsor on my Friday nights, January 7th, 1997.

I always say, you know, and we talked about a little bit earlier tonight. I always say don't be real impressed with that time. It's not real impressed with yours, right? The, the time does not impress me. It's the, how free can you be? It's up being free and being connected to God. And that's why we're going to talk today about how we get hooked up and, and connected. And these first 2 steps.

We learn how to to get hooked up to God. We learn how to get hooked up to each other. We learn how to make our relationships right. We we learn how to get our our wrongs right.

We learned how to surrender our life and now we got to keep it that way, right?

So now we got to figure out in in 1011 tells us how we're going to keep it, tells us it's our maintenance steps because it continues

lifetime.

So, and I'm going to use a book a little bit today and I'm going to tell you a little story. Can I really do it without that at all? Like in you're in the back of like move up. Can I do without that? I'm so much more comfortable about that. Yeah, I see nobody moving. I have an idea.

Yes.

All right, how about this? We're all going to stand up and stretch real quick.

Come on, People are falling asleep already. Even you, Chris. Yeah, everybody stretch.

Everybody stretch. Smile, Say how to your neighbor

What?

OK, Peace be with you

and also with you and also with you.

Thank you guys.

It's been a long day and, and I think it's been amazing and, but I can see you maybe needing to just stand up for a minute. So

tell you a little bit about how I I got here. The the strict disciplines in 1011

is our formula for living now.

See, I didn't know that at some point you would have asked me to do how how are you in 10-11? I would have said I did them. I did. I,

my sponsor, took me through all of the steps and now I'm helping other people.

I didn't even understand it right. I want to tell you that. And, and if you're living in, in any kind of solution, in prayer meditation, you, you knew, you knew I didn't know what I was talking about, but I would tell you about how I sat down and did 10 and 11. My, my sponsor's.

I had a sponsor.

It was amazing. And she took me through this work that's required to get free. She took me through this work. She took me through the book. We went line by line. We had dictionaries out. We met for hours and hours and we went through this book and she brought me up the way that you're supposed to bring a woman up in alcohol synonymous. And and she was absolutely fantastic. And and she was a vessel for God. I was untreated at the time and I had been for some time. And she, she sat me down

and she said, I can't help you with these things. They're complaining about meetings and how do you get your kids back and, and how do you get this and that. But I can, I can start to help you get free from all those things you're complaining about how I can help you lay your head on the pillow without seeing remorse and guilt. I knew nothing about that. She told me that I could be a perfect piece and he's alone if I would just sit down with her and do the work required. And I said, OK, because at this point I'm, I'm, I, I have the desperation and I'm willing to do whatever it takes. And and what happened was she did take me through this work.

Somewhere along the line, I fell asleep inside the rooms, Right. Can anybody relate to that? I don't know if anybody here. Yeah. Say the guy in the yellow shirt and Dan

and that's why I fell asleep inside the rooms now called synonymous. Not because you guys weren't telling me about it anymore. You didn't stop telling me about it. I just stopped hearing you. I got blocked off and

I didn't know what I was missing. You know, I didn't know what I didn't know until I knew, just didn't know what I was missing. I knew I was missing something and here wasn't starting to feel real comfortable anymore.

And I knew that I probably thought about getting drunk more than somebody

should think about it. And they don't want to tell you about that.

And we go back through the work and I would look at it alone by myself, and I would open up the book and I would say I got all these notes. See, I did what she told me to do. I followed the direction

and I went to a meeting one time and a friend of mine, good friend of mine today know him at the time and he was speaking at the group that I went to and and he was speaking about the strict disciplines in 10 and 11.

He was speaking about the maintenance of of keeping your spirituality alive. Who's speaking about a God of his understanding and who's speaking about these practices like ass turn, discuss, watch, tolerance,

patience, pausing. These are the spiritual practices that get us to be free to get us unblocked and undisturbed and connected with with the channel, the God, right? This is the this is how we stay in the beam. And what's the beam is long, right? Alcoholics Anonymous is all about love. It's about love.

That's, that's language of a, a, right?

There was a girl outside earlier crying. It won't say who, but she was tearing up and, and I said to her, that's beautiful. Because what happens is that means your heart is open. It means that you're hearing the language of Alcoholics Anonymous, which is the language of love. You're feeling love. You don't know why you're tearing up and feeling so emotional in this meeting. It's because you're feeling the love that we're all connecting to each other with right now

that's staying on the beach and I want to stay on the beam. So how do I do that

these strict practices that teaches me in 10 and 11? So I'm asleep in the rooms of Alcoholics Anonymous and other fellowships and and, and, and don't get me wrong. If you would have seen me, I had, you know, double digits and years and, and I chaired a lot of meetings and I made a lot of coffee still. And I and, and I,

I planned a lot of baseball games, right picnics and baseball games. I did and, and we did conventions. I had a lot of conventions and took a lot of girls in meetings and even sponsored a lot of girls,

so it's hard for me to see what I was missing. I had the fellowship and I and I had unity and I had service,

but what was I missing? And so this guy comes in and he's talking about these and he's free and he's light. I haven't felt light in a long time. I haven't had that, that childlike spirit that you see in each other when you have it, right? You can see the environment has this childlike spirit. He's just free and light and just here, right? That life of whatever that we took on in step three, right? We took on this life of whatever, a surrendered life. We see that too, right? What's a surrendered life? Whatever,

whatever dog died, whatever can make some meeting going to be late to the meeting, so to speak from the meeting, whatever tend to be okay. It's just that surrendered life of trusting a power greater than yourself that comes through you, and it's okay. It is whatever.

I didn't understand that in three, in 10 and 11, I get to experience that.

So we see that in one another when when you're free and you have that childlike spirit,

we're attracted to it and we want to be around it. So my friend, he spoke the meeting about that and I thought, I want to be around that. Where is he going? What's he doing? I want to go there. I want to figure this out. I want to, I want to be, I want to be in his face. I want to be in that kind of feeling that I get filled up when I'm around him and I go to where he goes and I and I hang out with people he's hanging out with. And my spirit starts to be filled up just by being in your presence.

And one of the hardest things I ever did inside and outside of the rooms, Alcoholics Anonymous, was go to him, go to another person,

state the time and put a lot of emphasis on my time earlier when I started talking, talked about how I'm not real impressed with my time or yours at that time. I like to hang out with people that worship people time because I had that

have much more to offer you, but I had that. And

so I had to go to somebody, you know, with maybe two or three years sober and say to him,

I'm scared, I'm missing something.

I don't want to die. I don't want to miss it. And I don't even know what it is.

And if you could just teach me, if you could show me, if you could follow me, we'd stay with me. If you could just figure out what it is and I'm not doing that. You're doing, I'll do it.

And he didn't, he didn't sit down and say, okay, well, what was 1-2 and three like for you? He just looked at me and said,

what's your inventory like?

How's your prayer meditation and how's your inventory working for you?

And that was the moment for me that I got it. I got what I was missing, right? I got it. OK, I'm not

lying to you that I'm doing inventory. Well, I go over the questions in my head before I go to sleep. Not really, right?

I don't have time for that. I can't even see it anyway. I can't see myself,

so he sat down with me. We went over

10:00 and 11:00.

Then I later said do I have to do the steps over again? And he said no, you went through them correctly. I don't understand why you would have to make a choice again. I already did that. What you need to do is stick in that 1011, the strict disciplines of it, the spiritual practices

will be all right. And from that day to this one, I've not thought about a drink again.

And that day to this one, I've gotten freer and freer as we go. And I don't know much about how how that is, except for I learned how to say undisturbed and unblocked, learn how to open up that Channel. I learned how to pray.

One of you guys were talking about it earlier in prayer. The book says it doesn't work. We, we, we cannot pray for ourselves and it doesn't work right. It, it doesn't, you know, and, and we do the, you know, if you just give me a job, I'll believe in you. What is that? And, and, and, and somebody said to me one time, if God exists, then he should tell me the lottery tickets. God's not real interested in lottery tickets,

you know, so, so I say to him, how? How am I supposed to pray and never include myself?

And I learn about how what I'm missing is connecting with you, right? Really connecting with you on a deeper level. Dave Perry talks about you want to get closer, God get closer to his kids,

hook up and connect with his kids, help his kids. Old God wants me to do is go out and help his kids. Right now. I have a new understanding of what we're really doing here.

We're just all coming together for the purpose of recovery. Nobody higher than anybody else. You know, believe it or not, there is not a leader.

Nobody's running the show. We're all God, don't have any grandkids, right? We're all just come together and connecting as God's kids and we're trying to help one another. And, and that's the beautiful part of alcohol, Alcoholics Anonymous. And that's what we're doing here. And that's what I was missing. I was missing the fact that picking you up and taking to to a meeting and taking you through the steps, not connecting with them, not experiencing them while I was doing it, but doing the service work that I was told I had to do to make me look good

was not the deal. This wasn't the deal.

I thought it was a deal. It wasn't a deal.

So that's why I chose 1011. I got a little emotional when I talk about about that experience, but when Dave Palmer called and he said what's that? Would you like to talk about? He said 1011

just like that, and we'd even like divide up like maybe Chris to talk about I'm 1011 and

because it, you know, it, it just sits with me and and I sit with 1011 all the time. I don't ever want to go away from from the prayer meditation and go away from continuing to take that inventory and looking all the time, right. I I can't get to where I want to go if I don't know where I'm at,

right? A girl said to me other day, I don't like doing inventory because before I go to bed I feel like I'm beating myself up and don't feel good. They're doing something wrong if you don't feel good and you don't want to beat yourself up. It's not about me anymore. Now I want to look at it and say did I harm you in any way? Not real concerned about me anymore. I want to know have I harmed you in any way? Did I harm you? Not look at it.

Did I not even know it? Do I need to look at something? I need to discuss it sometimes because my head, the problem centers in the mind, right? So my heads a mess

doesn't always tell me the truth.

So in 1011 and 10 when we get to do is we get to watch this. This is a friend of mine said the other day. I believe the most powerful word in the big book about Paul Thomas is a word watch. Just watch,

I no longer call you up and say I don't know what's wrong. Somethings eat me up. And, and The thing is, I cheated on my boyfriend and I did fight with that girl in the parking lot after the meeting and I did gossip about her a lot. And, and I got really pissed off and I started just going at her throat and, and now I don't feel, I feel a little uncomfortable now.

So how it goes, just watch for it to crop up, right? And watch for it and start to feel a little resentful. I'm starting to feel a little bit undisturbed. I'm sitting with you and you said something that's starting to make something inside of me not sit real well, not feeling real good about that. I'm watching it to crop up.

When it does, I instantly ask on to take that.

I don't call you anymore. And you say, did you pray? Well, no, hold on. I got to talk about what happened now, right? How many times we hear that? Did you pray? Well, we'll get to that. But what happened was she said and then he said, no, The first thing we do is cry.

A friend always says, you bring to the throne before the phone, right? We ask God before we ask anybody else. I ask God to remove it. I discuss it with you because I'm not real sure that I'm not telling myself lies. I can't see myself clearly all the time. So I discuss it with you and, and, and sometimes the answer is, I think you're good. Let's go on. And sometimes it's you know, you might want to go back and revisit that. You might want to go back to your boss and say, you know what,

you're right. I've I've had an attitude lately and and I should probably come down a little bit and I was wrong for that.

I get that direction from having women in my life

that are God center and God guided and got inspired

and they can see me in what I can't say

and I know that they've hit their knees today and they pray and they ask for that. The intuitive thought

when I can't feel it for my own, but I but I can tonight for the most part. So we we ask, we watch, we ask, we discuss, and then what do we do? Turn, Just turn right. The most beautiful spiritual practice I know is turn. Turning away from me.

Turning away from me into you. This whole book is designed to turn me away from me and into you.

When following this formula, we really can't go too wrong, right?

When I'm feeling a certain way, I start to remove it, discuss it with you, and then I turn my thoughts to somebody I can help.

It's amazing how quickly I can get out of meat just by seeing how I can help you.

Even earlier today and I was getting a little, you know, I'm not sure I have anything to talk about today. Let me just go talk to a friend and see what she needs. Just just for a minute. Turn me away from me. Just keep turning me away from me into you.

So we're actually, you know what you, you guys have brought your books could open them. I,

I'm going to open the book for a little bit only because there's a couple things I'd like to read and and then we haven't opened it much today. If you turn to 84, God bless David Palmer. He did all those steps in an hour. I've got 4 pages tense, 4 paragraphs

and I have an old whole hour to do it. I don't know if that's good or bad,

but in Sept 10 it says that

this thought brings us a step 10. What is that thought? What Dave just read? In the end, the promises and the thought was

it will materialize always if we work for them. That's the thought that we're left for at the end of nine. If we work for them, they will always materialize. Huge, right? That's a huge promise. It's not saying that most of the time you're going to feel this way. It's saying that if you could possibly do this always and work for it, seek and and take these actions, these verbs that are all through 10. If you could possibly do that, you'll feel these promises always. We're not going to go away,

but you got to keep seeking. You've got to keep these accents and these verbs in there. So it tells us

that we have entered the world of the spirit.

So now we're at a whole new dimension just because we've cleaned up the wreckage of the past. We've made our wrongs right. We've done our inventory, we've surrendered to to power greater than ourselves. Now we've entered into this rule of the spirit. We're in a whole different place now. We're not in this material world anymore. We're not sucking and all this resentment and garbage that's up here. We're entering into this whole new world. I don't know what that looks like. I don't know. Nothing about it

doesn't make sense to me, but I can see it in some of you and I want to know what that is. So now I've entered into it, I'm starting to feel this new power and energy flow in me.

Bless you.

And I wanted to hold on to that with everything I got. So now I've entered into this, this this world of the spirit. What does that mean? It means I I get all these promises of 10 talks about too and and I get a sixth sense

tells me that I'll have a sixth sense. It followed these directions carefully. It says that means I couldn't have skipped on anything on five.

That means I didn't skip on any of the steps at all.

That means if I follow them carefully, I took my hour and I and I humbly asked and I followed these directions carefully, that I can have this right here, right now.

I can have a sixth sense,

right? What if they told you if you quit drinking, gonna have six cents? And what what's that? I was I was I was thinking about maybe a house, maybe a car, maybe a job, maybe not be sick anymore. You could have a sixth sense means I I intuitively know not to go there. I intuitively know what to do next. I know about, I feel

a sense of what's right and wrong. I feel a sense of taking that phone call. Don't take that phone call. You know those feelings that we just think, I don't know what it was, but something just inside me was just telling me to go to that meeting tonight. I don't want to. I wasn't feeling too well with something inside of me was just saying, you know what? Why don't you go over to that 7:00 down the street?

Hey, it's not a solution based meeting and maybe they're not filled up with the spirit, maybe they're not on fire. Maybe they're not talking about the big book and maybe they hate you

and they don't like it when you do it. Go there. When you go there tonight, that's a sixth sense. It just tells me disguise me from movement to movement. I'm just guided through when living in the world of spirit.

So it says on page 84. We've turned to 84,

says that this is not an overnight matter. First of all, it tells us that we have to grow with understanding and effectiveness, right? So now we're cleaned up, we're done the Staffs part, we're cleaned up. Now we have to do the maintenance stuff. What is that? We have to grow up. Really what it told me was I have to grow up

to grow up and stop whining and turn into you. Just go to you and and see how I can be of helpfulness and usefulness to you. What, what, what alcoholism is all about fitting myself into the maximum service of others. That's what I'm doing. Growing up, getting over myself now and seeing if I can't

uses in a way that's effective in my life.

Taking my experiences and my wrongs. When I take my inventory and I see where it's wrong, taking those wrongs and turning them into how I can uniquely share that experience with you.

And then it tells us after that, that this is not an overnight matter, right? It's very important to remember that we get to 10 or you can get to 10 like I did the first time and say, well, I did that. It's not an overnight matter. We keep doing it for a lifetime. It continues on and on. It doesn't. If you're sitting here and you're on this step or whatever it is and you don't feel it right away, we just keep doing it. It's seeking and it's, these are verbs that we keep doing. We actively go out there and we go at it.

It says that

what we already went over, but it says that we continue to watch for selfishness, dishonesty, resentment, and fear, right? Because all of our character defects come from dishonesty, resentments, and fears, right? We saw that on our fist stab somebody, somebody got willing, sat down with us and didn't just listen to her fist up, but sat down with us

and showed us how we were inconsiderate, dishonest, full of fear and self seeking our entire lives.

And that it calls every defect we'd ever had and it caused every problem that we'd ever put herself in. At every situation we put ourselves in position to be harmed

because somewhere along the line we're full of fear.

Had self seeking motives.

So it tells me that I'm to watch for self-conscious dishonesty, resentment and fear. What step is that for? Right So now we're getting all the we're getting 4 through 9 into sub ten. Step 10 is 4 through 9 on a daily basis. Four through nine spot checks daily, 4 through 9 every day. We're not really done with four tonight 39 because we're doing on a daily basis in 10.

It says that when these crop up, we ask God to remove them at at once. At once we ask God to remove them. So again, we don't sit on it because sometimes we like to sit. You ever hear somebody say, well, sometimes I just like to feel bad. Why? Why do you just like to feel bad? Sometimes though, I want to feel free and good. I want to just feel sorry for myself. Sometimes I don't feel good. I don't want to just feel bad for a couple hours and then I'll pray. Why?

I'm asking God at once,

at once, and and this is my experience in my life today. Now, don't get me wrong, it's not not always this way, but I absolutely can see myself turning to God instantly. Instantly I can have somebody right in front of me and say something to me that is hurtful to me and instantly I go to God right here, right now as they're still speaking, I'm starting to feel hurt. God, you're here. Hook up. Let's connect because I'm going to look him in the eyes and I'm going to continue to listen to this, but my heart's starting to hurt. So can you just come in

right now instantly going to God with it?

We discuss them. We already went over that immediately. Not tomorrow, not next week. I get calls all the time. I got to tell you what I did last week because last Tuesday and I've been a mess ever since. My phone worked last Tuesday too. I don't. We immediately discussed it with somebody.

We make amends quickly if we have harmed anyone. 8:00 and 9:00,

right? So we discuss, which is step five, and then we make amends quickly. 8:00 and 9:00, our lenses are who we've harmed. And eight right here, we'll make amends like we did at 9:00. So we don't really need to go back to 9

at any point. If we can stay in the strict disciplines and practices of 10 and 11.

If I can see when I harm you and make amends right now, we're good.

How often do our door resentments? They're just because they build up, right? They're not even that bad. It's just because we let it build up. You would have thought you killed my mother, but really what you did was take my parking space. And I've hated you ever since.

So this is what happens. We got it. When we do it, we look at it immediately. It lightens it up when we look at it right now, instead of keeping holding a little bit inside, right? And a guy explained it one time that it's like a water bottle. I can hold this water bottle.

It's coffee cup, but I could hold this coffee cup like this. I'm good. Like, it's not heavy. I promise you it's what, 8 oz? It's not even halfway full. I can do this. I can have a resentment or gonna, you know what I mean? Like doesn't say now we're not human. We no longer have any resentments. We're going to have them.

You come back in a day or so and my arm hurts.

You come back in a couple hours, my arm is going to hurt, right? A couple hours something. I can't hold this up anymore. This is really starting to burn in here. It's just six oz. Why is it earning? Because I'm holding on to it too long,

but held on to this all night long. My arm would really hurt. It probably have to take me to a hospital. I'm pretty sure I couldn't do it anyway. But it I get a lot of pain. That's what resentments are like, right? We hold on to them. They get heavier and heavier. They start to hurt. When we first grab that resentment, it didn't hurt so much,

and that's why we do it immediately.

And then as we already talked about turn, we resolutely turn

our thoughts are someone that we can help. It says that love and tolerance is our code.

Love and tolerance is my coat. You know why loving tongues is my coat? Because I've answered the world in spirit. That's why I don't know anything about love and tolerance, that I do not know how to love and tolerate you. I don't like you very much and I know you don't like me

because he told me

and I get it.

And now you're saying that love and tolerance is my code. My code is my way of life.

My code is everything about me. My code defines who I am. So if my code is love and tolerance,

God must want for me love. God is love. You must want for me. Love A is a beam of love. All this is love and tolerance. How do I stay there in the world of spirit, The spiritual practices, right? I can only have love and tolerance as my coat because I can't do it. And God does

because it's in the world, the spirit that God can come in and he can do amazing things, even letting somebody like me live a code of love, intolerance. See, I lived out in the streets for a long time.

The book talks about that we seek the most oriented places to find approval companionship and it works. The book says it works momentarily and we wake up with the four horsemen, right? It tells us that page 151 and see, that was me. I was never comfortable with you and I would seek out the most sordid of places to find approval companionship. I had a beautiful home. I had beautiful family. I, I came from a wonderful, fantastic place and I would live

around barrels of fires and alleyways in Newark and Trenton.

I would go and, and, and, and I would feel uncomfortable and I would feel not okay with who I am. I would feel uncomfortable with my family. And so I would run and I would go the streets. And what you told me was my code was violence. You told me that anger would, would, would work it out

out there in the streets. They told me that I could get whatever I needed if I was angry enough.

They told me a lot of codes when I look down the streets, and I would go there purposely because I felt like I fit in there. And I came in here and your guys's codes, love and tolerance, I don't know anything about it.

I threw chairs at your head when you spoke. I walked in this room about Walks Anonymous and I was so angry. The only way that I knew how to communicate that I need help was to throw a tear at you,

call you on the parking lot. So you want to fight. Nobody would ever fight with me. They say no, Robin, we don't want to fight and just keep coming back and love you love yourself and say it makes no sense. I want to fight and nobody wants to fight. We love you, Rob. Just keep coming back and I get it. So I was angry and and I couldn't tell you. You know what? I know I, I seem like a,

an angry, violent mess off the streets, but I'm really, I'm a scared and frightened little girl

and absolutely scared to death of you.

Scared to death of love. I'm scared to death of the love that you give to me. I see you guys giving each other love and I know I got to make up a damn good story for you guys to give me love because you're not going to like who I am.

So I don't know anything about fitting into a into a world where everybody that surrounds me is practicing love and tolerance.

But you guys taught it to me. You taught me that love and tolerance was my code. And you taught me how by this formula here. And you told me it was through prayer, meditation. And you taught me that it wasn't just for the people I like. It wasn't just for my friends and it wasn't just for people. It was love and tolerance for the concepts and for the way that life just is. It's loving on all levels, no matter what. It's and, and, and it's not tolerated. Like, you know what? I really don't like the thieves sleeping

now, but I really don't like that that that that he's kind of a jerk and not Dave, but he's kind of a jerk and any and he's and he and he kind of rose her the wrong way and he don't really live his life right and judge the hell out of him and I don't like him, but it tells me have to tolerate him. It's not tolerance.

Used to think that was tolerance. Even I don't like you, I'll tolerate you. Doesn't feel good. And somebody could bless you and somebody tolerates me and it doesn't feel good to me.

Tolerance is accepting you for who you are, meeting you, where you're at right here, right now. No matter what, even when there's hate in you, even when there's there's sadness in your eyes, whatever it is, I just love who you are. The God in me falls in love with the God in you.

I see, I see every defect that I that comes in front of me and how close I am to that and how I was there last Tuesday or or two months ago and I'll be there on Sunday. I don't see any difference between being you, regardless of what, what, what defects you might be acting on today that I'm not, what defects I'm going to act on later. I just love you.

So you taught me how to do that, and I don't know how to do that my own. But I know that if I'm hooked up and connected with God, with this power greater than myself, this, this, this creator, the universe, if I can get hooked up and connected and walk in that sunlight of the Spirit and actually feel that deep down inside, how could I feel anything else? How could I have hate for you if God does deep down inside of me

and I feel His energy flowing through me and I've entered into a world of a spirit?

You can't have hate for you.

That's why it says that that we were reborn,

that our whole attitude and outlook upon life will change.

Not just some of it, not just some of the times. My entire outlook upon life has changed. And part of that is because this taught me how to get rid of self pity and dishonesty and self seeking motives. I was,

I don't know about you. I was so full of self pity. I suffered from self pity to the point that it absolutely paralyzed me. I was just grounded in self pity.

And I'm not saying like when I was drinking, like when I was two, I didn't have what I was supposed to have, wasn't given what it's supposed to be given. I never had it good enough. Nobody ever gave me enough attention. It was never good enough. I did not understand what the world was so happy about because I felt so sorry for myself. It was this black cloud of self pity that came over me and it was there. It was there when I woke up and was there when I went to sleep, and it was there no matter how hard I tried to get away from me. The black cloud of self pity went with me.

And 11, it tells me that I'm to wake up and ask God to to remove self pity.

It's almost like like these hundred people knew that we suffer from self pity and first thing we got to do in the days ask God to remove the self hitting. I went off the side there a little bit.

So it says that love and tolerances are code, which means now that we see is fighting with anything in anyone. I think they brought it up earlier, but I see he's fighting with anything in anyone. That means you. That means no matter what your opinion is on me or or how you do things,

I see it's fighting not only with alcohol and drugs, but I've seized fighting with with your ideas or maybe different than mine. That's OK. Hundred roads of Chicago. Just take one. I don't care. You get there

seized. It's a beautiful spiritual practice.

Stopped. Halted.

Don't fight,

I I no longer have to fight a drink, which I did in the Roosevelt Hall. Autonomous, fighting the urge to drink. Who wants to be here sitting in a chair fighting the urge to want to get high. So freedom in that.

Heard guys the other day. Every time the there's a beer commercial on the TV, especially during football season, it's really hurts when there's a beer course on the TV. I got to change channel because it makes me want to drink. Now I'm 17 years sober and I've been doing this for a long time and I know that how bad I want to drink when I see beer commercial. So I change the channels. What kind of way of life is that?

So freedom and that God love him, definitely went to talk to him after the meeting, but

only because we don't want to live in that kind of

I'm fighting alcohol and I've never won before. Now I just get to cease fighting. I'm to fight it. I have to talk to you about it.

Deep down in my heart, I'm just not fighting anything or anyone anymore until I'm at peace with you and my surroundings.

It says that for by this time, sanity will have returned, right?

That's because we've entered the world of the Spirit.

I can't bring candidates back. And I was insane.

Sanity starts to just return. It doesn't tell me. By this time I can start to have some same thoughts again. And if I do certain just help me, it returns. This automatically comes back to me. It's returned. I'm good. I don't have the crazy ideas anymore. Well, I do have crazy ideas sometimes, but I it's not, I don't, my mind doesn't go to slashing your tires.

My mind doesn't go to, you know what I should do? Pack up the car and go to Montana.

I'll find somebody with a horse ranch. OK? I said that the other day, called me, but I was joking. But that's where my mind used to go, these crazy, insane ideas that made me feel like I was schizophrenic. I talk about all the time I I sat in the rooms of alcohol phenomena for a very long time, believing I was schizophrenic, believing that if you found out I was schizophrenic, you would definitely ask me to leave for

her. Different personalities are coming out. Again,

we don't know which one we're talking to. She's not alcoholic. She needs to go. That's what they're going to get together and have some kind of group meeting about me and say that they're going to ask me to leave because I wasn't really alcoholic because I'm I'm so not to understand. I'm nuts. You guys seem sane and normal and I'm so nuts. Like what if you find out I'm not an alcoholic and you find out I'm insane? Then I'm going to have to go. And it was the 1st place I felt like I belonged and I don't want to go yet. So I'm going to pretend like an alcoholic

tells me that sanity will just return,

seldom be interested in liquor and quarrel from it like a hot plane. We will react sanely and normally, and we will find that this will happen automatically. Again, it just happens automatically. I don't have to figure out what to do next, it just happens automatically. I totally didn't look at the time, but when did I start?