The topic of Steps 4 and 5 at the Fellowship of the Spirit convention in Copper Mountain, CO

Will share on steps four and five. I will read Step 4. MIT is searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves. Step 5. Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.

Our first panelist today is Mike Bee. Mike B is from Turtle Rock Big Book Study in Irvine, CA. Will you please help me welcome him?

I'm Mike. I'm an alcoholic.

I didn't pick out this shirt. Somebody told me to wear it. But

on

steps four and five, I think that was,

that was a big thing for me to act to do. Because I remember when I, when I first came in, I was like, I was walking on egg shells, like I had pretty much 0 faith in my ability to stay sober. And I remember I just done step three and I really wanted to get four and five. Well, I wanted to get 4 done. And then I, I remember after I got, I did it pretty quickly. And then I remember after I got four done, I was nervous I was going to have to read this off to somebody.

And I thought then I was like thinking of taking stuff off because I was embarrassed about the stuff I was having to read off. But then, yeah, I pretty much did it straight out of the book, like nothing special. And then, yeah, I did the 5th step. And then I felt like a huge relief because

prior to that, I mean, pretty much I was lying pretty much like at least half everything I was saying was a lie and I was lying every single day. And then

to have to be honest with somebody and talk about what was going on with me, it was, it was interesting. I mean, I'd been the therapist and doctors and I just lied to them even. And yeah, it was pretty. It was a good experience having to do that and then,

and then I, I felt like all that stuff. Well, at the time I, I think the first one, I've done a few since I've been sober, but I think the first one I did,

I felt the presence of God the most. I felt like all this stuff that was blocking me off was taken away.

I remember I did the hour afterwards that I felt like a really strong presence and I felt like I finally had a conscious contact with Gotham and I, I really didn't want to drink anymore. Like I remember every day before that, I was waking up in the morning and I was, my heart was pounding out of my chest and I was just like so depressed that I was going to have to go through the day without a drink.

I remember I was going to sleep at night and I was depressed. I wasn't, I wasn't going to get to wake up the next day and I was just I was walking on egg shells. I kept having to do the one day at a time thing. Like I kept telling myself I was going to drink tomorrow,

he's gonna drink tomorrow and then make another drink tomorrow. And then after I did the 4th and 5th, I felt the relief. I didn't feel like drinking anymore. And so that was an interesting experience in,

you know, I was able to just go through the rest of the steps and stay sober. But after doing that

I've I've had to do. I don't know. I've gone through the steps a couple other times with

different sponsors, and what happens with me is I slack off on my 10th step and then I accumulate a bunch of stuff and I'll have a bunch of resentments and fears and I'll slap yeah. I'll also slack off on my third step. I'll,

I'll forget that I can rely on God for everything. And

each time it's the, it's the same experience, You know, I write it down, I do it, I do it quickly. I ask God to show me the truth about what's going on with me and I, I try not to sit on it. I'd like spend all my free time in it because when I've done them, it's when I need some relief, it's, and I just try and get it over with as soon as possible and do it as thoroughly as possible too. But

I actually, I, I went through it recently in the past year, I was having a tough time and I was just going nuts. I, I, I noticed it on the road especially, like I wanted to kill everybody and,

and, and I, I just, I was like getting afraid to drive because I just like, couldn't stand the people on the road and I wanted to rip people out of their cars and stuff. And I, I, yeah, I felt like I was going crazy and I wasn't feeling happy, joyous and free.

And so I went through it. And of course, this is since I got sober, I have done these. And the most recent one was the longest one. It's like 100 resentments. And then my fears were everything. And my sex inventory wasn't, wasn't too great and everything was just a mess. And

then I then I realized, well, I didn't realize my sponsor pointed out to me that I wasn't working a third step.

I was praying every single day. So I thought I was relying on God. Like I wake up every single morning, I'd say my prayers and I'd go about my day and

I really end up, my sponsor pointed out that I was just relying on God to keep me sober and I wasn't relying on God for anything else. And I had no idea I was doing that. And it was a big eye opener because I had all these fears about everything. And I thought that

everything was on me. And I don't know, for some reason I I want everything to be on me. I don't really want God to have all this power, but

it was driving me nuts that I was having to do all this stuff and nothing seemed to workout and people were driving me nuts. I want to control everybody. And I just, yeah, I wasn't feeling good. And

so, yeah, after that, my sponsor was able to point out that, you know, I needed to go back and redo my third step. And I had no idea that that was the issue. I was like, I just have. I thought that my main issue was I just had all these resentments that I needed to get rid of. And it ended up being that all my resentments were all the same stuff. And he was like, look, I don't even need to hear this one. Like I had all this,

he's he we just skipped over a whole bunch because it was all the same stuff. There was all these people on there that I didn't even talk to. And I just like people from meetings that I didn't like the looks of or whatever. And he he was like being skipped these. And yeah, so that's what happened. It was, it was interesting. I had no idea that was the problem. You know, I've read the book a bunch of times. I go to book studies and then it was really eye opening to see that stuff.

And yeah, it was really embarrassing because

I have, at the time I had like 4 1/2 years solar. So I was like, I have my stuff together, like I know everything. And I, I thought like I was doing really great and I just need to get some stuff off my chest. And yeah, I was missing like a whole big part of the program. And

I don't know for it's important for me to be looking at this stuff because like it I, when I, when I'm, when I'm living in resentments and I'm not

getting honest with somebody about it and looking at my part, I'll, I go nuts. And it's easy for me not to do this stuff because I'll be like, you know, that's not really a resentment because they're just annoying and anybody would get mad at them.

And I'll tell myself this stuff. And also to tell myself, you know, I shouldn't be resentful at them even though I am. So then I guess I'm not really resentful because I shouldn't be. And then over time I I accumulate the stuff and then the next day I know I'm going nuts. And then with Furious 2, if I'm not looking at it like them fears run in my life.

I I feel then I'm like, yeah, I'm living in a a prison

of my whole life is run by fear and I don't have yet to make decisions because fear is making them for me. And those things accumulate too. If I'm not staying on top of them, I could be going nuts. And

yeah, All in all, it's, it's a

yeah, I think, I think that's where I get the most relief is when I do these inventories. And honestly, I, I really don't like doing them. I, I, it's nothing I look forward to and it doesn't come natural to me. My sponsor keeps pointing it out. Even recently I've, I've been doing 10 steps regularly for the past year, which is a new thing for me 'cause I just was doing in my head or I was calling people up

and complaining about stuff

instead of just doing a ten step. But even recently my sponsor said that I needed to take an inventory because I started just doing the same thing with him where I was calling him up and complaining about stuff. I start going crazy. So yeah, you know, it's important for me to keep doing this and it's important for me to share it with somebody too, because I'll, I'll write it down or I'll do it in my head and then it's just not the same. I don't, I don't get the same relief. I mean, it's important to

for me to

share it. And that's my least favorite part of the whole thing. Putting the list together and making inventory isn't really a big deal. But but sharing, I just read doing it. I hate having being like, there's something wrong with me. I feel like at this point, I tell all of my head tells me at this point, like, Oh yeah, you know, you should have your stuff together. You shouldn't be getting resentful anymore. You should have no fears and this and that. But it says in the book, you know, that this stuff's going to crop up and I have to deal with it. So

I think that's pretty much all I got. Thanks, Jeff for letting me speak.

Thank you.

Next we have Chris B from Buckley. Listen and learn AFG. She's from Aurora, Co Thank you.

Hi, my name is Chris. I'm a grateful, grateful member of the Al Anon family groups. Good timing on the call up here because that spider was walking right across right there, right? So that was a good time to be called up here. Thank you.

Have you ever felt like God has got you? Like you're just so set with God that you just really don't need to do much? Like prepare, read, pack your clothes for Fellowship of the Spirit.

Half of my clothing is hanging in the hallway at my house. The lower half. But it's cool. You can't see beyond the podium. So is your imagination.

That's cute.

I'm surprised I'm speaking on Step 4 when really I woke up this morning in step one. Like ultimate powerlessness, right? Like God should have known to pack those clothes. Why wouldn't he have brought them? And then I have to get up in front of all of you and I have enough respect for the program to dress up. So I will ask your forgiveness for not

being more prepared when I got here.

But it, it's a really good example of how this program works because all of my best laid plans,

you know, I, I planned what I was going to wear. I ironed it, I hung it. I hung the tops on one side and the bottoms on the other 'cause I was hyper organized. That's what I do.

So again, my name is Chris. I am from the Buckley Listen and Learn family groups in Aurora

and I have been in program. I love hearing a Ayers talk about their sobriety date and I'd like to tell you my serenity date except I blew it this morning again. So every day is day one for me.

I've been in program 11 years this August and I will go ahead and like front load that like it'll be 11 years in August because I'll still be crazy in August. So it's OK, I can still come.

Yeah, thankfully you guys don't kick me out. And I am honored and humbled to be here. And just standing at this podium is proof that this program is freaking amazing.

There's a reason these steps go in order. That was the nicest thing my sponsor ever said to me. You don't have to do Step 4 yet. You have to do steps 1-2 and three first. So I get to wake up in the morning and realize I have no clothes and I get to be powerless and, and then I get to turn my will and my life over to the care of God as I understand him. And then I get to hope to God that nothing spills on these shorts for the next four days.

And I get to take an inventory of my clothing and go well it's funky pajama pad at bottoms or the shorts I wear yesterday

taking

or nothing at all, which is also an option. Don't be surprised taking an inventory. The Big Book says it is a fact finding

job, right? Page 64, all you a Ayers who have all the pages memorized. I'm very jealous. My sponsor does that too. And I'm really blessed to have been able to find a sponsor who is a Big Book thumper. Somebody was talking about that yesterday. Even in al Anon, she's a Big Book thumper and I'm grateful for that because I was first introduced to the Big Book when my mother got sober 20 years ago. And the Big Book that I used today is her very first one.

Oh, it is the podium. Something about this spot

and it's got all her underlinings and all of her highlights and then it's got my underlinings and my highlights and, and hers were yellow and mine were pink. And so there's a lot of orange in my big book.

I,

it is a fact finding and fact facing process. And right below that then it says he cannot be fooled. He cannot fool himself about value. If I were going to take an inventory in a store, I would go in and I'd say I'm out of cans of this and I have extra cans of that. When I took my own personal inventory, I had plenty of cans of judgment. I had lots of cans of fear and bulletproofness.

My first memories of my mom. My third memory of my mother

was her being drunk and I was in my late fours or early fives.

Didn't your life start like that? Like my threes?

Oh, Alan on salute. Anyway,

in my late fours, my first memory is my mom being really drunk. And of course there was a lot of people there and everybody was really drunk. And I don't remember all of the memory. I'm not sure what happened, but something scared me. She may have fallen down or something. And I was sitting at the top of the stairs and my memories of her crawling on all of her hands and knees up the stairs towards me. And when she got there, she said what's wrong, honey? Or what? Something like that. And,

and I said, and I didn't know what to say actually, because by 4, I had learned that the words I don't know were not allowed in my house. Who broke this lamp? I don't know. No, not the right answer. So I couldn't say. I don't know. But in that moment I realized I did not know what I was afraid of. I was just scared. And that started my fear inventory. And there came my big cane of fear. And I carried that around till I was 13. And then my parents got a divorce and we moved to a slightly less nicer side of the neighborhood. And I met all the bad kids. And I learned I could turn my fear into

10 feet tall and bulletproof, and that is a six foot tall woman and I was 6 feet by 13. That was easy to do because everybody was afraid of me because I was this big already. So when it came time to do my inventory, I had a lot of cans of fear and a lot of cans of, you know, the B word. And I had no cans of compassion. And my cans of care had been relabeled with Control Fix due.

I didn't realize that underneath that control label was the desire to care for people. And that when I said don't drink, don't drive, get out of the car, all of those things I tried to fix about your life was just me really saying I love you and I don't want to see you get hurt. What I found out in this program was that my honesty is I love you and I don't want to see you get hurt. That's it.

Not give me your keys. Not get don't drink another bottle. Not let me pour that out. None of that is my truth. My truth is I love you

and I got it to be able to be in this program. I got, OK, I'll back up a little bit. I got into this program 11 years ago, but I didn't start working the program right away. I was being warmed by the fire. So sitting by the fire and getting warmed was fine with me. And after five years of that, I know I knew I needed to walk through the fire to become transformed. And

there's another a, a Al Anon conference where boys aren't allowed sometimes every year.

And at that conference, I was lucky to meet my sponsor and only because I got out of God's way. And so this program is all about God's will, right? I, I went up there, I said I'm not going to do, I'm not going to get a sponsor. I'm not going to work this program. Let's be honest, God, I'm not interested. I just want some spiritual warmth. And I showed up and he did for me what I couldn't do for myself.

Um,

resentment is the number one offender

from it stems all of our spiritual, I know the next word is disease. And every time I read it, I read it this ease because it is my spiritual dis ease. And that's what brought me into working the actual program. Because even after five years of hanging out and even going to church and all those other things that I thought I was doing so well, I still lied. I still was fearful and I still was a huge judgement person. I judged everybody by the way they looked or acted or whatever.

By the way, nice shirt. Can I borrow that later? I don't have any clothes to wear.

I really like that shirt and I really like that my my sponsor pointed out recent I'm working my second fourth step, which is again an honor and humbling experience to be asked, Hey, would you share on the 4th and 5th step? Really right now when I'm working my second fourth step, really that was so apropos. And of course, my sponsor standing right there. So I can't say no.

And then she points out that in that first resentment Mr. Brown lists about Mr. Brown,

it's 19 words. And those are serious, serious offenses. Like you're hitting on my wife and you're going to take my job. That's like, let me sit down and write a resentment about that crap. It'll be a book. And then you were trying to take my job. You, you know, I can go on and on.

So my spiritual dis ease, even after attempting to be the best person I could,

I still wasn't. I was still very deficient and I did my steps 1-2 and three and I sat down to do my inventory

and I got to see the truth. I didn't get to beat myself up. I didn't get to go, oh, look at that can of control. Now let's see if I can burn the whole restaurant down with it. I just got to say there's a can and there's a missing can, and I got to fill the areas that were deficient

and I got to be honest about the areas that I needed to get honest with myself, like the can of liar.

If you had asked me 10 years ago if I was a liar, I would have told you no, no liar. I'm not just not a liar. I'm brutally honest. It's one of my favorite things. Brutally honest. Do you know what brutally honest really means? It means I'm not going to mind my own business. And I'm pretty sure I know what's best for you.

Or it means I am the queen of over disclosure so that you will never know what's really going on. Because if I tell you about all my sexual escapades and other things and you will never have to know when I'm just having a bad day. Or if you ever decided to use any of it against me, I could just go. I know I'm the one who told you that. And now none of it hurts me.

Had you told me 11 years ago that I was a liar, I would have told you that's not even possible. And yet, in this program, what I found out is that from four years old,

I was starting to develop an ability to read your mind.

You didn't know that, did you? I'm reading all of your minds right now. Stop it.

That was dirty.

If you ask me what I wanted for lunch, I would not tell you what I wanted for lunch. I would go through the process of determining what it is that you think I should be eating for lunch and that would be the answer I would give you. If you asked me if I had super salad, I would think, does this person want me to be eating warm foods or something healthy?

And then I would say a salad. Of course, I I probably ate a bag of popcorn. I'm a single woman. I have cereal for dinner.

Don't ask me what I ate today.

I, I don't know how to be honest with other people because I don't know who I I didn't know who I was. I didn't know how to say, I know who I am. I know what I like and I know what I've done. I knew how to cover all that up. So for me to be able to be brutally honest in this program, I had to start by taking an inventory so I knew who I even was. And then I could say, oh, I did lie. I lied a lot. And I did it out of fear. I did it from a place of fear because I didn't know who I was.

And I loved what Malia said. What did she say? Acceptance, sucker. Yeah, that's what I was. I wanted you to accept me no matter what it took. So

I know that Alcoholics use the bottle to accomplish that. I used everything else I could.

I was talking to a friend the other day about about Alcoholics and Allen honors and I said, you know the saying is they take a drink, the drink takes a drink and the drink takes them. I say, I get behind the wheel of a car. I'm drunk. You cut me off. I'm drunk. You don't even have to cut me off. You just have to actually be in front of me. And I'm drunk with rage. I'm drunk with power. I'm drunk with my own self will. I'm drunk with ego. I am determined that I'm the only person on the road who should be allowed to travel and you should get out of my way.

Unless you're behind me, in which case you need to slow down because you are going far too fast and you need to get away from my bumper. It doesn't matter if you're in the front or in the back. I'm drunk because I'm awake

and every day I wake up, I get to take the third step, prayer and hope that you know that my disease, bottle or not, will not come creeping up into my psyche

on page 66.

You know, there's a lot of laughter and smiling and joking in this program. Really.

OK, everybody's up here. Oh my God. Minutes left. Yeah, I know I was talking.

There's a lot of smiling and joking in this program, and it's awesome. And it's great that we can laugh and smile and be happy today. But this is a serious program for a serious disease that takes lives on both sides of the bottle. Then, two years after working with my sponsor, one of my sisters, one of my sponsor sponsors, shot herself in the chest.

Last

year, my best friend's ex-husband hung himself in a blackout

and apparently realized what he was doing right at the last minute, but wasn't able to save himself. On page 66 there are

5-6 death threats. I mean, this is a serious disease,

infinitely grave. We found that it is fatal. To drink is to die.

These things are poison.

It's a serious disease. And I could kill myself with denial. I didn't know I was lying, but I could have killed myself with that veil that I walked around with because I had no idea what was really going on. And if I didn't kill myself, I could end up in jail by killing you. Because that was definitely on my list of things to do, especially if you upset me. So it's a program of action, right? Steps four and five especially. There's a lot of action. You make the list, you take the inventory, and you tell someone.

My sponsor said something very peculiar the last week. She said this is not a program for those who need it. This is not a program for those who want it. Really. It's a program for those who work at. Oh yeah, the work, the actual action. So again, making the list was pretty easy. Like, I can get pretty honest with myself on paper when no one's around. And then I found I was stuck. I could not move past my Step 4 because there was one thing on it I couldn't get over. And I called my sponsor, my loving sponsor. Steps four and five for me are rounded. I summed up

one word and that is trust. I couldn't trust anybody before this program. I have a sponsor I can trust wholeheartedly today. And I called her up and I said this one thing is bugging me and I can't tell you. And she said, what is it? And I told her and she said, OK, feel better. And that was it. There was no judgment. She didn't kick me out of the program.

Admitted to God? OK, well, God knows most of my wrongdoings. Admitted to myself? Well, again, I don't really know what that means. I have a tendency to lie

and admitted to another person. It is when I'm actually saying it out loud to the other person, or reading it off the paper out loud to the other person, do I hear it with my own ears and finally understand what I've written down.

All of that is awesome. The exact nature of our wrongs. Being able to get the exact nature. Not that I am terrible, not that I'm the most horrible person on the planet, but that sometimes I do lie because I don't really know who I am. Once I know the exact nature of my wrongs, I can then share them. That was a miracle. This last month I had the opportunity to be on the other end of that. It was awesome to be able to trust my sponsor enough to share with her

my 4th step, but to be the woman who got to hear someone elses 4th step was the most humbling and amazing. And again, if you told me 11 years ago that somebody would be able to trust me enough to tell me their deepest, darkest secrets and that I would sit without judgment and love them unconditionally, well, I probably would have thought you were lying.

And it's the miracles of this program. I like to sum up the program with one word, and that is simply that this program is a miracle. And I will just end with page 71. We hope you are convinced now that God can remove whatever self will has blocked you off from Him.

Thank you.

Next we'll have Jeff and from Rule 62, Rapid City, SD.

Good morning. My name is Jeff and I am an alcoholic.

I didn't want to follow that.

I'm a member of the Rule 62 group. We meet at noon, Rapid City, SD. We're an open meeting. Rule 62. We don't take ourselves very seriously, but we take recovery very seriously. I've been continuously sober since August 20th of 1983. And for that I'm very grateful to you and I take no credit for that myself. I got up today and and I want to apologize to those of you who are new. I'm just as crazy, only in a different way than I was

30 years ago.

Jeff asked me to talk about my 4th and 5th step and I see he conveniently left the room. No, he's back there

and I and I thought if I, if I had a dramatic experience around that and I thought no, but I've had two completely different four steps and I want to share a little bit about those with you and to share about the first one. What I want to tell you is

that I first came to Alcoholics Anonymous

in 1982.

Prior to that, I was invited to Alcoholics Anonymous by a good friend who told me on a Thursday morning that, you know, if I wanted to come out to the club one day, we had breakfast on Sunday morning and he'd buy and I might meet some guys I knew and I really liked. And I told him I might stop by someday. And that was 1974. So I was probably looking really good as a young man that I was invited to a a A when I was 24 years old. But

nonetheless,

I came to Alcoholics Anonymous in 1982. My my wife was unmanageable. I read the steps.

I certainly I didn't have a problem with the insanity and, and I'll get to the 4th step, but you know, I wasn't going to turn my will and my life over. And the only inventory I was taking was yours. And if there was a higher power, he knew all this stuff anyway. And I certainly wasn't going to tell anybody until the statute had run out.

So there was number 4th and 5th step

and I've heard it said and I liked it. I didn't take the third, I skipped the 4th and bought a fifth.

Hence, my sobriety date is not a September of 1982.

I am grateful that you read how it works in your meetings because you told me that I may be constitutionally incapable of being completely honest and that scared me as much as drinking and living this way of life and dying.

So I sat down after probably a year

of sitting in the meetings, listening, talking to a sponsor, and I did it. I opened the book to page 60. Whatever.

I cracked it and this, this crappy little homemade desk I'd made with a yellow tablet

and I wrote down the four column inventory.

I wrote down those people that I was angry with, things I'd done wrong, institutions I had resentments against and my part in them. And I will tell you that wasn't a great four step. I did not go back a long ways in my life. And for whatever reason, I don't have a lot of childhood memories. So, you know, I went back to the stuff that was keeping me drunk.

You know myself, centeredness, my low self esteem, my anger at institutions

because it was always your fault. I You know that, Tom shaking his head. You know that it was your fault. You know, if I could just find a good woman.

Another longer story. So we won't go there,

but I did write down my part in it. The gentleman I was working with told me I had to look at my side of the street, but that was important. And he heard my first step

and I stayed sober

and I made some amends

to those closest to me and the people I worked with. And and I would sit in meetings and. And I would say,

well, you know, a lot of those. I heard a lot of those people. You know, those women that I'll never find. Yeah. Well, there was two women and they lived across the street. Let's get real. But back to the 4th and 5th step,

I had the the opportunity. Some of the gifts of sobriety are like steady employment.

My my trifecta, having a driver's license, insurance and license plates on a car all at the same time. I couldn't manage that drunk. And I was living in Minnesota and I heard a fellow say,

well, my sponsor told me I I needed to do a four step and I couldn't get around to it. So I thought, well, I'll call this priest and schedule my fifth step. And he's really busy, so I'll have a lot of time. And he called the guy, and the guy said, yeah, how about Thursday? So I thought, OK. And I was at a place in my career to my home life that I wasn't really comfortable in what was going on.

And I found myself snapping at people a lot. I'm wondering if I'd chosen the right profession

or I was restless, irritable and discontent. I was having a terrible time, so I wrote a four step.

I called my sponsor, who's still my sponsor. I said I'd like you to hear my fifth step. He's a very wise man. He looked at me and said call Kurt.

Now, I didn't want to call Kurt. I like Kurt, but Kurt was a Lutheran minister. I didn't go to church. I didn't want to call Kurt. Kurt was a Marine. I wasn't in the military. I didn't want to talk to Kurt.

Kurt lived in a very wealthy suburb and I still viewed myself as blue collar. I didn't want to talk to Kurt,

but I called Kurt and he said how about Thursday?

So I have a written four step

that was very honest and really touched some things that were causing me difficulties and was a four column inventory. And I met with Kurt. And what was remarkable about that compared to the first one is I, I walked in, I sat down with my friend Kurt and he had three chairs there.

And he said God is with us. You know,

I'm I'm a little thick. I needed the third chair.

I needed to understand not only that God knew what I'd done, but He was there with me in this experience.

One of the things on that was a situation with my oldest son

and I talked about that openly for the first time in a number of years. And this man that I didn't want to talk to, who now I'm very close to today, yet looked at me and said,

why don't you just look at him and say, I'm sorry I wasn't the father you deserved,

and then practice living amends.

And what that is done for the relationship of my son and I is remarkable.

The important thing I see in the 5th step today,

and I, if you haven't figured it out, I have a pretty enormous ego and and I'm I'm really blown away by listening to you people. You guys are fantastic,

but what I learned from my last fifth step with Kurt was

that it was the exact nature of my wrongs.

Because if I hurt you,

I will minimize that.

Wasn't that big a deal.

You know, you could spare the 100 anyway.

Really, everybody does that.

Or

I can blow it completely out of proportion.

My ego does not have clear vision of what goes on in the world. God does

my ego makes me greater than or less than constantly.

I do it when I'm sitting there. I'm do it when I'm standing here. I do it all the time without something to level me

and God does that for me in my morning meditation and my ongoing meditation during the day

of what the 5th step does for me. She's covering me up. Am I done?

I'm done. I'm plenty of time or I'm done.

Oh, I got 5 minutes.

Oh my goodness, now I lost my train of thought.

See how my ego is? Obviously I talked too long or not long enough. My ego gets me in so much trouble. Oh my goodness,

the exact nature of my wrongs. If I have to lay out to you

what happened openly and honestly,

you will say to me, this is what it looks like. This is how we can fix it.

You're a human being. Let's give it to God. He's sitting there in the empty chair.

Thank you my friend Kurt.

Now, I wore assured intentionally today.

One of the things I got to do in in sobriety, in another part of my life

is I went to Marine boot camp at 61 years old and survived.

It's a little bit of a longer story, but yeah, yeah, I did everything they asked me to do. And I'm not going to pretend it was what an 18 year old to do. It was about, you know, like 1% of it an 18 year old will do. But nonetheless, I'm here to talk about it. And I and I earned this shirt.

And the great thing about this shirt is what it says on the back. So I'll turn around for a minute.

Pain is weakness leaving the body

and I grow

through pain

and it's my pain and hopefully not your pain

and.

I got to sit down or I'm going to get way off track.

There's a couple people I want to thank Tom. I met Tom, I don't know, 5-6 years ago and he says you got to come to this conference and I've put it off for a long time. You know it. It's kind of like the guy in 74. He said, you want to come to an, a, a meeting And I said I will someday. Eight years later, you know, as kind of the same thing. So last year at our home conference in Rapid City, we invited this really nice young lady just be an Al Anon speaker and she brought this little guy as her husband, really nice guy named Kent. So I'm talking to

says, do you ever go to Fellowship of the Spirit? And I said I got to go to Fellowship of the Spirit.

So now I've said it to two people.

So now if I don't go, I'm lying

and, and, and I'm honest, right? Yeah. And you guys have a great conference. And I want to thank my new friend Jeff from Cheyenne for asking me to share just a little bit of my experience on on this amazing journey

that that you have allowed me to be part of.

You know, without you, without God, I'm nothing. And boy, you know, if you're new here, hang on. And if you've been around for a while, thanks. Thank you very much for my script.

Next we'll have Gerald VA Common Solution from Kingston, NY.

Hi, I'm Gerald, alcoholic,

really have to use the bathroom, but it's fine. I had

it's trying to figure out a nice way to do it this whole time. Sorry I didn't hear a word anybody said. I'm recovering from altitude sickness last night so I couldn't sleep about 2:00 AM. And the security team here are top notch. They're also medics in case you don't know. So they came to my room last night and he took my blood pressure, checked my eyes, gave me, you know, some non addictive medication. I'm good to go.

It's really nice to be home.

I've been here in a long time and first time I came to Fellowship of the Spirit, I came with a whole bag of stuff I needed to fist up. Desperately I needed a four step. Desperately I needed a third step. Desperate, I needed a second step. I had no first step