Step 12 at the Fellowship of the Spirit in Conyers, GA

Good morning everybody. My name is Dave Marquez, recovered alcoholic.

Here we are last session, Step 12.

Last but not least,

the first thing I would like to say about what I've experienced here is you guys have all been great. This has been a great functionary. Every else has helped put it on, participated, you've been interested, you paid attention to me. This is a lay down right here.

And this is this is where you know, you work at all the others. You get to come to something like this and and and and this is just a lay down to me. This is so, this is so easy.

I, you know, I told you about some of these groups back home that asked me to do these big book studies which would last me from six months to nine, six to nine months or so if I ever want to get to the 1st 164 pages. And

you know, one of those groups had been around for about 15 years and the GSR asked me if I come in their group and do a big book study because they had nobody in their group qualified and they had taken a group conscious if they wanted to do that.

And uninformed group conscious, they had no idea what that looked like.

And so I said to her, they said, well, you said, so you got to come down to the big business meeting so they can at least meet you and vote you in to do it and all this other stuff. And I said great.

And so I got there a little early, like I always do to a meeting. And I just kind of looking around and it's right after a meeting, regular meeting that they had. I don't see any big books. I see them putting stuff away in a cupboard. So I figured, well, there's probably some big books in the cupboard. So I walk over the cupboard and there's no big books in the cupboard.

And so I go to the guy and I said, so these guys are going to bring their own big books or you have big books. And he said, no, we don't have big books,

I said, so they're going to bring their own. I said, well, he says, well, probably most of you guys don't have their own big books.

I said. I don't normally make a condition on carrying the message of Alcoholics Anonymous,

but in the

business, meaning we're going to make a motion that you guys order a case of big books.

The group voted down.

That's right,

the guy came out of his own pocket by the case of books for the for the for the meeting. They voted for the meeting, but they weren't gonna invest in the books, right. Guy came out of pocket right. And that was that was a nine months of

Braveheart,

a lot of hack and slash boy. And

you know, I make I made amends for not being that way. And at times I was that way, you know, and I I'll never forget the secretary sitting next to me. I don't know. We were about a month into it and she just turned around and wheeled around at me and she goes, are you trying to tell us that we're doing it all wrong? And I said if the shoe fits.

All

geez. So this has been great. This is a lay down, you know so.

I impart to people what has been imparted to me. I impart to people what I trust that God wants me to impart to them. I, I sponsor people and sometimes it'll be multiple people. They're all in the same spot. And then they get together at the meeting and they talk like a bunch of little hens, right?

Like this. And then one of them will come to me and says, how come you didn't tell me that thing in Step 2 that you told him over there because it wasn't meant for you. It's not like it's scripted, right? I used to be a cookie cutter sponsor,

right? Because this is how I sponsored size talks won't be spoken. I used to be cookie cutter, very little intuitive, thought it was a lot of information and me just burying you. OK. And and then if you didn't get on board, then there was something wrong with you. OK, book talks about not doing that actually

and you want to do it some other way. Let them go do it some other way. But explain to them how some other way may not work. But let them have their druthers, you know? So

one of the things that happened to me when I first came into Alcoholics Anonymous in Hawaii is that I really had a tough time with meetings.

I can tell what the message was or wasn't because people, what people were sharing was all over the map and they called it a A. And,

you know, we talk about the desperation of a drowning man.

I just trained. I'm trying to save drowning people in the Marine Corps. You know drowning people do, when you try to save them, try to kill you.

So I don't know that I'm dying,

but something down deep inside knows I'm dying.

And so I come into a place that's supposed to be throwing me a life preserver,

and I'm getting bent out of shape because I'm scared to death. And I'm going to die right here in front of you because I can't get to help you say that it's here.

And thank God for the minority of guys that took me under the wing and say, hey,

thank God for my roommate. Thank God for my for God getting my roommates sober 10 months, 10 months earlier, earlier than me coming to a a with some guys that took him under their wing out of the big book of Alcoholics Anonymous. Because you know what they did after every meeting? We went to a coffee shop.

They throw me in a corner so I couldn't escape

and they and they would. All of us wasn't just me buried, they weren't buried in on me. But

not who said it. But what did you hear said in the meaning? What's the big book say?

And although I at the time I didn't think I needed to do what was in this book,

it at least exposed me to the truth of what really what alcohol Islamist was or what it is and what it isn't.

OK. And just that exercise on a daily basis after meetings com calm me down a bunch to where I could at least sit in meetings and not totally hate your guts

and feel like you were a threat to my Life.

OK,

I do that with people today when I have time and as much time as I have had in the past and be on the road. But

I will, we will get together. And what did you hear in the meeting?

You know, get them calm down. Get them to actually see what's in the big book about calling synonymous, OK?

I caught fire. I went through the steps the first time in 10 days.

OK, I was at, I was in, I was in nine on date, date

eight or nine. I came down beg my sponsors take these steps. We spent that weekend was a weekend. We spent that weekend doing 1-2 and three sent me home to write inventory. Wasn't the greatest inventory. I used the Joe and Charlie worksheets. That's what he had done and that's what he gave me. It did the job. OK, I came back that weekend 5567, spent the night at his house, kicked me out the door with an 8 step list

and off I went. OK.

And I was on fire and

sponsoring a couple guys and

I was living in a small mountain town. I was always having to travel down to Fresno, about 30-40 minute drive. And I'm used to small town a A. And I got tired of that drive for, you know, just to get a big book meeting. And it just hit me start one

in this group up here with these with these guys. And I'm, you know, I'm too crazy to be afraid. You know, fools rush in where angels fear to treasure. And I didn't know that these guys didn't want to be with me.

And so as I started bringing it up in the business meeting I got, I found out really quick they weren't interested in the big alcohol.

So I went to the school that we had the meeting in and I knew that we'd have a meeting on Friday night.

That particular group didn't, and I secured the room for a Friday night. Big book me

these guys in this these old guys that were in this little small town, a group said, oh David, meetings never, never make it around here. They they'll die and you're trying to do it on Friday night and the only thing that happens on Friday night in that mountain town is high school football. That's it. You know, high school basketball has high school football. You're not going to,

you know, we all go there. OK?

I said, well, I'm not asking for permission,

I'm just telling it's going to happen,

OK? I'm just wondering if you wanted to be part of your group and you want some 7th tradition or not, But will that perk their ears up because they wanted that money? 7th tradition

and the first night we had, there's some generally about 10 people that show up at the other meetings that we had. 410

couple weeks later, we had everybody there.

Yeah.

And later, you know, back in the provision for you talks about maybe what we may be one man with this book in your hand and using that and the power of God to watch the fellowship that you crave grow up around you.

And that has been the story of my sobriety ever since, good, bad or indifferent.

And

there's another part in Vision for You that talks about

the things that are so important to most people are no longer important to us.

I'm 25 years old,

I'm shot out of the cannon and this 4th dimension and all I care about is saving drunk souls. It's all I care about. I want to be self supporting

but other than that

I can careless. All I want to do is save souls. And I spent the 1st

more or less 8910 years of variety doing that

until God tapped me on the shoulder and says there's another part of this book

call the last four chapters

that you're not engaged in.

And it came on the heels of a discussion I got. I got to go out to the Colorado State convention after Don P died and Gary was out there and, and Bob was out there and,

and I got to have a sit down with Gary one time and, and he talked to me a long time. And, and

you know, if you guys don't know, Gary got sober at 20/4/1964.

I'm so grateful for guys. I got in this sponsorship family tree that I'm part of that got sober young and became adults in sobriety because when I came to when I came to AAI was it never was. I wasn't has been. I didn't burn anything. I had nothing to burn down to the ground. Nothing ever got started and I saw as it never was. And Gary was it never was. And you got to become an adult and do adult things in sobriety.

And so he started talking to me about power.

You started talking to me just like this 234 hour discussion that changed my whole perspective on things and

realization of a lack of power, you know,

and talk to me about newer and finer structures at this book talks about, you know, just initially becoming here. We've built, this spiritual structure gets built,

but then it goes on to start talking about newer and finer structures that are just as much about God's will as going out and carrying the message, maybe even more so.

And he asked me, where's your power to be

a present, father? Where's your power to be in a relationship? Where's your power to be

in a career that you want to be in, in an employment that you want to be, and not just making a check like Mike talked about?

Where's your power to do those things? And it was not there. The structures weren't there

and I and I had begun to realize shortly after that conversation going home that

that as noble as being out there and and just

just trying to save the a world

that I had begun to hide an alcoholic synonymous

so that I didn't have to participate in practices, principles and all my affairs. And God has already began to tap me on the shoulder and say

I got a whole new circle of life that you heard another part of this circle of life that you need to be a part of.

And

it wasn't without some pain to to get there. And it exposed a lot of reliances on the fellowship that I didn't know I had things that.

Don or Don C or Mark or somebody, Joe, I don't know who call it in pocket Gods, you know,

all these, all these things that point to God that we rely on and we don't actually rely on God and whether it's a sponsoring the service and all this other stuff.

I told you that I got into general service. I run the gamut on pretty much every

service position I could get get into.

And

I've I've come to the conclusion about General Services that having been on both sides, tried both sides of the fence of we don't need it and we do need it.

And this is just my opinion. In my observation, as big book people, I think we have a blind spot to general service and me included at at one point I decided, you know what, all I really need to do is keep this simple and personal.

And really what I was saying, I was fed up with general service

that they're a part of this program that is obsolete, which is a complete. This is not accurate.

But if we want change in the fellowship of Alcoholics Anonymous and we want to keep a pyramid that's inverted and not allow the the people take advantage of a bunch of uninformed people about our principles and flip this thing into a, a pyramid,

people like us need to get involved.

You want to restore the message of Alcoholics Anonymous, not just one soul at a time, but one group at a time. When community at time, we, I believe that we as big with people, more or less have a blind spot to getting involved in general service. And if more of us would get involved, the more we could start changing some of the ways the votes go, some of the topics that come up that we vote on.

And I've come full circle on that. I actually fell away from general service and pretty much put up a middle finger to it for years

and the more I see

I believe we just need to get involved more

from general service.

I was heavily involved in H and I,

I loved H and I.

After a while, I began to realize that there wasn't one person I met. I had shared a message with an H and I for five years and I actually saw in a meeting about Fox Anonymous

and I began to realize that there were a lot of people already in the meetings about called synonymous that would already be either new or or or been there a while and already there sick and suffering needing help.

And I just felt intuitively and that that God wanted me to dump that H and I commitment.

And anybody that knows the people that rely on H and I is because more people stay sober. 95% of people stay sober that do H and I because that's what they'll tell you.

These guys had a they had a fit when I dropped that, oh, you're going to get drunk. They told me also said, well, you better tell God about all that. And then they gave me the statistic and I said, well, 100% of people stay sober to do this.

There's a promise in there with agnostics about if we take a certain attitude cannot fail.

I said I'm just going to roll with that one. You know, God bless you, whatever, whatever service niche, God wants you and God bless you. But the point is, find it.

If I had more time,

I would love to dive back into general service.

OK, I was on a big, but I was on 1/4 edition committee. I was on 1/4 edition literature committee on whether we should, whether we need it or didn't need it. Our committee felt we didn't need it.

I've been on a committee where we had to take, We started decide to take a look at all the pamphlets,

take all the pet, look at all the pamphlets and see how accurate they are, how they really line up to this piece of this piece of literature. Because it seemed like a lot of people were getting confused by what was in the pamphlets and what's in this book.

Done that.

So

the most important, the most, the most growing. The work where I seem to have grown the most is like, Pateric says, that one-on-one work across the table with another alcoholic.

Last, I just want to touch on the last four chapters.

I've never heard many people actually talk about the last four chapters in workshops. And I think as you can see, we've had eight sessions or so. We're out of time and there's 64 more pages left in this book

that you can talk about, and there's so much information condensed in the last four chapters. It's so dense with principles that you could spend a weekend just on the last four chapters.

But most mainstream meetings that I go to and even some big book means I go to treat the last four chapters is as if it's some kind of filler

or like some kind of redundancy of the 1st 103 pages.

And I'm here to suggest you that it's not

it's a continuation. It's it is following the directions of the last principle of the 12th step as we read it on the on

chart practice English principles and all our affairs. A lot of people like to say, oh, there's 53 pages committed to the first step of alcohol. Synonymous must be important.

Well, there's 65 pages committed to the last principle of the 12 step, so that must be pretty important too, if not more so.

OK, I'm going to, I'm going to share with you a line from to wives that makes 2 wives relevant to everybody in a meeting of alcohol. Synonymous. OK. And it's right on 104. They lead with it.

It's in the

3rd paragraph.

Among us are wise relatives and friends who whose problem has been solved, as well as some who have not yet found a happy solution. We want the wise of Alcoholics Anonymous to address the wise of men who drink too much.

Here it is what they say will apply to nearly everyone

bound by ties of blood or affection to an alcoholic.

How do you sponsor?

How do you consider sponsorship and intimate relationship

sometimes more intimate than with the person you're married to or significant other.

Is that not a tie of blood or affection?

OK, I've never been married.

I never picked up two wives until I started finding out the trouble I had later on in sobriety, about five years with my father, who's an alcoholic, just like Tara. And you know what? I started seeing that same kind of trouble with the way I sponsored.

You know what, twice did I start seeing myself as the wife to the people that I sponsor. Maybe a sharper sponsor.

It cleaned up. It cleaned up a lot of stuff between my dad and I.

I'll never forget

my my dad continue to drink well into my sobriety.

I'm so detached from his alcoholism by that. By the time he did this on me, I'm visiting him. He's on the recliner,

pops out a recliner, comes to the kitchen. I'm already in the kitchen I'm at just busy and he says

she's just messing around like this. And he looks at me, goes, he goes, hey,

I go what? Because I'm going into rehab,

I go, what is it, your knee again?

He he goes no, for I'm going in tomorrow morning.

I said you're just laying there on the recliner right, right there. He just decided you're going to go to the VA and check into rehab like that.

You know, and, and you know, my national, you know, if that had happened when I was five years sober and I was starting to wake me up to really the real problems I was having with my dad, I was just would have buried him. I would have told him how how rehab doesn't work. I just would have told him a bunch of BS information trying to control how he ought to get sober.

I didn't do that, You know, for five years I saw thousands and thousands of Alcoholics and meaning sponsored people, all that stuff, and could see them as sick Alcoholics and still see my dad as an asshole and not as a sick alcoholic. And I, and today I don't even look at my dad as a sick alcoholic. I look at him as my dad.

I remember one time my mom. My mom is an untreated, untreated al Anon for ever. OK, she's been to meetings. She understands the steps. I heard this before, but she's sick as the day she ever walked in Alamo

and she has been 5150. She doesn't drink, but she's been 5150 at least five times that I know of

for being suicidal. Untreated Al anonism,

OK,

suicidal has be hospitalized so she doesn't kill herself.

And

I remember one time I was over there and she was pissed off that my dad been drinking and was trying to throw it in his face and and get me on board to cosign it.

And this is long. I'm way way I'm way free of this and and I just looked at her. I said I don't really care what dad does or doesn't do with alcohol. All I want to all I want to do is be a son to him. If he would stop drinking, that would be great because maybe he'd be around longer, but if he doesn't, that's whatever.

She just put the she just flipped because I wouldn't get on board, you know,

and with the blame and

it plays a role with my son.

I'm going to jump over to a line in family afterward. 2 lines.

Second paragraph 123

family confidence and Dad is rising high. The good old days will soon be back, they think. Sometimes they demand Dad bring them back instantly. God, they believe, almost owes this recompense on a long overdue account. But the head of the house has spent years and pulling down the structures of business, romance, friendship, health. See, things are now, excuse me, these things are now ruined or damaged. It will take time to clear away the wreck. The old buildings will eventually be replaced by finer ones. The new structures will take years to complete.

That will not happen. If you're buried in 1014 meters a week

and if you load yourself up on service commitments where you cannot practice these principles in all your affairs, that will not happen.

Way early in the book it talks about the most important demonstration of these principles. And there's occupations, homes and affairs.

I can't find it but off the top of my head. So there's a pardon family after that talks about the spiritual principles being brought to the family

in practicing these principles with the family.

And it goes on to make give this real subtle warning

that whether the family gets on board or not, the alcoholic has to or else pay the price.

This book will constantly bring back,

bring you back to step one,

right? If you don't do this, you're probably going to drink again.

So to me, to me, practicing these principles in all our affairs is just as much about not drinking every not drinking ever again, having this open channel between me and God that separates me from alcohol as as any other step.

When when I when I work with somebody, I don't fluff it up. I don't wait till they feel better to work steps. Book tells me the more hopeless they feel, the better what work the family afterward talks about, you know, don't wrap them in wool and put them up there like in a pedestal because he's sober. I you know that he said the opposite works better. And that's I sponsor that way too. Not heavy-handed,

but I'm not going to kiss their ass either, OK?

And I tell them the truth. You want to know why? That

why I do this over and over and over and seek to continue to grow spiritually

is because alcoholism, whether I drink or not, is progressive and fatal.

And if I don't continue to be willing to grow spiritually, and I say at some point this is enough, this is enough, Spiritual could grow.

Spiritual mind doesn't care if I do that by accident or on purpose.

At some point, that progressive spiritual Mali will just roll right over the top of me and it wins.

And I don't have the power to know when that's going to happen. And when it happens, I don't have the power to stop it.

This process and continuing on and practicing these principles and all our affairs

keeps this channel open. So I continue to grow spiritually.

I don't want to say I'm spiritual enough.

I'm doing it's. This is good enough.

So I

last thing on vision for you.

I thought it was kind of weird, you know, vision for you just seemed like

the four to the second edition just put in the back

and there's AI finally caught on to a line on page 153

at the bottom

of what Bill was trying to do here. Vision for you set the last paragraph.

So suppose now that through you several families have adopted this way of life. Catch this. You will want to know more of how to proceed from that point. Like that's not enough, right?

God has brought me so far down the scale

so that my dark past of alcoholism can be the most powerful asset. I have to have a key for life and happiness for another alcoholic and their family

hand them that key so they can avert death and misery. We are given that kind of power,

book Bill saying. But you're probably gonna want to know what more you can do,

right? Not really, but OK, I'm willing.

Perhaps the best way of treating you to a glimpse of your future. Then he goes into the history. What's the what's he telling you in this glimpse of my future? He tells me the history again, right?

Somebody came to him,

he went to somebody, they went to a somebody, they went to a somebody. And all sudden there was a fellowship in Akron.

He went back to New York, he went to somebody, he went to somebody. There's a fellowship in New York. Somebody left Cleveland or left Akron for Cleveland

is got us. Somebody got another somebody right? And then there was a fellowship

and the, and the rest of the vision for you is really an outline about how to build the fellowship around you that you crave.

And I start to ask myself, is that happening to me?

Am I willing to do that?

What's that have to do with whether I drink alcohol again or not? I don't know. But I'm going to get out there and do it and I'm going to get out there and try it.

I just am not satisfied to be the guy in Alphonse. It just kind of sits back and just kind of watch a go by. I just, I, I'm just not that guy. I've never been that guy in any walk of life. I just kind of have to be out there in front sometimes, right?

Through this process and through being open to.

What religious people may have to offer

different venues of carrying,

gathering up Alcoholics has been presented to me.

One of the first things that happened to me was

the guy in a A had been converted to the LDS church and he knew I heard my story. He came up to me and he says

you want to come back to church and I said no.

And he says, well, it's not how you think. I said, well, how do you how are you thinking? He says, well, I just,

I, you know, I converted five years ago and he says I started what's called the atom program in the church. Alcohol and drug addicted Mormons 12 steps of Christ.

And I said no. And he says,

I think you'll be surprised if you just come and help. And I said

my job isn't to be the be in the place of maximum usefulness to others.

Alcoholics may show up. I want to go check it out. So I go check it out.

So this starts this whole whole different Ave. For

getting Alcoholics into my life and helping them.

Two months later I got an offer to buy a insurance agency

in Mormon Mecca, Salt Lake City, UT,

and began to sponsor people through a A Not Through the Adam program

and

sponsor people that I never would have thought of available to sponsor.

Sponsor people. And

people talk about living a man's not really big on the whole concept of living amends, but to be able to carry a message of Alcoholics Anonymous to people that fell away from the church like I did or that are still active but are alcoholic and a A to me was bringing the whole thing full circle.

OK. And watching them go back into the church and become

stronger members and they've ever been was a was a powerful experience.

And later on, I had some very powerful experiences around spiritual experience, spiritual awakenings around

Native American spirituality. And,

and I had this one experience where

I felt driven to

go back to California, get plugged it back into the Native American community

and I had no idea what this was about. And then I stumbled onto

White Bison and the thing that Don C had started,

and I didn't know how. I didn't really know Daunsey was tied into it. All I know is I was handed

the well variety program and I and I did it as part of an 11 step

and then I applied to be a fire starter for for white bison.

I'm not aware that there's any Native American in me at all. I know I'm a white boy coming to this thing. As far as I know, half Mexican, which is Indian anyway, but

and so I don't think it's going to be accepted. And

I got a call from Don C and says you've been accepted as a fire starter. Then that's when we really realized that we had been in several different roundups and talked a few times and he just had to remember my name. And we got talking and,

and so I was able to take not only a but well variety back into white Bison, into the Native American communities that I drank at that I was I was raised around

and be able to hook into people that way. So God has opened up a lot of different venues.

We don't have monopoly on recovery. We don't have a monopoly on God. And if people come, people come here to Alcoholics Anonymous, and this is what I want to convey to, is that they're looking for Alcoholics Anonymous. It's my duty to give that to them,

and if I'm not giving that to them, I'm doing a disservice, OK,

In these other venues, if with what they're asking for is that stuff, and that's what I give them.

But this is Alcoholics Anonymous. This is the only thing that's really ever worked for me

and and we owe it to everybody that's walking in that door to give them the best opportunity at Alcoholics Anonymous. Don't let anybody ever tell you you're not unique.

Book is very clear that we are uniquely useful with other Alcoholics,

that we are given a gift that nobody else is given to work with other Alcoholics and bring them to God, get them reconnected to God, and so they can live a happy, productive, useful life and sobriety.

And that's all I have. Thanks.

Thanks, David.

My name is Mike Shane. I'm still an alcoholic.

Thank you,

Thank you, thank you, Brandon. It's been great. I sort of feel like I'm at the special OPS of a A

nice when I stand up to to do my inventory pitch at big book workshops and I put out what self esteem? Nobody knows. That's how I feel.

Everybody in this room goes estimation of myself and I'm going,

yeah, baby,

this is easy. I totally agree with Dave. Thank you very much for inviting me down here. And, and I'm glad, you know, Bob really talked to you guys up and,

and said to come down here. I, I quit doing this for a few years because I had to take care of my other responsibilities. I think you can hide out in Alcoholics Anonymous. I think you can hide out in, in meetings and not take care of the responsibilities in your life. And I spoke at 16 conventions one year and and couple of big book workshops. And next thing I saw is my business falling apart and my daughter was going through tough

and it started to cost me in my life. And I had to go back in and get off, get get away from this to to focus in on that and do the real work in Alcoholics Anonymous. As far as I'm concerned, which is sitting right here at a table across from a guy and taking him through the 12 steps of AAI, think that's where the real work comes.

I think that's the foundation stone of recovery in Alcoholics Anonymous.

If you take a look at the 12 steps, the 12th step, it says having had a spiritual awakening,

right?

So I started drinking at 13 years old. I I'm like Dave and I'm like a couple other people in here. I didn't have to worry about jobs in four O 1 KSI never had anything like that. I mean, the love of my life was the head stripper at the bar. I mean, I never built up anything to tear it back down. I never did. I learned to be a man in Alcoholics Anonymous and I did not catch Alco

synonymous in the meetings of Alcoholics Anonymous. That's not where I caught it. I caught Alcoholics Anonymous by working the steps with people and by hanging out with people and seeing how these guys would go through things and, and thank God, these people. And I almost feel like a name dropping in this group. But these were my friends when I came in. These were my this was my crew.

OK, think of these guys,

open their life up to me. See, when I 12 step somebody, when I sponsor somebody, it's not about teaching them, it's about allowing them. Then also to give them the dignity to make their own mistakes. It's about letting them get to know me as a human being. When I sponsor people, trust me, I share what's going on in my life, good, bad or indifferent.

I love it when you're sober as long as I am and some guy comes up to you and he goes, take me through the steps and he really thinks he's going to get, you know, learn the secret code, you know,

and you sit there, you go, I'm not, but I mean, you know, you sit there and you go, well, I'm going broke or I'm getting divorced and this is the way it is. But I can sure as hell show you a way to stay sober that's going to work for the rest of your life. That's what I can show you through thick and thin. And these guys did they open their life up? And I, I got to see these people like person Brown and, and Frank and, and, and all these guys go through just, you know, horrendous

stuff, But they were always out there taking people through the work. They were always in the middle of Alcoholics Anonymous and they, they,

they had ups and downs like every human being under the sun. And when I got sober, one of the things I liked about it was, you know, the treatment centers, I think have taken the smell of alcohol out of a A.

I loved it when I got sober because the guy sitting next to me probably half of the time

was shaken

and smell bad. And when you get up to do the Lord's Prayer, at the end, his hands, you could barely hold on to him, they were so sweaty.

And the treatment centers have taken the smell of alcohol out of Alcoholics Anonymous.

And So what has a lot of people done in a A is they think they've done a great 12 step call when they pick somebody up and take them to a treatment center and dump them off. Well, I've done my job.

Another thing that kills me are people that have been around for a while and they've been through the steps and they have recovery to a degree

and they go, I don't have anything to give anybody.

What a cop out. I call him a thieves.

Come in here and you, you get this thing because we gave it to you and now you're not willing to give it away.

Just get the hell away from me. I don't want nothing. Do it. I'm a bit opinionated

Skittle. I didn't have any Skittles this morning.

So. So what's happened in Alcoholics Anonymous is that I have seen

is that everybody's learned the lingo

and it's become this deal where

people know how to play the game. But

how many people here

have really gone into meetings outside of your little group here and heard people talk, give a straight message out of the Big Book of Alcoholics Anonymous? Not many, not too many. So the Big Book says, having had a spiritual awakening as a result of these steps,

we tried, tried to carry this message, not my message, this message

tell their Alcoholics, right,