The Whiskey & Milk group in Dallas, TX

Oh man, I get the privilege of introducing Arthur Deller.

There's one part in the book that actually stands out when I think about Arthur, and it's on page 51,

and it says that many hundreds show how the change came over them. When with these hundreds of people were able to say that the consciousness of the presence of God is today the most important fact of their lives,

they present a powerful reason why one should have faith. And I was probably about nine years sober when I met Arthur. And I had been,

quote UN quote, doing the deal of working these steps and sponsoring and going to H and I and helping lots of women. And he looked at me one night and at Starbucks with some other people and he said, you don't know anything about God.

And I felt hurt. But the truth is, is I was doing a lot of doing and I wasn't doing a lot of trust and I wasn't being and relying on a power. And when it comes to this section on 51, I didn't know the consciousness of the presence of God in my own life and sat before me this man who he could say that that was the most important fact in his life.

And I don't doubt that that's true.

Arthur is a man of many words, but he also is,

He's also showing that with his feet.

Umm, when he talks, I listen. So I'm very, very excited to get to hear him tonight. And I'm so excited that you do.

Can you all hear me?

I'm a soft talker.

Thanks, Ashley. It's almost started to cry. Damn, I don't cry often. I want to thank Wesley for asking me to come out here and tell my Stewart thank you

before I start.

There's only one reason I'm here anyway. It wasn't because Wesley asked me is because someone used Wesley to ask me to come here.

And I trust that that voice who got me clean, freed me from the bondage itself, puts me standing here today. I hope some of this stuff you can you can really relate to take it away

turned on in your life and see what happens. So I'm gonna bring that power into this room. We we said that serenity prayer, but I got to bring it in.

Okay,

so

you know, someone asked me to come here and tell my story and I was thinking about it today just briefly. I said, you know,

this whole world has made of stories.

We tell stories and we're usually narrating our own story.

I'm usually have that voice inside my head that's telling me what's going on in my life rather than experiencing what's going on in my life.

I lived like that for my pretty much up until about 15 years ago

and I stopped buying that story.

So I'm going to ask you is not to believe a word I'm going to say, but to map your experiences to some of mine.

And if they stick on that map,

maybe some of the directions I can point out that I took, you guys can take. If not, you'll just enjoy me talking for an hour.

So

I'm going to condense my using part.

I'm a recovered drug addicted alcoholic.

I love the taste of crack cocaine.

I love the smell of cocaine

immensely, even to this day.

But something happened to me.

I laid down the letter of this law and let it go, and I picked up the spirit of it, and that only was through initially. It was through grace. And I talked about grace sometimes because it took grace to get me into these rooms, but they didn't keep me here.

They protected me and got me here. And then it took some power to take over.

You know, I understood what my problem was a long time before I walked in here. I just couldn't do anything about it.

My problem was what everyone kept telling me. You're a dope thing. You're a drug addict. I don't want you living here. I don't want you working here.

Police usually confronted me and weren't the kindest and I would usually mock them and say you should have saw me how wasted I was last night. You're lucky you didn't catch me and that was all ego and it was all bullshit really. So I'm going to get into

the difference between

letting go absolutely utter defeat, abandoning myself,

and what it looks like in a trusting and relying relationship on a power that absolutely use everything it possibly could to get me here. And I cooperated by using everything I possibly could to get me here too. And I used everything I could to get here.

So

single mom, five kids, welfare in five states.

My dad's a safe robber. He's in prison all the time.

I'm an orphanage, foster care, foster care, juvenile detention for two years. I'm on my own at 14. Never made it past the 8th grade. I take my first hit at 12 years old.

Everyone else was like you hire you. Hi, we're passing around this court of Miller High Life the shittiest beer you could probably drink at the time. I think it was $0.79 for that court

and we're burning a joint. And I didn't feel high. I felt together. I felt peace. I felt like I can come out of my shell. I didn't feel afraid. I didn't care what you thought anymore.

And that started a every single day journey to get high again. Every single day. And I can't remember when I stopped until I got separated from it a few times.

So

I get out of there and, uh,

get out of juvenile detention. My mom ends up moving to Dallas and she moved in an unorthodox way. I come home from work. I'm working at a very young age in the city and I lived up in Queens, NY, if you couldn't tell.

And

I come home and everything's gone and there's a note saying I just can't handle it anymore. I said, OK, this is see, to me that wasn't abnormal anymore. That was how things went. I usually got abandoned and rejected and I got used to that.

I was robbing houses,

I was protesting for the IRA and I'm not Irish,

right? I have a Mohawk

and I'm pretty much batshit crazy.

I'm actually in full flight from reality. I'm an outright mental defective. I can't differentiate you footballs,

and I didn't think so.

I thought I did. I thought I knew it was going on, but I was driven by fear and I was scared

and I wanted to just be OK. And what happened was I have this idea of my life that if I can just get something outside of me to make it OK inside of me, I'm going to pursue that. And I tried a lot of things to do that, especially this. So that seeker in me use its attention to seek something in you so that you could give me the attention back. And that felt good. That felt good. That filled another hole because I didn't get attention when I grew up.

I was, I was a lonely kid in the room of people,

you know,

fast forwarding smoking crack, holding a handgun,

take an Ambien to try to come down,

doing hydrocodone

to try to do something.

And I've been smoking cracks since before crack was out. I was smoking it when it was when we were free basing back in 1984. I'm in New York. I break my leg at reunion arena. That predates anyone who only knows about American Airlines. Does anyone know about a reunion arena? Not many. So I I snapped my leg and they put me in the hospital. My my buddy takes my motorcycle. Two months later, I stick it in a trailer and drive up to New York. I've got a cast up to hear. Still got a Mohawk

and I wiped that bike out on a bridge going from Staten Island to Brooklyn. The state trooper laughs at me and says, get up and go put your money back in the change Plaza, the toll Plaza. So I'm hobbling back there. He I have to flip the motorcycle off me. He didn't help me at all.

A week later I sold it for a gram of coke

I needed. I needed to feel something different.

DWI's, lost marriages,

children, you know,

I was doing everything that they said I would do.

And guess what? None of that

makes me an addict. Not one thing

as I know people that are an alcoholic addicts have worse experiences than that. Worst consequences in that I've been to jail for aggravated assault, assault, buying crack.

Republican talks doesn't make me an addict.

Yes,

I can. So what makes me an addict

is that when I'm not on something, I want to be

and I'm obsessed until I can get that candy

and I am freaking out inside. I'm tight, I'm wound, my chatters loud, my gut is wrenched,

my vibration level is high

and I'm not OK. And that thought

repeats itself 100,000 times an hour. Just do another hit

and I can't anymore. I've stopped using the drug. It was using me. It was using my life to feed off me.

And So what had happened was I would then give in because I had no way I wasn't going to give in. I was too wound tight. I had to have that feeling released again, like that first joint in that court of beer when I was 12. And I couldn't get that feeling to go away. So what happened was right before I took that hit and during it, there was another voice going on. And it was the voice I wouldn't listen to. And it was my body saying please don't take that,

please don't take that. Because the moment you take that, I'm taking off full speed.

And here's what would happen. Check yourselves if this maps, do you see if it worked? I would take that hit to shut the noise,

my head would feel great and go ah, and my body would fly out of the cage like a rabid dog. And I would be then on the streets hanging out at motels in Harry Hines and Dolphin and Samuel. Just check this out. Or driving from Corpus to Dallas to buy crack. You can buy it 6 miles from Corp in Corpus, man. But the idea hit me why? There's probably some better stones up here, you know.

So I was on my way,

but what happened at that point was now my mind was screaming please don't take it. My body was saying please go get it

for me.

That's what makes me an addict, Alcoholic.

Not the things that happen to me. Not because mommy didn't hug me enough. I would have liked that. I didn't get it,

but because when I'm not using and I'm sitting in a meeting and I'm not well,

I'm wanting to get well. Who relates to wanting to get well to feel OK? Well, the hard part is, can I make that jump from that utter defeat to that full on trust and reliance on a power? Because that's the only way. Because every hit I ever took and every shot of dope I ever did and every drink I ever meant, I'm telling you in hindsight, I didn't know this going forward.

My God is believed through a rear view mirror. Oh shit, he did all that. That's how I felt.

I couldn't see it coming and I couldn't trust it coming, but I could see the protective nature that this power had over my life. I could see the amount of times I was given more than I deserved and I wasn't given what I was deserving of, which was probably a lot of punishment and beatings. So

there came a point and I've been coming to recovery since 1986 when they made me come. He handed me a piece of paper with 32 signature slices on it and they said this is a result of your DWI. Go to DWI school and go to

32 meetings.

I went to one meeting

and I realized I can get three or four different colored pens and pencils and I filled it out in about 7 minutes

and I waited a while and I turned it in. No one ever said a word.

Manage that,

got away with it, didn't get harassed, didn't have another problem with that. By the way, currently I was on 8 years deferred adjudication for an aggravated assault with intent to kill and I flee the state and so I Interstate felony flight from Texas.

I end up in New York. I moved to Delaware in the middle of the night. I move out of Delaware. I'm I was all messed up and I moved to Cleveland, OH and I'm just running man. I'm scared

I get popped by a drug task force in Ohio

and I got this 74 Dodge Dart with a brand new BMW stereo in it. So strange, it had this dim lights in the dash and this bright orange square radio

and they have us out on the snow at 3:00 in the morning on our faces and they go over everything pretty harsh. And I go, I'm going. I'm going away for a long time.

I have this felony charge on me and Iran

and they didn't find it and I felt like that was a wake up call and I wrote the judge

and I was savvy again trying to control everything. I stuck the letter in another envelope, mailed it to my mom and had her send it from New York so that they would not see the postmark coming from where I was.

I didn't have cell phone then. This is 86 and I I got reinstated and I got back here and it didn't get better. I was having dope sent to me from New York because cocaine was better up there because Colombians were bringing it in and Texas really wasn't getting good coke at the time. And so I'm freebasing my own adult and I can't stop man, and I don't really want to.

There's a

eight to 10 years of zero amount of income I earned during that time. I have three children, a wife and 0 income. I was using her, I was using society and I wasn't growing up,

see. And what really happened to me

fast forwarding was I had 11 years of recovery, but I didn't have one day of freedom.

And at 11 years of recovery was done through to

AAA. And this time in I had a sponsor tell me, please don't take offense to this. He said, addicts die in a

I said, what do I do? Because we'll go get a book Because he said, you know, the book better than me goes go get a book, a brand new one. And I said, oh, cool, I'll go get one. No, no, get a big one. I said I don't want to carry a big one.

I didn't want to carry anything that like, I didn't want to billboard in my hand, you know?

And I don't want anything in it because I don't want you to read your highlights anymore. I want you to read it like it's a fresh, clean slate. And I want you to practice, to set aside prayer regularly because what you know has kept you high for a very long time and it keeps you from getting free. And he was right. And I didn't like hearing that,

but I listen

and I took it in and I eternalized it.

I got into recovery. My last night out was

terrific, man.

I mean

I blew 20 grand in a month after

after about five week run after a relapse

the last night

I have about

$750 worth of dope.

Three different types and three different piles.

I'm on Ambien and I'm cooking dopes, smoking crack, and I'm making my own capsules of pure hydrocodone.

And then I started snorting hydrocodone

and then I started thinking SWAT teams were coming. Anyone ever had that?

I don't know why I thought that.

Maybe the crack,

just maybe.

But I'm standing there and I'm pacing like a rabid dog and I've got a pistol in my hand

and I've got another one in my drawer and they're fully loaded, one in the Chamber of safety off. And I think they're coming

for real

this time. They're coming,

see, every time they were coming, but they never showed up.

And I was delusional enough to believe they're coming.

This time they would come

and my smart ass thought if I'm holding a gun,

Dang don't fuck with me

they're going to kill me then I'm going to ask a question. I should have put that thing down, hit it under a pillow or had them taken from me,

My wife said.

What are you doing? She had never seen me high

ever.

And I was like, I'm serious. It was like Scarface. I was like I had my face was full of white and I was like, I have never felt this good in my eyes and the veins in my neck. And I'm holding this pistol and she looked at me and she goes, I'm scared. And she left the bedroom and slept in the other room. First time ever

and I went at it all night,

all night long. I did all that dope

and I didn't want to.

I didn't want to do it anymore

and I was being used to do that dope. It was feeding. See when they talk about we can be possessed of a new power. I was possessed of a different power that was using me to get high off of my life force, to wipe my family out, to destroy my career, to destroy everything I own.

You know, I'm a kid who came from a really broke, broken, messed up family,

you know, hardcore St. living style New York kid. And I had a life now. I gained some stuff back, I gained a career, I had things and none of it was enough.

You know, I was driving a fine European automobile.

I had a 66 figure job

and I would have thrown it all the way for one speck of just a break. I didn't even want freedom. I just give me a fucking break man. Inside I was cratering

that night. I'm tweaking

with my remote control that my friend set up my flat screen and sound system and it ain't working. So 1:30 in the morning,

I'm texting. You know how it is,

come fix this bro.

He was just 1:30.

I said. I am not able to watch my flat screen

with this remote. I can't get it to work. Just take the batteries out. Da, da, da. Needless to say, he goes. I'll come over tomorrow. I said yeah, you need to do that, man. What time of year is 1:00? I said thank you.

Well, I didn't sleep,

I was up all night, ran the dope down and around 10 in the morning I was just about out and I got scared. See, I had enough dope in me to kill two small children.

But see, once the dope was running out, I wasn't high anymore, even though I was so high

that, you know, I should have been hospitalized, right? I was so hot. I was so high that every hit I did, I would lay on the floor, listen for that same SWAT team to come in. I could hear their cars pulling up the street. You know, I was believing this. I was losing my mind

full flight from reality

and all of a sudden I see this carpet. I go oh shit. And I was just about to split. It was Glenn to come to fix the remote. He's going to mess up my high.

He opens the door.

And I didn't. I wanted to say this. Can you come back at one? I swear I wanted to say that because I needed to go out and get more

and instead I said I've been smoking crack and I can't stop. And I was shaking and all I did was grab me and he hugged me and my arms fell and I just went and it was over. Right Then it was over. It was over. I knew it was over,

he said let's go to a meeting and I said yes, yes, I there was number more. I gave in right there. I was defeated.

Did it look like I was defeated from the outside? Nope,

not at all

at $1,000,000

badass car.

My house is pretty much paid for shit ton of stock. ADA gave every single bit of it away at that moment,

and something suspended me that see, there is like that magic potion grace match with timing match with that moment of clarity in that willingness. And it was that perfect combination. It didn't come easily and I had to seize on that moment right then. There wasn't going to be another month. See, if I missed that moment, that window, it could be years more because it was years for me. Because the moment I pick up, I don't hang around y'all.

I go parallel universe. I I live at night, I sleep all day

and eventually upon everything I own

and then everything you might own

if I come over,

you know that Canon camera looks nice. I need to use your bathroom and all of a sudden I have it.

I'm not kidding.

That's how I was operating.

I go to a meeting, I walk into the place where I had 11 years, continuous sobriety, spoken podium, shared at meetings, sponsored people and I picked up that desired chip and I was petrified to do it. I was broken

and my ego didn't have enough resistance that that day to say don't do that. Go pick up a chip at Wham you. No one knows you there, you know what I'm saying? Or any group. Just go pick up a chip somewhere else.

I walked up and I people were floored, man, as I sat in the back seat where that homeboy in the Gray T-shirt is. And I said, I scrolled my way all the way around, came up and I got that desired chip and people were blown away because they knew me. They didn't know I was high

and now they knew and I knew.

And something happened though,

and I say this, not many people you might notice, but that crash site right there when I hit that morning,

that was the launchpad for being rocket into a new way of living.

And it happened right from that spot. I didn't get to say, oh man, that sucked. Oh, let me get together a little bit, Let me get my life squared away, Let me get some time, then I could take off from there. Nope, I didn't get a choice because what happened in that utter defeat that could absolute crushing blow. I took that doom state, understanding

is I got introduced to a power because it was the grace that got me back and that power occurred that moment. It literally changed me.

I surrendered in two ways. I I knew the drug had me.

I knew the liquor. I knew the lifestyle had me too. Because I liked it, man. I liked. I don't know why I liked. I don't. I don't know why I liked hanging out with dudes holding pistols inside of motel rooms

that I didn't know and who had names like Player

G Friendly. I'm like, if we get pulled over, I got to know a real name. A real name?

Someone give me a real name

and man, what you thought? You know, that kind of thing.

But something happened. Something happened that day. And I remember I called Lisa and I said, hey, I'm going to go to a meeting with Glenn. She she lives. You are

blew her away. She was. Are you serious? I said yeah. And I went that night and I came back and I went the next night and the next night and I kept going and I didn't want to go, but something wanted me to go and I was cooperating. Now see, I was cooperating with that power that possessed me to go get dope.

I was doing whatever it wanted to, whenever it wanted to,

at all times of the day and night, at the expense of everything that I held dear.

And I get to Tuesday. This was a Friday. On a Tuesday I walk in the firing line which is Wham east

and I I walk in there and I walk up to this dude after the meeting

and I said I need some help man.

That's all I said and ask for sponsor, and I said it with that same broken voice

that I had. One Declan walked in

and this dude is sort of like an MMA guy, you know,

he's one of the, we'll call him pillars of the group, whatever that means.

Don't be a pillar,

be a member. Sorry that was my rant.

He goes what is it bro? Is it anchor green? Don't want to fend? Is it women or money?

And I said no because you on paper, you got legal problems. I said no man, he goes, what's wrong? And I swear this is again, didn't I didn't want this to come out.

I said

I don't have God dude. I spoke that

and he looked at me. He goes, man, I usually like to watch guys for a couple weeks to make sure that they're serious. They are in meetings, they want to do the deal. I said I that same cracked voice. I said I don't have two weeks literally. And he said, come over and we began to take a journey together and I began to suspend ideas, ideas that were killing me. And I began to have incremental

small moments of sanity return.

They didn't land at one moment. The surrender moment happened, but I was just walking around this doomed, groundless where do I go kind of guy point me and click me because I don't know what to do. I didn't have yet have anything. I had a whole lot of knowledge about this book. I could like read full pages without looking at it. It was strange, but it wasn't helping me. It wasn't keeping me sober and it while sober. See, here's what happens.

I go out

and I come back in and I'm like, OK, I just need to stop using dope. I just need to stop shooting cocaine.

I need to stop smoking crack

and see and I get in and I stop that and I think, oh good, I've stopped, that's good, thank you God, and I'm OK Now. What I need to find out is why do I keep starting again and how do I keep from starting again and restarting again and restarting again and that cycle and promising people with such

Academy award-winning effect? You got to believe me this time when I don't even believe that I can do it.

But I got a really good ability to convince you to believe that I'm going to stop this time. But it didn't work anymore. No one bought it.

I went through the steps.

He was a hands off guy though. He wasn't a micromanager. He didn't push me. He didn't have to. I actually tell guys I sponsor. I said whenever they object or resist or rebel, I say here's what you do. Call. Call Doug. Just ask him anything. I'm not even going to fill your head with the thought to ask him. Just say, what was it like working with art and you'll hear what he tells you.

And I'll just challenge y'all to do that if you ever run into them because I don't want to brag on myself

because I did anything at any moment

with no resistance. He sends me 36 one hour tapes. He goes listen to these. And I only want you to write in the margin of your book in a black pen you got.

It's black pens. That's it.

I listened to all 36 twice and I didn't take three months. I began to listen to him

with headphones on with a pen over

like maybe a week.

I had nothing to lose

except my life and that was pretty much gone.

So I did that.

Few months later

I'm at his house bright an inventory wrote it and I had my I called my second surrender.

We're sitting there and I share with them inventory we're looking at revisiting. See he's bouncing me from 2:00 to look how crazy I was to three to look where I don't rely and four look what you do when you're out of alignment. Look what you do when you and I'm just seeing this like shell game three card money life and I start realizing

at my core I am fucked.

I am fucked.

I I literally turned him. I said I'm gonna go. I need to let her know to move

because I had now had about four months sober, but I knew I wasn't going to make it because I was still trying to stay sober on the unaided will.

And I used Doug and I had got that resource and I said this guy is a pillar and he's gonna help me and he's got the answer. He's gonna use the book. But I was using the letter of the law. I was using the functions and the process of the program, but I wasn't using their intention, which was to connect me to a power grader myself. That will solve my problem. My problem is I'm self-centered and driven by fear

and I can't get out. And I tried

and I looked at objects. Objects would be things I could buy, people I could control or be controlled by.

Shiny new things, rusty old things, whatever. It took something other than me to make me OK, and something definitely other than Her power greater than me to make me be OK.

And that day was my second surrender in this program because I knew I was not going to make it,

was not going to make it, and I wasn't using,

and I didn't think about using, but I couldn't see how to break free from that selfishness that wrapped me in a cocoon and had me tightly in its grip. See,

selfishness has billions of things at its disposal

to bring me right back into the game. The power has one thing,

truth

and everything. I kept looking outward at seeing I was. I was always looking out. Always looking out,

Bill Story says.

And this happened. I was inwardly reorganized.

I had a new footing. My roots grasped a new soil.

I didn't know much about that. It's like entering that world of the spirit. My next function was to grow in effectiveness and understanding of that world. I didn't know what it was like. I had mental ideas. I heard what you all said it was like, but I wasn't seeing anyone elevating above their problems that they told us we could do. Everyone was still slogging through quicksand talking about freedom,

and I'm like, this isn't what they mean. This can't be what they mean because I won't make it if I walk that I'm not going to make it.

I'm not,

he said. I want you to meditate twice a day, 5 minutes a day.

OK,

I did that and I thought that was a little weak so I went to 20 a day, twice a day because if 5 minutes would work, 20 would be better. Just like dope, right?

Just like dope, Same effect. Looking for something and I remember nine months sober now

and you know, I told you guys I've been around since 86, but I had a

since 93. This is great to like date myself. There's pot 90 people born here in 93 are there

right? 93 from 93 till now is 25 years and I have about 23 and a soap, 23 of them sober

with a lot of slices of getting wasted.

And I knew it was going to happen again.

Even though I'm meditating, even though I'm having these profound understandings, I knew something. I knew something was still missing. I knew it. And that's where no one can tell me what to do anymore. I had to start going inside

and I didn't want to.

I wanted to lookout. I wanted to perform for you, my sponsor, or for you. I want you all to see what I shared, hear what I shared, but I wasn't having deep and effective spiritual experiences.

So I

the irony man. I smoke crack in my closet even though I have a fucking huge ass house

and I found myself sitting in my closet writing nightly reviews and praying and I laughed one day I was sitting there and go this is incredible I'm seeking God in the same place I smoke rock

and I was laying on my face when I prayed. I just laid straight out like a swimmer because I felt like I needed to. Knees weren't enough for humility for me. Just not going to bring me down far enough. And I remember laying there and all of a sudden, at nine months sober,

I get this inside feeling. It wasn't us audible. It was a feeling and it said it said this.

You believe in the process of recovery to keep you sober

and it is blocking you from my power.

And I stopped right then.

I remember calling my sponsor. I said Nope, no more, I'm not going to do this anymore. And it was scary. Please don't try this at home.

I work the steps

fanatically,

wholeheartedly, just as prescribed, and I followed to the letter of the law and it was choking me out.

I set it down

and I turned my face to the sun

and I said OK, show me.

That was a big risk for me.

I had to let go of old ideas of using and old friends I hung with and old places I hung out with. Now I had to let go of the thing that got me

nine months away from that last run

and that was petrifying

and I did it. I put it down. Still was going to meetings for sponsoring guys working the deal, speaking when asked to part of the area commit, you know, committee, I think our social chair and that was a blast. We had a good time,

but that was the moment where I shifted from the many thousand on 50

to the many 100, because what I did is I let go of the most precious thing I could have at that moment, which was the freedom from the drugs that were killing me.

And I didn't know if that was such a good idea,

but I knew that I wasn't feeling the connection if I didn't let him

on. 85 they talk about some really powerful things. A

and in 86 and on 87,

they said we begin to trust this intuition,

this inspiration,

this insight that we gain.

And on 55 it says we finally saw the great reality was deep down within us. And I stopped looking outside in the room and I started going in for everything and I begin to find things about myself and it was painful. It make let me tell you this. It made my inventory look like a piece of crap. It made my inventory look like a joke. And I wrote a very,

we'll say, customized inventory.

And it was a joke because what I had never touched, what I had done, was I was superficially looking at the top of this table. This time I was boring through the wood. I was peeling it up. I was trying to find out what was really going on. I was getting to the root of my problem.

And I was doing it inwardly.

Meditation expanded, Spiritual understandings have expanded. And I began to

hear myself talking in meetings or to people and realize those aren't my words, That's not me. And I would become as surprised at what I was speaking as the person listening to it.

And I began to realize that I was now a funnel and not a bucket,

that I wasn't here to acquire all these wonderful little trinkets and goodies like Halloween candy and say, look at what I've gotten when I got back home and pour them out on my bed and say, this is my safety net. I kicked my safety net out the window

and I don't have one today that's visible or mental. I have a safety net

that wraps around me just like that dope did, but it isn't constricting the air out of me.

It isn't choking on every in breath and let not letting me get that out breath.

It is my breath

and it did something in my life

that I promise you

it'll do for you.

But here is the caveat.

There's ideas in the way, I'll guarantee it.

Because if you'd have told me that, that's what I had to do. See, I was looking, if I could do this, then I'll be. If I move here, then I'll be and then if I then I'll be dot dot dot. And it was never happening. I was never getting OK.

I tried something new

when I let go of this viewpoint, when I let go of these opinions, when I drop this idea.

And what's so interesting, and I say this a lot to people that are close to me is

what I'm describing to you is a thing that I say, I found this, I didn't find it. I removed the things that were blocking it from being realized.

It was always there.

I challenge you to look within. It's there.

But here's something interesting. I would give up even that idea if I was prompted to to go one more step further towards something. I call it the unknown, the mystery, and away from what is known. Which is my insanity. Because if I'm tossing the idea around, it's in a broken washing machine. It's not ever coming out

and I don't want to wear it. If it did,

I'm fortunate

I retired a year ago, a little over a year ago.

I spend my days waiting