The Northern Lights roundup in Prince George, BC, Canada

My name is Jeffrey B and I'm an alcoholic.

5 minutes before I just got introduced, I just had a huge spiritual awakening. I'm not really going to get to it, but I'm a little bit flustered. I got to see I got to see a man that just told me to trust the process back in 2003 and I haven't seen him since maybe 2004. And I got to see him here today. And we talk about this guy, but inside my household, me and my wife quite often lately. And this is the reason why is because he's here. So

to who you are, I love you.

I call myself an alcoholic. So what is an alcoholic? You know, it's, it's,

in short, you're going to see me reference a bunch of pages out of the Alcoholics Anonymous literature. It's kind of what I do, but it's not that I'm going to base it on the 1st 100 men and womens''s experience. Yes, it will. But I'm also going to base it on mine because I have a story, you know, in the literature talks about that I'm supposed to share in a general way what Jeff was like, what happened and what Jeff is like now. Not what it was like because the IT can get into a little bit of fables and dishonesty and and craziness,

right? And I want to thank

the roundup committee, everyone that's being of service here. I want to thank Rodney for doing what he does here. And I also want to thank the facility and the people that encompass this facility for allowing us to have this space for the weekend. And once again, I call myself an alcoholic. So what is it? So here's a page page reference. Page 44. The big book states that if Jeff honestly wants to, he cannot quit entirely. So what does that mean? What does it mean that Jeff cannot quit?

I've tried to stop drinking about 5500 times.

Best of that means something happens with an inside me and with inside my brain where I think it's OK or I'm not like you people or, you know, I remember 1996 Peach Fest, MC Hammer was in the house

and I went there that weekend and I drank and I went to work on Tuesday.

Maybe I can drink again sort of thing, right? And then it says that

if one drink and I can't control the amount I take. So what does that mean? It means this, Derek,

hockey games on tonight, You got to work tomorrow, I got to work tomorrow. We got obligations, we got stuff we need to do, right? So let's just go to this little pub, watch a hockey game and only have one, two or three drinks. That's it.

And what happens to me is that I don't have one or two or three. I have 1122 or 33 about 99.9% of the time.

That's why I call myself an alcoholic.

One of the great things about this weekend is I get to share this plug in this microphone with this man right here sitting in the front row. And his name is Marty J Marty J is my sponsor and he's been my sponsor for just over five years. So this is a great honor Sir, to be to be sitting in the room with you and sharing this podium.

Where am I going to begin? I remember driving in my mom and dads car, I was about six or seven years old and driving to the Children's Hospital in Vancouver, not really knowing why I'm going to the Children's Hospital or why I'm there for two weeks straight. Why am I in the children's psych ward? I'm not too sure.

Still to the day, I don't really know. But I do know when it comes to an insidious spiritual malady,

there's something different about this guy at a really, really young age. You know, I remember sitting there in the doctor's office with this Doctor S and talking about feelings, you know, and it made me feel real uncomfortable. And the reason why I tell this, this brief little historic story about myself is that

there was something wrong with me. You know, not that my mom said or my dad said or my two brothers said or even a doctor said. I figured this out with inside the 5 1/2 inches between my ears and my mind, you know, in a year later, I found myself back there again, not sure what's going on. You know, I was needles and, and machines and these magic milkshakes that I guess

would tell these machines what's going on with my body and all that kind of stuff. And I remember looking at, OK, sometimes I'm just going to talk and I don't even know what, where it's coming from. But I remember looking out this window

in the 70s and, and at this playground at the Children's Hospital and a swing was going with just this one little kid on the swing. You know, I just a loneliness that I thought this child might have had, you know, and I could relate to that,

you know, just being so alone.

Moving forward into Grade 8,

there's about a week into being in grade 8. So, you know, just going through a third, what a 13 year old boy goes through a whole new school. I had two friends, that's it, two friends and and a few 100 people at the school. And I got smoked by the speeding car and I did an end over my handlebars and landed flat on my knees and my stomach. And I picked myself up and I heard this big, this Big Bang. And what this Big Bang was, was my brain. My brain said this to me. It said,

if I'm going to

one day not be here, why am I even here in the 1st place? So already for for, you know, eight, six to eight years of a depressive state, I went into a really massive depressive state of not really understanding what life is and why even be around. I haven't even touched alcohol yet.

This all does not make me an alcoholic whatsoever. Age of 17 is when I had my first drink and I hated it. I hated the way it tasted,

I hated the way it made me lose control of my body. Movements meaning stumbling all over the place, you know? I just couldn't be me, you know? But there is something enticing about this. And I knew when I woke up the next day that was probably going to do it again.

By the age of 18, I was working downtown in Vancouver at a bar. This bar, I will just keep it nameless, but it was, it was how how I got working there was I'm drunk and I'm playing foosball at this bar and I was playing against the owner of the bar and I and I said, if I beat you, you have to hire me. So I got in using my older brother's ID and I beat him. So the very next day, which is a Sunday night, I started working underage at this bar in downtown Vancouver.

And it was magic. You know, like our literature talks about when they're drinking. I have arrived and I have arrived. I thought I was the guy off Studio 54, you know, all hundreds of people coming into this establishment to see me. I met people from all over the world, especially from from not just BC, but into the States, into Washington, into Portland and became friends with them and got them into the bars, got them into other bars. You know, I was just lit up. I was just on fire. And what we had to do there was drink,

you know, So I was a, I'm a beer Slinger by trade. That's what I do. I did it for 12 years.

I remember when I was 22 years old, inside that establishment, I was behind the bar and this song came on OK. My biggest fear today is dancing. It still is. It's just something that I just don't do. I broke my toe a few months ago from dancing in the kitchen with my wife. So it's just, yeah, Jeff, don't dance sort of thing. And

intoxicated, I jumped over the bar, I went out dance floor and I started that boogie into some sort of alternative rock music that was going on there. And then I stopped. I had a state of consciousness. Our literature talks about that we we cross this imaginary line. I remember mine and this was it. I stopped in the middle of that dance floor and I told myself you are so drunk.

You're you're a disgrace to this is establishment. You probably look horrible. You probably even dancing horrible. You need to stop drinking. You need to go back behind the bar, grab some water, put some coffee on, finish your job and go home.

So I did

walk around the back of the bar, put some coffee on, had some coffee, had some modern. The first customer that came up to me ordered two shots of this and two glasses of that, and I poured four shots of this and four glasses of that and I joined them.

No mental defense.

Anyone relate?

You know

that that carried on. So my, my drinking got so, so out of control

there in the late, in the late 90s. My dad was just going to refer him to his hoagie 'cause that's his nickname. He, my dad, Douglas is his name and he was about 66200 and 50 lbs tall, handsome. He was a Viking. He's from Sweden. He, this guy was just a, an ox, like a Viking guy

and but so gentle. He was diagnosed with cancer. So I'm already slowly burning my life down to the ground. I can't control my drinking. I've tried to stop so many times. You know, when, when you're singing in the porcelain bowl and then, and then you, you wake up and you bring on the chicken the night before, that kind of thing. And yes, he got diagnosed with cancer and then he became cancer three. And then within a year or two years, it came back and, and it got right. It was terminal and I watched my dad

go from this big Viking to about 90 lbs open, wet, hunched over, can barely walk. One of my last memories of him with him shuffling at Saint Paul's hospital, just walking down the hallway and I remember this one time. So I'm I'm a write off like I'm just out of control. He looked over at me, I looked at him and this is what he said to me. He didn't say it to me, but this is what my brain said.

The reason I'm like this is because of you, Jeff.

That's what I thought he said. That's what I heard. That's what I heard my brain say. And what that did is it sprouted me down to a bottom that I wish no one would ever get to. And this bottom was like this. I took a trip

pack the bag with a sketchbook as I like to draw a skateboard because I was an old 80 skater and one shoe and I packed my bags and found myself in a downtown east side of Vancouver homeless.

So as we know the downtown east side of Vancouver, if you don't Google it, it's for all of God's forgotten children go. That's what we used to call ourselves. I was it's the right in the middle of the downtown east side of Vancouver is Maine and Hastings. So picture this Maine and Hastings. I'm one block on the West side at Hastings in Columbia looking at these people going I'm not like you. I'm, I'm living in the skids, thinking I'm in the Hamptons sort of thing, right?

You know what I mean?

December 1st 99 my dad passed away.

I lost

my king.

I lost the guy that brought me up,

you know what I mean? And, and

Hoagie,

I found myself at the Lions Gate Bridge. You know that bridge that separates the North Shore from this Downey Park, right? It's like the Golden Gate Bridge of San Francisco, Majestic. It's got those lions on both sides. And I'm walking across. So I found myself in the middle of that bridge wondering how warm the water was. And I woke up at my little brother's house in Coquitlam, which is an hour away. I don't know how I got there. How I got off that bridge, I had no idea.

Today I do. And if we can think outside of the box, this is how I know

I named after one of my mom's, my mom's little brother. His name is Rudy. That's my middle name. Rudy. I know, I feel it in my intuition was one of us. But he couldn't find us. He was on that bridge of the age, age of 30 like I was in November, like I was almost to the day to the exact time he jumped. He didn't survive.

Who do you think got me off that bridge? Obviously, by a grace of a loving power. And my uncle,

I truly believe that story. So I'm at my little brother's house. This was 2000,

2002,

and my little brother, he's my Big Brother, but he's my little brother by age. He works in the health industry and he's a personal trainer. And one of his clients was a guy named Corey W Some of you, where are you? I've got to find you. The guy just saw before the meeting. There you are. You know who Corey W is, and

he was a director of a treatment facility. And

Chris, my brother was talking to him about me and what I'm going through and

he told Corey that he found me. And Corey said, OK, keep him there. Don't let him use the phone. Don't let him leave your house. He put me on restrictions before I'm even in treatment. And in December, December 24th, I got into this treatment center and it was the best Christmas Eve of my life. 2002, December 24th. Why was it the best? Because I opened that door to 50 men that were just like me,

some of them in different fellowships,

different issues, but they all had a spiritual malady. Every single one

and they felt somewhat part of I learned how to brush my teeth, I learned how to do the dishes, I learned how to cook food. All this, you know, the

living life kind of with inside a facility. I was given one of these. So this is my big book. Just got a nice cover that I got from Chris R from Texas and they said go up. I have nothing against facilities. I love them. You know, I love how of the work they do. They got me to meet you people, but this is what happened to me. It's my truth and my story was I was given a big book to go to my room and read it and do the steps.

So I did. So I sponsored myself,

yeah,

March middle of March 2003, I decided it would be great to just have a wondering, that's it, just one drink, you know, just that one drink. And I ended up having that one drink and then and then like, like our friend that spoke earlier,

maybe I wasn't that bad. You know, a week later I had a one or two drinks. We got to that. I had, I don't even know, I can't count that high. But what happened to me in that relapse is it took me to a more of an emotional bottom. I didn't. There's no bridges.

But there is so much dishonesty. There's so much delusion. There's so much

defects of character or shortcomings. Just giving birth again and and my bottom this time was more of an emotional bottom and it was August 15th, 2003. I phoned that treatment center and the person working at that certain treatment center,

bless them,

told me that I should have got it the first time

I got the phone.

And I said I know. I knew who I need the phone and it was Corey. So I phoned Corey on his personal cell phone and he said get in there tomorrow. We're going to get you on the couch.

Backtrack a little bit that first time in treatment, my very first meeting with you people. So check this out. It was a Thursday night on four days over. It's just after Christmas and we get into the the druggie buggy. Some of you might know about that stuff and and we go to this meeting that's it was a men's meeting called Newport men's. And this is my experience there and it was one of the, it's still today is one of my favorite experiences besides waking up each day to see my babies

and my wife.

I walked inside that door and there was this guy. This guy stood out. He was wearing black galoshes, pinstripe overalls, a farmer galore, huge, huge, huge beard. But this is what he did. It might blow you out of the water. It's pretty fantastic. As I walked in there and he put his hand out,

he put his hand out to me. The last person that ever did that was a long, long time ago prior to to that day, right? And

I felt something. I felt something. It was good, new, but it was good. When I walk into that room and there's this table just like this, some guy sitting here that we call the chairperson. And there's another person sitting over there called the secretary. This guy, this guy,

this guy.

And I turned 19. My first legal drink was in this pizza joint called Bella Pizza in Richmond, BC. There's a man there or a young man named Chad. Chad Tebow, just call him Chad, was a man's man. This guy had the gift for the gab he knew it was doing. He was tall, dark and handsome. You know, it's like, I want to be like that guy.

When I walked inside my first meeting, there he was 2 1/2 years over.

I've always wondered, Bertie had wine. I've watched his life get a little crazy and then he just disappeared and there he was. So that's my first experience with you people. That meeting was a men's meeting, like I said before, and it was all Scottish people. So I didn't, I couldn't even understand anything they're saying. No idea. I just kept looking at Chad and the guy at the door. Santa, Chad, Santa Chad sort of thing.

But but there was something there.

I could feel it, just like I could feel it here. There's something something going on.

So that relapse ended up going back into treatment August 16, 2003. So by the grace of a loving God, strong sponsorship, the 12 steps of Alcoholics Anonymous, the Fellowship of Alcoholics Anonymous, our traditions and our concepts, I have been sober ever since August 16th, 2003. And for that I'm truly grateful

into sobriety. Now I knew what I needed to do. I knew I needed to learn to to to take directions from this treatment center, but I also knew I needed to go back to where I met you people,

you know, and not just to go to that meeting, but just go to a bunch. Like, what is it that you guys have? I don't quite know. You know, I'm still not an alcoholic yet. Yeah. I've lost the power of choice and control and drinking, but I'm still not an alcoholic. I didn't realize I was an alcoholic in depth depth until it was 14 years sober.

I grabbed the sponsor his name leads me right now but it isn't Nanaimo right now and the reason why I picked this man because he scared the poop eye to me covered in tattoos. He wrote a wrote a a big loud motorcycle exactly opposite what I would go to. I'm like, OK, I need to change everything.

Dave RI went to Dave and I'm like Dave sponsor me. And and and and it's is there a wrong way to sponsor? I don't know. I don't have the answer to that. You know, it's is there a long way to do the steps? I don't know. As long as just do them, you know, just do them. And if you're new, I know there's someone new here.

If you're trying to figure this out, please just give us to your halfway through step 9.

Give us to that because something's going to happen. At that point,

he took me through this desk. He said, Jeff, are you an alcoholic? I said yes. Do you believe in the power greater than yourself? I'm willing.

Let's get on our knees and do the third step prayer that fast.

There's nothing wrong with that. But I missed the four words. I missed the doctor's opinion. I missed more about alcoholism. I missed our friends Jim, Fred, the Mana 30 and my best friend, the Jay Walker.

I I love that story. The jaywalker. It's it's such my go to because it explains the progressiveness of this disease. Let's look at the jaywalker. The jaywalker, the guy likes to go across the street and get hit by moving vehicles, right. The 1st is a car gentle. It's just a car. Hopefully it's a little Volkswagen. But he gets hurt, he goes to the hospital, he recovers and then he decides to do it again. This time he gets hit by a trolley. We call them buses today.

A little bit bigger than a Volkswagen. See the progressiveness

gets hurt. I think he even has brain damage. Goes to the hospital, recovers physically,

steps outside of the hospital and he sees that fire engine and that fire engine is going fast. If the signs go any jumps out in front of it,

the progressiveness is our disease. That is a really crazy story in our big book, but it I can relate to it.

And we started doing the four step. You know, I got through the 12 steps. I had somewhat of a spiritual awakening. I kind of liked what what you guys had. I'm willing to go to any soon. I'm somewhat willing to go to any length to get it. But I fell in love with the rooms of AAI fell in love with talking in in front of microphones. I'm the type of person if you see me outside of this room and we're at dinner, I'm quiet.

I'm this guy way over here even today,

but something happens to me like your energy, the spirit, this God thing that fills this room, the spirit of what's in this room that isn't a A is here.

Something happens.

My reset is a paralyzed mind. Picture that

paralyzed. I can't move mine. I can't speak. That's my was my go to. It's not today, but that's who who I used to be.

So I fell in love with you people and things are starting to go real, real good. And, and

I remember

that second time through treatment, going through the steps and we got step step 9 inside this facility. And there's one, there's two things I wine, I would not even bring up. I didn't even put it in my four step. And, and the second thing is that I just don't know how. I just didn't know how. And the one thing I wouldn't bring up was, was whatever it was and, and today it's a financial amends and today it's still not being amended, but the willingness is there. And and the financial part of it is in the bank collecting high interest

until that day happens.

It's there. I can't find the people. I don't know anything about it, but it's there. It's there. And the other one was when my dad,

there'll be three times when you're going to see me teary. And it's just gratitude. It's not sorrow. And it's when I talk about my father. Here it comes

when I look at this man,

when I talk about my wife

a month before my dad passed away.

I'm in their house. So I'm homeless but I'm in their house.

His wallets on the table.

Pick his wallet up and I stifle through it and whatever I found it put into my pocket

and they turned around. He was right there, right behind me.

He's so

cancer broken and he's watching his middle son do this stuff and he looked at me in tears. Why are you doing this?

And I didn't know what to say. I looked at him and they just laughed. I just left.

I couldn't even live of myself with that. How did, how does an untreated practicing alcoholic who's got all these insecurities, all these fears,

all these defects live with that? And how we do that is we drink.

We drink so we can get the effects produced. A sense of some sort of delusional ease and comfort.

How am I supposed to make amends of that one? He's not here physically. He's in the absolute truth. My dad has no form,

so this is what I did. I wrote a letter, read it to myself, threw it in the garbage.

It was kind of OK, you know, something happened

within the next time through the steps. He came up again in my four step. I'm like, OK, he's in. He's in my list of my eighth step.

How am I going to do this? It's still it's not done. It's not done. So I wrote a letter.

I read it to another man.

Ceremonial burning.

I can breathe a little bit easier, but it

when I saw my mom, I looked at my brothers or thought about my dad. Worry, remorse and morbid reflection. We're still there,

seven years into my sobriety.

I'm sitting in the back, the back of the meeting.

You know what they say about people sitting in the back of the meeting? It's a shoe. It's a shoe section. It's where the slippers are loafers and the sneakers hang out. That was me because it's right by the exit door, right

after the meeting is over. This man named Charles S, He might get a tear to Charles SI. Hope you people can meet him. This man changed my life. This is what he did,

came to the back of the room and he said, Jeff, my name is Charles and I'm like, yeah, I know who you are. I'm untreated in the rooms with a little bit of not even sobriety. I am just dry

and I introduced myself and I had this feeling of finally

make safety answers because I was dying in the rooms of a A

and he said, well you are you willing to meet me at my house this Monday and bring your big book? And I said, yes, Sir, yes, I am.

And I met Amanda's house and this is what he did with me. And it will blow you into the water too, just like Santa with his hands. He sat across the table from me, opened up the big book, had a 12:00 and 12:00 right there for six and seven stuff. You know, because the big book, 6:00 and 7:00,

14 lines in the big look. That's all I'm saying over there. Break,

but I mean went through steps one through 12 with step five with another guy named Randy P who is my sponsor at the time and it took us about 8 1/2 hours over 8-8 weeks. We went through it all and I got lit up. Things changed. I heard, I heard what this the message is book. I heard what you guys are saying and you guys are saying in these rooms and I started to sponsor people.

You know, I, it was, I was on fire.

Step nine came up with my dad.

What am I going to do now? And this is what the man said to me. He said use God, use God in these amends. And this is what God gave me,

Jeff,

your dad, before he died, he carried this pillow, this pillow that my mom's daycare kids, my mom had a daycare, these little kids, 5 and under all did their own signature. And one of the moms sewed it onto this pillow. And he carried this around for both the three last three months of his life that helped his back when he sat down was the main reason why. And he loved these kids.

He said, go grab that pillow, go to your mom and dad's house, grab your mom, get her permission if it's OK for you to do this. And you go sit by the pool that your dad made for his three boys back in the late 70s. Because I remember every Sunday morning waking up and I knew where my dad was. He was cleaning the pool in the middle of summer. And he loved doing it for us. So I made direct amends to my dad through my mom,

and it worked. I had to voice it. I had to voice it to someone that knew as well, knew my actions, knew who I was, knew who he was.

And she listened and she gave me feedback and she said, Jeff, you missed this, this, this, this, which I did.

And I became free. And how I know I became free.

The next weekend I'm sitting at my house. So I'm not quite married. I have two beautiful little babies. These these angels

and I'm sitting on the couch, it's in the middle of the day and my doorbell goes, this is about 2007, 2008. So I'm like 5-5 years sober, six years sober. And I opened the door and guess who's at the door?

My dad,

obviously,

it was some sort of vision, but he was there and he walked into this room and he said, Jeff, I just want to see how you're doing. And he looked like the Viking I grew up with. He looked so healthy. And he's paraded around the house. And he said, I'm so proud of you. But there's things I need to do. There's things I have to do. And he left, and I woke up standing up in the middle of the living room,

not where I first started with on the couch.

Freedom

Another week goes by. I have this dream. So it's at night. It's at night and and it's a dream. I've had to go to the hospital and I needed to bring my mom and my two brothers. And you know, I fly my dreams. I'm like super crazy Superman in the dreams. So I'm sitting there in the hospital and and they have a drape around someone that's in the room there. And I levitate to look over the drape and there's this older lady.

She lived a graceful life. She was in like in her 90s

and she took her last breath and I watched her crossover

but she was holding someone's hand.

Guess whose hand it was?

Hoagie,

he looked at me and he disappeared. That's what my dad does today. And by the grace of the 12 steps of A A and this power and strong

step 12 work, because Charles wasn't my sponsor, but he carried a message, I became free of the biggest amends that this guy had to had to make and overcome and be free from.

So eight or nine years sober,

I became one of these. Maybe you can relate to it.

I became one of these that I know that on page 95, line 26 and 7th word is you're welcome. It is. Look it up. I became one of those animal mechanical guys. I started sponsoring a lot of people with my big book tucked under my arm. Not that there's anything wrong with that. You know one of my favorite animals in in in the Disney movie Bambi is is the rabbit thumper.

But if it wasn't in the 1st 164 forget about the forwards and the doctors opinion. I went from 1 to 164. I'd give you one of these.

It's not in here.

Come on. Nope, I don't need to hear it. I became one of those and what eventually happened because our diseases progressive like some of you have already talked about

is that I truly believe relapse starts at our current state of consciousness. What does that mean Jeff? OK, so relapses up here and now I start to become a little bit more conscious. I become more awoke. I start to practice principles. Either relapse is starting to go down. I'm starting to, you know, be free. I have these resentments are starting to to go away. The fear is starting to fall for me all this stuff. So I'm like this, you know, but this is just, it's going to, if I don't continue, if I don't, not just,

but if I don't grow, if I don't do 10 and 11 and discipline myself to do 1011. If I don't look at all my innermost selves, that I'm an alcoholic. If I don't do the forest, if I don't do all this, the inventory, especially if I don't carry this message, and if I don't practice these principles and all our affairs,

this happens. Relapse happens.

Took about three years, Three or four years from that day.

I'm the guy with the big boat tucked underarm. I ran and I was talking to Marty. Marty, how do I tell this story in a general way without breaking anonymity with the with the people, even with the structure I might have been in,

You know, how do I protect anonymity in a big way? Because I don't ever want to break it.

And I found it. And you know where I found it? In the big book. And you know how I found it is I found a big book that came from a retreat. And you know, when people sign the like we just did there, people write things. And this one person wrote, she's from Kelowna and she wrote page 206. Saved my life.

What's in Page 206? Women suffer too. What's what is she talking about there? And I started to read it and this is what it says. I found myself,

I found myself in the situation that filled me with the raging and righteous anger. I'm 14 years sober. I'm Mr. Thumper. I'm the guy that has a book tucked under my arm. I'm becoming very, very animal mechanical with, with our our program. There's not much love, not much love, a lot of knowledge, no experience.

One night, it was a Friday night,

I found myself in the situation that filled me with a raging and righteous anger. Let me say it again.

I found myself in a situation that filled me with the raging and righteous anger.

That's what it was like.

I was so angry at the situation

that I have never felt an anger like this, even as a child, before drinking or during drinking. This was new.

This was so new and like my new friend

talked about in his little share,

my brain did this.

You know, we'll fix that job.

A drink. Get off that stool. You are

20 feet behind you in a nice box is a bunch of booze. You need to go get some and you need to show these people what they're doing to you. And I thought, yeah.

And I thought a vote Hazel,

my 7 year old daughter.

And I thought about Oliver, my 12 year old son.

And I thought about Jeffrey, my 17 year old son

that I thought about my wife Brandi. Yeah, this alcoholic had to marry a lady named Brandy, named after a booze. Of course,

the reason why I say that is because they didn't have the power to save me because I still got off that seat that I was sitting. And then I still made my way to overwear this ice box is that it was loaded with a lot of alcohol. And on my way there, my brain still was doing stuff to me. And this is what my brain said. My brain said, you know what, it's Friday. Your home groups on Monday. Just do this for two days and go back to your Home group on Monday. You guys heard the beginning in a general way. What my story was that's not what this guy does.

I have one. I'm going to have 100 and I'm going to go find a bridge

and probably this time I'm probably going to see how warm the water is. I'm probably going to feel how warm the water is. That's what happens to me. But I believe just go back to your Home group on Monday, do this for 2 1/2 days. Show the pain people are, are showing you, you know, feel all this kind of stuff. And I went to go do it. Little did I know I went 20 feet past the ice Bock into it, into a bathroom and I found myself looking at the looking at myself in the mirror

and I got the cold sweats

and I heard this voice. And if you guys are in that room, you would have heard it too. And this is what this voice said to me. It said you can do that or you can come find us. You guys would have heard it. And I white knuckled it that night. Page the bottom of page 43 says that we won't have this mental defense except in few rare cases. That was the rare case where somehow there was

a rare case where I didn't drink that night

and I woke up the next day and I spun the globe and I put my finger, wherever this lands, I'm going to go, I'm going to CKA there. And it was called the Richmond Roundup 2017. I go to the Richmond Roundup almost dead from the night before, almost drunk from the night before. Guilt, worry, remorse, morbid reflection. I got, I'm riding the Four Horsemen,

but I had enough willingness to go. And I go. And this is how I showed up.

Yeah,

broken, so afraid. And they showed up to you people with this undermark. That's my ego, my egoic personality, Mr. AA, in an egoic way. But I'm almost, I'm dying. And I sit down at this round table by myself in complete isolation.

This man in a suit

comes up and sits down beside me and introduce himself as Tim W. And we start chatting about nothing, just chatting. And I'm pretending I'm faking everything.

And then another man in the suit, we'll call him Mr. Marty J, this man right here, he sits down. He knows. Man in suit #1 Tim W. They start conversing. They start conversing with me. I'm like, OK, this is weird. What's going on here? Something's going on here. I don't know what it is, but whatever. Another guy in the suit, Soup man #3 sits down. This guy's short but built like an ox. This guy had a lot of energy and a lot of oomph behind.

His vibe, he sits down, he knows Marty, you know, and he's talking to Tim. They're all chatting away and I'm sitting there going, OK, what did the what is this? So this Madden suit #3 wrote grounded in the big book. His name is Lyle P. So back to the washroom. The night before, I had a choice

to go to God and not to go to God. And thank God I went to God because God put me in front of three heroes. There are no heroes in there. But that day there were three, Marty, Tim and Lyle. And they embraced me. They embraced me. And the chairperson of that roundup goes, we have a special guest for our first speaker. His name is Tim W from Portland, OR. I think he's a descendant from Chuxi lineage. And he went up there. Superman number #1 When they told his story, I'm like, OK,

full, this is, this is just a little, this is lots. This is, this is so much stuff.

He sat down. I'm like, what is going on here in my brain? And then she said, OK, we have another guy gonna do, his name is Marty J. And he's gonna do an hour long talk on 6:00 and 7:00.

I show up and as he pushes his chair back, I tug on his suit jacket and I go, Marty, how you gonna do this? It's 14 lines in the big book. You got to do this for an hour. Really. How you gonna do this?

He went up there, introduced himself as Marty J Silver, member of Alcoholics Anonymous, and he looked at me and he said, watch

today. This is 2007, five years later. If he had enough, if they didn't shut that round up down that night, like if it didn't close, he wouldn't even be on step seven. He would not even be there yet. He'd still be in step 6. There's so much in step six and seven. He sat down and I'm having these moments. I'm having an awakening. I'm like, Tito, get me a tissue. I don't know what's going on here. Lyle goes up there and tell his amazing