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Welcome back, everybody. So, so let's just pretend we've made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understand him. and we know a little bit about what that decision looks like, what it's going to what's what it's going to include.

One of the things that um started to dawn on me, which was I've got to tell you, a revelation to me was I'll just read one little paragraph here. It says, "So our troubles we think are basically our of our own making. They arise out of ourselves." And the alcoholic is an extreme example of self-well riot, though he usually doesn't think so.

I I didn't, you know, I was one of the people who didn't think so. And and part of the process of the first three steps started me on a realization that my problems weren't coming at me. They were coming from me.

And it was a real shift in in perception for me because because the way I thought and how how I believed everything was falling in line in the world. I re I really thought that I had a lot of bad breaks. I really thought I was surrounded by a lot of disingenuous people.

I I thought that, you know, my lot in life was not offering me the opportunities that I saw maybe some of you having. And and I really I was caught up I was caught up in this selfdefeating belief system. And I started to come to believe that my problems were of my own making.

I'm creating all of this mess in the in the way I in the way my mind works. I believe as an alcoholic, I have a mind that wants to kill me. It wants to kill me.

I'll just give you a a brief example of how this mind would work. I'll give you two examples. One of them was, this is back when I was still drinking.

I would come to and lift my head off the pillow and the immediate thought in my mind was those bastards. I would immediately go to the the the the latest uh the the latest debacle I was involved with and the the latest injustice in my life. And I would start to obsess on that.

And then I then I would go out to my $100 car and drive off to my terrible job, you know, where I had an alcoholic boss. And and and you know, the whole way I'm thinking, you know, you know, today is going to suck today. You know, I'm going to go to work.

My boss is going to say something. I know he's going to say something. And if he says something, I'm going to say something back.

And and then we're going to get into it. Then I would probably have to hit him, you know. And then, you know, now I'm going to lose my job.

and I'm not going to have any money and and like this this is what I'm thinking about on the way to work which is a mile and a half away you know so I'm caught up in in the in this in this stuff and then and and if I'm not thinking about that you know I'm think I'm thinking I'm thinking about you know the embarrassing and shameful things I have done I could never get past those so I'd be like I can't believe I did that last week, you know. Oh my god, I can never go back there again. Oh, you know, oh, that was I can't believe it.

Oh, and and this this is this is the the the bondage of self and how it was manifesting in me. Now, I get sober and I show up in Alcoholic Anonymous and I got this, right? I got this stuff on me and I'm acting as if I'm not completely insane in my earliest meetings because I don't want I I I'm I'm very attached to what you would think about me.

You know, I don't want you thinking I'm a loser. So So I've got to I've got to act as if I'm okay with this AA and I'm okay myself. But I'd be sitting in a meeting.

I went to a lot of discussion meetings early on cuz I just didn't know better and they were the closest ones to my house. Probably the biggest mistake I made in AA was going to all the meetings that were close to my house. And there was this one discussion meeting and and every one of these meetings has the guy you know you know who I'm talking about the blowhard.

And and I and I'm sitting in this discussion meeting and the topic is, you know, some crazy thing and he raises his hand, right? I'm like, "Oh my god." Oh no, he raised his hand. Oh, he raised his hand.

Oh, please don't call him. Please. Oh, they called on him.

Now I got to hear this blowhard from talking about his family for 5 minutes. You update us on his aunt Fanny and Uncle Floyd. Oh yeah, dude.

Tell somebody who cares, you know. Oh, God. Oh, he's grateful now.

Oh, that warms the cockals of my heart that he's grateful. I think I'll go outside and slash all four of his car tires and then I'll walk with him outside out to, you know, after the meeting, you know, just to see how his gratitude holds up. I'll find Oh, thank God he's Thank God he's done.

Thank God. and I got I can't let you know that this is the kind of stuff that's going through my head cuz you throw a net over me. So, I'm sitting there like a good AA.

Thanks for sharing. You know, there's turmoil in my head early on. Turmoil.

And this is this is this is the bondage of self that I must be rid of. It will kill me. It will resent me out of alcoholic synonymous.

It I will resent myself out of alcoholic synonymous. It almost happened to me early on. I joined this one home group and you know nobody was friendly to me.

It was basically cuz I was going late, leaving early and not talking to anybody with my head down. you know, those are, you know, so the hell with this group, you know, and I go to another group and uh and that group had the slow painful group conscience meetings, you know, the contentious just with people just getting and and I was on one side and everybody's on the, you know, finally I couldn't take it anymore. Leave that home group, right?

and and I end up I end up going to another home group and in the meantime I've started working the steps and this home group I ended up in for 20 years. It it it you know I lovingly referred to it as a Somerset Hills highbottom group. It cuz it really was they were all professionals there.

There'd be a surgeon, you know, a money manager, a lawyer, an airline pilot. There'd be Chris, the bad electrician, you know, with the $100 car. But but and that's the group I should have resented myself out of, right?

But I'd been exposed to the steps. I'd started the step process. And the step process saved me from You ever see anybody resent themselves out of Alcoholics Anonymous?

I know we all know scores of them. If this stuff isn't addressed and it isn't addressed early, you know, with a real sense of purpose as a piece of business, you know, we we we we won't be able to stay. We'll resent ourselves right out of here.

So, after the third step, it says uh next we launched on a course of vigorous action. The first step of which is a personal house cleaning. Now, they didn't waste any time back in the day, okay?

when when he says launched a friend of m friend of mine's an airline pilot and he explained what launched means he says launch Chris launch is is going from zero to 200 in a matter of feet you know that's like what launch is so uh it's a good thing no one among us has really been able to maintain anything like perfect adherence to these principles because I don't know that I launched into a fora I meandered in in in into a a fourstep, but but I got to it in time. You know what I mean? I got to it in time.

Um so so he he starts to use u business language. Bill was kind of a failed businessman and he likes to use analogies that will make sense to the to the most amount of people. So, so he talks about a business inventory and he talks about, you know, what you have up on your shelves.

So, let let's say you own a shoe store and all the shoes you have are like old and they haven't sold and they're not in style anymore, but you're you're going to hang on to those shoes cuz damn it, I'm not, you know, I'm not sending them back. I'm going to wait until somebody buys them. If if you if you have that type of attitude, your shoe store is going to close.

You ha you have to keep good you have to you have to keep good control over the inventory. I think I need to keep good control over my emotional and and spiritual inventory. And remember, I've I've got a mind that wants to kill me.

This is important work. It want my mind wants me to be so uncomfortably in self that the only thing that is an answer for relief and a vacation from the pain of that self is alcohol. So I've got to I've got to find another way.

Now it moves us immediately into a resentment inventory which which I think is appropriate. I think it's the absolute perfect place for me to start cuz I am pissed my life. I'm living at home with mom and I'm 33.

My wife and family left me 10 years ago when I needed of them the most. You I've got a terrible job and a terrible car and they've made me walk so many times because of my DUIs. It's ridiculous.

And and and if you and my life really is pathetic, I can't go to a class reunion, you know. Hey, Chris, how are you doing? What are you up to?

Well, me and mom, you know, we're we're hanging out and I'm doing a lot. I I I mean, my So, I was upset about my lot in life and and I blamed it on you. I blamed it on I blamed it on you.

It would have been inconvenient for me to take responsibility for all this stuff. I was like the guy who got the DUI cuz the mechanic forgot to fix the tail light. You you know I I didn't want to take responsibility for any of this stuff.

And I'm pissed. I'm pissed at a lot of people, a lot of places and a lot of things. So they call it a grudge list in here.

And they also say resent resentment is the number one offender. It destroys more alcoholics than anything else. Why does it destroy more alcoholics than anything else?

Cuz it cuts us off from the sunlight of the spirit. We wither like a weed that that that's been poisoned and we die. That's just what happens with this resentment.

I can't tell you how many I go to this beginners's meeting uh and I still go. It was one of the first meetings I go to. Uh, I never I never make I never name the meeting because it's not really appropriate, but it was the it's the Basking Ridge Monday night beginner's meeting.

And uh, and here's the format for the meeting. There's 100 120 people in there some nights, right? And the format is anyone with less than 90 days, we want you to share.

They even call on you and you get to share first. And then it goes from from 90 days to 6 months and 6 months to a year. And I get to watch the transition of toxic selfishness in this meeting when the people with less than 90 days are sharing your hair is blown back by the selfishness and self-centerness.

My my parents are cutting my allowance off and my girlfriend's not talking to me. And me me. Thank you.

you know, and then the people with with 90 days to 6 months, you know, I'm working with my sponsor, you know, and uh he's got some good things to say, you know, but uh and then you go then you go from 6 months to a year and it's like, you know, I did this inventory and I'm I'm starting to see I'm really starting to see some stuff and and then the people with more than a year get to share their experience, strength, and hope. And all of a sudden the air clears and I get to see I get to see the transition that we go through if we're you know consistent with meeting attendance and sponsorship. I get to see this this beautiful transition away from this toxic selfishness and and self-centerness.

Now I love I love the list. it. There's an economy to this work that gets missed by a lot of alcoholics cuz we've had therapy and we've read all the self-help books and we've done the Tony Robbins seminars and we've we've explored our our our wounded inner child, you know, for three years and we've done all this stuff.

So, so that the economy of this stuff can sometimes be elusive, but his whole resentment inventory is this big. It's like less than a hundred words. This this I mean, this is the stuff that could kill him, right?

And I love how it's laid out. And I want to just call attention to one person, Mr. Brown.

Okay. All right. What's the cause of the resentment?

His attention's to my wife. Mr. Brown is hitting on this dude's wife.

Told my wife about my m mistress. What? We don't do that, guys, do we?

That's That's low. Brown may get my job at the office. So he works with this guy and the guy's trying to take his job, trying to take his wife, trying to screw up his affair and trying to take his job.

Then you skip down to to his wife. He's mad at his wife and it says she likes Brown and she wants the house put in her name. So Brown is gold for the house.

Now, now I don't know about you, but no one's ever come at me that hard. You know what I mean? No one has ever come at me that hard.

And Bill is saying, "These are the kind of resentments we have to get over. We have to get over these or they kill us." Now, I've worked with a lot of guys. I've worked with a lot of guys and a lot of them, you know, have these resentments that they're really unwilling to look at.

And as a sponsor, it's it it's it's my job to to help move them into a willingness to see these as deadly, to see these resentments as deadly. They're not justifiable. They're deadly.

To see them as deadly, and to get them ready to face these resentments at least in an inventory in an inventory form. And and another thing that was really interesting for me was get I got an understanding of a res of resentments through this inventory. I can't be mad at anything unless it's harm harming, threatening or interfering with what I want or harming threatening and interfering with what what I have.

it be there there there's no wind for the sale without something like that, right? So, so by going a little bit deeper, that's deeper than I ever went, you know, looking at really what was what what it affects. Going deeper, I started to see the nature of these resentments.

And when I put pen to paper, there were a lot of them that were made up in my mind. They they say fancy to real resentments. A lot of these resentments were just my mind.

Remember I told you how my mind worked. I'm gonna go to work and then he's going to say this and he's going to say that. I mean, I could go into these tangents and develop a resentment against you when I haven't even talked to you.

You know, it it fancy fancied or real. So being honest, being truthful, trying to be as accurate as possible when I'm writing these things down was was really really important for me. Um, I believe, you know, I believe there are things that are blocking me off from a connection with the divine, a connection to the power, a connection to God, a connection to the father of light, a connection to the great reality.

There's a million ways to describe to describe that experience. But I think that there's a lot of things that block me off. Does don't give me a chance to to engage.

does doesn't allow me the ability to form relationship with the divine and you and me a and the world and these resentments are the number one thing I think that block me off. There's a there's a great line in the 12 and 12 and it it confused me for years and and I I I'm not as good as Steve at at quoting them because I've got the ADHD DDH HD. Uh but uh but it says something like this.

It says defeective relationships were almost always the cause of our immediate woes, including our alcoholism. And and Steve was talking about relationships is everything, right? Resentment is certainly the number one offender to those relationships.

At least in my case, and it has to be dealt with. I've I've got to get to a place where all is well in my world. I just do because that's the that's the best place for me to be to make this connection to to have this connection with God.

And uh I think what I'll do is if it's okay I'll pass it over to you. Thanks Chris. Hey everybody.

Um, you know, Chris has really laid it out and and and and got us to that point in the inventory of self-examination, right? We were talking in the last session that that self and its various manifestations is what has defeated me. Wasn't alcohol that defeated me.

Self is what has defeated me. So, we look for its common manifestations. And then it says, "Resentment's the number one offender." Apparently, at least percentage-wise, resentment is the number one manifestation of self.

It destroys more alcoholics than anything. And while I believe that's true in the collective, I will tell you that for me, fear is the number one offender. And and uh and of course, fear, as you see in our book, is attached to almost all the resentments as well.

So, I don't know that that uh that that is even um a challenge. I I'll be talking about the fear inventory in a minute cuz we want to touch all three of the bases. Usually when you're at something like this, resentment gets all the press cuz it's the number one offender.

When we talk about it in our meetings, it's almost always the resentment part and I think probably appropriately. But so Chris got us all the way here to this selfexam. If self is what has defeated me, then I'm going to do some selfexamination.

I'm going to take a look at self and I'm going to go into these resentments and into the inventory. Look to see where self has manifested. And but but the first part of the inventory is really kind of self-indulgent.

I've been doing it for years. Make a list of people that that you're pissed at. Oh, I got one already.

I mean, it's and and the truth is, you know, I didn't show up at AA. I'm kind of felt like one of those guys who didn't think he resented a lot of people because I'm not a yeller or a screamer. I I I I was more than than feeling like I had resentments.

I was quietly disappointed in the world and its people. And and which is by the way, we talked about over in the third step that one of the things that that is necessary is for me to quit playing God. It doesn't work.

And one of the ways I play God is to think I know how things ought to be. And so I look out and I'm constantly disappointed in you and the way things are. Later in the 12 and 12, it says we will see one of the things that that that I will pull from this step work is that it says we will see that we've been making unreasonable demands upon our fellows, ourselves, and upon God.

So you disappoint me, I disappoint me, and God disappoints me. If you're keeping score, there's no one left to be disappointed in. Everybody has let me down.

And I don't think about that consciously. That's why I have to do this self-examination to go look for these underlying things that I don't recognize normally. And so, you know, I get a list of, you know, my sponsor said cuz I'm wrestling with this frustration.

I I mean with this resentment and wondering if I have them. But he said start with the acute and the obvious. The 12 and 12 uses that language.

And I decided my mother was acute and my brother was obvious and I put them down. But he said also think about people who frustrate you, who've disappointed you, who've let you down. Cuz that is a resentment when I when I I just attach different labels to it.

And that helped me grow this list. But again, I get to list these people and then I get to to do a column that that tells you what they did to me, my view of what they did to me. And I've been doing that on bar stools forever.

I've been talking about them and what they did. And I've been talking about what it affects. Right?

Here's that so here's what he did. He's getting in my pocketbook. He's messing telling my wife I got a mistress.

Uh this Mr. Brown dude, like the t-shirt says, needs his ass kicked. Right.

Uh uh uh but uh but all of that all of that is is selfindulgent. And then you change the game on me again. Now you say, "Okay, but now let's look at that list from an entirely different angle." When you when I write it down, it's a grudge list.

You know, my sponsor says, "Don't try to talk yourself out of it. Be be mad." It's a grudge list. We were burned up.

So, I got the list. But now, how about look at it from an entirely different angle. Well, what's that angle?

And see, my sponsor didn't spend a ton of time trying to help me determine, as Chris said, whether this column too, whether the whether what they did to me was real or imagined, whether I was accurate. But I don't know about you guys, when I call my sponsor with something, I explain it to him in agonizing detail cuz we want to explain it in such a way that he or she truly understands. And and my first sponsor, Frank, had really poor phone skills.

And uh uh and he would just stop. He said, "Hey, Steo, Steve." He said, "Let's just assume you're right. Now what?

I want to relitigate. I constantly want to relitigate. And if I forgive you, I give up the right to to keep, you know, litigating the, you know, I want to I want to be the the the prosecuting attorney and I want to continue the prosecution and I will build my case around the fact that my facts are right and I want to keep focusing on the facts when what we're doing is focusing on the resentment.

And and the the feeling is is that I can't be okay until Chris talked about it be, you know, we'll visit again when we get to the 10th step, but at least in the 12 and 12 in uh it talks about the spiritual axiom that whenever I'm disturbed, no matter the cause, there's something wrong with me. And that used to bother me a lot. I don't know about because I again it felt like one more time you're blaming me for what's going on out here.

But really I think what's being said is whenever I'm disturbed no matter what the cause there's something wrong with me. And what's wrong with me is I'm disturbed. And the solution is to be undisturbed.

And the illusion is that the way for me to be undisturbed is to reconcile these external circumstances to my satisfaction. When this isn't happening anymore, when you have apologized or when you treat me differently, when things change, then I can be okay. And and the simple truth is though it's not easy to get to and I'm not always willing to accept it is that now's the time that I can be okay the moment I'm willing to be okay.

The moment that I give up that judgment, the moment that I and again I don't mean to live in a circumstance that's untenable or abusive. I'm not talking about that. But I was in we were having a similar conversation in a meeting one day and a woman was going through a divorce and she had a restraining order on her on her uh husband and she said he's coming uh and the topic was forgiveness and she said the uh he's coming every night and standing at the head of their driveway and screaming obscinities at the house and talking about the kids and talking about her in front of the kids and he said how she said how do you forgive uh you know that when that's going on and I said I said well You know, I talked to her afterwards.

I didn't say it in the meeting, but I tal I said, you know, you can forgive someone and get a restraining order at the same time. You can you can deal with the circumstances, but do it with a peace of mind and a forgiving heart. And that seems inongruent, but it and it is when it's just me.

But when I invite God into the circumstances, that opportunity is there. And so this entirely different angle says says what if they too are spiritually sick. What if cuz it says I can no more be free of these resentments than I could alcohol.

So I get here and powerlessness has has presented itself again. Apparently I don't have any more power over resentment than I do alcohol. You don't seem to be able to talk me out of having a resentment.

You can give me good information and good reasons, but I seem to be I seem to be stuck with it sometimes. But it says, so what's our course to be? It says, here's our course.

We're going to look at it from a different angle. When you put this down, you were coming at it from the injured person, from those son of a guns, from a grudge list. But now, let's take a look and and and think maybe perhaps they are spiritually sick like ourselves.

So I begin to see these people not as different than me but like me. People like us don't get here without hurting some people along the way. We've done and we might not have done what they did to us.

You know we read over in the third step says admitting we are somewhat at fault. We're sure others are more to blame. And I'll hang my hat on that.

I will I and and this is saying we'll get to it in a minute but setting aside the wrongs of others completely. we resolutely look for our own mistakes. So the game changes here once I've gotten these three columns.

It says that that that's when I invite God into this process and I ask God to help me show pity, patience, and tolerance that I would gladly grant a sick friend. And I ask God, how can I be helpful to this person? Nothing is more counterintuitive than than for me to think how could I be helpful to this person that I'm feeling this resentment towards.

And then it says while we cannot be helpful to everyone at least. So that tells me at a minimum maybe I'll come out with this at least God will help me to show a kindly and tolerant view of each and everyone. How can I take a more kind and more tolerant perspective of the people of whom I'm or even institutions and principles that I may resent?

And I can't do it of my own will. But if I invite God into this process again honestly, truly, humbly, but see, I don't want to give up my right to be angry. I want to keep talking about column two.

I want to keep talking about what you did. You know, I I watched the uh uh uh CIS, you know, there was CIS, then there was CIS Miami, then there was CIS New York, and then you got NCIS, which is going to run forever, obviously. And uh uh but I watch them and they all start the same.

Within that first scene, somewhere there's going to be a dead body, and the NCIS team is called to the scene. And in this particular episode, let's say a car has uh driven off of a cliff, fallen hundreds of feet down into a ravine where it hit and smashed and exploded into flames. So, the body is mangled and burned and to all external evidence, it was either the fall or the fire that killed the person in this car.

But that's not sufficient for the CIS team. They take the body back to the lab and they do an autopsy. They cut and go in.

And when they go in, they discover that there was a massive heart attack that caused him to drive off the cliff. They caused the crash that caused the fire. Now, I will tell you that that step two that that column two in in my inventory is the external evidence and it happened.

The fall happened, the crash happened, the fire happened. The facts are right, but I didn't go far enough. And now I'm being asked to to do a spiritual autopsy to go in and take a look at the cause of my resentment.

Not to c not wonder whether what they did or didn't do was right or wrong. Why do I feel the way I feel around this? And how can I be free of that feeling?

And again, so that's when I invite God in, right? And and and and we do what we call the sick man's prayer. You know, a lot of people talk about the prayer in the back of the book in in uh uh freedom from bondage.

And she talks about praying for them for two weeks or longer. And that's good. I I've done I do it.

And I think it's good advice. But first, I need some power I don't have to do something I can't do, which is which is invite God into this to help me show a kindly and tolerant view. How can I look at this person differently?

Perhaps they too are spiritually sick. And now we've got a common ground to get on and only then do I seem to be able to do what it encourages me to do next, which is setting aside the wrongs of others. So now I just throw column two and three away.

they're no longer important to the process. That was just the way you reeled me in. So, so now setting aside the wrongs of others completely, setting aside column two completely.

We resolutely look for our own mistakes. Now, that to me doesn't mean that I'm looking in this relationship and see where I'm at fault for everything. But I do at least want to look for in this relationship or in any relationships.

Have I lied to any have I lied in this relationship? Have I been resentful in this relationship? Have I acted out of fear anytime?

Not about what I put in column two. Almost everybody in here has got a parent somewhere on their inventory. You going to tell me you never lied to your parent?

Of course you did. You can't survive your teams and not lie to your parents. Have I ever resented them?

Yeah. Or a spouse or a sibling or an employer. And so I'm moved all that stuff and I take a look and say, "Yeah, yeah." Now, admitting I'm somewhat at fault.

I'm sure others are more to blame. I still want to keep going back and relitigating what they've done to me. And this is just asking me now.

That's But we're just looking at you, Steve. Have you lied? Have you acted out of fear?

Have you been resentful? Have you been dishonest? And I just want to look for those and own them where I have and later I get a chance to go to, you know, if you steal $5,000 from me and I steal $50 from you, my mind says that you owe me $4,950.

But this is saying, I got to forget the five grand and I got to deal with the 50 I stole, whatever that is. And that's the look we get to take there. And and and it is freeing if I'm willing to do it and I can get past getting hung up relitigating what you did to me.

Forgiveness feels like to but not forgiveness doesn't feel this way. My resistance to forgiveness seems to be based on if I forgive you, you win. If I forgive this, and forgiveness isn't me giving you absolution, me coming to you and saying, you know what, lucky you, I forgive.

The forgiveness is just my heart opening back up and not being held captive to those hard feelings. I want to be lighthearted in my recovery and I'm stuck there sometimes. So, so that's that's what I find there.

And then I want to move into the fear inventory and throw it back to Chris some for that. And then uh I promised you some sex discussion. And uh uh and and to be truth truthful, it takes longer to talk about it than the act itself.

But uh uh uh uh at any rate, the uh uh I was 6 years sober before I realized I had not well before I realized there was a fear inventory. And I certainly hadn't done one. And I and I was at a weekend like this, though the two people doing it were far superior to me and Chris.

And uh uh actually it was Don P and Gary B. And uh uh and they were talking about this inventory and they were talking about some stuff I hadn't done. And I didn't know I hadn't done it.

And I don't blame anybody for why I I anyway I hadn't done it. And I've got I meant to bring with me because I often do uh uh uh March the 6 of 1997 was the first inventory fear inventory I ever did. And I've got it.

I still show it to guys all the time. And I've done a lot of fear inventory since. And the fear inventory has been the most uh uh uh freeing for me, the most informative and the most freeing because I didn't recognize I mean I knew I was afraid but I wasn't always putting that label on it.

but I didn't understand it. And and so our book says when you know and and look, I'm not a guy that gets into the debate around the mechanics of inventory. I I I'm not going to argue about whether this is a uh the resentment inventory is a three column or a four column or even a five column inventory.

I look down here after it gives us the example. It says nothing counted but thoroughess and honesty. If I'm honest and thorough, we're probably going to get somewhere.

If I'm not honest and thorough, it doesn't matter what my technique is. Doesn't matter how many columns I've got. If there's BS in the column.

So, so just trying to find my way to this stuff. But, but over here in the fear inventory, it says when dealing with our fears, we put them on paper. That's not complicated, but starting to write them was kind of daunting.

And and and uh and and that first fear inventory, I've got it. And I've got the fears that I've heard, you know, a thousand people give and and many of them are the same. And and uh I had a, you know, I had a fear of success and a fear of failure.

I had to fear what people think of me. I had a fear at my job that they'd figure out I didn't know what I was doing, that I'm in my office pretending like I know what I'm doing. And the truth is, so was everybody else.

Everybody closed their offices goes, "How the hell did I get here?" You know, >> and uh and the thing is, we probably wouldn't be in that office if we weren't up to the job. But we're always that that ego that fear that selfcentered fear which is at the root of my trouble drives me. It says in deal with our fears, we put them on paper, right?

And then it says we ask ourselves why we had these fears. And but I don't, it's kind of a rhetorical question in the book because the book answers it. Says, isn't it because self I'm back to this self-examination.

Is it because self reliance failed us? And I wasn't quite sure what that that read good, but I don't quite know what it means. But I go on and read it says we we think there's a better way than self reliance.

And the third and it says we're living on a different basis. Am I? What is that different basis?

Well, my goodness, just three pages over, I got on my knees and said, God, I offer myself to thee to build with me and do with me. I'm living on the basis of trusting infinite God rather than my finite self. And so the the my fear is when I am self-reliant and and and this is what that looks like to me that my fears are that something's going to be po something.

It's going to be too hard. I'm going to be too poor. I'm going to be too old.

I'm going to be too lonely. I'm going to be too embarrassed. It's going to be more than I can handle.

Whatever happens is going to be more than I can handle. And the book says, you're right. It is.

That's why I'm inviting God into this. When I am self-reliant, depending on me rather than depending on God, I am afraid and I should be. I'm incompetent to handle these things.

But when I trust, so I'm inviting, am I really inviting God into these situations? I read that I got I had a whole list of these fears. And again, some of the things I'm sharing with you now weren't apparent to me as I'm doing that first inventory.

But what did become apparent to me in that first fear inventory as I wrote them down, cuz I've got written in real time, I I wrote a little box around it, that all of a sudden I noticed that there was a lot of selfpity in my fear inventory. Now, self-pity is one of the defects of character that, you know, it's just not very sexy. I'd like to have a lust problem if at all possible.

Self-pity is kind of a weeny problem to have, but it was, and I'll tell you how I know, and I've had guys do this, uh, uh, sometimes grab one of your inventories and read it with a whiny voice. I'm think I'm afraid of success. I'm afraid of failure, you know.

And it's not to make fun of those things, and I never make light of somebody else, but I realize how much self-pity is in there that, oh, this can't be happening to me. Oh, this won't be okay. I won't be okay.

And I got this whole list that my fear is, this whole list of things that I don't even know, I've decided are are can't happen. And as I said uh I think earlier this morning in a way that's me breaking my covenant with the third step because in the third step I said do with me as you will. My fear inventory is full of stuff that can't happen to me.

And so I have not really turned that over. And and what I used to think I was hearing from people is that if you have enough faith everything will turn out okay. If you're prayerful, you're faithful, you're good aa doobie, if your meeting attendance is good, you're sponsoring people, check the boxes, you know, and that that that the reward will be God will give you what you want.

But my my experience has been more that that it's not that I'll be okay or or that that everything will work out okay. It's that I'll be okay no matter how things work out. And I become and my preferences begin to disappear.

My demands begin to lighten up a little bit. My requirements, my target for happiness gets bigger. What if I can only be okay if a few, you know, that that bullseye really gets small sometimes?

The demands I make on the world for me to be okay. You know what? If you went to BaskinRobins and they got 32 flavors, right?

and you say, "Just give me whatever you think I'd like." But if I'm if I'm bound and determined on tutti frutti and they're out of tutti frutti that day, I'm screwed. But what if I'm okay with vanilla? What if I'm okay with chocolate?

What if I'm okay with these various things? What if I'm I'm okay? I'm sitting in meeting and this is when I give it back to you, Chris.

I was less than 60 days sober and man, everything was blowing my mind, you know? I mean, I was just attracted right away. I really was to the things I was hearing in NAA and uh there was a brand new guy in there and I mean, literally beat up and and and we did what we do in meetings a lot.

Everybody's, you know, when you're 60 days sober, nothing you love better than a brand new guy cuz f Jesus, I'll start talking to him instead of me. And uh uh and everybody was encouraging, right? And and they gave a little pitch and said, "Keep coming back.

It gets better." The next person shared and said, 'Keep coming back, man. It gets better. And that went three, four, five people all in end in their little pitch with, "Keep coming back.

It gets better." There's old guy named Herb in there. And and uh uh Herb woke up just long enough to share with us. And uh uh he said, "I'll tell you when it gets better.

Godamn it. It gets better when it's okay the way that it is." And man, my head was spinning like Linda Blair and The Exorcist. You know, I'm trying to figure what the hell did he just say, man.

and and and I can't figure it out, but but it's I'm driving home, you know, and I'm telling you, 32 years later, I can hear him say it just like he's saying it this morning. And what he was saying is it gets better. Right now, we spend so much time talking about living a day at a time.

So much time talking about living in the moment. Well, this is it. And I keep getting ready to have a good day when when this happens, when this happens.

It gets better when it's okay the way that it is. And that's available to me. But it means the destruction of self-centeredness.

Chris, thank thanks, Steve. You know, may you find him now. I mean, think about that.

May you find him now. Not after a bunch of work or not after church, you know. May you may you find him now.

Now, um fear fear was an evil and corroding thread. The fabric of my existence was shot through with it. It created circumstances that blew up my life in 1300 different ways.

But I didn't recognize it. It manifested in me like low to high level anxiety. Like I just didn't want to be right here right now with you.

I I wanted to be somewhere else. I always was uncomfortable with myself and and my environment. And I look back I do you it took multiple fear inventories really for me to dig dig deep enough.

But I look back and I I look at how fear corroded the quality of my life in a million ways. Uh I had an unbelievable fear of of of speaking in public in school. I'm talking you know first grade through through high school.

there'd be uh there'd be a a responsibility to give an oral report on something and rather than get up in front of class and take the chance of looking stupid, I would cut school that day and a couple more days after just to be sure I'm missing the makeup. Okay. Uh John and I were John and I were talking about this uh this morning.

They had they had square dancing in gym class, you know. Uh it did not it was not okay for me because what they would do is they would line you up on one side of the gym. All the guys line up all the girls on one side of the gym and then blow the whistle and you had to run across the gym and ask a girl to dance.

That was traumatic for me. You know what? What if they say no and I get shamed and I have to go home and kill myself?

So, so, so all this stuff I I mean it just it it it the fabric of my life's existence was just negatively impacted by by this anxiety or fear whatever you want to call it uh from an early early age. And then then I then I start adultting. You know, we we all get we all have to start adultting at one point in time or another, like getting jobs.

And you know, I I'd be I'd be afraid to to try for a job or I'd be afraid to ask for a raise because if I was denied, I'd have to quit. And you know, I I in personal relationships, I I was afraid of being honest. I I was afraid to let you know like what I was really like.

So I chameleoned, you know, I I try I tried to come off as I think you would want me to come off because because I was afraid of if you saw the authentic me, you'd feel about me like I do, which is not too good. And and this is this is like devastating for a quality of life. But if you would have walked up to me the day I walked into AA and said, "Chris, fear is a real big problem in your life," we would have had a problem because I would have had to prove to you that I was not a coward.

But that's not that's not the way fear impacted the quality of my life. It was it was more under under the horizon like like like was I was I daring? Was I reckless?

Would I fight somebody that called me out? Would would I drive a motorcycle, you know, as fast as I could? Would I jump off bridges?

I do all these daring things that if that that look like, you know, the John Wayne kind of courage. So, so I didn't recognize this as as fear. I I I didn't know what it was.

I just knew I I just didn't want to be right here right now with you. This isn't working for me. You know, I'm just going to exit.

And that's really that's really the impact fear had on my life. You know, I heard one I heard one speaker way back when, one of the greats. He used to say, "Folks, all I ever wanted to do was step out easy.

Be able to step out easy. And that's not something I could ever do. There were there were always problems and and worrying, you know, this is going to happen, that's going to happen.

And I need to I need to inventory these fears. I I need to come to terms with this this this this selfcentered fear. It's all based in in self.

And and it's true that all resentments have some form of fear attached to them because I can't be mad at at it at at a person, a place or an institution without without having fear of of you know what had happened or what's going to happen. And uh and it was it it was it was another evolution for me to to come to terms with with just the destruction that this fear had. Now, how do you how do you get rid of something that's so ingrained in your character in in your emotional state?

You know, I can't I can't somebody can't just come up to me and say, "Hey, Chris, just stop worrying. Just stop worrying. Don't worry about it.

That it's so deep within me that that I think the only power that's going to be sufficient to make a change in my life is this power they call God. It's just there's just there's nothing else. I can't read the book, you know, getting rid of fear for dummies because it's it's it's almost not really an intellectual exercise.

It's a spiritual exercise. I to to to start moving away uh moving away from this from this fear. Um there's a promise there's a there's some promises in here when they're going through the fear inventory.

We're now at the basis of trusting and relying upon God. We made a decision to do that in the third step. So he's assuming we meant it.

Uh we're we're we're trusting and relying upon God. It says we trust infinite God rather than our finite selves. We're in the world to play the role he assigns.

Just to the extent that we do as we think he would have us and humbly rely upon him does he enable us to match calamity with serenity. So there's got to be engagement with this relationship with this power greater than myself for this stuff to work. And to the exact extent that I play the role God assigns uh and try to do what I believe he would have me have me do.

I believe that puts me in in the atmosphere where I can match the calamity with serenity. I can start to step out easy a little bit. There's a lot more work that really I had to do for this to really start to start to work for us for me.

Um, but probably one of the greatest benefits that I got from Alcoholics Anonymous and my engagement in Alcoholics Anonymous is a relief of this anxiety of this self-centered fear. Um, and it's it's not only enabled me to match calamity with serenity, it's enabled me to do the things that I never would have even wanted to do before I got sober. There's a lot of things that I would just say no to.

You know, somebody would suggest something. No, that's not that's not for me. You know, you guys go ahead.

There's like a million of those things that once this once this fear starts to you start to outgrow this fear, you start to say yes to and then the world the world becomes a different place to live in. You know, my world was so small uh toward the end of my drinking. It was so tiny and it didn't include very much at all.

Uh and it was it it existed all up here, you know, in my head. And over the course of the years, engaging with all of uh the meetings, the steps, the service, the sponsorship, what what has happened is I've I've become willing to engage in things that I used to be very very afraid to do. I you know I had a huge fear of of people and crowds and I always wanted to be on the out I always felt I was on the outside and that would make me want to be on the outside you know uh I I I never could I never could fit in with with the the the the group I could never feel like that you know I'm a part of or I'm connected to or I'm in unity with and this this reductionist fear has got me to the point where I just I just walk I just you know I'm okay with stepping out easy and and doing things that uh I would have been in I I you know you you become the kind of person you wouldn't even wouldn't have even liked when you first came in you know what I mean and uh and you know I'm so grateful for uh for the power of this inventory and I'm so grateful for the intuition uh that Bill and Hank and the people that put this this book together had.

I mean, did they did they put their finger on the on the on the problem and the solution in the best way possible? I listen, I've I've gone through this book without exaggeration probably 600 times, you know, in all the workshops and working with people and the studies that I've listened to and everything. And practically every time I go through it, something jumps out at me at a deeper level.

It hits me at a level it's never hit me before. And this year where where this book is really hitting me is on a mystical level. It's a mystical level of and you know you know what I mean what I mean by that is some of the terminology in this book is mystical.

self had defeated us. The father of light, the great reality, a power greater than ourselves. All all this terminology, there's tons of it in here.

It's really it it's really on a mystical level. And and Bill is what, four years sober, five years sober when this book gets put together. It's it's it's amazing to me.

And you know what the mystics what the mystics were were they were people who went all in. They went deep. They were the people you'd find in the Himalayas in the caves, you know, sitting there meditating, you know, up in the caves or they'd be the they'd be the people who'd go on the one yearong silent retreats at Gethsemane or, you know, with Thomas Merin.

These are these are the people who had an inner drive for a connection to the divine. They pushed away everything else and they went all in and they put on the robe and and they started the disciplines of of whatever to get a deeper experience with God. You know, I believe I believe the alcoholic to a degree is an unresolved mystic.

I think within us, Steve touched on some of this already. I believe within us is a desperate need to connect with the divine and be in unity with the divine. And I think that desperate need pushed us into all kinds of crazy sprees.

certainly our alcoholism, but drug addiction, uh the the way the way we've approached sex and gambling and money and all all all these forms of externals to get us to feel connected and in unity with internally. And this book is saying we find this great reality, the connection and the unity. We find it within.

We clear away all the crap and it's already here. Like Steve said, it's already here. We just we just need to move the baggage away.

and fear and resentment are two of the two of the great and and guilt and shame and remorse are another bunch of them, you know, are are uh the sex inventory. So, what I'll do is uh is if if uh if you want, I'll pass it over to you cuz you promised everybody sex. Yeah.

Well, Christian made me think when you said I promised everybody sex. uh uh that uh many of you have probably heard that that an AA meeting is in many many ways like an orgy that uh uh uh when you leave you realize you've had a really good time but you don't know who to thank and uh uh uh uh so that leads us into now about sex, right? And uh and you know it's a it and I did want to have this conversation because because we often don't and and it's a can be a challenging one to have because it's such a personal private part of our lives and and nothing can uh turn a room full of grown-ups like us into junior high school kids like that conversation because that's kind of the way we respond to those things because we because to look at it in the eyes sometimes is is daunting.

Uh but again I think the point I want to make up front is that at least from my perspective um AA is not examining my behavior. It is not as it says we're not the arbiter of anyone's sex life and uh uh so so it is not trying to determine whether what I've done is a right thing or a wrong thing in terms of behavior. It is I'm encouraged to examine that like we have these other areas of our lives to see is it selfish?

Is anybody getting hurt? Is it arousing jealousy, bitterness or suspicion? Is it dishonest?

Is there something I could have or should have done instead? It is it is examining the relationship to seeing those things. It's not saying you should or should not do this or that.

A few of the things that that comfort me coming into the the conversation is uh uh you know first Bill writes that uh uh we all have sex problems. You know, there's some things in the book where he writes in the past tense, we used to do this or used to do that, but and I don't know if it's on purpose or not, but here he says, and he's talking about the first 100 initially, right? He he said, "Look, we all got sex problems.

We'd hardly be human if we didn't." And then I'm further comforted a little later on when it says we treat sex like we would any other problem. So it's not some special category in terms of how we respond to those. But I do think because it is so personal and so private and we tend to ourselves sometimes attach shame or guilt or around that or someone else has has put that on us.

Shame or guilt. So finding so we just I just rather keep this back here. I'll put everything else in the game, but I don't want to put this in the game, you know, and it's and and it's a challenging thing sometimes to look at.

And when it says we all have sex problems, I just choose to, you know, I I I know I am uh uh casting a wide net, but I'm just going to go on to say that I think that means that we everybody in here has sex problems. We don't all have them at the same time, and they don't look the same with everybody. And they and they're different at different times.

We tend to think about this initially in terms of misbehavior, right? I mean misbehavior in quotation marks. Maybe as our book calls a little reckless romancing even though I might be in a committed relationship or a marriage.

And certainly that's included in there. But sex problems can extend into how do I view this area of my life? It's a God-given instinct that we've already talked about.

And it says that our our sex that that this is not to be used lightly or selfishly, but it's important. It's important and it's more important to some people than others. But back in the 12 and 12 in the 12th step, it talks about that there'll come a time that every sound human being will want to have the deepest possible union with someone in the areas of physical, mental, spiritual, and emotional.

So the physical makes the top four. You know, now I will tell you I spent a lot more time focused on the physical rather than the spiritual, mental, and emotional before I got here. You know, back in that 12step, it's only a couple of pages over that the the conversation that we are all used to hearing where it says when boy, it's when boy meets girl on AA campus that problems arise.

>> And it says they should be well enough established. I think that means both in their recovery but also maybe with each other that in the areas of mental, spiritual and emotional their compatibility that they are compatible and it's not wishful thinking and it doesn't even mention physical when boy meets girl on AA campus cuz Bill's figuring okay they already they already laid up with each other and now they'll try to figure out that mental, spiritual and emotional stuff later cuz we get we get carried away right away and and and and boom and and and we don't pay attention to those things. But then sometimes we can be in these relationships or we can either how we treat sex, how the how sex impacts me and potentially how my how my feelings or behavior impact others around that.

It can it can not be about having a lot of sex. It could be about having none. It could be about being so uncomfortable or so having such strong emotion around that that I can't find a way to to enjoy this part of of this god-given instinct.

And and there's not a right amount or wrong amount or right kind. I'm telling you, AA doesn't care and how much sex you have or who you have it with or how many of you they're having it or what gender you are or what you're wearing or any AA just does not care. But but what I'm looking for is what we started this whole inventory looking for is what is blocking me off from my relationship with God and my relationship with you is some of this stuff getting in the way and and uh uh and that's all not you know and and it says that God alone can judge my sex conduct.

And thank goodness the book says that opinions may run to extremes in AA. You want some extreme advice, you know, just ask your AA home group. But I got a couple of thoughts about sex.

Who'd like to weigh in? >> Uh you're going to get a whole cross-section of ideas just like, you know, you guys might leave here with absolutely, you know, dismissing anything that I say doesn't fall into your wheelhouse. That's okay.

But but it's not about the activity. It's a like everything else. It's the inside job that I have to take a look sometimes.

So, I will tell you that uh at you heard me talk about the fact that there were some infidelities in my marriage uh before I got sober and then I got sober and I straightened out. It wasn't hard. I mean, I began I I for eight years.

I'm I'm I'm doing good. And then I ended up, my brother and I took some guys out to dinner one night and uh uh it was a business thing and and uh uh it became clear in the dinner that uh these guys would like to go to a gentleman's club. Now, if anything has ever been misnamed, it's the gentleman's club.

But uh uh but anyway, we So we get my my brother and I my brother's paying the check. He comes over to me. He said, "Steve, I know this ain't your thing, man." He said, "And and it wasn't his thing either, but he he said he said, "But I'll take them." And uh I went uh I'll go and uh uh and so we go, right?

And then these guys came back into town uh about a month later and and we went again. And then I started going just to see if they were there. And uh uh uh and now I'm just a heartbeat from being on the Jerry Springer show, you know, and uh uh and I start going right and I'm doing this three or four months and it turned into a pretty regular thing and I'm sneaking into my own house and I'm I'm just doing a you know just all the associated things around this that that were making me a liar and and and all of this stuff.

But I go to my sponsor cuz and I hadn't told him you don't want to tell them too early. And uh uh uh and uh and I said, "Frank, this is what I'm doing, man." And and uh uh and I feel guilty about it. And this is the point I want to make.

Frank said, he he said, "Well, Steo," he said, "Either quit feeling guilty or quit going. I don't care which." Cuz see, he wasn't telling me whether that I'm sure he had an opinion, but he wasn't telling me whether that was a right or a wrong thing to do. He said, "But since you feel guilty, let's do an inventory on this.

Let's look at it and you will either discover if there's something that doesn't work for you or you will find freedom to go without the guilt." And he was uninvested in putting his opinion on there. He wanted me to to me and God to figure out where does that fit with me? And we start doing the inventory and I began answering the questions, right?

Is it selfish? Well, clearly it's selfish, but not so much I can't handle it. And uh uh is it dishonest?

Yes, dishonest because I'm not telling my wife and daughter where I'm going. I'm spending money. You know, there uh during a time when money was tight for us.

I can promise you our budget didn't have a line item for strippers. Uh uh uh so I'm I'm manipulating that. But maybe I can handle that.

But I get down to the question that says, "Are you rousing jealousy, bitterness, or suspicion?" And the answer was absolutely not. Absolutely not. Uh because I'd won back the entire trust of my wife and daughter.

They weren't questioning where I was and I was out late some. They weren't. There was absolutely not one bit of suspicion around that.

And that is what I discovered I wasn't going to be able to live with. I wasn't going to be able to stay sober and do this. Now, I couldn't have told you on the front end of that inventory that that's what I was going to find.

And that's been true of most of my inventory work that I think I know what's going on and then I do that spiritual autopsy and I discover something other than what I thought was going to be at the root of my problem. Now, that was just my experience. If we go on and we find things, guys come to, you know, I'll have guys ask about pornography, you know, and and uh uh and that's, you know, something that that there's, you know, everybody have, you know, and and I show up here with no opinion about that, no expressed opinion about it.

But I say, "Look, man, I'm not telling you whether whether that's a good thing or a bad thing, a right thing or a wrong thing. What I'm asking you is, is it impacting your relationship with your with your wife or with your with with your, you know, significant other? Is it impacting your relationship with God?

Sandy Beach said, "I'm I was privileged to go on this walk with Sandy." This had been about 15 18 years ago at the first Far Corners retreat that he put on. And I was a little disappointed in me about something I'd been doing. And I end up on this walk with Did you ever go to that Far Corners retreat?

You had this uh prayer St. Francis walk and and you would go and and every there was a station that would have a uh uh one of the verses to the prayer of St. Francis and then and you stop and contemplate, talk about that, go to the next one, go to the next one.

Well, Bob B and Sandy B invited me to go on this walk with them. And these are just Mount Rushmore guys for me, right? And I'm and and and and I'm on that walk and and uh and I'm talking about again some stuff I'm disappointed in me about.

and and Sandy goes cuz he'd given a six and seven talk that had just gone over my head, you know? I mean, it was just uh and I'm trying to find the the balance between personal responsibility and God removing this defect of character. Where do I act better before God makes me better is kind of the way I was framing it.

And Sandy said, we're walking and he said, "Well, Steve," he said, he said, "Uh, he said, "Let's take pornography." He said, "How how do most guys watch pornography?" And I said, "Well, I don't know, Sandy." I said, "I've heard that uh" said, "What what I've heard is that uh uh" and he said, "Well, how do most guys he he said, you know, he he said he said, you know, lots of times somebody goes in the room, closes the door, and locks it, maybe closes the blinds, you know, turns on the computer, do whatever they do, and they've left God on the other side of that door." and then come out, open the door and go, "Okay, God, here I am. I'm back. Let's go out into the" and but they we they've excluded God from this area of your life.

He says, "What I'm telling you is Steve, next time you get ready to watch some pog pornography," he said, "Invite God with to go with you." I said, "Sandy, I got to be honest with you, brother." I said, "Uh, that's not the manager I had in mind." And uh uh uh uh but he but what he was saying was he he said if you will earnestly and honestly invite God into this part of your life. He says that that that you will find your way that things will fall away that need to fall away. But you got to really that's that humbly ask we will talk about when we get to six and seven.

And again, it's not pornography being a good or a bad thing. It's not any of these other things. It's not what what you may or may not be doing.

I'll tell you one last thing. My wife cringes when well, she's cringing at everything I've said so far, but uh uh uh I gave I did a men's retreat one weekend and a guy came up to me toward the end of the weekend. He said he said, "Aren't you afraid Conniey's going to hear that?" I said, "She ain't listening to six hours of me talking to pick up one thing.

you know, she's not going to she but you know, one of the sex problems I might have today is that uh uh in our relationship and and and uh uh at our age and and stuff that we now, you know, there's not a lot of uh uh spontaneous sexual behavior at home. we got some planning to do, you know, and so and it really is taking a lot of the pressure off, right? So, what's happened is Sunday afternoons is typically where we'll spend some time together and uh uh and and it's valuable to both of us.

I don't want to I mean, it's an important part of our relationship, but if it's a Sunday afternoon and I don't get home till late tomorrow night, y'all screwed up my whole week. But uh uh uh but if it's Sunday afternoon and for some reason, you know, I'm I'm kind of waiting on the on the signal cuz we all know they got the keys to the car. And uh uh uh and all of a sudden, I hear the shower running, right?

I know. Well, what the hell? Cuz I know that means that no, the time is the store's closed.

And I don't say anything. I just pout. I'm But I'm being serious.

I don't say anything. I'm too immature to say anything. So I just sit there in that silent scorn.

I'm kind of I'm kind of disappointed and I'm kicked off and then the phone rings and it's a sponte and I don't want to talk to him. I don't want to answer or if I do I'm short. Maybe my daughter calls but I'm pouting so I don't.

So my my availability to other people this this is a sex problem. And uh uh so I I I've broadened how I view what these things might turn into and how I get my feelings hurt or how you know whatever those things are. So it's just been a uh it's refreshing for me to be able to take a look at that and put it in context of of everything else that every other area of that selfexamination and it begins to tap down to stuff.

So now I don't take that personally nearly as much. Now Conniey's more likely or I'm more likely on a given day to say, you know what, I need a pass today. Hall pass today.

Just, you know, not feeling. That's okay. The but growing up and and treating this area of my life like I do so many other areas of my life, like a like a real adult and recognizing that we treat it like we would any other problem.

And uh uh that's just been immensely helpful to me and helped me put things in their proper perspective and realizing that that what I'm really trying to do is make sure that that whatever my feelings are, whatever my behavior is in that area is not cutting me off from God and cutting me off from you and impacting the relationships with the people closest to me. That that's what it's about. It's about freeing me up so I can be of more use to you and which is everything we're doing here in AA.

So, uh, that's all I know about sex in 20 minutes. So, uh, time time for lunch. We're g am I am I correct in that?

What? Uh, uh, this is lunchtime. >> Okay.

And we're going to be back four o'clock. Malcolm >> right here. All right.

All right. My name is Chris and I am an alcoholic. >> Welcome.

Welcome back. I hope everybody had an opportunity to drive around town, go to the marble quarry, uh go up to the to the grave and and and pay the traditional homage up there. Uh it was it it I think it was nice to have a a period of time where we could just settle down a little.

Uh we're going to be moving into the fifth step now. But but I you know what came to me over the last couple of hours is an experience I had at a workshop years and years ago that was really revvely to to me. I I was at this event um called called the the Brooklyn Roundup, right?

It was I don't know seven or eight years ago. There was a number of speakers, number of one-hour speaker slots were set up and uh and a good friend of ours from Austin, Texas, Katie, gets up and she's talking about relationships. And she does this.

Okay, every everyone, you know, be honest and everybody please participate. I want participation in this. And she goes, every sing every single person in here that's married, raise your hand.

Now, there's like 600 people there. So, I'm telling you, maybe 60 people raise their hand. And right away, you know, my my eyebrows go up because something like 51% of adults in America are married, something like that.

That's the statistic, right? So, right away, you know, we're we're deviating from the norm. We're at like 10%.

But it even got worse after that. She said, "Okay, everybody in here that's been divorced, raise your hand." And like 350 people, raise their hand out of like 600. And then it got worse.

She She goes, "Everybody that's been divorced three or more times, please raise your hand." And at least 200 people raised their hand. Now, I got it. We've done a really poor job with this relationship thing, with the intimate relationships.

We we are we're challenged with that and the sex inventory says that you know we need an overhauling. So in the last session we went over we went over a number of things. Uh it asks us then to put an ideal together for our future sex conduct.

How who do we want to be when we show up at the next party? And we're we're we're supposed to develop those characteristics and and ask God to mold us toward those those characteristics. And I think it's really possible for us to get to a place where we're where we're really healthy because because in an unreovered state, we've pretty much rendered ourselves permanently single.

You know what I mean? and and for one reason or another, unless it's a real bizarre uh a bizarre relationship. So, so a lot of work I think really has to go into that.

A lot of work like placing the welfare of the other ahead of our own is a is a is a a a good guidepost, you know, that helps a lot. Uh being respectful and being transparent and all that and all that stuff came hard for me. Uh it's been it's been a struggle.

It's been a struggle not to not to avoid, you know, uncomfortable things by uh by lying through omission, you know. It's it's not a direct lie. Well, you should have told me, you know, so so there there's been there's been a lot of the grow those growing pains uh with me, but it's an area where we're really going to we're going to get dividends if we if we put the work in.

We're we're really going to get dividends because I I truly believe you attract what you are. and and and if you're you're a if you're a spiritual supportive transparent kind of a person, that's that's what you you tend to uh to attract. So, just >> can I say something?

>> Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. >> Well, because it's such a it's such an interesting thing, at least to me, because I've been married for 38 years and I was married for for almost 7 years before getting sober and I met my wife in a bar over a eightball of cocaine.

It was hers and I was very attracted to her. And uh uh and a few months later we we uh uh went on a trip to Mexico and and drank something out of a coconut and ended up on a boat that went out to international waters and a Austrian merchant marine read in Spanish what he swears was a wedding ceremony. And uh we don't speak Spanish so we don't know what we agreed to on that boat.

But uh uh uh but the point I would make and it was 7 years almost 7 years later when I got sober and her sobriety dates 10 days after mine but we we stayed married but we struggled and I think that when you that there are a lot of relationships that don't survive recovery because we are different people and what brought us together won't necessarily keep us together and the things that that brought us together. And so we had to figure out a little bit like I talked about earlier, are we compatible? Not do we care about each other, we also were parents to a to a daughter 5 years old when we got sober.

But at one point, and we were really struggling, you know, four or five years into into our recovery and and you know, I'm coming out here to AA and I'm I'm I'm seeing that there's more to be had. And I think Connie likewise was seeing that from her own perspective. And and uh um so we're home one day and and kind of to Chris's point, she says, "What what would you like I'm complaining, I'm sure, about something.

She says, "What do you want this to look like? What do you want this relationship to look like?" And I said, "Well, I want us to be honest and open and transparent and emotionally intimate, and I'd like you to go first, please." And I keep waiting for somebody else to see if it's safe for me to go in the water because I'm not used to doing that. And so it it took us a good while.

And and I'm just grateful. I often kid I I haven't been uh I've been married to three different women. They were just all Connie.

And uh uh she's been married to multiple versions of me over the last 38 years cuz we change and grow hopefully. and and uh uh I think what we found and and we're quite different people in a lot of ways but you find a way to respect those differences and that compatibility doesn't mean you see everything the same. For us, it meant we have enough security to allow the other person to be who they are.

And we encourage that of each other and for each other rather than than be so insecure that that I need uh we were joking when I left. She said, "Don't have fun without me." Because that used to be the way things were. Don't get caught having fun without me.

That's somehow disloyal to the marriage. And now she's hoping I'm having a wonderful time and I'm hoping that she is. So, go ahead, Chris.

>> Thanks, Steve. So um so okay, we've put together this list. Hopefully we've had some guidance from sponsors or spiritual advisors or book studies or whatever.

We we gain all this information from from different places. But honestly and thoroughly, we've put together a resentment inventory. We've put together uh a fear inventory and we've put together a sex conduct inventory.

And we've done the absolute best job we can. and it gets to a point where you just kind of know it's done. You might be able to continue to add stuff, but you kind of know it's done.

Now it's time now it's time to find the right person to share this inventory with. Now, now my ex my first experience with with a fourstep u it was it was in 1990 and this is pre you know Joe and Charlie pre- anything. Um the guidance that you would get in meetings back then if you asked how do you do a fourep somebody in the back would go kid you do a fourep with a pencil and everybody would laugh and that that was what you what you would get in my area for advice.

So, so what I did was I went to a lot of 12step meetings where it was it was the four step. I I found I figured out where fourstep meeting is going to be over here next week and over here and I went to a ton of four-step meetings. I had done a life story in in treatment.

And I kind of put this thing together without really any guidance. And really what it was was it was a confessional exercise. It was I was saying that yeah, these are the mistakes that I've made.

These are the these are the faults I've made. These are the dirty little secrets that I have. These are some patterns that I've discovered in my personality, much to my chagrin.

And I and I had this thing uh I I still have it. It it it's like in one font, you know, there it's like it's like a novel in two pages. And what it was was it was a bizarre confessional life storyesque kind of a thing.

And it was time to meet up with my sponsor and do my fist study. And what I did what I did was uh uh I made arrangements. I made an appointment with him.

And he liked he likes to multitask. So he said, "We're going to do it at the park while I'm walking my dogs." Right? So, we took a long walk through Lewis Morris Park down in Marstown while I read this stuff.

And and I and and here here's what here's what the confessional being honest aspect of a fifth step did for me. What it did was I went into this thing with my head held low. I truly believed that I was a scumbag.

I mean, if you do if you let all the people down that I let down, if you made all the mistakes I made, if you did the crazy things in blackouts, I if if your families blew up and, you know, and and you'd come to in jail and all this kind of stuff happened and you're normal, you would probably have the same feelings I had. like I I really I really thought, you know, there's something really really differently wrong about me and I start reading this stuff and he's just listening and he's walking the dogs and I finally get done. I finally get done and I look up at him and he goes, "Huh, that's not so bad." And I kind of got a little pissed.

What do you mean that's not so bad? you know, this is this is stuff that had been crushing my spirit for years. That's not so bad.

We can work with that, he said. And uh and he saw the look of puzzlement on my on my face, right? And and this is what he said, and I'll never forget it.

He said, "Chris, this is what I think your alcoholism was like. First of all, I think you were alcoholic before you started drinking. Picture a campfire with like red coals, you know, the the coals are the embers are just red hot and you're and and you come along with with a can of gasoline and you throw it on those embers and all of a sudden the flames just just jump up in the air and burn everything around.

He goes, "That's the way I think your alcoholism was. I I I think you were smoldering and when you started drinking alcohol, all of a sudden the flames went up and they burnt you and they burnt people around you and there was a lot of damage. There's no question about that.

But I want you to know that you're making a serious effort right now to change. You're making a serious effort to move away from the type of person you were and take responsibility for a lot of this stuff. Then he said, "Lighten up on yourself a little bit." And that was my very first experience with a fist.

And I I went to that park with my head held low. And on the way home, something had changed. Something had changed.

And you know, I had a feeling that maybe maybe I'm going to be okay. And and it was it was a wonderful feeling. I then get involved with people who um who really had some deep working experience with the text Alcoholics Anonymous.

I got inspired through recordings at first and I got to meet some really serious people. Uh and and the next inventory I did, I could honestly say it was a big book inventory. It was it was a list of resentments with the columns.

It wasn't life storyesque. And I started to learn uh I started to learn some things about myself. Now the confessional life story I already knew all this stuff.

There was no discovering deep chunks of truth about myself in that exercise. There was spiritual virtue and a real benefit in doing that type of uh that type of thing with my sponsor. But it was nothing like my experience when I started to do the inventory the way it's laid out in the book Alcoholics Anonymous.

And I remember, you know, I was I was inspired by uh I was inspired by by some by tapes and and and some people and and I went back to to my sponsor with with my inventories and he he wanted to know what they were. He'd been doing fisteps with people forever and he's like, "What are all those columns? you know what what is this?

And uh and I said, you know, I said, 'Look, you know, this is the way I I I I I had some instruction and this is the the way I did it, and I'd appreciate it if you'd uh if you'd just bear with me. And and we did it. We did that uh that inventory.

And I read all of everything that I wrote. Everything that I wrote, I read. And it was tr it really was transformational.

Some of the promises after step four are really impactful and step five are really impactful. Um and you know I can honestly say that uh I believe my spiritual awakening started right right you know 3 4 and five was the beginning of of a huge spiritual change in me and again all this stuff is remarkable to me that that that they came up with this inventory that Bill came up with this inventory laying in bed or you know whatever the story was and and the economy of it. You know, I'm tell I'm telling you, I've known people that have been in therapy for long long long periods of time, and when they did a big book inventory, they said, "I I've never seen this stuff.

I never understood this. You know, I I never I never had, you know, this is amazing." And so, so it's it's really remarkable just how just how powerful and just how effective these inventories are. And when we read them, for me, it was the first time I was really being transparent and honest with another person.

I h I had no facade, you know, going into those fists. I wasn't trying to make you like me. I you know I wasn't I wasn't trying to to to say it a way that would you know keep you from from thinking I was small.

I mean I you know I I read it the way it was written and that was the way uh these workshops described uh the process and I did it that way and I got to tell you the people in the rooms the people that I was fellowshipping at that time saw an enormous change probably more than I did. Right after that, I started sponsoring a ton of people, the craziest lunatics you've ever seen in in in in your life. And you know, the because there was an apparent change in the way I was sharing the the things I was discussing and how I was expressing my my experience in these in these meetings.

And and it was it it really was huge. Um, the alcoholic leads a double life. You know, that's an understatement.

We We lead multiple double lives. Uh, I'm I'm trying to be this with you and this with you and and and there was something I was very uncomfortable with was being myself because I didn't really think much of myself. I mean I believe me I was toxically selfish but I didn't have a high opinion of of of myself.

So so I thought it better to you know create a a facade. So all that stuff started breaking down around this time and I started to become Chris and and you know I look back I've probably done a dozen four and fives over the years. Uh there was a period of time I did I did it every year.

Then there was a period of time it stretched out to about four. I think the last time I did a full-blown uh series through the steps was about 3 years ago. And and uh you know I know what I know what the warning signs are when I need to revisit this stuff when I haven't when 10 and 11 hasn't been doing the the whole job.

I be I start to become cranky critical. I start to uh uh judgmental. You know, those are all those are all warning signs that I need to dig back into uh dig back into this inventory work and and go over it again.

But I've had amazing experiences with with these fists. I I want to share for a minute and then I'll turn it back to Steve. I want to share on my experience hearing fifth steps.

I've heard several hundred at the very least. And I want to tell all of you, we're all the same. You know what I mean?

Like, yeah, there's differences in these inventories. There's different things that we did. There's different ways that we've seen things.

But as a as a category, we alcoholics are pretty predictable. You're going to do a fistep with me, there ain't going to be any surprises for me in that fist. You you know what I mean?

You may you may think there will be, but but but I've pretty much heard it all. I a couple of psychopaths did did a fistep with me, like real serious, you know, criminal deviants, and those were disturbing fists to hear, but you know, the traditional the traditional uh Alcoholics Anonymous fistep is, I like you more after you've shared your fifth step than I did before you shared it. you know, e every time because what we're doing is we're we're exposing how we fell short.

And we all fall short every day. We fall short. And I would much rather be around somebody that can be honest and transparent about their falling short than somebody who's just going to bulldoze past that and and go on to make the next mistake.

You you know what I mean? So, so that so that that's that's been my experience with uh with fistps. Um the thing that I've done probably more in the last 10 years is because I believe there's an economy with all this stuff.

I'm not okay with you showing up to my house with 700 pages. Okay? it.

There's no way to to do 700 pages if you follow these instructions. There's an economy to these to these instructions. So, and another thing that I do is that we sometimes we have a tendency when we're reading a fistep to give you the story first, read the thing in the fistep, and then tell you a little bit more about that situation.

And a lot of times that comes from ego. that doesn't really come from spirit. And and I'll try to cut that short because I think there's impact in in sharing it the way it's written.

You know, is is is it appropriate to let somebody have a long talk in in many cases? Abs. Absolutely.

Absolutely. But there's also an impact in in hammering what's being written in the fistep over and over again. I was selfish.

I was dishonest. I was selfseeking. I was frightened.

I was selfish. I was dishonest. I was self-seeking.

I was frightened. I was I I was selfish. I was frightened.

I was dishonest. Over and over again, there's an impact in sharing that with another person that I think is is transformational. You know, all these steps are spiritual in nature and all these steps prepare us for the next ones.

And uh and if we're honest and we're thorough and we're and we're diligent about this work, I you know, I've just I've just seen such change in myself and I've seen such change in people I've worked with with this with this process, you know, and uh I'm going to pass it over to you, Steve. Thanks, Chris. You know, I'm I'm comforted always when someone I respect uh uh shares my views.

You know, it gives me and and Chris just talked about things that uh uh that I really uh believe in strongly. And some of it has been uh uh has evolved over time, uh which I'll get to in just a second. And I'm just going to talk for about 5 minutes on this and give it back to Chris to lead us into step six and seven because you covered it.

So, well, but it uh uh you know, I was in a meeting and it was a uh a fourth and fifth step meeting and and usually, you know, when you go to a fourth and fifth step workshop, let's say, let's say it's an hour long, you usually get 55 minutes of fourth step and then and then 5 minutes of fifth step. We we give it short shrift a lot of the time, yet it's such a critical thing. You know, the book says that we must be entirely honest with somebody if we are to live long and happily.

I mean, that's all that's at stake. If you want a long happy life, this is probably going to be a requirement. And uh uh you know, my sponsor Frank, he he said, "Steve, somebody needs to know everything about you, but not everybody needs to know everything about you." And you know, so there are things that that are best kept uh not secret, but but private.

And I now as I've been sober longer and and have confidants, uh I mean I overshared in the last session, right? I'll talk about just about anything, right? But to to put stuff on the table in a way that's useful and helpful, but I went through a period where I talked more during your fifth step than you did.

And man, and and and uh and I realized I you know, it didn't take me but about 10 years to realize I was doing it. Uh but I realized how how egoic that was and how self-centered that was that it wasn't my intention but it but I you know now I really want to honor what someone has done and let and you have done that work and and the book says you know I want to read these last couple of paragraphs because these are this is not about the fifth step this is about the fourth step and it says if we've been thorough you know we've written down a lot we've listed and analyed ized our resentments. We've begun to comprehend their futility and fatality.

We've commenced to see their terrible destructiveness. We've begun to learn tolerance, patience, and goodwill toward all men, even our enemies. We've listed people we've hurt by our conduct and are willing to straighten it out.

If if you have already made a decision in an inventory, your grosser handicaps, you've made a good beginning. That being so, you will have swallowed and digested some big chunks of truth about yourself. That's how I show up at the fifth step.

In theory, in theory, I have begun to see the futility and fatality of life if I'm living. I have got that list of people. I have arrived at some level of willingness to try to make right what I can.

And I have swallowed and digested some big chunks of truth about myself. I keep trying to tell people what they swallowed and digested when they're doing their fifth step. Right?

I was interrupting that process. And now what I want to hear, the humility of the fifth step is for me to come tell you what I discovered about me, man. Yet this is me.

And there certainly are things that we might uh weigh in and comment about in an effort to try to be helpful, but not hijack that process by turning myself into a uh junior psychiatrist, you know. And uh my go my my job is not to show up with all the answers. I'm just another AA guy tripping down the road making the same mistakes and I'll put undue pressure on myself to solve your problem and if I don't have an answer for it, I'll make something up.

And I just want to, you know, I I've just over the last few years really been able to back off that a little bit and just honor what somebody's done. I'm sitting in a meeting having that fourth and fifth step uh uh meeting and and a a a newer guy working on his fourth step being as honest and earnest as he could be said, I don't know why this is necessary. Talking about the fifth step, he he said, "I've got this.

I know more about me than anybody." And I realize I should as I'm sitting there, I think to myself, I know more about me than anybody, but I often misinterpret the information. And so and and when I'm say it out loud to somebody else, it tends to I tend to have a different experience than when I'm having the conversation in my head. And it often comes out differently than I was thinking it when I begin to share it with somebody.

So it it's just been critical. And it says we pocket our pride illuminating every nook and cranny. My pride will keep me.

You know, I can come to something like this or any of us. You know, I can share so much with you guys that you will think, man, I can't believe Steve is willing to talk about that. And then I might have that thing tucked around in back that I didn't put on the table.

You don't know that I have I have, you know, hidden I' I've kept my secret safe by appearing to be open and honest and I and and what I have said has been has been accurate. But the thing that will get me is what I keep behind the curtain. The secret.

And the secret in my experience is more dangerous than the than the information I'm keeping secret. It's the fact that I have a secret that tends to block me off. From 15 years sober to 18 years sober, I had a secret.

And uh uh I I had something I didn't tell anybody else. And what began to happen to me was I began to feel separate from you and separate from God. I'd be sitting a meeting and a topic would come up and I'd realize I uh I either can't share on it or I've got to make something up.

I got to be a hypocrite. And I usually chose hypocrite by the way as uh but it was Whoa. That's Melissa calling me if you're if you're curious.

And uh uh you know it's it's just um this this being totally honest with somebody has just been critically important to me. And uh and and like Chris said, I come out of that, my experience has been is that when I when I open myself up, when I, you know, bear myself and bear my soul to you, that we leave that exchange closer rather than that thing I think is going to to come between us. It becomes the human and the spiritual connection.

And it says in those promises that that Chris uh uh uh referenced, it says that that we uh we begin to feel the nearness of our creator. We're beginning to get that God consciousness because that thing between you and me and me and God again is usually those things that I'm h keeping too closely held. And uh so I just want to honor that uh uh that that fifth step and that that sharing you know one one with another.

And when I'm on the receiving end of that I want to honor that by by being what it says understanding closed mouthed person. The most important two most important things for me to do in in when you come to me with with a fourth step to share your fifth step is to listen and keep a confidence. Anything else is a bonus, but listen and keep a confidence and allow you to move on with the with what you what you have discovered with those big chunks of truth about yourself that we take into steps six and seven.

So take us there, Chris. Thank you, Steve. Okay.

So, moving moving into step six, there's there's one final exercise that can be uh that can be described as, you know, finishing up the fifth step. And, you know, I miss this for a number of number of runs through the steps, but I I've I've come to I've come to understand kind of its importance because because I'm being asked to be contemplative. being asked to do meditation and prayer on a daily basis to really try to seek intuitively seek within some of these answers.

And and this returning home, this returning to home exercise, I'm going to read it. Um returning home, we find a place where we can be uh quiet for an hour reviewing what we have done. We thank God from the bottom of our hearts that we know him better.

So this this fifth step really is bringing us closer to God. Taking this book down from the shelf, we turn to the page which contains the 12 steps. Carefully reading the first five proposals, we ask if we've omitted anything, for we're building an arch through which we shall walk free at last.

Is our work solid so far? Are the stones properly in place? Ha.

Have Have we skipped anything? Have we dodged and and weaved anything? So, so I I'm supposed to do a review, just a contemplative review of the first five steps so that I'm confident I haven't left anything out as I move into step six.

You know, have I fully conceded to my innermost self that I'm an alcoholic? Am I willing to believe uh uh or do I believe that there's a power that I can gain access to that's that's going that's that's going to solve my problem? Uh have I made a decision to really really go all the way in with this this Alcoholics Anonymous 12step process?

Have I made a decision that this is really the right thing for me in in my life? And have I been honest? Have I left anything out of my Fora?

Did I leave out Tallahassee 1978, you know, in a blackout? Did I Did I, you know, did I leave that out? Because the thorowness is really, really important.

Uh, like Steve was saying, if there's something we're holding in the background, that can be corrosive to our spiritual condition as we move through the rest of these steps, it it can screw everything up. So, so being able to after this returning home, being able to say to myself, I did the I did the best job with the set of tools I had at the time. You know, I I've I've not uh overtly left anything any stone unturned.

uh and and and and if something comes to me uh you know something I'll immediately take care of that uh with with my sponsor being having that attitude um we then look at step six if we can answer to our satisfaction answer what the the questions in returning home we then look at step six We've emphasized willingness as being indispensable. Are we now ready to let God rem remove from us all the things that we have admitted are objectionable? Can he now take them all?

Everyone. If we still cling to something, we will not let go. We ask God to help us be willing.

So, so my, you know, my ex, my experience with step six is like this. my character defects. When I walked into Alcoholics Anonymous, you you you could see my my faults, my character defects.

Picture an iceberg. Okay, a certain percentage of the iceberg is sticking above water. There was stuff that was was visible to me.

It was visible to you. It was it was cutting me off from relationships. you know, I saw that stuff.

But over the course of time, what's happened is I've been able to look below the horizon a little bit. I've been able to the manifestations of self. I started to be able to recognize ones that weren't overt.

They didn't they didn't impact my relationship with you. They were they were deeper. They were deeper and they were below the surface.

So, I think two things are are really true. I think that you can do step six and then step seven very very quickly. And I also think they're a lifetime job.

And and those and those two things don't sound compatible together, right? But but the attitude I bring the attitude I bring to this do do I want to change? Do I want to get better?

do. It's easy to say I want the defects of character that I find objectionable removed and I I'm going to always say yes to that. But sometimes sometimes sometimes there's there's deeper there's deeper stuff.

So another thing that um should be emphasized is there's prayers all throughout this book and the first time first couple of times through the steps I don't remember saying those prayers but almost each action step has a has a prayer you know there's the sick man prayer there of there's the obvious third step prayer uh but here's a here's a sixstep prayer you know God you know God uh ple you or sevenst step prayer. God, please please take these these defects of character away. And there's even a prayer in step six.

If I'm unwilling to let God remove these defects of of character, there's an there's there's still a path forward and that path forward is to pray for pray for pray for willingness. You know, it's not unusual. I heard a a a good friend of ours out in Aspen uh shared this one time and he was talking with his sponsor and you know he he he was he was holding on to some things you know like that he wasn't really willing and ready to to to let go of and in the conversation it came out that family work and and sex life all right were were things that you you know, he didn't really feel comfortable completely turning over.

And then he looked at his inventory and the inventory was all family, work, and sex conduct. So, it's it's almost like the more fouled up something is, the more we've got fingernails into it, we're going to we're going to hold on and fix it. And this is really a remark.

These two steps almost look irresponsible to me when I first looked at them. Now, let's jump to uh step seven. When ready, we say something like this.

My creator, I'm now willing that you should have all of me, good and bad. I pray that you now remove from me every single defect of character which stands in the way of my useless to you and my fellows. Grant me strength as I go out from here to do your bidding.

Amen. We've all said that prayer in meetings, you know, till the cows come home. Then it says, "We have completed step seven." That almost seems irresponsible to me.

We've completed step seven. But when I think about it, when I think about it, there's no way to get rid of self without God's help, right? There just seems to be no way to get rid of this selfishness and this self-centerness without God's help.

We must have God's help. And the whole program is about gaining access to God's help. So maybe they mean what they say here.

We've completed step seven, you know, end of end of sentence. And that doesn't mean I need I I I need I don't need to stay aware of these things. and continue to do inventory with step 10 and continue uh to practice these principles in every way they're available and appropriate for me to do so.

But I think I think my job is the willingness and the attitude. I don't think I have the power to remove these defects of character. They're my default settings.

uh they're they're they're core pieces of self and to try to apply self on core pieces of self to to rid the self somehow just doesn't make any sense to me today. So I believe I must have God's help. Now it look this almost looked irresponsible to me, you know, God take him, you know.

But we're asked to move on to another step after this. We're asked to move on to another step after this. That plays a all this stuff plays a role.

All these steps are uh as Steve said interconnected, intertwined uh with each other and they create this awakening in us, a change in personality. um a a a shift in perception that happens when we've gone through these steps that leads to really really solid recovery. So, you know, I I touched briefly on those two steps.

Uh Steve, what do you have on six and seven for us? >> Well, I I don't have much. They're not really very important.

And uh uh I try to focus on the important steps, but uh uh you know the truth is we do we kind of do a drive bond six and seven because uh initially and and I I think like Chris said that the you know the directions are as simple and straightforward as the two paragraphs that are there, but the spiritual depth and surrender of what I'm committing to in those two paragraphs house. You know, Steve Martin used to have a a comedy routine and it was called uh uh how to be a millionaire. He said, "Okay, first you get a million dollars, right?" And that's what and and yeah, but Steve, how did how did you get the million?

And that's what here. So, I'm going to I think that that this is as simple kind of as that, but but there's so much to it and and it is really kind of doubling down on the unmanageability talked about in the first step. You know, it could be I'm powerless over alcohol and uh my defects of character are unmanageable.

We say in, you know, uh, with regard to alcohol, the book says that that the great obsession of every abnormal drinker is that one day he'll control and enjoy his drinking. And I would say often unconsciously because I'm spiritually asleep that that my great obsession is that one day I'll control and enjoy my defects of character. Just like alcohol where I wanted to do just enough to get from from alcohol what I want but not suffer the pains of it.

I want to indulge be selfindulgent around some defects of character in a way to serve my purpose but not you know and and and what but I am I I I'm powerless over that. I don't have the necessary power to to manage the defect. So I am when I arrive here, you know, six and seven are kind of the now what steps, you know, I've done that inventory.

I've done that self-examination. I have arrived at six and seven with more information about me than I've ever had. And the question becomes now what?

Now that you have discovered these things about you, are you really willing to change? And kind of like we I was kidding earlier. I'm willing to change, but I want to dictate what the change looks like.

I want to I you know, my sponsor Don kids about that that that he got here and and and he misund now that I'm here. How would I, you know, and it's interesting to me. This is another one of the big bait and switch moments in Alcoholics Anonymous.

So, be careful again if you're new because in the sixth step as uh as Chris read it, it says that we emphasize willingness as being indispensable. We're now ready to let God remove from us all things which we have admitted are objectionable. And that's kind of like, you know, that's kind of like me playing God again, right?

Here's a list of defects and I'm ready that you should take these. I got four over here that I've decided I'd really like you, you know, I want to keep playing over here with these. When I get to the seventh step, it says that uh uh I'm ready now that you should have all of me, good and bad, which implies number one that I don't know which is which.

I don't get to be in charge of that. I'm putting all the chips on the table. you know, when you when you uh uh I was going to use I used to have an analogy of a yard sale, but now it's on uh uh you know, you're you're doing it on eBay or or uh Etsy or whatever.

But when my wife and I moved 7 years ago from our from a home, a 2600 ft home to a,70 square ft condominium. We were downsizing, right? And that's what we're doing here.

I'm downsizing. And when we're downsizing, we went through that house and we identified those things we were willing to get rid of. In fact, some things were old and in the way and no longer useful.

Uh uh and we want to be rid of this and maybe even make room for some new stuff that might be better. And so using the yard sale analogy, I'm taking all of this stuff out of the house. We put it out in the yard for them to come by on Saturday morning.

everything I've decided we're willing to be rid of. But when they come over for the yard sale and they're picking around through my stuff, I've then got to say, "You know what? Go on in the house.

Take anything in there you need, you know, and I'm really fond of that recliner in the big screen, you know, but take anything you need that's going to make me that stand in the way of my usefulness to you and my fellows." And man, that's another one of those do with me as you will moments in AA. That's a double down on that third step prayer. Oh, here I am.

Take, you know, you go to a restaurant and say, "Bring me what you think I'd like." You ever go I I used to get a haircut. Now I But when you go get your hair done, you tell them what you want it to look like when you leave. You don't say, "Hey, do with me as you will." No.

Cuz that's too important to me. And and and when I do that, when I spiritually say, "Do with me as you will," there's a fear of what am I going to look like when you're done? What are you going to leave me with?

Will I be able to operate? I'm not used to operating without. I got some tools here that they're they're troublesome and and but but but I'm familiar with them.

So that level of surrender that says really do with me as you will. And it says, you know, in the 12 and 12, it talks about the fact since God, you know, what that's where it says, and I I won't say it's misqued, but but I think misapplied sometimes that says the only step that we work 100% is the first step. Well, really, it's the first half of the first step.

The only thing I can measure in Alcoholics Anonymous is when I had my last drink. I can quantify that. That's a physical, you know, space of time between June the 29th is the last time I had a drink in today.

But my spiritual condition is all over the board at any given time. And so when I when I arrive here, it says that God has given me this 100% freedom from alcohol so far. And why it says why can't he do that on these other things?

And and part of and and it says it's the riddle of our existence. But one of the reasons it says is because that I have to be I was beat into this state of of of submission with alcohol where I was willing to give it up 100%. But everything else that we've got is a God-given instinct that's outgrown its usefulness.

It says the measure of my of my uh defects of character are the difference between God's intended use and my misuse of these God-given instincts. So there can't be a 100%, you know, all of these all of this desire for sex, society, and security which are God-given. I'm always going to be somewhere on the dial and I'm just trying to do, you know, hoping that I'm growing, continuing to grow along spiritual lines where I'm a little more toward God's intended use more often than not.

And the willingness that, you know, it says in here, it says in the third step that willingness is the key. It says here that uh that I've got to find the willingness. And again, you know, I told you I was 18 years sober before I looked up dilemma.

Well, that same, you know, since long as I had that dictionary out, I looked up willingness as well. And one of the descriptions of willingness was doing that which I would not do as a matter of course. Now, that makes perfect sense to me.

There is not a thing AA has asked me to do that I was just about to do before I got here. There's everything in those 12 steps is counterintuitive to the character that I showed up with cuz I showed up at Alcoholics Anonymous with a defective character. I know my character is defective because it creates defects of character and that means that I was living life and and life was being run through the prism of a character that's defective and it is producing these defects that we found in in the fourth and fifth step.

And for me, I have to be careful again not to confuse the behavior for the defect. The behavior is the outward external evidence of the defect, but the defect is internal. And uh uh you know, and and and how do I you know, it says that God won't render us white as snow without my cooperation.

So, I got to cooperate. God's got the power, but I got to cooperate. And you guys been telling me that since I got to AA, you've been saying that we act our way into right thinking.

We don't think our way into right acting. And let's say I go to the supermarket when I'm brand new in AA and and uh you know, there he or she is in that express lane with too many items. And I know they're too many items because I have counted them.

and uh uh and I got no choice but to snatch him or her up and and and make a scene and send them over into the right right aisle. And you guys say, "Steve, that's just you you you know, that's bad behavior, man. That's just not the way we want to act here." So next time I'm there and there he or she is again and they still got too many items cuz I'm still counting them.

And by the way, I count a six-pack as six items. Oh, you know, and and this time I don't say a word. I stand there in line.

I don't say a word, but I'm about to implode from not saying a word. Right? I'm biting my lip.

There's blood trickling down, but I don't say a thing. Now, I'm not free of that defect of character, but I'm not causing any collateral damage with that. I'm not acting on that defect.

That in itself is an act of humility. to act different than I feel is an act of humility. And humility and character building are the two key things about step seven that the 12 and 12 talks about.

And uh uh and if I do that often enough, if I go to the store and I stand in that line and don't respond to the person with too many items, one day I will find myself there and not even count the items. And if that ever happens, I'll report back to you. But uh uh uh but you know, it is it is so so that's how I participate in this.

I have to realize again and it's it's the common theme that my problems are all internal and and my that that defective character that produces these defects is treated by is treated spiritually by these 12 steps. these steps that are spiritual in their nature that Chris read earlier this weekend that if practice as a way of life will give me that 100% sobriety expel the obsession to drink but leave me happily and usefully whole. Not grudgingly whole.

Not the guy in line that's still counting the items and and feeling but happily and usefully whole. And you know it's it's uh it's again those demands you know 6 and 7 and 12 and 127 is where it talks about the fact that my demands that's where it says we all know the difference in a simple request and a demand. And I I'll tell you a story.

Uh when I was I went to to Toronto to a a weekend retreat not unlike this, right? And I'm sitting up here uh uh with a friend of mine, Mary Jane Roy. You might know Mary Jane, but anyway, uh we're doing the deal and we break for lunch just like we did here today.

And and we're at we were out at a restaurant and and I'm sitting at a table with about eight people, a round table with eight people and they came and they took our order and I ordered a cheeseburger and the guy next to me I noticed, ordered a club sandwich and then they went around and took everybody's order. Right. And uh uh and a little while later they brought our food out and they gave me a cheeseburger and they gave the guy next to me a cheeseburger and I see him start eating this cheeseburger.

This is your zen moment for the weekend if you've been waiting on it. Uh they give this guy this cheeseburger and I said, "Hey man, I thought you ordered a club sandwich. This is unbelievable." Listen to what he said.

He said, 'I did, but they brought me a cheeseburger. That's it. I said, "Brother, you don't have to live like that." And I'm serious.

I said, "We can get you a club sandwich." And I'm standing up calling the, you know, the people over and he's going, "Steve, no, I'm good, man." And understand, he just wasn't eating the damned do cheeseburger cuz that's what life had served him. He was fine with the cheeseburger. Now, he had every right, if he had wanted to, to say, "You know what?

I ordered a club sandwich. Would you guys mind getting me in?" They would have gotten in the club sandwich and, you know, 10, 15 minutes, he would have gotten that. That would have been perfectly okay.

But wasn't his life better in that moment because he was okay with the cheeseburger? And see, I will tell you, metaphorically speaking, I go through life ordering a club sandwich and getting a cheeseburger, and it ain't okay. In fact, I go through life waiting on you to get my order right, and I don't even know I've placed an order.

I go through life with that disappointment, that defective character is seeing what's missing all the time. And it says living a life of unmet demands will leave me in a state of continual disturbance and I don't want to be continually disturbed when that character we are. This is that this character development is that psychic change is that internal change that we've been talking about because the the answer is always inside.

It's my last story before I'm done for this afternoon, but there's a a Sufi story and with my accent, I've never felt right telling a Sufi story, so I've changed it to Tennessee Redneck. And uh so you got an old boy outside uh uh uh just outside is his front door looking in the grass for the keys to his pickup truck. He's lost the keys to his pickup truck and he's crawling around looking for them.

And couple of guys drive by, a couple of buddies of his, and they see him and they ask him what he's doing. And he says, "I've lost the keys to my pickup truck." And as good friends are want to do, they get out and help him look for the keys. And they're crawling around looking.

And pretty soon, some other boys drive by. And before you know it, you got eight or 10 people crawling around on their hands and knees, painstakingly looking through every blade of grass for the keys to this pickup truck. And finally, one of them asked.

So he said, "Where were you when you lost the keys?" And he said, "I was inside." >> They said, "What are we doing out here?" He said, "Well, the light's so much better out here." And see, I'm always looking out here. And I will tell my story to you so convincingly that you will help me look, but the the keys are inside. His keys were inside the house, but he's out here.

The keys to that to that defective character to this life that is not uh uh uh in a state of continual disturbance is internal and I still get caught up thinking that it's out here and that is the way I view things through a character that is defective. My view of life is through that character through the prism of my alcoholism through the prism of that self-centeredness. And I get here to six and seven.

I bring this package to this thing what I've learned about me so far cuz I continue to learn. But then I go, "Yeah, man. God, I'm ready.

Take it. I don't know what it's going to look like. I don't know what you got for me.

I don't know. I don't know how you want to use me." You know, it's like saying, you know, as as Chris said earlier where we talk about we're like actors in a play and I want to direct the play, but but but I'm not the director, I'm the actor. Says we are in the world to play the role he assigns.

So what sometimes my morning prayers, okay, what what's my role today and how would you have me play it? But I keep casting myself in the role of action hero being in charge. And sometimes I'm just supposed to be, you know, policeman number three walking down the sidewalk, not even a speaking part.

What's the role you would have me play? And give up assigning myself. And that's what my defects of character do.

They are me assigning myself these various roles and how I'm going to work out into the world today. So that's all I got. That that's great.

The lights the light's better out here. I love I love that story. So two stories and then I you know I'm I'm done for the afternoon.

Um what one of them one of them has to do with you know when Steve was talking Yeah. I was I was realizing that so much of this is about quelling the disturbance, the inner disturbance. We're learning how not to fight in certain areas in these steps.

They're teaching us about learning how to fight. And one of the promises in the 10th step is we stopped fighting alcohol or anything else. So So I had a I had a favorite t TV show in the in the late 1960s.

There's might be people old enough to remember this. You remember the show Kung Fu? You know, David Keran, what the what the story was about was he was a Shaolin priest who had to like split his country and he was hiding out in the Old West back in the like 1800s or something something.

He'd given all these all these adventures, but he was he was a kung fu master Shaolin priest. So, he was like really really mellow and zen-like, but he could also kick your ass. And that there was something very cool about that.

And and I love this show and and I it was one of the shows that just stayed in my memory o over the decades. And about 10 years ago, it came out on DVD and I said I said, you know, I'm going to I'm going to get this. So, I got all three seasons on DVD and I watched the show watch the show again and there was this one episode.

So, Kane is is sitting around a campfire with a couple of friends that he's just started traveling with. He's sitting around a campfire and talking at night and all of a sudden these robbers come up and these robbers come up and they got their pistols out and and they hold these guys up and they and they search these guys and they they take they take whatever they want from the his two buddies and they search him and he's got like he's he's got like a pouch of herbs or something and they get get disgusted and then they they they disappear. They're gone.

Now, the two guys know about Cain and his abilities, right? And and they say, "Why, you know, why didn't you do something? You could have taken taken those guys out." >> And he said this, "I had nothing to defend." And it was like, it was like an acid moment for me revisiting this and watching it.

My whole life I've been I've been defending things that weren't worth defending. My whole life I'd get in an argument with you about anything. I'd be defending a a turd.

You know what I mean? Like it's, you know, it's it stinks and and it everybody hates it, but it but it's my turd, you know? And and I'm going to, you know, and I'm def I'm defending this stuff.

And and so these what these steps do is is they they get us ready to you know stop stop fighting. Now the next story I want to tell you'll lead into steps 8 8 and N. Um Steve said uh a great quote from the 12 and 12.

God will not render us white as snow without our cooperation. So you know how then shall I cooperate with the removal of my character defects? Certainly, we say the prayer and we're willing and and we follow those instructions, but there's there's got to be a continuence of an attitude.

Uh I'll tell you this one story. I was sponsoring this guy uh and you know, he he was he was rough. I lived in this town called Basking Ridge and it was a bedroom community with professionals and there was really not a lot of crime except for me and John and and and literally literally what would what would if somebody was walking their dog without a leash, you know, it would make the newspaper.

It was one of those places, right? And this guy this guy moves in and shows up in our AA meetings and and it's about 6 months before he could even talk. He he just he just could he was so smashed up.

Come I ended up sponsoring him of course. Uh but but but he was so smashed up he he was on pounds of percoetses and alcohol for like a long period of time. He got detox and they told him to go to AA and and and he was in AA and I started working with him and he had uh he had the willingness he he the willingness that's born of desperation.

He was desperate. He knew he was going to die. Uh and so he became willing to to follow uh follow our lead and to follow my suggestions as a sponsor.

And one day, you know, one day we're we're leaving a we're leaving a convenience store and we're heading to a meeting. And we we both got coffees at the convenience store cuz we knew who the coffee maker was at that meeting. And so so and as we're walking out of this convenience store, I see him do this.

He just really really quicks grabs a pack of cigarettes as as we're going through the door and puts it in his pocket and we're out. And I'm like, "Whoa, wait a minute. Did you just steal a pack of cigarettes?" And he goes, "No." I go, "Let me rephrase that.

Did you grab a pack of cigarettes as we were leaving the store and not pay for them?" Yeah. I go, "Oh, that's stealing." He goes, "No, they were on the rack in front." What does that mean? He goes, "You're a chump if you don't take those." They budget for that.

You know, he he'd been doing this his whole life. He came from the city. And so so you know, all right, sponsor summit.

Time for a sponsor summit. Uh you know, we need to talk about this. We had a we had a talk about it and uh and he became willing to put envelopes together and to put money in envelopes and to go back to 20ome convenience stores that he's been doing that he's been doing that too since he was a kid.

And he actually went back out and he started handing these envelopes and saying I'm alcoholic. I can try to straighten out my life. sold.

Here's some money. And uh and he did that with like like 25 convenience stores. And I just want to ask you a question.

Do you think he still steals cigarettes? >> You know, each of these steps just just roll into the next one in such a logical sequence. I think the best possible atmosphere to be in for the removal of character defects is to become willing to make amends to the people and institutions those defects of character have harmed and to actually go make amends to the people in those institutions that those character defects have harmed.

And uh and with that I I don't have anything you Okay, we're uh uh we're back. We're over at uh Mal We'll let Malcolm tell us what we're doing now. Thank you for listening to Sober Sunrise.

If you enjoyed today's episode, please give it a thumbs up as it will help share the message. Until next time, have a great day.